Alessandra Capezio

Women in the boardroom and fraud: Evidence from Australia

We examine the relationship between women’s representation on corporate boards and fraud. Drawing on a discussion of existing studies, we hypothesise that increasing women’s representation on boards can help mitigate fraud. We provide validation to our conjecture through an empirical analysis of 128 publicly listed companies in Australia. We show that the increase in women’s representation on company boards is associated with a decreased probability of fraud. We demonstrate the consistency of this result across different robustness checks. We believe that our findings could be of interest to policy makers interested in enhancing board governance and monitoring.

Investigating Employee Turnover in the Construction Industry: A Psychological Contract Perspective

AbstractEmployee turnover has long been, and will continue to be, a significant concern in the construction industry. Organizations that can retain skilled employees have a stronger competitive advantage. In two independent studies in China and the Philippines, the authors investigated the role of psychological contract breach in predicting employee turnover in the construction industry. The results reveal that psychological contract breach results in emotional exhaustion, which in turn predicts employees’ turnover intentions (Study 1) and actual turnover (Study 2). The results further suggest that younger as opposed to older construction workers who experience psychological contract breach are more likely to experience greater levels of emotional exhaustion and exit their organizations. Accordingly, to retain skilled workers, construction organizations should understand and continuously manage employees’ psychological contract expectations and provide more support to younger workers. This paper offers si...

Play at Work: An Integrative Review and Agenda for Future Research:

Play has gained increasing interest among progressive-minded managers as an important driver of motivation and productivity in work contexts. Despite its popularity in contemporary organizations, there is little consensus in the academic literature about the role of play in the workplace. This review organizes and synthesizes the current state of knowledge of play at work in order to gain a more comprehensive understanding of what play at work is, when individuals engage in play at work, and the effects of workplace play on work outcomes. First, we review existing definitions of play and their limitations. We then introduce a recent conceptualization of play in adulthood that defines play based on three core features and discuss its relevance in the workplace. Second, we review theoretical perspectives on play and extant empirical research on the antecedents and consequences of play at work, organizing it according to three levels of analysis. Third, we propose a promising agenda for future research by focusing on a number of important issues that have emerged from our review of existing work. These issues are organized into two sections: refining and extending the current research on play, and generating novel ideas and new research directions on unexplored areas of inquiry. We believe this review makes important and timely contributions to the research on play at work by providing comprehensive analysis of the diverse and fragmented literature on play in the workplace.

In Pursuit of Success The Differential Moderating Effects of Political Skill on the Relationships Among Career-Related Psychological Needs and Ingratiation

Ingratiation is one of the most commonly studied social influence tactics that is used by employees to advance their career goals. Research examining predictors of ingratiation has rather shown inconsistent findings. To address these inconsistencies, this study drew on social cognitive theory to investigate the role of political skill as a moderator in the associations between two career-related psychological needs (i.e., need for achievement and need for power) and ingratiation. We tested these associations using independent 150 matched employee–peer dyads from Thailand. Results revealed that self-reported political skill exerted differential moderating effects on the associations among the two career-related psychological needs and peer-rated ingratiation. Whereas the association between need for achievement and ingratiation was positive under high levels of political skill, the association between need for power and ingratiation was positive under low levels of political skill.

The effects of Machiavellian leaders on employees' use of upward influence tactics: an examination of the moderating roles of gender and perceived leader similarity

Machiavellian leaders have a strong propensity to advance their personal interests, which may unknowingly precipitate their employees to behave in a similar manner through the exercise of upward influence tactics as a representative of political behaviors. Machiavellian leaders can be broadly described as displaying strategic and self-serving, misanthropic and agentic orientations. Thus employees may find it hard to work with such leaders and, subsequently, recognize the relevance of exercising social influence in order to facilitate their supervisory relationships. Accordingly this chapter examines the effects of a leader’s degree of Machiavellianism on employees’ use of upward influence tactics, and further examines how the moderating roles of the gender of the employee and their perceived leader similarity come into play. In so doing, this chapter addresses the dearth of research examining the effects of Machiavellian leaders on employees’ performance of political behaviors. More specifically, it develops a better understanding of how Machiavellians may influence employees’ choices of upward influence tactics, and identifies some relevant conditions that may impact the exercise of social influence.