Jennifer D. Nahrgang

Integrating Motivational, Social, and Contextual Work Design Features: A Meta-Analytic Summary and Theoretical Extension of the Work Design Literature

The authors developed and meta-analytically examined hypotheses designed to test and extend work design theory by integrating motivational, social, and work context characteristics. Results from a summary of 259 studies and 219,625 participants showed that 14 work characteristics explained, on average, 43% of the variance in the 19 worker attitudes and behaviors examined. For example, motivational characteristics explained 25% of the variance in subjective performance, 2% in turnover perceptions, 34% in job satisfaction, 24% in organizational commitment, and 26% in role perception outcomes. Beyond motivational characteristics, social characteristics explained incremental variances of 9% of the variance in subjective performance, 24% in turnover intentions, 17% in job satisfaction, 40% in organizational commitment, and 18% in role perception outcomes. Finally, beyond both motivational and social characteristics, work context characteristics explained incremental variances of 4% in job satisfaction and 16% in stress. The results of this study suggest numerous opportunities for the continued development of work design theory and practice.

Leader-member exchange and citizenship behaviors: a meta-analysis.

This article provides a meta-analytic review of the relationship between the quality of leader-member exchanges (LMX) and citizenship behaviors performed by employees. Results based on 50 independent samples (N = 9,324) indicate a moderately strong, positive relationship between LMX and citizenship behaviors (rho = .37). The results also support the moderating role of the target of the citizenship behaviors on the magnitude of the LMX-citizenship behavior relationship. As expected, LMX predicted individual-targeted behaviors more strongly than it predicted organizational targeted behaviors (rho = .38 vs. rho = .31), and the difference was statistically significant. Whether the LMX and the citizenship behavior ratings were provided by the same source or not also influenced the magnitude of the correlation between the 2 constructs.

Understanding why they don't see eye to eye: an examination of leader-member exchange (LMX) agreement.

Although it is an explicitly dyadic approach to leadership, some leader-member exchange (LMX) research has been characterized by relatively low levels of agreement between leader and member judgments of the relationship. Using a combination of meta-analytic methods and primary data collection, the authors sought to explore several theoretically and methodologically meaningful factors that might account for lower levels of agreement. On the basis of data from 64 independent samples (N = 10,884 dyads), the authors found that overall agreement was moderate in nature (? = .37). In addition, they found that longer relationship tenure, affectively oriented relationship dimensions, and ad hoc sampling techniques showed the highest levels of agreement. Empirical results from 98 matched dyads revealed that the extent of LMX agreement increases as the length of relationship tenure and intensity of dyadic interaction increases. Implications for LMX theory and future empirical research are discussed.

Harmful Help: The Costs of Backing up Behavior in Teams

Prior research on backing-up behavior has indicated that it is beneficial to teams (C. O. L. H. Porter, 2005; C. O. L. H. Porter et al., 2003). This literature has focused on how backing-up behavior aids backup recipients in tasks in which workload is unevenly distributed among team members. The authors of the present study examined different contexts of workload distribution and found that, in addition to the initial benefits to backup recipients, there are initial and subsequent costs. Backing-up behavior leads backup providers to neglect their own taskwork, especially when workload is evenly distributed. Team members who receive high amounts of backing-up behavior decrease their taskwork in a subsequent task, especially when a team member can observe their workload. These findings indicate that it is important to consider both the benefits and costs of engaging in backing-up behavior.

A quasi-experimental study of after-event reviews and leadership development

We examine how structured reflection through after-event reviews (AERs) promotes experience-based leadership development and how peoples prior experiences and personality attributes influence the impact of AERs on leadership development. We test our hypotheses in a time-lagged, quasi-experimental study that followed 173 research participants for 9 months and across 4 distinct developmental experiences. Findings indicate that AERs have a positive effect on leadership development, and this effect is accentuated when people are conscientious, open to experience, and emotionally stable and have a rich base of prior developmental experiences.

The opponent process theory of leadership succession

Groups are increasingly conceptualized as self-regulating, adaptive social systems, where time and history play central explanatory roles. Despite this, concepts related to opponent processes, which are central to theories of self-regulation, have been absent from discussions of leadership of groups. In this paper, we introduce the opponent process theory of leadership succession, and argue that the impact of leadership on current outcomes can be fully appreciated only by complementing the understanding of the current leader’s behaviors and style with the behaviors and styles of his or her predecessor. We outline both the process and content of opponent processes highlighting their potential to explain both adaptive and maladaptive behavior in groups.

Not all differentiation is the same: Examining the moderating effects of leader-member exchange (LMX) configurations.

Leaders often influence whether an employee stays or quits and yet research in collective turnover, or turnover at the work-unit level, has neglected leadership as a key antecedent. In the current study we examine how the quality of leader-member relationships within a group (i.e., leader-member exchange, LMX) influences building a shared mindset of collective organizational commitment and ultimately influences collective turnover. We build on a key tenet of LMX theory that leaders form differentiated relationships with followers and propose that not all LMX differentiation is the same and therefore, researchers must take into account the configuration, or mix of high and low LMX relationships, within a group. We expect LMX configurations will moderate the influence of LMX differentiation on collective turnover through the mechanism of collective organizational commitment. We find 5 configurations of LMX relationships, including a bimodal, solo-status low LMX, solo-status high LMX, and 2 fragmented configurations. As hypothesized, LMX differentiation positively relates to collective organizational commitment and negatively relates to collective turnover in a solo-status low LMX configuration and a fragmented LMX configuration, and negatively relates to collective organizational commitment and positively relates to collective turnover in a bimodal configuration. Theoretical implications and future research directions are discussed.

Illuminating the “face” of justice: a meta-analytic examination of leadership and organizational justice

A significant body of research has described effective leader behaviours and has connected these behaviours to positive employee outcomes. However, this research has yet to be systematically integrated with organizational justice research to describe how leader behaviours inform justice perceptions. Therefore, we conduct a meta‐analysis (k = 166, N = 46,034) to investigate how three types of leader behaviours (task, relational, and change) inform four dimensions of organizational justice (procedural, distributive, interpersonal, and informational) referenced to the leader and to the organization. Further, we examine the joint impact of leader behaviours and justice perceptions on social exchange quality (i.e., leader–member exchange), task performance, and job satisfaction. Our results suggest that leader behaviours differentially inform leader‐ and organization‐focused justice perceptions, and the joint effect of leader behaviours and justice perceptions offer more nuanced explanations for outcomes.