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Although political skill has attracted scholars’ notice as an important moderator, its main effects and functional mechanisms of political skill have been less explored. Drawing on Conservation of ...

This quantitative review explored the political skill construct and its predictive ability across a number of organizational outcomes. First, we extended the Ferris et al. meta-theoretical framework of political skill. Next, incorporating meta-analysis, we found political skill is positively related to self-efficacy, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, work productivity, organizational citizenship behavior (OCB), career success, and personal reputation, and negatively related to physiological strain. Political skill was not significantly related to psychological strain or perceptions of organizational politics. Using meta-regression and dominance analyses, political skill predicted task performance after controlling for the Big Five personality characteristics and general mental ability. In a test of indirect relationships, our results suggest that personal reputation and self-efficacy partially mediate the political skill–task performance relationship. Finally, in a post hoc test of political skill dimensions, we found that networking ability, interpersonal influence, and apparent sincerity (but not social astuteness) predicted task performance. Our findings provide a comprehensive assessment of theory and research to date on political skill and extend theoretical foundations to stimulate new inquiry into the operation of this important construct.

Reviewers and researchers have been investigating response to student writing for several decades. To what extent have these research findings influenced teachers’ real-world practices? Beyond investigating teachers’ mechanisms for providing feedback, this study aimed to examine what is behind those choices: What principles guide teachers, and how were those philosophies formed? Do their practices appear to be consistent with their views about response? The teachers’ voices have been the missing link in the research base to date. There have been surveys of student opinion about response and text analyses of teachers’ comments, but only rarely have teachers themselves been utilized as primary informants in studies on response. The present study utilized a mixed-methods approach to examine the research questions. A team of researchers surveyed (N = 129) and interviewed (N = 23) community college and university writing instructors from the same geographic region—volunteers who had responded to an online survey—about a wide range of practices and analyzed examples (3–5 texts per interview participant) of these informants’ written responses to students. The results showed variation across instructors and some discontinuity between teachers’ self-reported response principles and their actual practices, as demonstrated in their own written commentary.

Historically, organizational politics and political leader behavior have been framed and characterized negatively, as self-serving and counter-productive. However, scholars have noted that political acts can achieve positive ends, and have called for further discussions of positive forms of political leadership. Continuing in this recent stream of research on positive perspectives on organizational politics, a framework of leader political support is proposed, suggesting that the positive features of leader political behavior, and testable propositions are developed. The leader political support construct is defined and its antecedents are explicated utilizing a social capital perspective. Additionally, social exchange theory is used to explain the consequences of leader political support. Contributions to both leadership and organizational politics literatures and directions for future research are discussed.

Summary Although the passion that people demonstrate at work would appear to be a topic of considerable interest and importance to organizational scholars and practitioners, we know virtually nothing about it. In response, we introduce the work passion construct, discuss what we currently understand, and provide needed directions for future research. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Although research to date has established the criterion validity of work engagement, little research has examined relevant boundary conditions capable of altering its documented positive effects on important workplace outcomes, despite widespread appeals to do so (e.g. Parker and Griffin, 2011). In the present four-sample investigation, a competing hypotheses format was adopted, pitting against each other perspectives of ‘politics as a hindrance stressor’ and ‘politics as a challenge stressor’ as moderators of work engagement–work outcomes relationships (e.g. job tension, job satisfaction, work intensity, job performance). Cross-sample findings demonstrated that organizational politics perceptions strengthened positive work engagement–work outcomes relationships, such that engaged individuals were less stressed, more satisfied, worked with greater intensity and exhibited greater performance when they perceived their job environments to be political. This series of results affirms the challenge/opportunity stressor properties of politics perceptions for individuals more actively involved in their jobs and workplaces. Cross-disciplinary implications of these results for theory and practice, strengths and limitations, and directions for future research are provided.

This study examined two potential mediators through which leaders transmit their position power into an effectiveness outcome. Drawing upon recent work integrating trait, situational, and behavioral theories of leadership effectiveness, we hypothesized and tested a model specifying that the interactive effects of leader position power and leader political skill on follower satisfaction would be mediated by followers’ perceptions of leaders’ initiating structure and consideration behaviors. Specifically, this model indicates that leaders who are both in powerful positions and politically skilled are perceived to initiate more structure and demonstrate more consideration for their followers than their nonpolitically skilled counterparts, which, in turn, positively impacts followers’ satisfaction (i.e., an indication of subjective leadership effectiveness). Utilizing 190 leaders and 476 followers, we found support for the hypothesized model. Contributions to various literatures, strengths, limitations, and practical implications are discussed.

In this study, the controversial issue of written corrective feedback (WCF) is examined through a longitudinal (16-week semester) multiple-case study approach. Ten L2 writers (from “Generation 1.5” backgrounds) in a developmental ESL writing class at a U.S. university wrote four in-class texts, revised them after receiving WCF, and participated in retrospective interviews after each of the first three writing and revision sessions. Data collected included student background questionnaires (N = 10), four student texts (originals plus revisions) per participant (N = 40), recordings and field notes from interviews with participants (N = 30), and recordings and notes from an end-of-semester interview with the classroom teacher. Analyses focused primarily on students’ descriptions of their own self-monitoring processes as they revised marked papers and wrote new texts and individual and contextual factors that appeared to influence their writing development. Students found the techniques used in the study (focused WCF, revision, and one-to-one discussion about errors) useful, but formal knowledge of language rules played a limited and sometimes even counterproductive role in their self-editing and composing. Our findings suggest that teachers should take a more finely tuned approach to corrective feedback and that future research designs investigating WCF should go beyond consideration of only students’ written products.

The present investigation was a three-source test of the intermediate linkages in the leader political skill–leader effectiveness and follower satisfaction relationships, which examined transformational and transactional (i.e., contingent reward behavior) leader behavior as mediators. Data from 408 leaders (headmasters) and 1429 followers (teachers) of state schools in the western part of Germany participated in this research. The results of mediation analyses, based on bias-corrected bootstrapping confidence intervals, provided support for the hypotheses that political skill predicts both transformational and transactional leader behavior, beyond other established predictors, and that transformational and transactional leader behavior mediate the relationships between leader political skill and leadership effectiveness. The contributions to theory and research, strengths and limitations, directions for future research, and practical implications are discussed.

There has been no more fundamental concept in the field of industrial and organizational (I–O) psychology than “employability,” whereby individuals seek to gain and retain jobs with organizations, and organizations desire to attract and keep quality employees. Indeed, theory, research, and practice in the field continually have sought to identify the best predictors of performance and career success. Expansion of the predictor and criterion domains has been a focus of scholarly and practical concern for at least the past couple of decades, as we have realized that the fundamental nature of work, jobs, and organization have changed considerably in U.S. organizations.

What comes to mind when you hear the term underemployment? Does a slight, disapproving frown purse your lips? Does pity flood your heart? Or do forgotten mental notations to study the topic permeate your brain? Although we are intimately familiar with unemployment and its effects, we are much less aware of underemployment and its impact on people and organizations. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, in January 2012, underemployment was estimated to affect more than 10 million people in the American civilian labor force. Its magnitude suggests that underemployment is a significant issue for all involved. By combining practical experiences from an outplacement firm (Right Management, headed by our second author) and what we have learned from academic research, we herein describe five types of underemployment, discuss widely held assumptions about the issue, and offer suggestions regarding ways that organizations might harness the power of this economy-wide phenomenon.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The Moon Pie is an icon in the American South, where both its image and its taste evoke memories of country stores and their agrarian worlds. If we Google Moon Pies, 3,060,000 references appear on subjects that range from art and literature to festivals, recipes, and astrology. In his entry on "Moon Pies" in the Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, Tom Rankin explains that the Chattanooga Bakery in Chattanooga marketed the product as "the original marshmallow sandwich." The delicacy consists of "one quarter inch of marshmallow sandwiched between two cookies about four inches in diameter." The sandwich is then "coated with chocolate, banana, coconut, and vanilla frosting." (1) Earl Mitchell invented the moon pie in 1919 when he worked for the Chattanooga Bakery. While visiting a company store at a coal mine in Kentucky, Mitchell asked miners what kind of cookie they would like in their lunch pails. They said they preferred a big one. Mitchell then asked what size the cookie should be, and the miners pointed to the moon. His son Ed Mitchell Jr. recalls: Moon Pie was a big seller, especially in the coal fields where they didn't make much money. And when they bought something, they wanted to get the best bargain. And there they were getting a great big pie for a nickel. I'm sorry dad didn't patent that thing. I'd have a Cadillac on each foot. (2) To explore how the Moon Pie has shaped the lives of southerners on a personal level, a few years ago I spoke by phone with several friends who generously offered their thoughts about the tasty treat and its importance in their lives. Each speaker is a distinguished figure whose work on the American South is well known, and they responded warmly to the topic. (3) AUTHOR LEE SMITH ON MOON PIES, WHOOPIE PIES, AND HER CHILDHOOD FAMILY TRIPS: I have always loved them. We always ate them as children, and when I think about them I have fond memories. We took our lunch to school, because we never had school lunches. And we had a lot of Moon Pies in our lunches. We took them on car trips because they were all wrapped up in their little wrappers. At a certain point, when everybody in the car would start getting really loud, we would get out the Moon Pies. In Maine, we noticed an enormously popular thing that is regarded as a particularly "Maine" item: the Whoopie Pie. A Whoopie Pie looks like a giant Moon Pie. They are the size of a small cake--not real high like a layer cake. It has two fairly dense chocolate layers with a mixture in between that is very like the mixture in a Moon Pie. There are several famous roadside diners that specialize in their version of the Whoopie Pie. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] THE LATE DOUG MARLETTE, AUTHOR AND CARTOONIST, ON HOW MOON PIES ARE MORE THAN A CLICHE: Over the years, Mr. Campbell, the president of Moon Pies, would send me big cases of Moon Pies in New York. I introduced a lot of New Yorkers to the marshmallow treat. I have a novel [Magic Time, 2006] that is set in Mississippi, and I have a minor incident involving Moon Pies that I couldn't resist putting in because it is just such a part of a backdrop, it has become a cliche. How do you infuse cliches with meaning? That has become my entire job as a cartoonist. Moon Pies are one of those things that we all think we know. I try to do that in the cartoon and in the novel. It was funny in the Northeast, in New York, to see the reaction because they had never seen Moon Pies. I had Moon Pies falling from the sky, which was inspired by [the cartoonist and satirist] R. Crumb. It is kind of like kudzu. It has a mysterious, mystical quality. It is like a Rorschach test. I am attracted to these things as a professional purveyor of metaphors and symbols. These are all larger than life, more than the sum of the parts. They are more than marshmallow and cake. My new novel is set in the Civil Rights period in Mississippi, and I have one of the main characters, a guy who is down from Detroit, become addicted to Moon Pies during his stay. …

Although the concept of duty has a historic and philosophical foundations dating back to Aristotle, there is very little theory and research in this area of scientific inquiry. In an effort to address this lack of scholarship, a theoretical foundation and a model are presented that clearly delineate the construct of duty, and the nature of its development within an individual-organization relationship. Using social exchange theory and the three-component model of organizational commitment as the conceptual foundations, the proposed duty development model explains the individual-level antecedents and the phases of commitment that individuals may progress through during their tenure in an organization. The various types of exchanges and transactions inherent in the social exchange theory provide the basis for each phase of commitment individuals experience. It is proposed that certain antecedents make individuals more likely to form a sense of duty toward an organization, but the development of this type of relationship requires an organization to focus on commitment building efforts, such as perceived organizational support and organizational culture. Contributions to theory and research, organizational implications, and directions for future research are discussed.

Certain winter annual weeds have been documented as alternative hosts to soybean cyst nematode (SCN), and infestations by such species are common in no-till production fields in the midwestern United States of Indiana, Ohio, and Illinois. The objective of this research was to determine the influence of crop rotation and winter annual weed management on winter weed growth, SCN population density, and crop yield. Two crop rotations (SS and soybean–corn rotation) and six winter annual weed-management systems (autumn-applied herbicide, spring-applied herbicide, autumn + spring applied herbicides, autumn-seeded Italian ryegrass, autumn-seeded wheat, and a nontreated check) were evaluated in long-term, no-tillage systems at West Lafayette, IN, and Vincennes, IN. In the fourth and fifth years of these experiments, the 2-yr corn–soybean rotation generally resulted in increased soybean yield, decreased winter annual weed growth, and reduced SCN population density compared with SS. Autumn or spring herbicide applications or both were a more effective option than cover crops at reducing winter annual weed density. Cover-crop systems generally did not differ from the nontreated check in winter weed density. Between years three and five, winter annual weed SCN hosts in nontreated check plots increased approximately threefold to levels as high as 102 and 245 plants m−2 at West Lafayette, IN, and Vincennes, IN, respectively, which are infestation levels at or above those commonly observed in production fields. However, controlling winter annual weeds did not influence crop yields or SCN population density. The results of these studies suggest that winter weed management, even at the high levels of weed infestation present in these studies, appears to have little value as a tool for SCN management in corn and soybean production systems in the midwestern United States.

Sternidius alpha (Say) was previously recognized as having several subspecies that were subsequently synonymized. We examined two variants of S. alpha that seem to be morphologically similar except for their color. Specimens of S. alpha collected in Indiana show two different common color patterns depending on the locality. DNA was extracted from 14 individuals. Phylogenetic analysis using a 648 bp partial sequence from the barcoding region of the cytochrome oxidase I gene revealed three different clades.

PurposeAlthough reputation is important to career success, little is known about how individuals develop their personal reputation at work. This study seeks to investigate the role of work relationship quality and citizenship behavior as partial mediators of the political skill‐personal reputation relationship.Design/methodology/approachIn total, 145 triads from a manufacturer in the Midwestern USA provided data for the study. Employees rated their political skill and citizenship behavior, supervisors rated their relationship quality, and coworkers rated the employees' personal reputation. Based on the complementary theories of signaling and social exchange, the relationships between the constructs were analyzed with structural equation modeling.FindingsPolitical skill demonstrated both direct and indirect effects on the development of personal reputation. In particular, work relationship quality and citizenship behavior partially mediated the relationship between political skill and personal reputation.Research limitations/implicationsPersonal reputation was evaluated by a randomly selected coworker, but a collection of perceptions would be helpful.Practical implicationsPolitical skill training and/or mentoring relationships may help individuals manage their personal reputation at work, thus benefiting their careers.Social implicationsThis study focused on personal reputation in a work environment. However, the results also may be useful to individuals in different types of organizations.Originality/valueThis is one of the first studies to investigate how individuals develop their personal reputation at work. Unlike previous research that used self‐evaluations of personal reputation, this study used peer evaluations, which is more appropriate for the construct.

Grounded in leader–member exchange, social exchange, political skill and influence theories, the present two-study investigation tests the model that leader political skill is related to both leader and follower effectiveness through leader–follower relationship quality. It is hypothesized that leader political skill is associated with leader effectiveness (Study 1) and follower effectiveness (Study 2) through relationship quality. The results support the hypotheses and were constructively replicated in Study 2, contributing to theory that leader political skill enhances relationship quality, which then ultimately affects leader and follower effectiveness relationships. Strengths, limitations, directions for future research, and implications for practice are discussed.

Written corrective feedback, referred to hereafter as ‘written CF’ and also known as ‘grammar correction’ or ‘error correction’, has been a controversial topic in second language studies over the past fifteen years. Inspired by John Truscott's thought-provoking 1996 essay inLanguage Learning, many different researchers have undertaken new programs of investigation, while others have engaged in scholarly synthesis and argumentation around the topic.

Bursaphelenchus xylophilus and Bursaphelenchus mucronatus are migratory endoparasitic nematodes that live in pine trees. To gain insight into their molecular similarities and differences, transcriptomes of the two nematodes were analysed. A total of 23,765 and 21,782 contigs (> 300 bp) were obtained from B. xylophilus and B. mucronatus, respectively. More than 80% of the contigs could map to each other's transcriptome reciprocally. A total of 23,467 and 21,370 Open Reading Frames were predicted, respectively. Besides those known parasitism-related proteins, six new venom allergen-like proteins (VAPs) were found, which were not homologous to known VAPs. Enzymes involved in xenobiotic biodegradation were abundant in the two transcriptomes based on KEGG functional annotation. Metabolism of xenobiotics by cytochrome P450 comprised the main detoxification pathways. The mRNA expression levels of detoxification genes in nematodes living in the host were higher than those in nematodes feeding on fungus. However, there were fewer enzymes involved in the α-pinene degradation. Our results indicate that the two pinewood nematodes have evolved similar molecular mechanisms to adapt to life on pine hosts.

We characterized coldwater stream fish community response to habitat degradation and channelization for agriculture. Coldwater streams are not common in the lower midwestern United States, and these streams differ from warmwater streams with respect to their diversity and community response to degradation. Six sites were sampled on the coldwater Mac-o-chee Creek in Ohio. Three reaches were classified as geomorphically constrained (by a roadway) and three as recovering (unconstrained and not channelized or cleaned for more than 100 y). Within each reach 31 mesohabitat units were sampled and were delineated as riffles, runs, or pools. Our goals were: (1) to examine how habitat and geomorphic impairment influences the abundance and community structure of coldwater fishes; and (2) to test whether the constraints on recovery from channelization were more influential in structuring communities than mesohabitat types. Our hypothesis was that we would find lower species diversity overall in the recoverin...

This research expands the study of political skill, a construct developed in North America, to other cultures. We examine the psychometric properties of the Political Skill Inventory (PSI) and test the measurement equivalence of the scale in a non-American context. Respondents were 1511 employees from China, Germany, Russia, Turkey, and the United States. The cross-cultural generalizability of the construct is established through consistent evidence of multi-group invariance in an increasingly stringent series of analyses of mean and covariance structures. Overall, the study provides systematic evidence that political skill can be treated as a stable construct among diverse cultural groups. Furthermore, our findings demonstrate that translated PSI measures operationalize the construct similarly. With some exceptions, the item loadings and intercepts are invariant for the US and non-US responses, suggesting partial measurement equivalence. After verifying the accuracy of item translation, we conclude that any differences can be explained by variation in the cultural value of uncertainly avoidance and cultural differences on a low-to-high context continuum. Detected dissimilarities are addressed, and some suggestions regarding the correct use across borders of the instrument by managers and researchers are provided.

The recruitment and selection of human resources represent the most important activities in which organizations of all types engage. However, there is much scholars still need to know about the predictors of recruitment effectiveness. Using a sample of Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) university football coaches ( N = 175) and their recruiting outcomes, the authors hypothesized that recruiting effectiveness is specifically affected by the individual qualities of the recruiters, in addition to the past performance of the team under the current head coach. The results supported the hypothesis, demonstrating that the interaction of recruiter political skill and head coach performance explained significant variance in recruitment effectiveness. Implications of these results and directions for future research are discussed.

There is perhaps no more important dyadic relationship than that between a leader and a follower. Nonetheless, few studies examine the implications of both leader and follower power on important work outcomes. Therefore, using resource dependence and role theories, the authors examined the process by which leader power affects important work outcomes, namely, work relationship quality and job tension, through met relationship expectations. Additionally, the authors suggest that the leader power–met expectations relationship is conditional on follower power. A state agency was sampled to obtain and analyze 100 leader–follower work relationship dyads, whereby both dyadic partners were surveyed. Results indicated that leader power affected both leader–follower relationship quality and job tension through followers’ met relationship expectations. However, contrary to our hypothesis, the leader power–met expectations relationship was not conditional on follower power. Contributions of this study, strengths and limitations, and directions for future research are discussed.

We developed and tested the conditions under which team member change results in flux in team coordination and consequently affects team performance. Results showed that team member change caused high levels of flux in coordination when a member changed to a more strategically core role, or there was low information transfer during the change. Furthermore, coupling strategic “core role holder” change with the relative cognitive ability of a new member was associated with even greater levels of flux in coordination.

PurposeA labor union's strength is a crucial factor when considering outcomes such as its constituents' empowerment. One of the most important goals of any labor union is to achieve increased balance‐of‐power between the labor and management groups; hence, union strength is an accomplishment of this fundamental aim. It follows that stronger unions, measured by their perceived effectiveness in dealing with management, will contain more empowered constituents. Previous union‐related research typically considered employee empowerment at the group‐level of analysis (e.g. improved work rules, pay, and benefits for entire groups of employees). The purpose of this paper is to propose and test hypotheses on the relationship between perceived union strength, a micro‐ or workplace‐level analog of union bargaining power, and perceptions of shared leader‐member expectations using supervisor‐subordinate dyads as a unit of analysis.Design/methodology/approachWorking adults across the USA were sampled (n=347), through the use of a survey software company that makes survey panels commercially available. Respondents were racially/ethnically diverse, with a mean age of about 41 years (range of 18 to over 62 years), and slightly more females than males (about 65 percent female). Also, about 13.5 percent were members of a labor union.FindingsEmployees who belonged to more powerful unions (i.e. compared to employees who belonged to less powerful unions) demonstrated increased shared‐leadership expectations with their supervisors. In support of Hypothesis 1, non‐union employees also possessed increased shared leadership expectations in comparison to union workers where the union was perceived as weak. As proposed in Hypothesis 2, unions perceived as strong produced more empowered constituents relative to unions perceived as weak. Finally, non‐union employees did not appear to differ in shared‐leadership expectations from employees perceiving strong unions, contrary to Hypothesis 3.Originality/valueA contribution of the present study is to show that unions also have significant connections with supervisor‐subordinate relations (i.e. shared leadership), and that simply having a unionized workplace does not guarantee increased employee empowerment; unions must also be strong.

The blending of oral traditions, visual arts, and music has influenced how Southern writers shape their region's narrative voice. In the South, writing and storytelling intersect. Mark Twain introduced readers to these storytellers in “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.” Twain blends both black and white voices within Huck's consciousness and awareness – in Huck's speech and thoughts – and in his dialogues with Jim. A narrative link exists between the South's visual artists and writers; Southern writers, after all, live in the most closely seen region in America. The spiritual, gospel, and rock and roll are musical genres that Southern writers love – although jazz, blues, and ballads might have the most influence on their work. Southern poets and scholars have produced anthologies, textbooks, and literary journals that focus on the region's narrative voice and its black and white literary traditions. Southern writers have created stories that touch the heart and populate American literature with voices of the American South. Future Southern writers will continue to embrace the region as a place where oral, visual, and musical traditions are interwoven with literature.

Career success is determined by a number of factors, including some combination of specific competencies and a performance record, along with network development, organizational politics, and reputation building. Theory and research suggest that employees’ political skill predicts their career success, and that this relationship is mediated by employees’ reputation in the workplace. These hypotheses were tested in a predictive study, collecting 2 waves of data from 135 career employees, covering a 1-year timeframe. Political skill at Time 1 predicted hierarchical position, income, and career satisfaction at Time 2. Furthermore, reputation mediated the relationships between political skill, hierarchical position, and career satisfaction. Contributions, implications, limitations, strengths, and future research directions are discussed. jasp_862 1..24

This study introduced, and provided the first evidence for, the notion that people possess more or less fuzzy attribution styles and that the degree of fuzziness affects important work variables (e.g., occupational self-efficacy and political skill). Field theory was used to explain how fuzzy attribution styles might arise. Contributions of this study, its practical implications, directions for future research, and strengths and limitations were discussed.

In this essay, we further delineate the defining characteristics of theory as well as what constitutes a theoretical contribution in organizational research cultivated by our collective experiences in the field. Additionally, we offer our views regarding the fragmented state of thinking that currently exists, how this view has come about, as well as available remedies. Unfortunately, an accurate and honest treatment requires the realization that many of the problems facing the field are not likely be solved without radical shifts in its philosophy. In our identification of issues and subsequent discussions, we err on the side of candor, which may offend some readers. Others may simply view our beliefs as unduly cynical. However, our intention throughout this essay is merely to “call-em-like-we-see-em” and not to overstate the case or elicit strong emotions or negative reactions. On the other hand, we view it as a disservice to simply reiterate the “party line,” which presents an existing knowledge base that is both robust and accommodating. Clearly, it is neither.

Recruitment of top talent is one of the most important things organizations do, and if they do it well, it can be a source of sustained competitive advantage. In this article, we propose that recruiting effectiveness has a lot to do with the individual qualities and characteristics of the coaches doing the recruiting, in addition to the reputation of the university. Indeed, we argue that recruiters' political skills equip them to select the proper combination of situationally appropriate influence tactics in the formulation of their influence strategy, while also leveraging the organization's reputation in order to ensure recruitment effectiveness. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

1 The sustainable use of forest resources requires an understanding of the influence of site conditions and forest health on both pest species and those species providing ecosystem services such as pollination and decomposition. 2 The beetle family Cerambycidae is diverse and contains both pest and nonpest species, with many species performing such ecosystem services. 3 We predicted that as hardwood tree productivity decreased, the proportion of pest Cerambycidae present would increase at a site. We used site index as a measure of hardwood tree productivity. 4 The proportion of species that were pests did not change with productivity because the abundance of both pest and nonpest species increased with declining productivity. 5 The findings of the present study have implications for both managing pest species and conserving the biodiversity of nonpest species.

Team-based work structures are increasingly used in organizations as a viable means of improving performance. However, there is relatively little research on the practices of staffing teams and the implications of such practices with regard to a firm's competitive advantage. In this paper, we evaluate methods of team staffing from a strategic human resource management perspective. Included in this discussion is an extrapolation of individual approaches to team staffing, which include staffing individuals to build a team, and cluster hiring, which refers to organizational efforts to acquire and fit a pre-existing team with a new role. In particular, we evaluate how individual and cluster hiring modes influence the competitive advantage of organizations, linking human resource management practices with strategic outcomes, and presenting testable propositions to guide future research and practice in team staffing.

Although leader-member exchange (LMX) was identified in the literature nearly 40 years ago, a comprehensive empirical examination of its antecedents and consequences has not been conducted. The authors’ examination included 247 studies, containing 290 samples, and 21 antecedents and 16 consequences of LMX quality. Results indicated that while leader behaviors and perceptions, follower characteristics, interpersonal relationship characteristics, and contextual variables represent significant groups of LMX antecedents, leader variables explained the most variance in LMX quality. Moderator analyses revealed that the particular LMX scale, country of participants, and work setting studied did not produce meaningful influences on the relationships in the meta-analysis. However, power distance and individualism did moderate some of these relationships. To provide continuity with the LMX meta-analyses and conceptual reviews that have focused on LMX consequences, the authors tested a number of mediation models. The results demonstrated that LMX frequently plays a mediating role in the relationships where mediation could be tested.

Promotions in organizations traditionally have represented the principal measure of career success, and they tend to be based on evaluations or judgments of employees' promotability made by supervisors. Yet theory and research on the antecedents of promotability judgments have presented an inconsistent and ambiguous picture of just what factors are best predictive of such evaluations. In the present investigation, longitudinal data obtained from supervisors of professional employees were used to rigorously test the relative influence of task and contextual performance on judgments of promotability. Results indicate that task and contextual performance not only explain unique variance in judgments of promotability but also interact, such that subordinates who excel in task performance and in the job dedication aspect of contextual performance are judged more suitable for promotion than subordinates who excel in one but not in the other. Implications of results are discussed and future research directions a...

This two-study investigation framed performance as one potential form of influence that interacts with political skill to affect power assessments. It was hypothesized that favorable performance is more likely to be leveraged into higher levels of interpersonal power when individuals possess high levels of political skill but not for individuals low in political skill. Study 1 ( N = 97) demonstrated that individuals with positive performance were more likely to possess higher levels of interpersonal power if they were high in political skill. Furthermore, higher levels of performance were not related to power for individuals low in political skill. Thus, these results from Study 1 established support for the hypothesis. Study 2 ( N = 384), using a multisource design, constructively replicated these findings. Contributions to theory and research, strengths and limitations, directions for future research, and practical implications are discussed.

Response to student writing has been a research concern for composition specialists for the past several decades. However, most research to date has utilized student opinions or researcher judgments about teacher feedback, with researchers rarely consulting teachers themselves as informants. Also, first language (L1) and second language (L2) response research has been completed and disseminated in separate arenas, with little consideration given to the current blurring of boundaries in many educational contexts between L1 and L2 student writers. In the study described in this article, college writing instructors in both mainstream and specialized L2 writing contexts were surveyed (N = 129) and interviewed (N = 23) about their backgrounds (training and experience) and their philosophies and practices with regard to response. In addition, samples of their commentary on student papers (3–5 papers per interview subject) were collected, discussed with the instructors, and analyzed. Although most instructors were aware of adapting their approach to feedback for L2 writers, the nature of these adjustments varied dramatically across subjects, as did their overall attitude toward the endeavor of responding to L2 writers. The article concludes with a discussion of practical implications of the findings for teacher response practices and for professional preparation of L1 writing instructors who work with L2 students.

Political skill is a social effectiveness construct with a demonstrated capacity to predict job performance. However, because performance prediction research in this area to date has made exclusive use of self-reports of political skill, and due to frequent distrust of self-ratings of constructs in important personnel decisions, there is a need to investigate how multiple alternative sources of political skill and job performance measures relate, thus raising both theoretical and methodological issues. In three studies, employing a triadic data collection methodology, and utilising both cross-sectional and longitudinal designs, this research tested the hypotheses that employee political skill, measured from the perspective of employees' assessor A, will positively predict job performance rated by assessor B (i.e. Hypothesis 1a), and vice versa, that employee political skill measured by assessor B will predict job performance ratings measured by assessor A (i.e. Hypothesis 1b).

Personal reputation has been argued to demonstrate important influences on work outcomes. However, substantive research on personal reputation is relatively scarce. This two-study investigation empirically supports and extends existing theory regarding the temporal development of personal reputation (i.e., antecedents and consequences), and thus contributes to a more informed understanding of both the construct and criterion-related validity of this important construct. Study 1 is conducted longitudinally, in order to assess the development of personal reputation over time, which is undertaken to demonstrate the effects of human capital and social effectiveness as antecedents of reputation. Study 2 complements and extends the first study by conducting a field investigation examining the effects of time, human capital, and social effectiveness as antecedents of personal reputation, while also exploring the reputation consequences of autonomy, power, and career success. Our findings suggest that human capital, time, and social effectiveness play a part in the development of a reputation. Furthermore, career success, power, and autonomy were shown to be outcomes of the reputation construct. Contributions and strengths of this investigation, limitations, and directions for future research are discussed.

Socioanalytic theory postulates that job performance ratings are predicted by basic social motives moderated by social competency. The two motives are the motive to get along with others and the motive to achieve status and power. The present two-study investigation assessed these motives as work values and collected supervisors' job performance and promotability assessments. Social competency was assessed as political skill at work. The results provided strong and consistent support for the hypotheses, thus providing a more direct test of socioanalytic theory and extending it to demonstrate effects beyond overall job performance ratings on contextual performance and promotability assessments. Contributions and implications of these results, strengths and limitations, directions for future research, and practical implications are discussed.