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Correlational analyses of data from 126 Chinese business students in 32 learning groups showed that groups with cooperative goals engaged in more constructive controversy. Those with competitive or independent goals had fewer open discussions. Groups engaged in constructive controversy rated themselves as more innovative and loyal. (Contains 31 references,) (SK)

Employees' ability to explore and exploit is a micro-foundational component of organizational ambidexterity and hugely influential for organizational performance outcomes. However, little research has directly examined the relationship between exploration and exploitation with a performance at the individual-level. Building on the hierarchical dynamic capability perspective of ambidexterity, we investigate how employee exploration and exploitation affect task performance. We argue that employees' ability to explore enhances task performance through employee exploitation. Furthermore, drawing on the strategic fit perspective, we examine how this employee exploration-exploitation-task performance relationship varies across different levels of organizational competitive orientation. Using a sample of 278 employees from three IT companies in China, our findings demonstrate that both employee exploration and exploitation have a positive effect on task performance, and employee exploitation acts as an effective mechanism which partially explains the relationship between employee exploration and task performance. Notably, we also find that the path relationship of employee exploration-exploitation-task performance is stronger when competitive orientation is low rather than high. Theoretical and managerial implications of these findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers have traditionally distinguished leaders by the extent to which they are oriented to people and productivity, and meta-analytic results indicate that these orientations have consistent and practically important effects. But research is needed to understand the dynamics by which these orientations induce team effectiveness. This study empirically relates leader orientations to teamwork by suggesting that productivity- and people-oriented leaders develop cooperative goals among team members that in turn results in team effectiveness. A total of 146 team leaders from 21 organizations in China completed measures of productivity and people orientations and their encouraging cooperative goals among team members; 1067 team members rated their effectiveness. Results of the structural equation analysis support the theorizing that leader productivity and people values when complemented by strengthening cooperative relationships can contribute to making teams effective in China and perhaps in other countries as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The form of corruption evolves in the continuous games with anti-corruption. With the change of institutional environment caused by corruption, a salient symptom of corruption in current China is its fission: corruption spreads from individuals to groups and then to the whole organization, from lower-level administrators to higher-level leaders according to the managerial logic. In essence, corruption fission is an on-going process during which the corrupt actors produce and reproduce the corruption networks by committing illegal interest exchanges. This article develops a social exchange analysis to this phenomenon and attempts to answer two basic questions: why and how corruption in China takes on a form of fission. Social exchange theory, to some extent, integrates and complements the rational choice perspective, the organizational institutional perspective and the social network perspective, providing a relatively complete theoretical framework to explain the dynamics and tactics underpinning the corruption fission. Two main dynamics have been identified, namely the internal dynamic and the external dynamic. Specifically, the internal dynamic, regarding the corrupt actors as the fission initiators, demonstrates that they tend to embed themselves into the multi-level corruption networks by seeking for the cover-up and assimilating the immediate colleagues, so as to establish offensive and defensive alliances to make their illegal exchange safer. By contrast, the external dynamic, seeing the corrupt actors as the diffusion receivers, indicates that those who are embedded in the family or acquaintance networks and restricted by the ethical norms of quanzi, e. g. responsibility and renqing, tend to adopt a view of exceptionalism to maintain and expand the improper interest of the quanzi members. To realise the corruption fission, however, it also needs multiple tactics to effectively couple the above two dynamics. The corrupt actors adopt differing exchange tactics based on the stage characteristics of the corruption fission. The corruption fission consists of four stages, i. e. choosing the exchange actors, investing in the exchange relationship, balancing the exchange power and finally establishing the exchange order. Therefore, corrupt actors choose the corrupt exchange parties through risk assessment and tentative social exchange tactics, enter into the "my family" quanzi through simulant-intimate and service penetration tactics and enhance the awareness of interest community through coexistence tactics. A corrupt exchange order is the result of the comprehensive use of those tactics. This micro social order generates self-support norms and logics, which, in turn, facilitate the institutionalization of the corruption fission. To curb the corruption fission in China, it requires integrated measures. Firstly, it hinges on the perfection of the power restriction and supervision system that aims to avoid overconcentration of power and secure the publicity of decision-making. Secondly, we must enhance the corruption cost and implement the consistent punishments on the briber and bribee. Thirdly, the rule of law should be promoted to prevent the permeation of kinship and renqing to the public power area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Psychological safety has been shown to facilitate learning from experience that can help organizations adapt to the changing marketplace. Shared rewards and cooperative, but not competitive and independent, goals may help department members feel supported and able to discuss open-mindedly their experiences, including mistakes, and learn from them. One hundred and twenty five CEOs and 436 executives from 125 companies in China completed measures of psychological safety, goal interdependence, and shared rewards. The results of two structural equation analyses suggest that shared rewards can convince departments that their goals are cooperative and that this conclusion in turn leads to psychological safety. These results were interpreted as suggesting that shared rewards and cooperative goals are important foundations for organizational psychological safety in China and perhaps other countries as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Any political or administrative activity can be separated into decision-making, execution and supervision, and correspondingly, power can be divided into the power of decision-making, the power of execution and the power of supervision. According to this classic framework of trisection, corruption falls into the corruption in decision-making, the corruption in execution and the corruption in supervision. Among them, the corruption in decision-making refers to the deviation of the exercise of public power from public interest in decision-making. Specifically, in the process of decision-making in law and/or policy, development planning, the selection and appointment of officials, public investment, and so on, the decision maker disobeys public interest or gains an unfair advantage for its own interest or for the stakeholders. It is not only distinguished from decision errors by its subjective factor, but also different in their objective performance from corruption in execution and supervision, such as authority and effectiveness. The current tough corruption issue faced by our party and government has much to do with those "leaders" who are mainly responsible for decision-making, indicating the lack of corruption control in China's current decision-making system. Therefore, the effective control of corruption in decision-making is of great significance to solve the problem of party and government leaders' corruption. Under the framework of In-Out system analysis, the absence of restriction and supervision mechanism at the input side, within-system and output side of the present decision-making system has left institutionalized space for the realization of improper self-interest and led to the corruption in decision. For this reason, the public-interest-oriented mechanism for power restriction and supervision should be established and strengthened because it can facilitate the constraint of decision-making power and form a complete chain of supervision in order to squeeze as much institutionalized space of self-service as possible. What is more important is to open up institutionalized channels for the public interest to merge into the decision-making system so as to maximize the public interest and to realize the clean and efficient governance of the decision-making process. To be more specific, at the input end, the expression mechanism of public interest should be improved to curb the interest groups' control of the public policy agenda; within the decision-making system, a sound decision-making mechanism should be designed to integrate public interests and to prevent unauthorized access to private interests; and at the output end, especially in the choice of decisions, a democratic resolution mechanism should exert its full impact. This corruption governance, which is based on the control of the decision-making process, is an effective way to supervise the "leaders" in our current system. The position of the "leaders " determines the difficulty of monitoring them. Controlling the decision-making process will transform the supervision of leaders (people) into the supervision of decision-making (things), thus transforming the focus on "things" to that on "people." This is undoubtedly of great significance to the avoidance of the negative impact of supervision caused by authority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Employees from different departments of an organization often do not have the relationships and interaction patterns that facilitate integrating and applying their knowledge together. This study proposes that departments that develop collectivist rather than individualist relationships engage in constructive controversy (CC) and share knowledge. Results using data from CEOs and Vice Presidents of various industries and regions of China suggested that collectivist but not individualistic values promote open-minded discussion of views which results in knowledge sharing. Coupled with previous research, these results suggest that collectivist values and CC provide an important foundation for productive knowledge management in organizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Organizational values of people and respect and interdependent structures of team procedures and task interdependence may help departments believe their goals are cooperative and thereby coordinate effectively. CEOs in China completed measures of their organization’s values and interdependent structures and their Vice-Presidents completed measures of the department’s goal interdependence (cooperative, competitive, and independent) and collaborative effectiveness. Structural equation analysis suggested that values and interdependent structures promote cooperative, but not competitive or independent, goals that in turn results in collaborative effectiveness. These results, coupled with previous research, were interpreted as suggesting that people and respect values, team procedures, task interdependence, and cooperative goals are complementary foundations for synergy in China and perhaps other countries as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study proposes that when top management team members are convinced that their leader is committed to people and productivity, they conclude that their leader is effective and contribute to making their organization innovative. Cooperative goals among top management team members may be credible evidence that their leader has people and production values. Executives from over 100 organizations in China completed measures of their cooperative, competitive, and independent goals, their leader's people and production values, and their leader's effectiveness. CEOs from these firms rated their organization's innovativeness. Structural equation analysis suggested that cooperative goals among top management teams convince them that their leader values people and production and that these values in turn result in leader effectiveness and organizational innovation. Results, coupled with previous research, were interpreted as suggesting that cooperative goals and leader people and production values are foundations for leader and top management team effectiveness in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, the authors used the theory of cooperation and competition to identify conditions that promote student team innovation. Through an investigation of student teams in Beijing, China, the authors found that teams with cooperative goals engaged in open-minded, constructive controversy, whereas teams with independent goals avoided open discussion. Teams with a high level of constructive controversy rated themselves as innovative and loyal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Cell-free fetal DNA (cffDNA) has opened up new approaches for non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT), and it is often used as the second-tier test for high-risk pregnant women in detecting trisomy (T) 21, T18, and T13 after serum biochemistry screening. This study aims to discuss the clinical performance of NIPT as an alternative first-tier screening test for pregnant women in detecting T21, T18, T13, and sex chromosome aneuploidies (SCAs) in China., Methods: A total of 42,924 samples were recruited. The cell-free plasma DNA was directly sequenced. Each of the chromosome aneuploidies of PPV was analyzed. A total of 22 placental samples were acquired, including 14 FP and 8 TP samples. The placental verification of FP NIPT results was performed., Results: Among 42,924 samples, 281 (0.65%) positive cases, including 87 of T21, 31 of T18, 22 of T13, and 141 of SCAs were detected. For the detection of T21, the positive predictive value (PPV) was 78.46%, for trisomy 18, 62.96%, for trisomy 13, 10.00%, for SCAs, 47.22% in the total samples. For trisomy 21, the PPV was 86.67%, for trisomy 18, 80.00%, for trisomy 13, 20.00%, for SCAs, 56.52% in advanced maternal age (AMA) women. The PPV of T21 increased with age. For T18, the PPV showed an overall upward trend. For T13 and SCAs, PPV was raised first and then lowered. Placental verification of false positive (FP) NIPT results confirmed confined placental mosaicism(CPM) was the reason for false positives., Conclusions: This study represents the first time that NIPT has been used as a first-tier screening test for fetal aneuploidies in a pilot city with large clinical samples in China. We propose that NIPT could replace serum biochemistry screening as a first-tier test.