Donald J. Vredenburgh

A Process Framework of Organizational Politics

This paper attempts to advance the study of organizational politics by developing a comprehensive process framework for understanding individual and group political activity. Previous concepts are reviewed and a definition is offered. The process framework is developed through antecedent conditions, operating mechanisms, and outcomes, with operating mechanisms including goals, strategies and tactics, and style and political sensitivity acting as a moderating variable. Suggestions for conducting research are offered.

Contextual model of leadership influence in hospital units.

Using Kerr and Jermiers (1978) taxonomy of substitute and neutralizer variables, the contextual model indicates that the staff nurses education, group cohesion, and work technology substitute for the head nurses leadership behavior by having direct and indirect effects on job performance. The hospitals administrative climate appeared to neutralize leadership influence.

An analysis of role stress among hospital nurses

Abstract Using a sample of 566 nurses from four urban hospitals, this study focused on role stress,conceptualized in terms of role conflict, uncertainty about acceptance of ones behavior by supervisors and peers, and role ambiguity. Results indicated that individual attributes, including education, locus of control, and professional commitment, predicted role stress, as did work content variables and leadership sensitivity. Interaction effects on individual performance were discovered between role-stress variables and education, feedback from others, and leadership sensitivity. This study did not contribute to understanding nursing turnover.

Human Nature, Organizational Politics, and Human Resource Development

The human species possesses psychological attributes derived from evolutionary natural selection. This human nature has developed historically in adaptation to fundamental conditions that continue to exist in modern work organizations. Thus genetic predispositions can cause contemporary self-interested behavior amid organizational threats and opportunities. Select individual attributes and particular organizational conditions suggest specific political behaviors, represented here as theoretical propositions about organizational politics.The prevalence of organizational politics defines a need for human resource development programs to lessen dysfunctional politics. Organizations can act through individual and organizational development programs based on needs assessments to increase awareness of dysfunctional outcomes, discourage political behaviors, and encourage alternative practices. In addition, the human resources function can contribute organizationally by fostering positive organizational politics in the form of responsive interpersonal leadership.

An Examination of the Central Life Interest Scale

This paper investigates the Central Life Interest (CLI) scale using four distinct respondent groups. Attention is focused on ability of the items to discriminate respondents across groups as well a...

The relevance of democracy to organizational management

The relationship between democratic ideals and organizational structuring and functioning receives attention in this article. After a brief historical consideration of liberal democracy in the United States, we analyze social, managerial, ethical, and economic issues defining the relevance of democracy to organizational management. These issues lead to a presentation of specific purposes that particular mechanisms of organizational democracy can serve. Because of other scholarly attention to participative management and employee ownership, hierarchical constraints receive emphasis here.

An Analysis of Professional Commitment and Seniority as Moderator Variables of the Feedback and Performance Relationship among Hospital Nurses.

The present study examined moderating effects of professional commitment and seniority on the relationship between four types of feedback and individual performance using a sample of 369 nurses. The findings indicated a negative impact of reprimanding supervisory feedback on performance as seniority increased and a curvilinear relationship between client feedback and performance with greater seniority. Professional commitment did not emerge as a significant moderator of the feedback/performance relationship.