Janet L. Kottke

Understanding the processes that facilitate and hinder efforts to advance women in organizations

Purpose – Aims to look at the way women in Western industrialized countries have made significant career advancements but barriers remain which necessitate organizational intervention. A number of initiatives that have commonly been introduced to help women in their career development have produced only modest gains in womens advancement.Design/methodology/approach – Argues that four basic underlying processes – social cognitions, justice, threat, and utility – must be considered and managed as part of the development, implementation, and evaluation of initiatives targeting womens career advancement, if such initiatives are to have their desired impact. These underlying processes and their implications are presented with recommendations for organizational leaders and human resource professionals.Findings – The goal of womens advancement is both noble and vital to long‐term organizational success, and initiatives to further the cause are needed. These goals are not, however, without their obstacles. By ...

DEVELOPING TESTS FOR MEASURING BLOOM'S LEARNING OUTCOMES

The purpose of this project was to develop tests to measure the six facets of Blooms Taxonomy of Educational Objectives for the Cognitive Domain. Eight short stories with different themes were written, and tests were developed to measure Blooms six different levels. After revisions of the items and stories, 487 college students read all 8 stories and answered multiple-choice items and vocabulary quizzes for each story. Factor and reliability analyses yielded inconclusive results regarding Blooms taxonomy.

Master’s and Undergraduate Industrial/Organizational Internships Data-Based Recommendations for Successful Experiences

Internships play a vital role in the education of master’s and undergraduate-level industrial/organizational (I/O) psychology students, providing applied learning experiences in organizational settings under qualified supervision. This article presents results collected from surveys of organizational hosts and interns. It addresses locating sites for internships, ensuring an appropriate experience, and the responsibilities of organizational hosts. The authors describe the responsibilities of faculty and students, student competencies, and evaluation of student performance in providing a meaningful internship experience. They provide suggestions for yielding productive and useful internship experiences for master’s I/O students with particular attention on the development of an appropriate internship site and framing requirements with the organizational host. They recommend strategies and techniques for monitoring and evaluating the I/O intern.

Can Androgyny Be Assessed with a Single Scale

The measurement of psychological androgyny has been widely discussed in the literature. Several approaches have been tried: simple differences in Masculine-Feminine scores, median splits, and continuous scores. This study was an attempt to determine if a bipolar M-F scale centered with an Androgyny midpoint would yield similar results to those on Berns widely used measurement of androgyny. The results suggest the concept of androgyny may be specific to the scale used.

Teamwork satisfaction: Exploring the multilevel interaction of teamwork interest and group extraversion

Multilevel modeling is used to examine the impact of teamwork interest and group extraversion on group satisfaction. Participants included 206 undergraduates in 65 groups who were surveyed at the beginning and end of a requisite term-length group project for an upper-division university course. We hypothesized that teamwork interest and both extraversion dispersion and higher mean extraversion would predict satisfaction with the group. Results indicated both teamwork interest and mean extraversion were not a predictor of satisfaction. Contrary to the hypothesis, greater extraversion dispersion and the interaction between teamwork interest and extraversion dispersion predicted less satisfaction. Extraversion dispersion was a better predictor of student satisfaction when individuals were more interested in teamwork. Additionally, extraversion dispersion may be a suppressor variable for teamwork interest. These results have implications for instructors facilitating group work and ensuring students have a positive group work experience.

Measuring follower confidence in top leadership direction

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to define the construct of confidence in top leadership and to develop a brief measure of that construct.Design/methodology/approach – Two studies were conducted in which 674 working adults completed measures of work‐related attitudes. In both studies, the scale demonstrated convergent and discriminant validity with like and unrelated constructs.Findings – The results provide evidence for the construct validity of the new measure.Research limitations/implications – Respondents were relatively young and drawn predominantly from a working student population in a single region of the USA. Additional research should be conducted with additional working populations, especially in the context of addressing organizational change.Practical implications – The short five‐item scale would be useful as a diagnostic tool for assessing the confidence of organizational members in their top leadership.Originality/value – This study supports a concept, confidence in top leadership, t...

The Devil is in the Details: A Comment on “What Might This Be? Rediscovering the Rorschach as a Tool for Personnel Selection in Organizations” (Del Giudice, 2010)

Although we find ourselves in agreement with Del Giudice (2010) on a number of concepts presented in his article, as industrial-organizational psychologists with extensive knowledge and experience in both personnel selection and executive development and assessment, we feel compelled to respond to two key aspects that we believe were inadequately addressed. Del Giudice (2010) made a forceful case for the possibility of using the Rorschach as a personality assessment tool to select organizational leaders. Nevertheless, we put forward that Del Giudice overstated the viability of using the Rorschach as a personality assessment tool to select leaders given the current, limited empirical evidence. Much of the evidence Del Giudice provided for the use of personality measures in personnel selection is based on research of the Big Five personality framework (i.e., normal range personality tests) and not on clinical tests of psychopathology. In addition, Del Giudice also underestimated the practical issues involved in using the Rorschach as a tool for personnel selection. Here, we wish to address the devil that is in those details, focusing on two issues: contextual relevance and face validity. Del Giudice (2010) provided a general overview of some reasons why specific personality dimensions are relevant to occupational selection, the limited use of the Rorschach for selecting employees, and the types of knowledge, skills, and ability (KSAs) that are related to leader performance. Generally, we agree with Del Giudice’s conceptualization of the KSAs that are important for leaders to possess. That said, we propose that a great deal of research remains to be done to demonstrate that the ideas Del Giudice expressed about leadership qualifications can be measured with the Rorschach. For example, there is little doubt that executives face complex situations (Yukl, 2010). To suggest that a Rorschach mirrors those situations, however, strikes us as premature theorizing at best. So, whereas we agree with the view that executives work in complicated settings, it is not clear how the Rorschach substantially represents the com-

Scaling the construct androgyny : reply to Willemsen

Miller and Kottke reply to Willemsens 1993 critique of Kottkes 1988 paper. We believe that Willemsen may have overstated the purpose of Kottkes study Kottkes intention was not to develop a new measure of androgyny or to provide a definitive answer to whether masculinity and femininity are bipolar concepts but rather to show that the concept of androgyny requires additional theoretical and empirical clarification, particularly in its measurement.

Industrial–Organizational and Human Factors Graduate Program Admission: Information for Undergraduate Advisors

Many psychology departments do not have industrial–organizational (IO) or human factors (HF) faculty members. As such, potential IO and HF graduate students may miss career opportunities because faculty advisors are unfamiliar with the disciplines and their graduate programs. To assist advisors, this article highlights the content of IO and HF disciplines, presents tips on how to advise undergraduates for admission to IO and HF graduate programs, provides sources of IO and HF information, suggests employability options in IO and HF, and offers an advising brochure that is available upon request. A wide variety of career options exist in both IO and HF. Advisors assisting students in evaluating potential careers and identifying graduate programs should find this information useful.

Undergraduates Learn About Industrial–Organizational Psychology and Human Factors From an Informational Brochure

An informational brochure was created to assist students and faculty unfamiliar with the industrial–organizational (IO) and human factors (HF) disciplines. The brochure highlights the content of these two professions, presents advice for undergraduates to prepare for admission to IO and HF graduate programs, provides sources of IO and HF information, and suggests employability options in IO and HF. To determine if this brochure effectively informed students about these professions, students read either the IO and HF brochure or information about school psychology. Knowledge about IO and HF programs increased significantly after reading the IO and HF brochure. Suggestions for its distribution are offered.