745 research outputs found
Companies face special challenges when employee departures pick up speed
Firms need to track turnover volatility as much as turnover rates, write Matthew Call, Anthony Nyberg and Rob Ployhar
ILR Impact Brief - Knowledge, Skills, and Performance: Getting the Most From Team Training
Teams are an integral feature of the American workplace; indeed, more than 80% of the Fortune 500 companies make extensive use of work teams. Action teams, pulled together to carry out a particular time-limited function that requires the specialized expertise of its members, are becoming increasingly common. Researchers have noted that the success of these teams is often thwarted by their lack of information about teamwork in general and their insufficient mastery of basic team competencies. Most organizations train team members for the particular job at hand, so the question arises as to the utility of generic team training. In other words, would imparting knowledge and skills that could be applied in, and adapted to, any number of situations improve outcomes, and if so, what is the mechanism that facilitates this result
The Impact of Task- and Team-Generic Teamwork Skills Training on Team Effectiveness
This study examined the effects of training team members in three task- and teamgeneric teamwork skills: planning and task coordination, collaborative problem solving, and communication. We first examined the degree to which task- and team-generic teamwork skills training impacted team performance on a task unrelated to the content of the training program.We then examined whether the effects of task- and team-generic teamwork skills training on team performance were due to the transfer of skills directly related to planning and task coordination, collaborative problem solving, and communication. Results from 65 four-person project teams indicated that task- and team-generic teamwork skills training led to significantly higher levels of team performance. Results also indicated that the effects of task- and teamgeneric teamwork skills training on team performance were mediated by planning and task coordination and collaborative problem solving behavior. Although communication was positively affected by the task- and team-generic teamwork skills training, it did not mediate the relationship between task- and team-generic teamwork skills training and team performance.Theoretical and practical implications of these results are discussed, as well as possible limitations and directions for future research
Changing an Unfavorable Employer Reputation: The Roles of Recruitment Message-Type and Familiarity with Employer
An unfavorable employer reputation can impair an organizationâs ability to recruit job seekers. The present research employed a four-week longitudinal experimental design to investigate whether recruitment messages can positively change an existing unfavorable employer reputation. Two hundred and twenty-two (222) job seekers rated their perceptions of an organization before and after being randomly assigned to receive a series of high- or low-information recruitment messages. As expected, job seekers receiving high-information messages changed their perceptions more than job seekers who were exposed to low-information messages. In addition, job seekersâ initial familiarity with the employer was negatively related to change in their perceptions of employer reputation. Finally, there was some evidence that job seekersâ familiarity with the employer influenced the impact of different recruitment messages. Implications for research and practice are discussed
A survey-based cross-sectional study of doctorsâ expectations and experiences of non-technical skills for out of hours work
Objectives: The skill set required for junior doctors to work efficiently and safely Out of Hours (OoH) in hospitals has not been established. This is despite the OoH period representing 75% of the year and it being the time of highest mortality. We set out to explore the expectations of medical students and experiences of junior doctors of the non-technical skills needed to work OoH.
Design: Survey-based cross-sectional study informed by focus groups.
Setting: Online survey with participants from five large teaching hospitals across the UK.
Participants: 300 Medical Students and Doctors.
Outcome measure: Participants ranked the importance of non-technical skills, as identified by literature review and focus groups, needed for OoH care.
Results: The focus groups revealed a total of eight non-technical skills deemed to be important. In the survey âTask Prioritisationâ (mean rank 1.617) was consistently identified as the most important non-technical skill. Stage of training affected the ranking of skills, with significant differences for âCommunication with Senior Doctorsâ, âDealing with Clinical Isolationâ, âTask Prioritisationâ and âCommunication with Patientsâ. Importantly, there was a significant discrepancy between the medical student expectations and experiences of doctors undertaking work.
Conclusions: Our findings suggest that medical staff particularly value task prioritisation skills; however, these are not routinely taught in medical schools. The discrepancy between expectations of students and experience of doctors reinforces the idea that there is a gap in training. Doctors of different grades place different importance on specific non-technical skills with implications for postgraduate training. There is a pressing need for medical schools and deaneries to review non-technical training to include more than communication skills
How Supervisors Influence Performance: A Multilevel Study of Coaching and Group Management in Technology-Mediated Services
This multilevel study examines the role of supervisors in improving employee performance through the use of coaching and group management practices. It examines the individual and synergistic effects of these management practices. The research subjects are call center agents in highly standardized jobs, and the organizational context is one in which calls, or task assignments, are randomly distributed via automated technology, providing a quasi-experimental approach in a real-world context. Results show that the amount of coaching that an employee received each month predicted objective performance improvements over time. Moreover, workers exhibited higher performance where their supervisor emphasized group assignments and group incentives and where technology was more automated. Finally, the positive relationship between coaching and performance was stronger where supervisors made greater use of group incentives, where technology was less automated, and where technological changes were less frequent. Implications and potential limitations of the present study are discussed
Response to editorial by Bryan and Rafferty
No abstract.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/49325/1/20140_ftp.pd
Work-Unit Absenteeism: Effects of Satisfaction, Commitment, Labor Market Conditions, and Time
Prior research is limited in explaining absenteeism at the unit level and over time. We developed and tested a model of unit-level absenteeism using five waves of data collected over six years from 115 work units in a large state agency. Unit-level job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and local unemployment were modeled as time-varying predictors of absenteeism. Shared satisfaction and commitment interacted in predicting absenteeism but were not related to the rate of change in absenteeism over time. Unit-level satisfaction and commitment were more strongly related to absenteeism when units were located in areas with plentiful job alternatives
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