Timothy R. Hinkin

A Brief Tutorial on the Development of Measures for Use in Survey Questionnaires

The adequate measurement of abstract constructs is perhaps the greatest challenge to understanding the behavior of people in organizations. Problems with the reliability and validity of measures used on survey questionnaires continue to lead to difficulties in interpreting the results of field research. Price and Mueller suggest that measurement problems may be due to the lack of a well-established framework to guide researchers through the various stages of scale development. This article provides a conceptual framework and a straightforward guide for the development of scales in accordance with established psychometric principles for use infield studies

THE COST OF TURNOVER: PUTTING A PRICE ON THE LEARNING CURVE

Employee turnover does more than reduce service quality and damage employee morale—it hits a hotels pocketbook.

Development and application of new scales to measure the French and Raven (1959) bases of social power

Presentation de la mise au point et des proprietes psychometriques de mesures des differents types de pouvoir

The influence of individual characteristics and the work environment on varying levels of training outcomes

This study tested a model in which pretraining self-efficacy and motivation were hypothesized to mediate the relationship between job involvement, organizational commitment, perceptions of the work environment, and training reactions and knowledge acquisition. It also proposed hierarchical relationships between levels of training effectiveness criteria. A series of analyses demonstrated support for the model. Future research should incorporate a multilevel framework and consider the multidimensional nature of training outcomes.

Contextual Factors and Cost Profiles Associated with Employee Turnover

To gain insights about the nature and expenses of specific aspects of employee turnover, the authors gathered data from thirty-three U.S. hotels and found that the costs of turnover were generally higher for (1) high-complexity jobs; (2) independent properties; (3) high—average daily rate (ADR) properties; (4) large properties; and (5) high-occupancy properties. The authors also identified several activities associated with recruitment, selection, and training that were linked to lower overall costs of turnover. The results shed new light on the nature and consequences of turnover and provide some prescriptive guidance for managing this serious operational and strategic challenge.

Transformational Leadership or Effective Managerial Practices

Over the past several years, much attention has been given to Bass and Avolios notion of transformational leadership. However, there are striking similarities between Bass and Avolios concepualization and several fundamental managerial practices. To examine this concern, we conducted a study that compared the transformational leadership scales from Bass and Avolios Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ) with four scales from Yukls Managerial Practices Survey (MPS). The results provided mixed support for the distinctiveness of the MQ. A confirmatory factor analysis supported a distinction between the underlying constructs measured by the MLQ and MPS scales. In addition, a composite measure of transformational leadership did account for a significant proportion of variance in ratings of leader effectiveness, beyond that accounted for by the MPS scales. However, the proposed dimensionality of the MLQ was not supported, and the MLQ scales were highly related to the MPS scales.

An Analysis of Variance Approach to Content Validation

Although procedures for assessing content validity have been widely publicized for many years, Hinkin noted that there continue to be problems with the content validity of measures used in organizational research. Anderson and Gerbing, and Schriesheim, Powers, Scandura, Gardiner, and Lankau discussed the problems associated with typical content validity assessment and presented techniques that can be used to assess the empirical distinctiveness of a set of survey items. This article reviews these techniques and presents an analysis of variance procedure that can provide a higher degree of confidence in determining item integrity and scale content validity. The utility of this technique is demonstrated by using two samples and two different measures.

The Effect of Employee Turnover on Hotel Profits: A Test Across Multiple Hotels

Abstract Employee turnover is generally recognized as a costly phenomenon, and hotel companies consequently have initiated various turnover-reduction programs. Despite many studies, however, it remains difficult to assess exactly what effect turnover has on operating profits—and thus to assess the return on investment for initiatives designed to reduce turnover. An analysis of gross operating profits and employee turnover rates at 98 full-service hotels at one hotel company yields an estimate of the actual dollar costs of employee turnover. In general, the cost of turnover increases with ADR. That is, the cost of a 1-point increase in turnover is greater for a hotel with a high ADR than for an economy-tier property. On average for this sample, the cost in GOP of a 1-point increase in turnover rose

Transformational Leaders in the Hospitality Industry

525 with every dollar increase in ADR. Thus, for a hotel with a

An Examination of “Nonleadership”: From Laissez-Faire Leadership to Leader Reward Omission and Punishment Omission

125 ADR, each point increase in turnover cost another