Kyle W. Luthans

The Proposed Contagion Effect of Hopeful Leaders on the Resiliency of Employees and Organizations

Hope has often been misunderstood and underestimated as a potentially powerful human capacity. Traditionally, hope has too often been dismissed as a whimsical and abstract concept that could not be well defined, let alone measured, developed, and applied to the workplace. However, the recent emergence of positive psychology and positive organizational behavior has now clearly shown that hope is a strength that has many important implications for todays embattled organizations- both in terms of effective leadership and employee retention and performance. The purpose of this article is to not only give the background of the positive approach and define hope as an important strength in positive organizational behavior and authentic leadership, but to also propose that hopeful leaders can have a contagion effect on the resiliency of employees and organizations undergoing traumatic change.

The Impact of Business School Students’ Psychological Capital on Academic Performance

Psychological capital (PsyCap) consisting of the psychological resources of hope, efficacy, resiliency, and optimism has been empirically demonstrated in the published literature to be related to manager and employee positive organizational outcomes and to be open to development. However, to date, little attention has been devoted to the impact of this positive core construct on important student-related outcomes. This study tests the relationship between business students’ PsyCap and their academic performance (grade point average [GPA]). The results indicate not only the predictive relationship between PsyCap and GPA, but also have important implications for training of PsyCap for business student development, retention, and success.

Recognition: A Powerful, but often Overlooked, Leadership Tool to Improve Employee Performance

A key dimension for effective leadership involves reinforcing and motivating others to encourage superior performance. Financial and non-financial rewards can be utilized for this purpose. This paper explores the background on the nature and importance of employee recognition as an effective leadership tool and reports the results of a survey examining the value of recognition to all levels of employees in a large, nonprofit institution. These employees indicated they value highly personalized recognition for a job well done as a critical dimension of their reward system. These findings provide further evidence that employee recognition should be given more attention by leaders as they attempt to meet the retention and productivity challenges facing todays organizations.

Expatriate development: the use of 360‐degree feedback

This article first reviews the status of expatriate training and the need to evaluate the transfer of this training to expatriate managers on‐the‐job in a foreign culture. A multisource or 360‐degree feedback system is proposed as both a way to evaluate expatriate cultural training at the behavioral and performance levels, as well as a way to develop expatriates to make them more effective once in the local culture. A proposed expatriate management effectiveness questionnaire (EMEQ) is described in terms of its theoretical foundation and specific scales, and how it could be used in a multisource feedback program for the effective development of expatriate managers.

Building the Leaders of Tomorrow: The Development of Academic Psychological Capital

The now widely recognized core construct of psychological capital (PsyCap) consists of the state-like positive psychological resources of hope, efficacy, resilience, and optimism. PsyCap has been empirically shown in the research literature to be related to various employee attitudinal, behavioral, and performance outcomes and open to development and change. Most recently, PsyCap has also been shown to be significantly related to business student academic performance. Using a pretest, posttest control group design, the present study tested whether the PsyCap of business students can be developed through a micro-training intervention. Results from this quasi-experimental study provide initial support that the Academic PsyCap of business students can be positively affected by a short training intervention.

Successful Reemployment Through Resiliency Development

The proposed model in this article seeks to extend the job search literature by considering resiliency as a predictor of job search behavior and reemployment outcomes. In addition, because past research in this area has not expressly considered job search skills, they are included in this model as an additional predictor along with their interaction with resiliency. The importance of resiliency for job seekers is discussed with particular emphasis on young adults, minorities, and relocating spouses/partners. Because resiliency is a state-like variable, suggestions are offered to promote the development of resiliency in job seekers. It is hoped that the theoretical framework proposed in this article and the specific recommendations for resiliency development can positively affect job seekers pursuing reemployment.

Psychological capital: A new tool for driver retention

Purpose – A number of studies have identified a relationship between the positive psychological capital (PsyCap) of employees and desirable outcomes. Given current and projected shortages of truck drivers that could become the “Achilles heel” of the global supply chain, the purpose of this paper is to test whether and how drivers’ attitudes and PsyCap relates to their intentions to quit. Design/methodology/approach – Using survey data from truckload drivers (n=251) from two major transportation firms, correlation, regression, and path analysis were conducted to assess the relationship between job satisfaction, organizational commitment, PsyCap, and intentions to quit. Findings – Results of this study indicate strong positive relationships between PsyCap and job satisfaction and organizational commitment and a strong negative correlation with intentions to quit. Structural equation modeling suggests that job satisfaction and organizational commitment mediate the relationship between PsyCap and turnover intentions. Practical implications – Managerial implications for recognizing, understanding, and developing PsyCap in the transportation industry are derived from this study. Specific training guidelines are provided. Originality/value – The major contribution of this paper is that it provides, for the first time, empirical evidence that PsyCap can be utilized to improve retention rates for truckload drivers.

Applying behavioral management in Eastern Europe

As posed in the title, the authors make a case for the use of behavioral management as a pragmatic and effective way to help East European managers improve employee performance. After providing the cultural and theoretical grounding for the use of a behavioral approach, the five-step O.B. Mod. model is presented. The successful use of O.B. Mod. in a Russian factory is given detailed attention and then the case is made for using this approach in all Eastern European organizations. Particular attention is given to the nature and power of contingently administered social reinforcers to increase employee performance at no cost. The authors conclude that this approach can help meet the competitive challenges Eastern European management faces now and in the future.

A positive approach to management education: The relationship between academic PsyCap and student engagement

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between the positive psychological strengths of undergraduate business students, collectively known as positive psychological capital (PsyCap), and their levels of engagement. Design/methodology/approach This study has a cross-sectional design in which students from two Midwestern universities were surveyed regarding their levels of PsyCap and levels of engagement in educationally sound activities. Item response theory (IRT) and hierarchical regression were used to test study hypotheses. The authors assessed measurement validity using confirmatory factor analyses in MPLUS 7.0 using four-category 2PL graded response models with a weighted least squares means and variance adjusted estimator. Hierarchical regression was used to control for alternative explanations of variance in assessing the effects of PsyCap on student engagement. Findings Using measures of student engagement drawn from the National Survey of Student Engagement, the analysis indicated significant positive relationships between the academic PsyCap of 323 undergraduate business students and their levels of student-faculty engagement (SFE; r=0.30, p<0.01), community-based activities (CBA; r=0.28, p<0.01), and transformational learning opportunities (TLO; r=0.19, p<0.01). A series of hierarchical regressions also indicated that PsyCap is a significant predictor of student engagement as assessed against SFE, CBA, and TLO. Research limitations/implications The findings from this study suggest that further research examining the relationship between PsyCap development and student engagement could have significant implications for management educators. The positive associations found between these key variables could be utilized by management educators to implement novel and effective teaching interventions for developing the PsyCap of their students and, ultimately, increase their students’ levels of engagement. Originality/value Although extant research has demonstrated connections between positive psychological constructs (i.e. hope, self-efficacy, resilience, optimism) and student engagement, this is the first study to take a holistic view of developable, positive psychological capacities, collectively assessed as PsyCap, and examine the potential impact on three recognized dimensions of student engagement.

Pragmatic Tools to Assist Leaders: The Use of Metrics and Spider Diagrams

This article points out that although leaders need vision, charisma and other lofty ideals, they also need pragmatic tools to get the job done. Two such tools are the use of metrics to objectively measure performance of key result areas and then the use of these measurements to construct a spider diagram that allows visualization of strengths and weaknesses in order to more effectively develop strategic plans. Metrics and spider diagrams are pragmatic tools that can be used by leaders in order to effectively compete in todays hyper competitive environment.