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Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of work characteristics on members' self-efficacy and collective efficacy, and the subsequent effect on police officers' performance. Design/methodology/approach – A multilevel model is adopted to analyze quantitative data obtained by using 812 police officers and 54 chiefs of police stations in Taiwan as the research objects. Findings – The authors found that work characteristics affected members' self-efficacy and collective efficacy, which further affected the individual- and group-level performance and the contextual effect of social work characteristics (SWCs) and collective efficacy on self-efficacy and individual performance. The authors also confirmed the cross-level moderation of social characteristics on the relationship between motivational work characteristics (MWCs) and self-efficacy, and between self-efficacy and individual performance. Research limitations/implications – A limitation was the characteristics of the sample, which consisted of mostly first-line uniformed police officers in Taiwan. From the perspective of managerial implications, it is felt that police organizations should beef up the training on police officers' collective efficacy, such as building group spirit, improving members' sense of responsibility, and building up trust with the organization. Originality/value – The findings prove that the study of work design is particularly important for enhancing the management effectiveness of police organization, because it explains the causes of a number of organizational behaviors as well as a number of important results that influence the police organization (e.g. efficacy and performance). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public security, traffic management, and service for the people are the 3 major functions of policing in Taiwan. This definition encompasses not only the traditional job characteristics, but also the level of contextual characteristics and social characteristics because of police work's characteristics and its frequent interaction with the public. Thus, the present study conducted a multilevel model analysis by taking self-efficacy and collective efficacy as the mediating variables. The purpose was to investigate the influences of motivational work characteristics (knowledge-oriented) and social work characteristics (socially and contextually oriented) of work-design model on the police officers' organizational citizenship behavior (OCB), by using first-line police officers in Taiwan as the research objects. The study showed not only that knowledge characteristics will influence the self-efficacy of a police officer and that self-efficacy can in turn influence individual police officers' OCB, but also the contextual effect of social characteristics, contextual characteristics, and collective efficacy on self-efficacy and individuals' OCB. Additionally, there was a crosslevel moderating effect from contextual characteristics on the relationship between knowledge characteristics and self-efficacy and the relationship between self-efficacy and the individuals' OCB. The authors conclude the article with research implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]