Julie Cogin

An Empirical Investigation of Sexual Harassment and Work Engagement: Surprising Differences between Men and Women

Research has demonstrated the growing prevalence of sexual harassment (SH) across continents, industries and occupations as well as the associated negative outcomes (Glomb et al. 1999). Not surprisingly, job satisfaction is one of the job-related variables that is frequently investigated in the SH literature, with Lapierre et al. (2005) meta-analytically establishing that SH significantly diminishes job satisfaction. Other studies have argued, however, that ‘satisfied’ employees do not necessarily perform to the best of their abilities (Crossman & Abou-Zaki 2003) and that work engagement is a better construct to understand what makes employees ‘go the extra mile’ (Hallgerg & Schaufeli 2006; Buckingham & Coffman 1999). This study, conducted in Australia, adopted the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (Schaufeli et al. 2002a), as an empirical gauge of the construct ‘work engagement’ and the Sexual Experiences Questionnaire (Fitzgerald et al. 1988) to measure SH. A strong negative relationship was established in addition to significant differences in the SH experiences of men and women.

Value orientations as predictors of cultural and business impact: individual suitability for cross-border assignments

Purpose – This research was undertaken to further understand a “values” based taxonomy designed to assess the “cultural and business suitability” of managers for appointment to cross‐border business and management roles. In particular, this paper aims to explore the extrapolative and interrelated nature of a two‐dimensional bipolar taxonomy of value orientations; as well as the nature and strength of the relationship between the models predictors.Design/methodology/approach – A sample of 262 cross‐border managers working for a large transnational American owned logistics firm responded to this study. The group completed a questionnaire based on a two‐dimensional taxonomy of value orientations. The dimensions tested were first a managers values viz., their potential “National Identity”. Secondly, a managers values vis., their potential “Cross‐Border Business Focus”. Factor analysis and canonical correlations were employed to identify key factor constructs and then to evaluate the measurement fit between...

Modelling and predicting the performance of cross border managers

Purpose – Cross border managers are an important feature of the global economy. Despite this, research evidence suggests that the primary selection criteria for cross border managers are technical expertise and domestic business knowledge. This has resulted in insufficient numbers of high calibre candidates to meet the demands of todays global business context. This paper aims to argue that an understanding of an individuals value orientations is important for selecting cross border managers and predicting subsequent performance.Design/methodology/approach – The paper reports the testing of a multidimensional value orientated taxonomy on a sample of 658 managers employed by three multinational organisations. The model was tested via SEM. OLS multiple regression was carried out to identify whether the dimensions of the taxonomy predict the performance of managers in cross border roles.Findings – Results yielded sound factor structure of the taxonomy with a single factor solution identified on each of the...

Controlling healthcare professionals: how human resource management influences job attitudes and operational efficiency

BackgroundWe assess how human resource management (HRM) is implemented in Australian hospitals. Drawing on role theory, we consider the influence HRM has on job attitudes of healthcare staff and hospital operational efficiency.MethodsWe adopt a qualitative research design across professional groups (physicians, nurses, and allied health staff) at multiple levels (executive, healthcare managers, and employee). A total of 34 interviews were carried out and analyzed using NVivo.ResultsFindings revealed a predominance of a control-based approach to people management. Using Snell’s control framework (AMJ 35:292–327, 1992), we found that behavioral control was the principal form of control used to manage nurses, allied health workers, and junior doctors. We found a mix between behavior, output, and input controls as well as elements of commitment-based HRM to manage senior physicians. We observed low levels of investment in people and a concentration on transactional human resource (HR) activities which led to negative job attitudes such as low morale and frustration among healthcare professionals. While hospitals used rules to promote conformity with established procedures, the overuse and at times inappropriate use of behavior controls restricted healthcare managers’ ability to motivate and engage their staff.ConclusionsExcessive use of behavior control helped to realize short-term cost-cutting goals; however, this often led to operational inefficiencies. We suggest that hospitals reduce the profusion of behavior control and increase levels of input and output controls in the management of people. Poor perceptions of HR specialists and HR activities have resulted in HR being overlooked as a vehicle to address the strategic challenges required of health reform and to build an engaged workforce.

Doing more with less: productivity or starvation? The Intellectual Asset Health Check

The recent wave of savings in public service expenditure comes at the risk of creating starved workplaces, depleted of intellectual assets. This paper examines the perils of starved workplaces and how to avoid them. Organizations that nurture their intellectual assets were found to outperform their peers with 13.3% higher productivity. These organizations created a ‘win–win situation’, achieving both productivity targets while sustaining high stocks of emotional and human capital.

Computer-supported qualitative research

For many years, qualitative analysis has largely been undertaken using manual techniques. Since the late 1980s, dedicated software has been developed to aid qualitative analysis. The first generation of computer programs was largely designed to assist researchers in managing data by enabling the structuring of information from focus groups, field notes and interviews. One of the first computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software (CAQDAS) packages (developed by Australian academic Tom Richards) was called NUD*IST, which stands for Non-numerical Unstructured Data Indexing, Searching and Theorising. It was designed to provide a program like SPSS but as a non-Statistical Package for Social Scientists. Second generation CAQDAS packages introduced functions for coding text and manipulating, searching and reporting on the coded text. This assisted researchers in the retrieval of text from data, enabled scholars to code that data and develop a system of relating codes to each other using tree-like structures.