Bonding and supportive relationships among black professional women: Rituals of restoration

In two-day assessment workshops 71 black professional women explored the kinds of supportive relationships they have formed with significant black women friends and the consequences of these supportive relationships for their growth and development. Findings show two major types of supportive relationships: (1) other-oriented relationships, in which participants' bonds with other black women emphasize the provision of support to the other, and (2) self-enhancing relationships, in which participants' bonds with other black women are reciprocal in nature or are oriented toward self. Within these two types of relationships, three main functions of support were found: (1) social companionship, (2) task help, and (3) supportiveness. Of these three functions, the receipt of supportiveness consisting of emotional support, high commitment to one another, and encouragement to tackle life's obstacles resulted in the highest levels of growth and development among the participants, thus most effectively validating and addressing their experience of bicultural stress.     

Correlates of career-oriented mentoring for early career managers and professionals

This study examines several different kinds of correlates of career-oriented mentoring experiences among early career managers and professionals. Survey data were collected from 416 respondents employed in a wide variety of jobs, organizations, and industries. The respondents averaged 30 years of age, and 28 per cent were women. Results indicated that younger, more work-involved respondents from higher socioeconomic origins received more career-oriented mentoring. In addition, managers received more mentoring than professionals, as did those who were higher in the organization hierarchy. While gender of the protégé was unrelated to the amount of career mentoring received, reasons are offered for this result. Various boundary conditions likely to affect mentoring processes are discussed and several directions are recommended for future research on mentoring.     

Emotional appeal in recruitment advertising and applicant attraction: Unpacking national cultural differences

We investigated the impact of the type of emotional appeal (ego‐focused vs. other‐focused) used in recruiting advertisements on applicant attraction to firms through two experimental studies across three countries (the United States, China, and Singapore). In Study 1, we made a traditional cultural comparison between the United States and China, whose dominant cultural values are characterized by individualism and collectivism, respectively. We found applicants in the United States were more strongly attracted to firms whose recruiting advertisements were based on an ego‐focused emotional appeal, while applicants in China were more attracted to firms that used ads with an other‐focused emotional appeal. Study 2 was conducted in bicultural Singapore. We primed bicultural applicants to be either the individualistic or collectivistic aspect of their cultural heritage. Applicants with individualist priming were attracted to recruiting advertisements with an ego‐focused emotional appeal, whereas applicants with collectivist priming were attracted to advertisements with an other‐focused emotional appeal. In addition, both studies revealed that a job applicant's regulatory focus (promotion vs. prevention) mediated the influence of national culture on the relationship between type of emotional appeal and applicant attraction to firms. Practical implications and suggestions for future research also are discussed. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Work—family conflict: A comparison of dual-career and traditional-career men

This research examines differences in the antecedents and consequences of work—family conflict — a form of interrole conflict that occurs when the demands of work and family are mutually incompatible in some respect — for two groups of career-oriented men: those with a homemaker wife (called traditional-career men) and those with a spouse in a career-oriented job (labelled dual-career men). Using a model built on the work of Kopelman, Greenhaus and Connolly (1983), the responses from 136 dual-career men and 137 traditional-career men were compared. The primary conclusion of this research is that maternal career employment has a significant effect on the antecedents of work — family conflict. Dual-career men appear to experience a significant negative spillover from their work domain. We suggest that this spillover is due to a lack of structural flexibility in the workplace, outdated organizational policies that operate on the myth of separate worlds' and a lack of social support for the male dual-career role which contradicts societal norms.     

The multiple ways of behaving creatively in the workplace: A typology and model

Evidence in the literature suggests that employees can engage in other types of creative behavior at work beyond producing something new and useful for their organization. This paper seeks to advance our understanding of these “atypical” creative behaviors. We conceptualize a typology that encompasses both the commonly studied form of employee creativity (conventional steward‐type) and three other types of employee creativity that have not been previously theorized (critical steward‐type, cunning agent‐type, and innocent agent‐type). We then advance a conceptual model to identify situations that may lead employees to use their creative potential one way versus another. Further, we examine the different implications of these creative behaviors for the organization, employee, and society. Our conceptual framework provides a broader perspective of workplace creativity in which a wider range of behaviors, mechanisms, and outcomes must be considered. It provides new directions for future research as well as implications for managing creativity in different organizational and cultural contexts.     

城市河道黑臭水体污染治理技术研究

城市河道黑臭水体对市民生活有严重不良影响,黑臭水体形成复杂、治理难度大。本文通过分析黑臭水体的外源性及内源性成因,明确了黑臭水体来源与治理方向,同时从控源截污、底泥修复、水体净化等方面研究了有效治理城市河道黑臭水体污染的技术,旨在进一步明确其治理策略,以期为有效治理提供参考。     

Railway safety climate: a study on organizational development

The safety climate of an organization is considered a leading indicator of potential risk for railway organizations. This study adopts the perceptual measurement–individual attribute approach to investigate the safety climate of a railway organization. The railway safety climate attributes are evaluated from the perspective of railway system staff. We identify four safety climate dimensions from exploratory factor analysis, namely safety communication, safety training, safety management and subjectively evaluated safety performance. Analytical results indicate that the safety climate differs at vertical and horizontal organizational levels. This study contributes to the literature by providing empirical evidence of the multilevel safety climate in a railway organization, presents possible causes of the differences under various cultural contexts and differentiates between safety climate scales for diverse workgroups within the railway organization. This information can be used to improve the safety sustainability of railway organizations and to conduct safety supervisions for the government.     

When is female leadership an advantage? Coordination requirements,team cohesion,and team interaction norms

This study seeks to understand to what extent and in what contexts women leaders may be advantageous for teams. More specifically, this study examines how team leader gender relates to team cohesion, cooperative learning, and participative communication. Furthermore, the study argues that advantages derived from female leadership may be contingent on teams' coordination requirements. I propose that as teams' coordination requirements increase (i.e., with functional diversity, size, and geographic dispersion), teams with women leaders report more cohesion and more cooperative and participative interaction norms than those with men leaders. I aggregated survey responses from the members of 82 teams in 29 organizations at the team level. Findings from hierarchical linear modeling analyses suggest that female leadership is more positively associated with cohesion on larger and more functionally diverse teams and more positively associated with cooperative learning and participative communication on larger and geographically dispersed teams. These results call for more research on boundary conditions on the relationship between leader gender and team outcomes, on the role of relational leadership on complex and diverse teams and, ultimately, on the potential mediating role of cohesion and team interaction norms on the relationship between leader gender and team performance. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Work as good‐minded undertakings and effortless assignments: Chinese meaning of working for hospitality workers and its motivational implications

Meaning of working (MOW) or the understanding of the purpose of working is a cornerstone in organizational behavior. This study answers the call to explain the MOW in Eastern contexts characterized by interdependent identities. We collect our data from hospitality workers in Taiwan, where Chinese Confucian and Taoist cultural precepts are strong. Our findings reveal that our informants use 25 typical vocabularies of motive in establishing and maintaining five salient identities that gain significance through two Chinese work meanings (i.e., good‐minded undertakings and effortless assignments). These meanings demonstrate the theoretical contributions of our findings to the MOW literature. We also explore the interplay between our emic findings (grounded in Taoism and Confucianism Chinese cultures) with etic motivation theory to advance understanding of prevention and promotion foci.     

城市黑臭水体的产生原因及治理对策

在我国经济发展势头如此迅猛的背景下,城市污染问题日益严重。城市黑臭水体对城市生态环境造成严重影响,如果不能及时进行治理,则会对原有水生态循环系统造成破坏,影响城市居民正常生活。本文首先对城市黑臭水体产生原因进行分析,然后提出有效的治理对策。     

Safety culture and the issue of power

Issues of power and conflict in organizations are rarely addressed in safety culture research. Much safety culture research thus rests upon a harmony model of organizational life. This, it is argued, is a fundamental shortcoming of the existing research. The article discusses the relationship between power-oriented and cultural approaches to organizational safety. The accident with space shuttle Challenger is used as a case, since this accident has been analysed through both approaches.The article argues that issues of culture and power are so intertwined that safety culture research should incorporate perspectives of power and conflict. This is necessary in order to be able to give a realistic account of the dynamics of organizational life. Introducing a more power-oriented view on safety culture can also serve as the basis for important ethical considerations regarding the improvement of safety culture.Finally, it is argued that a safe culture is not necessarily one which is homogenous and free from conflict. Having conflicting views on safety can in fact be a safety resource by serving as a kind of requisite variety that facilitates learning.     

The stress of managerial and professional women: is the price too high?

‘Live as domestic a life as possible. Have your child with you all the time. Lie down an hour after each meal. Have but two hours intellectual life a day. And never touch pen, brush or pencil as long as you live’. Dr S. Weir Mitchell, 1855 When Dr Mitchell, purportedly the greatest North American nerve specialist of his time, gave the above advice to his patient Charlotte Perkins Gilman, he almost certainly believed he was helping her get over a severe nervous condition. Fortunately, she did not take his advice. Instead she devoted herself to the study of economics and regained her health. The perspectives offered to working women by many a modern day Dr Mitchell appear to have changed somewhat in subtlety, but little in kind. For example, the August 18, 1986 cover of Fortune magazine featured a beaming mother and cherubic child illustrating the lead article, entitled ‘Why women are bailing out’. The article goes on to tell why four of the ‘best’ women MBAs had quit the workforce. One stated ‘I had to hire and fire people … I just don't want the hassle’ (of corporate life). Another having passed up a promotion at a Houston bank, ‘quit to have her first child’ and after her second had no plans to go back to work. A third complained: ‘I just couldn't do it. I watched other women sliding as they tried to juggle both career and family, making themselves crazy in the process’. And the fourth left a big accounting firm because the ‘hours were bad, and is now happier as a “part time teacher”’. While the Fortune article mentioned several reasons for women's leaving the corporate world ranging from competing family demands to discrimination, the underlying messages were clearly that mothers have to choose between children and career and that the business world is too cold, uncaring and tough for women, in a word no place for a lady. A chorus of such articles have appeared in the popular media warning against the dangers of career commitment for women, which are said to include everything from burnout, infertility, alcoholism, heart attacks to terminal spinsterhood (Faludi, 1991). More serious treatments emanating from academia have often reached similar conclusions. These dire pronouncements are especially influential to young women contemplating a professional or managerial career, but indeed those already in such careers may also wonder if they have made a bad choice. To answer such questions, this paper will explore some aspects of the relationship between career and emotional health and well-being for a group of highly successful career women.     

Parent driver characteristics associated with sub-optimal restraint of child passengers

OBJECTIVES: To identify parent driver demographic and socioeconomic characteristics associated with the use of sub-optimal restraints for child passengers under nine years. METHODS: Cross-sectional study using in-depth, validated telephone interviews with parent drivers in a probability sample of 3,818 vehicle crashes involving 5,146 children. Sub-optimal restraint was defined as use of forward-facing child safety seats for infants under one or weighing under 20 lbs, and any seat-belt use for children under 9. RESULTS: Sub-optimal restraint was more common among children under one and between four and eight years than among children aged one to three years (18%, 65%, and 5%, respectively). For children under nine, independent risk factors for sub-optimal restraint were: non-Hispanic black parent drivers (with non-Hispanic white parents as reference, adjusted relative risk, adjusted RR = 1.24, 95% CI: 1.09-1.41); less educated parents (with college graduate or above as reference: high school, adjusted RR = 1.27, 95% CI: 1.12-1.44; less than high school graduate, adjusted RR = 1.36, 95% CI: 1.13-1.63); and lower family income (with $50,000 or more as reference: <$20,000, adjusted RR = 1.23, 95% CI: 1.07-1.40). Multivariate analysis revealed the following independent risk factors for sub-optimal restraint among four-to-eight-year-olds: older parent age, limited education, black race, and income below $20,000. CONCLUSIONS: Parents with low educational levels or of non-Hispanic black background may require additional anticipatory guidance regarding child passenger safety. The importance of poverty in predicting sub-optimal restraint underscores the importance of child restraint and booster seat disbursement and education programs, potentially through Medicaid.     

Distributive and procedural justice as predictors of employee outcomes in Hong Kong

This study examines the extent to which employee judgments about distributive and procedural justice predict job satisfaction, intent to stay and evaluation of supervision in Hong Kong. Distributive and procedural justice each plays a role in determining work outcomes of Hong Kong employees. However, some effects of these justice variables differ from results of previous studies in the United States (U.S.). First, in previous U.S. studies, procedural justice moderates the relationship of distributive justice with evaluation of supervision, but not with job satisfaction or intent to stay. For Hong Kong employees, procedural justice moderates the effects of distributive justice on job satisfaction and intent to stay, but not on evaluation of supervision. Second, previous U.S. studies have shown that procedural justice has a larger effect on work outcomes for women, while distributive justice has larger effects on outcomes for men. For Hong Kong employees, the effects of procedural and distributive justice are about the same for men and women. Differences in the effects of distributive and procedural justice between Hong Kong and the U.S. may reflect cultural dimensions, such as collectivism/individualism and power distance, as well as the relative availability of rewards for women in the work force. Practical implications and future research directions are discussed. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

When can culturally diverse teams be more creative? The role of leaders' benevolent paternalism

The current research examines the conditions under which cross‐cultural teams can realize their creative potential—a consequence of their cultural diversity. We propose that in more culturally diverse teams, team members are less open when communicating with each other, which impairs the team's ability to elaborate on the information contributed by different members, ultimately limiting team creativity. We further theorize that leaders' benevolent paternalism, a leadership style that is particularly prevalent in East Asian contexts, can reduce the negative consequence of intercultural diversity on intercultural communication openness. On the basis of multiwave, multisource data from 48 culturally diverse teams in China, we found that perceived intercultural diversity is negatively related to intercultural communication openness, which, in turn, is positively related to information elaboration, and ultimately, team creativity. Leader benevolent paternalism attenuates the negative relationship between intercultural diversity and intercultural communication openness. These findings enrich the literature on intercultural diversity by calling attention to communication‐related obstacles.     

Prevalence of work-family conflict: Are work and family boundaries asymmetrically permeable?

This study tested Pleck's (1977) hypothesis concerning gender differences in the relative permeability of work and family boundaries. Data were obtained from a randomly drawn community sample of 631 employed adults (278 men; 353 women). Respondents reported that work interfered with family life (W→F conflict) more frequently than family life interfered with work (F→W conflict). These results suggest that work and family boundaries are indeed asymmetrically permeable with family boundaries being more permeable than work boundaries. However, there was no evidence of gender differences in the pattern of asymmetry, indicating that the dynamics of work and family boundaries may operate similarly among men and women. Implications for future research are discussed.     

Going beyond work and family: A longitudinal study on the role of leisure in the work–life interplay

Going beyond the relation of work and family, the present three‐wave longitudinal study spanning one year assessed different forms of conflict and facilitation between leisure and the life domains work and family and their relation to subjective well‐being. A sample of N = 277 employed men and women reported their perceived conflict and facilitation between leisure, work, and family and subjective well‐being. Results suggest that leisure is a source of facilitation for work and family, and, at the same time, a major recipient of conflict from work and family. Moreover, leisure conflict was negatively correlated and leisure facilitation was positively associated with concurrent subjective well‐being. Both conflict and facilitation between all three life domains remained highly stable over the course of one year. Only few and non‐systematic lagged effects were found, indicating that the variance of the stability of the constructs and their relations over time leave little room for longitudinal predictions. Taken together, the study demonstrates that, similar to work–family relations, conflict and facilitation with the leisure domain are also associated with subjective well‐being and remain highly stable over the course of a year in the lives of young and middle‐aged adults. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Integrating race and adult psychosocial development

The biographical interview method was used to study the lives of 10 black male entrepreneurs. The findings of this investigation supported Levinson's theory of developmental periods. The concept of evolving life structure was found to be vibrant and viable. Because of the impact of racial dynamics and racism, on the men's lives, two new developmental tasks of adult psychosocial development are proposed: (1) to form an individual racial identity that both acknowledges and frees the individual of their own racism and prejudices, and (2) to form an individual self-concept dedicated to the eradication of racial discrimination and racial prejudice from society.     

Work schedule flexibility and family life

This paper explores the implications of work schedule flexibility for family life. Based on data from the 1977 Quality of Employment Survey, it demonstrates that flexibility of work schedules moderates the effects of nonstandard work schedules on family life. That is, nonstandard work schedules tend to have a less negative association with the quality of family life when accompanied by a high level of schedule flexibility. The paper further demonstrates that this tendency of flexibility to act as a buffer against the negative effects of nonstandard work schedules on family life is more pronounced among working women than working men.