Ingrid Smithey Fulmer

Personality and citizenship behavior: the mediating role of job satisfaction.

Using meta-analytic path analysis, the authors tested several structural models linking agreeableness and conscientiousness to organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). Results showed that the 2 personality traits had both direct effects and indirect effects-through job satisfaction-on overall OCB. Meta-analytic moderator analyses that distinguished between individual- and organization-targeted citizenship behaviors (OCB-I and OCB-O) showed that agreeableness was more closely related with OCB-I and conscientiousness with OCB-O. Finally, the path analyses predicting OCB-I and OCB-O offered further support for the general hypothesis that these 2 constructs are distinct. That is, the results of these analyses revealed that agreeableness had both direct and indirect effects on OCB-I but only indirect effects on OCB-O, and that for conscientiousness the pattern of direct and indirect effects was exactly opposite (direct and indirect effects on OCB-O but only indirect effects on OCB-I).

“Our Most Important Asset” A Multidisciplinary/Multilevel Review of Human Capital Valuation for Research and Practice

Despite managers’ claims that their organization’s human capital is their “most important asset,” few can confidently state the financial value of that resource or quantify in financial terms how changes in management practices, culture, or workforce composition affect the value of that resource. Scholars of strategic human capital and strategic human resource management face a similar situation, relying more on inferences about human capital resource value than on empirical measures of it. In an effort to explicate the challenges associated with financial valuation so that scholars can begin to move past them, we provide a multidisciplinary review of existing work that has been concerned with the estimation, disclosure, and management of the financial value associated with an organization’s human capital resources. We propose a multilevel organizing framework to facilitate the linkage between the financial valuation issues highlighted in our review and the recent literature on strategic human capital/strategic human resource management. Based on the insights drawn from this review, we then propose a series of next steps or “action items” to stimulate future research that holds promise for yielding both new theoretical insights and important practical implications for organizations.

Perspectives of Managers Toward Workplace Breastfeeding Support in the State of Michigan

Managers’ attitudes influence female employees’ perceptions of workplace breastfeeding support. Five focus groups were conducted with managers in the state of Michigan (N = 25) to assess their attitudes toward supporting breastfeeding. All focus group discussions were recorded, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed for themes. Participants supported efforts by managers and companies to assist breastfeeding employees, but the extent of accommodations they supported varied. Most participants reported no company breastfeeding policy or were unaware of their company having one and showed mixed attitudes about needing a policy. Participants acknowledged the potential for lower productivity and coworker jealousy toward time for breastfeeding or expressing milk but believed that benefits of support included employee recruitment and retention. Participants demonstrated some understanding of breastfeeding benefits. They identified barriers and facilitators for breastfeeding support at both the organizational and individual levels. Results of this study will be used for instrument development to measure managers’ attitudes toward supporting breastfeeding.

Development and Piloting of an Instrument That Measures Company Support for Breastfeeding

Background: Maternal employment has been cited as a barrier to continued breastfeeding, yet there have been few studies identifying company breastfeeding support. Objectives: The study objectives were to develop and pilot an instrument that measures formal breastfeeding support in companies. Methods: A survey of company breastfeeding supports was developed, based on the literature and expert review, and the survey piloted with Michigan-based companies. Results: Completion of the surveys and open-ended comments indicated survey items were generally well understood. In the study sample (N = 151), significantly more support was offered in companies having more employees as compared to fewer, and in companies from the health care versus all other sectors (P < .01). More support was also found in companies reporting requests for support, upper management combining breastfeeding and work, and a population that they felt likely to require breastfeeding support (P < .01). Few companies (3%) had written policies on breastfeeding or pumping at work. However, the majority of companies allow women to pump milk at the worksite (94%), and provide time (73%) and nonrestroom space to pump (78%). Fewer companies allow breastfeeding at the company (22%) or designate a room solely for breastfeeding or pumping (32%). Conclusions: The survey instrument is appropriate to determine breastfeeding supports in companies. In Michigan, larger companies and those in the health care sector provide more supports, most companies provide some type of space and time to pump, but other supports are limited.

More Bang for the Buck?: Personality Traits as Moderators of Responsiveness to Pay-for-Performance

Extensive prior research has found that, on average, people are more productive under properly designed incentive pay systems; this effect is not necessarily uniform across people, however. In two laboratory studies utilizing within-person study designs and tasks varying in level of structure, we examine how individuals’ personality dispositions systematically predict differential responsiveness to pay-for-performance (PFP) relative to fixed pay. As expected, average productivity was higher when people received PFP (in the form of piecework pay) than when they received fixed pay, but the productivity-enhancing effects of PFP were especially pronounced for more extraverted and less conscientious individuals in less structured tasks. Emotionally stable individuals also had enhanced productivity under PFP, an effect that has not been observed in previous research on personality and pay.

Ideal or an ordeal for organizations?: The spectrum of co-worker reactions to idiosyncratic deals

Idiosyncratic deals (i-deals) are individualized employment arrangements negotiated between organizations and particular employees (“i-dealers”). Most prior research has focused on the two parties to the i-deal, but in the current work, we focus on the co-workers of i-dealers who are often affected by the i-deals of others in ways that have additional and sometimes unexpected implications for organizations. We present a theoretically grounded framework that integrates cognitive, affective, and contextual processes to better understand when and why co-workers develop positive, neutral, or negative reactions to such arrangements. We predict that a range of reactions can occur, and may vary in valence (positive, neutral, or no reaction, or negative), degree of activation (active or passive), and target of the reaction (the organization, the i-dealer, or self). The nature of the reaction mirrors the emotions of the co-worker in response to self- and other-oriented cognitive appraisals of the i-deal by the co-worker. The nature of the reaction is also shaped by the consistency of the i-deal with the organization’s norms for differential treatment of employees. In the concluding section, we discuss future extensions and research implications of our model, and a number of potential managerial considerations that derive from our theorizing.

Person-based differences in pay reactions: a compensation-activation theory and integrative conceptual review

Compensation research has focused traditionally on how pay design characteristics (e.g., pay level, individual or group incentives) relate to average employee outcomes and, in toto, on how these outcomes affect organizational performance. Recently, scholars have begun to pay more attention to how individuals vary in the strength of their reactions to pay. Empirical research in several disciplines examines how the interplay of pay systems and person-based characteristics (psychological individual differences, demographics, and relative performance or position in a group) relate to important work-related outcomes. We develop a compensation-activation theory that frames compensation design characteristics as workplace “situations” providing cues that activate individuals’ corresponding fundamental social motives made salient due to chronic or transient person-based characteristics. Where activation occurs, stronger-than-average responses to the compensation “situation” are expected. Using the theory as a lens, we synthesize and reinterpret existing research on person-based reactions to pay characteristics, including sorting, incentive/motivational effects, and effects on collective pay system reactions and unit/organizational outcomes. We conclude with a research agenda aimed at refining compensation-activation theory and advancing the study of compensation as it affects individual and organizational outcomes.