Robert D. Costigan

A cross-cultural study of supervisory trust

Purpose - This study examines the relationship of a supervisors affect-based trust and cognition-based trust to a subordinate employees self-ratings of enterprising behavior, which includes creativity, risk taking, initiative, motivation, and assertiveness, and to the supervisors and coworkers ratings of the subordinates enterprising behavior. The extent to which the power distance and in-group collectivism cultural variables moderate the relationship between affect-based trust and enterprising behavior is assessed. Design/methodology/approach - Survey responses of US, Turkish, Polish, and Russian supervisor-subordinate-coworker triads were collected in a number of firms. Regression results were employed to test the research hypotheses. Findings - The findings of this study show that the supervisors cognition-based trust and affect-based trust of the employee are associated with that employees enterprising behavior. Significant two-way interactions indicate that the relationship between affect-based trust and enterprising behavior is stronger in the three collectivist countries than in the individualist USA. The moderating effects of power distance, on the other hand, appear to be negligible. Originality/value - The main implication of this studys results is that human relations theories, which are based on the supervisors top-down trust of the subordinate employee, may be more effective in collectivist cultures than in individualist cultures.

Developing the Great Eight Competencies with Leaderless Group Discussion.

The Great Eight competencies are work behaviors that promote employee effectiveness in 21st-century organizations. These competencies include enterprising and performing, adapting and coping, organizing and executing, creating and conceptualizing, analyzing and interpreting, interacting and presenting, supporting and cooperating, and leading and deciding. This article proposes an alternative pedagogy, leaderless group discussion, for developing the Great Eight competencies in business students. An example and a roadmap are also provided that show how leaderless group discussion can be employed in the college classroom. Leaderless group discussion is surprisingly efficient in that all of the Great Eight competencies can be developed within the student at the same time with one exercise. Recommendations to help make leaderless group discussion practical for the business classroom are discussed.

Adaptation of Traditional Human Resources Processes for Total Quality Environments

Imagefile:The worldwide total quality (TQ) movement, which emphasizes quality, continuous improvement, empowerment, and teamwork, is redefining the context in which workers behave in organizations. Traditional human resources (HR) processes appear to be..

A cross‐cultural study of coworker trust

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between an employees trust of coworkers and that employees enterprising behavior. The extent to which cultural dimensions, in‐group collectivism and power distance, moderate the trust‐behavior relationship is considered.Design/methodology/approach – A rigorous research methodology was employed to minimize potential problems with common method variance. Trust ratings were provided by 135 US, 203 Turkish, 100 Polish, and 86 Russian focal employees. Their 524 coworkers provided enterprising behavior ratings for these focal employees.Findings – The results show that both cognitive‐ and affect‐based trusts of coworkers is associated with enterprising behavior. The findings also indicate that the affect‐based trust/enterprising behavior relationship is stronger in higher power distance cultures than in lower power distance cultures. In‐group collectivism, however, does not moderate the trust enterprising behavior relationships.Originality/valu...

A study of Russian, Polish, and U.S. self and peer raters: Moderators of rating agreement

This study investigates one aspect of the multi‐source feedback process: the agreement between self‐ratings and coworker ratings of workplace behavior. Moderators of rating agreement (i.e., number of years that the coworker had known the employee, trustworthiness of the employee, and country status) are carefully examined. Eighty‐six Russian employee‐coworker dyads, 99 Polish dyads, and 95 U.S. dyads from more than 225 organizations participated. Regression results indicate that rating agreement was higher when the Polish and U.S. coworker knew the target employee a shorter period of time and when the Polish, Russian, and U.S. target employee was considered trustworthy.

Learning Goals of AACSB-Accredited Undergraduate Business Programs: Predictors of Conformity Versus Differentiation

Learning goals are central to assurance of learning. Yet little is known about what goals are used by business programs or how they are established. On the one hand, business schools are encouraged to develop their own unique learning goals. However, business schools also face pressures that would encourage conformity by adopting goals used by others. The authors examined the extent to which learning goals of business programs are unique versus similar. Their evidence suggests business schools adopt goals that are quite similar. Public schools and lower ranked schools were more likely to demonstrate such conformity. The implications of goal similarity are discussed for management education and assurance of learning.

Schein’s Career Anchors: Testing Factorial Validity, Invariance Across Countries, and Relationship With Core Self-Evaluations

The purposes of this study are to (1) examine the factorial validity of Schein’s career anchors orientation inventory (COI), comparing the original eight-factor model with an alternative nine-factor model, (2) examine the cross-cultural invariance of the COI and its factor structure across two countries, (3) investigate whether core self-evaluations (CSE) is associated with career anchors, and (4) determine whether the relationship between CSE and career anchors varies by country. Survey data were collected from 469 participants (230 from the United States and 239 from Turkey). Based on multigroup confirmatory factor analysis, the results indicated that the alternative nine-factor career anchor model of the COI has better factorial validity and configural invariance than Schein’s eight-factor model. The findings showed support for the association between CSE and the pure challenge anchor and a moderating effect of culture on the relationship between CSE and two other anchors.

The significance of direct-leader and co-worker trust on turnover intentions: A cross-cultural study

This study examines the relative strength of the relationships of an employees affect-based and cognition-based trust of their direct leader and co-workers to the employees turnover intentions in four countries. Surveys were completed by 554 participants; the sample consisted of 81 Russians, 113 Poles, 155 Americans and 205 Turks. It was found that the employees affect-based trust of their direct leader was more strongly associated (negatively) with turnover intentions than was the employees affect-based trust of their co-workers for our combined international sample; however, the association of cognition-based trust of the direct leader and cognition-based trust of their co-workers to turnover intentions did not differ. This study looked at the moderating effect of culture. We found that in-group collectivism moderated the relationship of both affect-based trust of co-workers and cognition-based trust of co-workers to turnover intentions.