Catherine Hellemans

Perceptions of corporate social responsibility, organizational commitment and job satisfaction

Purpose – This paper aims to, first, investigate the impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR)’s various dimensions on organizational commitment and job satisfaction, and, second, to examine the moderating role of employee expectations in this relationship. Studies have increasingly focused the attention on the links between perceptions of CSR and employees’ attitudes. However, a majority of studies do concentrate on internal CSR impact. Design/methodology/approach – A field study based on data from 621 workers. The constructs were measured by validated self-report questionnaires. Findings – The results show that ethical and legal internal and external practices significantly influence the affective organizational commitment. The results also indicate that job satisfaction is positively influenced by internal and external ethico-legal practices as well as by philanthropic practices. Nonetheless, the role of expectation as moderator could not be demonstrated. This matter is discussed in the section d...

Risques psychosociaux et capacité de travail des travailleurs âgés : validation du VOW/QFT

Les capacites de travail sont definies comme un equilibre entre les caracteristiques propres au travailleur et les exigences liees au travail. Le VOW/QFT a ete developpe en Belgique afin de saisir la capacite de travail des travailleurs vieillissants en tenant compte des facteurs de risques lies aux conditions de travail, et notamment des facteurs de risques psychosociaux. L’analyse de la validite du VOW/QFT a ete realisee en suivant les propositions du paradigme de Churchill (Churchill, 1979 ; Roussel, 2005) : analyse exploratoire, analyse confirmatoire et analyse correlationnelle. La structure factorielle du questionnaire s’est revelee stable ; la consistance interne des dimensions elevee. Les analyses de regression ont montre que la capacite de travail etait expliquee a pres de 30% par les facteurs de risques psychosociaux, et principalement par le plaisir ressenti au travail

Antecedents of work ability in the cleaning sector. From health, competence and pleasure at work to working conditions.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyze the antecedents of work ability among cleaning workers, especially older cleaning workers. The objective is to understand the physical and psychological working conditions related to low work ability in order to improve those making it difficult to carry out the work. Design/methodology/approach A total of 603 Belgian cleaning workers complete the work ability index and other questionnaires on perceived health, competence, and physical and psychological work conditions. Findings The results confirm that older workers are a risk group in terms of work ability. Beyond the perceived health and skills, the results emphasize the contribution of pleasure at work to understand work ability. Pleasure at work itself is explained by different physical and psychological working conditions among age subgroups. Among workers under 40 years old, work pace and overload are the best predictors of pleasure at work. Among 40-49 years old, use of knowledge and opportunities for training, as well as opportunities for participation, are the best predictors of pleasure; among the oldest workers, however, repetitive movements and social support are the best. Originality/value This paper argues that consideration needs to be given to the fact that different psychological working conditions, especially pleasure at work, are necessary depending on a worker’s age, as well as prevention action for improving work ability.

Evaluation de la capacité de travail des seniors : l’apport des compétences perçues.

Resume Le Work Ability Index (Ilmarinen, Tuomi, & Klockars, 1997; Ilmarinen, 2007) est un outil valide fort utilise dans les recherches epidemiologiques pour mesurer la capacite de travail des seniors. Alors que le WAI est relativement centre sur la sante, le VOW/QFT (Hellemans, 2010, 2011, 2013) vise a elargir la notion de capacite de travail a celles de competences, au-dela de la question des capacites fonctionnelles. Cette contribution vise ainsi a tester les convergences et divergences entre le WAI et les deux indices de capacite de travail du VOW/QFT, ainsi que leurs predicteurs respectifs. Les analyses menees aupres de 254 travailleurs soumis aux visites medicales ont montre notamment que les scores au WAI et a l’evolution des capacites du VOW/QFT sont fort correles de maniere generale et chez les ouvriers, mais pas chez les employes. Les resultats mettent en evidence l’interet de tenir compte des competences percues pour l’evaluation de la capacite de travail chez les employes.

Are employees more mobilized after job mobility

The antecedents of voluntary employee turnover are well studied, but little is known about the consequences or outcomes of this voluntary job mobility. We address this gap through a survey study of 121 banking employees who have changed their employer in the last 3 years. We hypothesized that job change, whether self-initiated or imposed, may improve organizational commitment, work engagement, and well-being. These positive effects are expected when the job change is perceived as professionally and personally beneficial. Regression analyses revealed that employer change that is perceived as successful, whether voluntary or not, predicts an increase in general well-being, work engagement, and, to a lesser extent, affective organizational commitment. These results suggest that employer change may help employees to be more mobilized in their new work. Misconceptions about highly mobile employees and advantages of job change for both employees and organizations are discussed.

Bystander Helping Behavior in Response to Workplace Bullying

This research examines the role of colleagues’ helping behavior in workplace bullying. Although colleagues are often able to intervene to support the victim or stop the bullying, passive behavior and nonintervention are more frequent. The bystander effect described by Latané and Darley (1970) has been studied in the context of school bullying and sexual harassment, but only rarely has it been studied in the context of workplace bullying. We tested the influence of the belief in a just world for others, self-efficacy, perceived severity, and causal attribution as determinants of three types of bystander helping behavior. We used a vignette describing a case of bullying in a vertically organized workplace in an online questionnaire survey, which was completed by 194 workers. The results showed that low self-efficacy was associated with nonintervention, that perceived severity mainly determined public helping behavior, and that both internal and external causal attributions contributed to explaining both emotional and public support for the harassed colleague. The results highlight the importance of training to increase awareness and recognition of bullying phenomena among colleagues.