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Refereed/Peer-reviewed This study examines whether sweating existed in clothing outwork in Australia at the start of the twenty-first century. A history from below investigation is conducted of the working lives of immigrant outworkers, interviewed in their own language in their own homes. Content and textual analyses of their narratives show that outwork was sweated labour. Individuals worked intensively for long hours, sometimes through the night, and often helped by family members. They worked so hard because piece rates were very low, work was irregular, and they could gain no other job. However, individuals disliked the job the least when they could pay the bills by working themselves to exhaustion. The results contribute to debates by showing that outwork was not undertaken for reasons of entrepreneurship, flexible working hours, or “pin money.” Outworkers carried out large volumes of repetitive sewing tasks to meet tight deadlines so they could make a basic living.

Refereed/Peer-reviewed The current study examined the relationship between faculty gender diversity (GD) and college and university level outcomes and the role that diversity climate (DC) plays in these relationships in a sample of N = 282 4-year, public and private, non-profit, degree granting institutions in the U.S. Based on social categorization and signaling theories, we hypothesized a negative effect of increasing percentages of female faculty on institutional student graduation and retention rates measured at three points in time. We also hypothesized that these negative effects would be attenuated in higher education institutions with more positive DCs. Results revealed that faculty GD had a consistent linear negative effect on graduation and retention rates with little evidence for a moderating effect of DC. Supplemental analyses using cross-lagged panel analyses on a larger sample of 4-year, public and private, non-profit, U.S. degree granting institutions found that these negative effects were consistent across time, lending support for the causal effect of faculty GD.

Using dynamic theory and methods, we investigate the phenomenon of older workers who withdraw from paid work while still healthy. We focus on intention to retire as the penultimate stage in the retirement process. We extend socio-emotional selectivity theory to explain the growth of intention to retire. Older workers have a rising perception of time running out but good health allows for an ongoing choice between remaining in work or active retirement. While, in general, older people in poor health have a greater intention to retire than those in good health, we hypothesize that the passage of time motivates the healthy to increase their intention to retire, especially when manager support is low. We examine longitudinal data consisting of three waves of survey responses (2011, 2012, and 2013) from 495 workers in their 50th year and older. We employ growth curve analysis (random coefficient modeling). The findings show that over a 2-year period, in contrast to other older workers whose retirement intention remains stable, individuals in consistently good health but with low manager support demonstrate a growth in intention to retire. That is, we identify the “queue jumpers”: those workers who speeded up their retirement process relative to other older workers. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Migrants are a growing segment of the highly educated international workforce, and these skilled migrants (SMs) are critical to the growth of developed, mature economies. SMs frequently report negative workplace experiences antithetical to their integration, raising important questions about how organizations might help these host-country newcomers to transition to become organizational insiders. Our aim is to integrate a broad and multidisciplinary literature and identify opportunities where organizations and managers might intervene to enable a successful socialization process and improve SMs’ workplace experiences. We review the empirical research from 2000 to 2019 for SMs employed in developed, mature economies and focus on the SMs’ workplace experiences postorganizational entry. We employ a three-phase socialization model (anticipatory socialization, accommodation, and adaptation) as our organizing framework to identify SMs’ key challenges and outcomes, consider those challenges and outcomes through a socialization lens, and isolate the challenges and outcomes that characterize each transition point (from anticipatory socialization to accommodation and from accommodation to adaptation). We then use these distinguishing characteristics to recommend activities that organizations can implement at each transition to facilitate SMs’ socialization process. By leveraging the three-phase socialization model to align organizational activities with SMs’ workplace experiences, we extend the field’s understanding of SM socialization (inparticular) and of the organizational socialization process (more generally). Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Once upon a time, there was a group of management scholars. They spent their time in an ivory tower, thinking great thoughts. Sometimes, when the scholars had an especially exciting thought, they would try to share it with end users. The scholars would rush to the tower’s windows and toss paper airplanes out into the air. But, alas, their thoughts were not relevant to the end users. The scholars’ paper airplanes crashed to the ground, and so the scholars’ work had very little impact. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

PurposeVoluntary collective turnover can be costly for workplaces. The authors investigate the effectiveness of high-performance work system (HPWS) intensity as a tool to manage voluntary collective turnover. Further, the authors investigate a cynical workplace climate (CWC) as a boundary condition on the HPWS intensity–voluntary collective turnover relationship.Design/methodology/approachThe unit of analysis is the workplace, with human resource (HR) managers providing data on HPWS practices in Time 1 (T1) and voluntary collective turnover two years later. Aggregated employee data were used to assess the cynical workplace climate. Hierarchical regression analysis was used to test the hypotheses.FindingsThis study’s results demonstrate a negative relationship between HPWS intensity and voluntary collective turnover when there is a low cynical workplace climate. The authors find that in a high cynical workplace climate, HPWS intensity is ineffective at managing voluntary collective turnover.Research limitations/implicationsThis study’s results show that HPWS intensity needs to be well received by the workforce to be effective in reducing voluntary collective turnover.Practical implicationsTo increase the chances of HPWS intensity reducing voluntary collective turnover, workplaces need to assess the level of employee cynicism in their workplace climates. When the climate is assessed as low in cynicism, the workplace can then consider implementing an HPWS.Originality/valueThe authors explain why the HPWS intensity–voluntary collective turnover relationship varies across workplaces. As HR practices are subject to interpretation, workplaces need to look beyond the practices in their HPWS and focus on employee receptivity to HR practices.

Gender inequality is a complex problem with multiple interrelated indicators (e.g. underrepresentation of women in leadership roles, gender pay gaps). Our academic community has been following a three-step ‘script’ to motivate organisations to act on gender inequality: we document the inequality, we build a business case for equality, and we advocate solutions to correct inequality. But too often, our well-meant messages have negative consequences. We may be inadvertently presenting gender inequality as an intractable problem and creating unrealistic expectations among stakeholders about gender equality benefits and gender inequality solutions. As stakeholders become impatient with Australia’s slow progress toward gender equality, we may need to reconsider this strategy. Academic researchers may be more successful change agents if we are more deliberate about highlighting the interconnections among gender inequality indicators, identifying the organisational value of gender equality beyond financial performance, and advocating small-scale structural changes alongside large-scale interventions. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Support that helps job seekers maintain confidence might decrease unemployment rates among people with disabilities. In this study, clients described their employment barriers (disability, education, and work history) and then reported their job search confidence 3 times at 6-month intervals. Their employment support agency provided information about the support (counseling visits, support hours, and financial resources) it delivered. Clients with more disabilities and education barriers experienced declines in job search confidence unless they received intensive levels of employment counseling. Three visits to a counselor maintained client confidence, and confidence improved only after 18 visits. Other service intensity indicators (support hours and financial resources) did not halt confidence declines. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

This study investigates the influence of employees’ perception of managerial breach of the normative relational contract(i.e. the psychological relational contract at the group level) on workplace performance. Many employees in Australia are employed on a permanent or continuing basis and have normative relational contracts whose terms are embedded in human resource practices. We use normative relational contract theory to hypothesise that where there is a mutually recognised high-quality normative relational contract – a strong contract – the emotional bonds of loyalty that are developed by collective sense-making constrained negative reactions to breach. We also hypothesise that, where managers offer high-quality contract terms that are not recognised by employees, the failure to elicit loyalty means that breach has negative performance consequences.Panel data are obtained from a two-stage national,multi-source study of employees (n = 1,733) and senior human resource managers (n = 57). Results from hierarchical moderator regression analyses support the hypotheses.They demonstrate that a strong normative relational contract ‘buffers’ employees’ negative responses to breach. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

This study investigates the antecedents and consequences of organization-level inclusion climate. A national sample of human resource decision-makers from 100 organizations described their firms' formal diversity management programs; 3,229 employees reported their perceptions of, and reactions to, their employers' diversity management. Multilevel analyses demonstrate that identity-conscious programs (programs that target specific identity groups) generate an inclusion climate. Moreover, the analyses provide evidence of multilevel mediation: In organizations with an inclusion climate, individual employees perceive the organization as fulfilling its diversity management obligations and respond with higher levels of affective commitment. This study represents an important step toward understanding how a shared perception of organizational inclusiveness develops and how inclusion climate facilitates the achievement of diversity management objectives. The findings also shed light on the important role of identity-conscious programs in promoting organizational commitment within a diverse workforce. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

During the first few months of the COVID-19 pandemic, employees worked from home in record numbers and enjoyed extraordinarily high levels of autonomy. Now, as employers reopen their doors, we can build on those gains to create better workplaces than the ones we left behind. HR has a window of opportunity in which to develop psychologically safe workplaces, trust-based employment relationships and socially connected workforces. But progress towards better workplaces hangs on a few critical adjustments in the HR researcher–practitioner relationship. HR researchers must work with HR practitioners to identify organization-level interventions and examine their simultaneous influence on employee and employer outcomes. HR practitioners must create sandboxes where those interventions can be pilot tested, and resist their instinctive urge to establish formalised structures and develop monitoring systems. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Despite the expected advantages of appointing women to corporate leadership roles, empirical evidence provides mixed support for the positive relationship between women's representation in the top management team (TMT) and subsequent firm performance. Considering the evidence that female TMT members are often paid less than their male colleagues, this study examines the implications of a gender pay disparity for the relationship between women's representation in the TMT and firm performance. Our analysis that draws on TMT pay data in public Australian firms demonstrates that gender pay disparities within TMTs negatively moderate the relationship between women's representation in the TMT and subsequent firm performance. Specifically, when female TMT members are paid less than their male colleagues, and this gender pay disparity is large, women's representation in the TMT is negatively associated with firm performance. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

We investigate the effect of employment systems on the layoff-performance relationship. We construct a typology of two types of HPWS (Calculative or “hard” HRM and Collaborative or “soft” HRM) and two non-high performance systems (Traditional HRM and Low HRM). We use attribution theory as a framework from which to draw hypotheses. We examine survey responses from two waves of panel data. We employ cluster analysis to identify distinctive configurations of employment practices used in UK workplaces. We use the cluster outcomes as explanatory variables in moderator regression analysis. Following layoffs, we find that Calculative workplaces experience lower subsequent performance than Collaborative workplaces. Over the next five years, Calculative and Collaborative workplaces experience equivalent amounts of performance change but Calculative workplaces fail to make a full recovery. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

This Collection offers insights from twenty of Australia’s leader academics and thinkers into the survey results of 15,000 Australian rental households. The Collection draws on data from The Australian Rental Housing Conditions Dataset funded by the Australian Research Council in partnership with six Australian universities as well an additional AHURI funded COVID-19 module.

Governments are encouraging workers to remain in employment beyond traditional retirement age. A tangible expression of this in Australia is the move to raise the Aged Pension access age from 65 to 67 by 2023. This policy assumes that the majority of workers will be able to extend their working lives. However, even at the age of 65, one-third of older workers have left their jobs involuntarily, with poor health an important reason for exit. Yet the significance of worker health for maintaining or limiting employment is not reflected in current policy architecture. This article draws on the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia Survey and uses a prospective, longitudinal study design. Our analysis estimates the extent poor health limits working past 50 and the ways in which health-related risk are compounded by other forms of labour market disadvantage. We find that having a chronic health condition is associated with a five-fold increase in the risk of involuntary retirement from work. Moreover the overwhelming majority of those with a health condition will leave the labour market because of it. We also find evidence that labour market disadvantage linked to caregiving, occupation and job quality compounds health-related involuntary retirement. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

As new roles emerge in organizations, it becomes critical to understand how organizational structure can impede or enable the managerial discretion available to role incumbents. We leverage the rich context provided by the emergent role of sustainability managers to examine the interplay between the top-down forces of structure and the bottom-up influences of managerial discretion in shaping new organizational roles over time. We analyzed qualitative data collected from in-depth interviews with sustainability managers in 21 case study organizations in India and Australia, supplemented with archival and observational data. We identified three organizational configurations, with varying levels of top-down structural and bottom-up managerial discretion dynamics at play. Each configuration had different implications for the manager’s role. Our analysis suggests that the third configuration—with semi-structured formalization and a decentralized sustainability program—provided the most conducive conditions for managers to use their discretion to champion innovative sustainability initiatives. New managerial roles in the other configurations, however, do not have to be static. With the maturation of organizational programs and active championing by managers, the structuring of organizational functions and managerial roles can co-evolve. Our findings describe a process of “shaping and being shaped,” as structure and managerial discretion co-evolve over time. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Female representation at senior organizational levels lags well behind male representation. We investigate whether there is a positive nonlinear relationship between female board representation and female executive representation: the trickle-down effect. We investigated 1,387 organizations listed on the Australian Securities Exchange between 2003 and 2012 and found the hypothesized nonlinear trickle-down effect operating between board and executive levels. The trickle-down effect was strongest after 1 year but still significant after 5 years. We investigated two potential moderators of the effect: organization size and gender diversity recommendations.There was no moderating effect of organization size, but contrary to expectations, gender diversity recommendations slowed the trickle-down effect. Our findings suggest that organizations can address the paucity of women at senior organizational levels by starting at the top. Specifically, organizations making multiple appointments of female board members should expect improvements in female executive representation. However, the signaling and advocacy opportunities afforded by female board appointments may be less potent in the context of external interventions. Our findings contribute to the ongoing policy debate about the value of regulatory interventions to increase female representation at senior organizational levels and highlight the need for research on the unintended consequences of these interventions across national contexts. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Gender equality goals have proven to be difficult for organizations to achieve. Management scholars attribute gender equality’s intractability to decoupling: Organizations adopt structures, policie...

We investigate older workers’ intention to retire as a temporal process. We use Carstensen's socio-emotional selectivity theory to investigate the influence of the passage of time on employees' cho...

Sexual harassment (SH) is an increasingly prominent issue for organisations across the Asia Pacific. However, despite the costs of SH, there has been little consideration of why approaches to SH training vary so widely across countries. We report findings from two national surveys that document the prevalence and characteristics of SH training in Australian and US organisations. Results indicate that training was more prevalent in US organisations. We also examined whether differences in provision and type of training across the two countries was a function of differences in practitioner knowledge about training (a knowing gap) or the ability to use training best practices (a doing gap). There was some evidence of a doing gap reflecting differences in resource availability across the two countries. Findings suggest that practitioners in US organisations have access to more training resources, and are more likely to devote those resources to SH training. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Organisational strategies to achieve gender diversity have tended to focus on 'bottom-up' approaches such as mentoring or leadership training. We investigate an alternative 'top-down' approach: the trickle-down effect. We integrate theories from the psychology and management literatures to hypothesise a positive relationship between female representation at two levels. Data from 20 departments in an Australian public service were collected for the period 2002-2012. Female executive representation in 1 year had a positive impact on female representation in the executive feeder group in the following year. The trickle-down effect was strongest in the first 2 years, but still significant after 5 years. We investigated two moderators, department size and gender diversity target. The effect was stronger in large departments. Surprisingly, the gender diversity target strengthened the trickle-down effect only when female executive representation was under 15%. Our finding of a trickle-down effect suggests public sector departments should consider appointing women to senior roles as a top-down strategy for increasing organisational gender diversity. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Purpose Managers develop psychological contracts (PCs) with staff as part of their people management responsibilities. A second-stage mediated moderation model explains how a manager’s personality influences the content and fulfillment of PCs in different organizational contexts. The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach Survey data from 749 managers at Australian organizations were collected and regression analyses were used to test the hypotheses. The Edwards and Lambert (2007) approach was used to analyze conditional indirect effects. Findings Managers high on agreeableness, conscientiousness and extraversion are more likely to establish relational PCs with their staff than managers low on these personality traits. The effects of agreeableness and conscientiousness on the fulfillment of the PC occur through the “relational PC” variable. Once a relational PC is established, a manager’s ability to fulfill the PC is constrained by the extent to which polices and practices are formalized. Research limitations/implications Organizations may need to delegate more power and discretion to managers to enable them to fulfill employer obligations toward their staff, and/or clearly communicate to managers their boundaries in employment promises. In turn, managers need to be aware of personality’s influence on the creation and fulfillment of promises. Causality cannot be inferred because of the study’s cross-sectional data. Originality/value Research has focused on employees’ personality and perceptions of the PC. This study is the first to focus on managers’ personality and PC creation and fulfillment.

The “glass ceiling” metaphor represents the frustration experienced by women in the 1980s and 1990s who entered the workforce in large numbers following equal opportunity legislation that gave them greater access to education and employment. After initial success in attaining lower management positions, the women found their career progress slowing as they reached higher levels of their organizations. A formal definition of the glass ceiling specifies that a female disadvantage in promotion should accelerate at the highest levels of the organization, and researchers adopting this formal definition have found mixed evidence for glass ceilings across organizations and across countries. Researchers who have expanded the glass ceiling definition to encompass racial minorities have similarly found mixed results. However, these mixed results do not detract from the metaphor’s value in highlighting the stereotype-based practices that embed discrimination deep within organizational structures and understanding why women continue to be underrepresented in senior organizational roles around the world. In particular, researchers investigating the glass ceiling have identified a variety of obstacles (including glass cliffs, glass walls, and glass doors) that create a more complete understanding of the barriers that women experience in their careers. As organizations offer shorter job ladders and less job security, the career patterns of both women and men are exhibiting more downward, lateral, and static movement. In this career context, the glass ceiling may no longer be the ideal metaphor to represent the obstacles that women are most likely to encounter.

Refereed/Peer-reviewed

In virtually all economies, executive positions are highly male dominated. This study examines the pay gap between male executives and female executives in large Australian firms from 2011 to 2014 to evaluate whether female executives are paid equitably compared with male executives. The mean pay comparison shows that female executives earn 80.7% of the total pay earned by male executives. A large part of the gender pay gap is explained by differences in positions held; female executives are particularly underrepresented in highly paid executive positions. After controlling for executive position and other relevant individual and firm characteristics, there remains a 15.1% gender gap in total pay. Our findings suggest that to achieve the goal of gender equity, both the proportion of women at executive level and the executive-level gender pay gap need to be monitored. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

This study investigates the variability in well-being of people with disabilities in paid employment in two different labour market contexts: the beginning (1998) and end (2009) of a period of growth in non-standard hours and work intensification. It focuses on the well-being constraints that arise from three influences: a person's disability, a person's gender, and the labour market context. Hypotheses are developed using the social model of disability and social identity theory. Hierarchical moderator regression is employed to examine two national samples of nearly 4,000 people with disabilities in paid employment. Individuals who are most limited by their disabilities, particularly women, reported lower well-being in 2009 than in 1998. Welfare-to-work policies affecting these disadvantaged groups are discussed in relation to the labour market and national regulatory environments.

Work-life practices are frequently suggested as a strategy for improving women's representation in management. We predicted that work-life practices would increase the proportion of women in management, but their impact would be most evident when the workforce gender composition makes gender stereotypes less salient. Hierarchical multiple regression was used to analyze the relationship between work-life practices in 2002-2006 and the proportion of women in management in 2010, 2012, and 2014. Overall, work-life practices had a positive effect on the proportion of women in management, but only after an eight-year lag. However, this positive effect was not observed in organizations that were highly male-dominated. Leave arrangements and direct provision of services (e.g., childcare or eldercare) had the strongest associations with women in management. Our findings demonstrate the value of work-life practices in improving women's representation in management, but the effect is not immediate and does not operate across all organizational contexts. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

People with disabilities rely heavily on specialist agencies to find suitable employment. This research examines how agency consultants use recruitment ads in their work with clients. We analyzed the ads collected by consultants and learned that the ads were dominated by organization and job attributes. The ads contained less information about preferred applicant characteristics and selection procedures. Consultants used the ads to facilitate immediate matches between clients and employers, but they also used the ads to nudge clients in new career directions. The results reflect challenges consultants experience in balancing long-term needs of clients against the short-term demands of employers. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Across the globe, women continue to be underrepresented in academic institutions and face several inequities. To redress these, many universities are acting to increase female student participation...

Purpose: This study investigated the moderating effect of intergroup contact on the relationship between the race composition of organizational representatives, perceived similarity, and minority applicant attraction. Design/methodology/approach: 344 minority Malaysian-Chinese university students read a job advertisement that varied the racial composition of organizational representatives (100 % Malay or 50 % Malay–50 % Chinese or 100 % Chinese). Of these participants, 161 were Malaysian-Chinese in Malaysia (high intergroup contact location) and 183 were Malaysian-Chinese in Australia (low intergroup contact location). After reading the advertisement, participants responded to a series of scale items (e.g., perceived surface-level similarity, perceived deep-level similarity, and applicant attraction). Findings: Results showed that the effect of race composition on attraction was stronger for minority participants in Australia than for minority participants in Malaysia. Perceived deep-level similarity mediated this moderated relationship. Implications: The study findings suggest that organizations should include minority representatives in their recruitment advertising to attract minority applicants, particularly to attract minorities in locations with few opportunities for intergroup contact. Originality/value: By testing the mediating effects of perceived surface-level and deep-level similarity, this study contributes to our understanding of the mechanism linking the interaction between race composition and location with applicant attraction. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Demography theory suggests that high gender diversity leads to high turnover. As turnover is costly, we tested the following: a main effect prediction derived from demography theory, and a moderating effect prediction derived from the relational framework. Data on 198 publicly listed organizations were collected through a human resources decision maker survey and archival databases. The results indicate that higher gender diversity leads to lower turnover in organizations with many gender-focused policies and practices. Findings suggest that organizations can lower their turnover rates by increasing their gender diversity and by implementing gender-focused policies and practices.

Policies that encourage the aspirations of disabled people for mainstream employment might be an effective way to increase their workforce participation rate. This study aims to determine which people in sheltered employment aspire to a job beyond their current sheltered employment job. We asked 64 people with sheltered employment jobs about their workplace and job fit, their intentions to stay in their current job and their future job aspirations. The key finding is that perceptions of fit indirectly and adversely affect aspirations via intention to stay. Participants who felt they fitted planned to keep working at their sheltered workplace, but a stronger intention to stay made it less likely that they could identify an alternative to sheltered employment. These results were not influenced by age or the time spent in sheltered employment. Policy should therefore support people in sheltered employment to develop realistic job aspirations. Helping disabled people to identify opportunities beyond sheltered employment can avoid complacency and free up sheltered job opportunities for other disabled people. But policy changes are required to leverage sheltered employment as a first step for disabled people to develop mainstream job aspirations and facilitate transitioning beyond sheltered employment job options. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Employee change cynicism is an unintended consequence of organizational change, which can undermine the effectiveness of change initiatives. Based on social information processing theory, we examine the impact of two human resource roles (administrative expert and strategic change agent) on the relationship between the quantity of organizational change and employee change cynicism. Using multilevel data from 1,831 employees in 70 organizations, we find employees who are exposed to more organizational change report higher levels of change cynicism. However, the strength of the organizational change–cynicism relationship is affected by the role of HR in the employees’ organizations. When HR undertakes an administrative expert role, change is more likely to generate change cynicism. When HR undertakes a strategic change agent role, change is less likely to generate change cynicism. Our results suggest that organizations need to think carefully about the role of HR during organizational change and encourage HR to adopt a strategic change agent role. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Organizations might benefit from maintaining relationships with former employees, who could be rehired later or encouraged to refer job applicants and customers. We integrate the management literature on voluntary resignations and the communication literature on relationship dissolution to explore how conversations between an exiting employee and his or her manager facilitate (or constrain) post-exit relationships. Employees who had recently resigned from full-time jobs described their exit experiences in semistructured interviews with the research team. The results suggest two dominant patterns. When employees exited for external reasons (e.g., to pursue a program of study), they engaged in very direct communication strategies, elicited positive responses from their managers, and left with high interest in a post-exit relationship. But when employees exited for internal reasons (problems within the employment relationship), they engaged in multiple exit cycles and moved from indirect communication strategies toward increasingly direct ones. Managerial responses to these strategies failed to capitalize on opportunities to nurture post-exit relationships and sometimes generated a “vendetta effect” among exiting employees. The results suggest that managers might benefit from training in how to conduct effective exit conversations, particularly with employees who are leaving for internal reasons. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Stereotype threat is a psychological condition that can affect anyone who is a member of a negatively stereotyped group (Roberson & Kulik, 2007). Kalokerinos, von Hippel, and Zacher (2014) make a strong case encouraging greater research on stereotype threat in the workplace. Their arguments hinge on empirical evidence that the experience of stereotype threat is associated with employee outcomes such as unfavorable job attitudes, work disidentification, and lowered career aspirations. I agree with Kalokerinos et al.’s conclusion

The author considers societal and managerial challenges posted by an aging population. It mentions the aging population is motivating changes in how people are managed and will challenge social norms of equity and fairness. It comments many countries are examining the age at which people can utilize employer- and government-supported retirement funds as extended life expectancy means in theory older people can work longer, and considers the consequences of increasing the official retirement age.

The inconsistent findings of past board diversity research demand a test of competing linear and curvilinear diversity-performance predictions. This research focuses on board age and gender diversity, and presents a positive linear prediction based on resource dependence theory, a negative linear prediction based on social identity theory, and an inverted U-shaped curvilinear prediction based on the integration of resource dependence theory with social identity theory. The predictions were tested using archival data on 288 large organizations listed on the Australian Securities Exchange, with a 1-year time lag between diversity (age and gender) and performance (employee productivity and return on assets). The results indicate a positive linear relationship between gender diversity and employee productivity, a negative linear relationship between age diversity and return on assets, and an inverted U-shaped curvilinear relationship between age diversity and return on assets. The findings provide additional evidence on the business case for board gender diversity and refine the business case for board age diversity. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Social context shapes negotiators’ actions,including their willingness to act unethically. We use asimulated negotiation to test how three dimensions of social context—dyadic gender composition, negotiation strategy, and trust—interact to influence one micro-ethical decision, the use of deception. Deception in all-male dyads was relatively unaffected by trust or the other negotiator’s strategy. In mixed-sex dyads, negotiators consistently increased their use of deception when three forms of trust(identity, benevolent, deterrent) were low and opponents used an accommodating strategy. However, in all-female dyads, negotiators appeared to use multiple and shifting reference points in deciding when to deceive the other party. In these dyads, the use of deception increased when a competitive strategy combined with low benevolence based trust or an accommodating strategy combined with high identity-based trust. Deception in all-female dyads decreased when a competitive strategy was used in the context of low deterrence-based trust. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Public policy based on a pro-work philosophy has encouraged the employment of people with disabilities. Using a national sample of 170 care recipient–caregiver cohabiting dyads, we investigated a model linking the care recipient's weekly work hours (0–45) to the psychological outcomes experienced by the care recipient and his or her caregiver. For care recipients in poor health, longer work hours were associated with a lower sense of accomplishment. Further, the negative psychological outcomes experienced by the care recipient were associated with greater caregiver stress. These results suggest that public policy concerning the employment of people with disabilities should be evaluated within the context of the caregiving relationship. Efforts to engage people with disabilities in employment should be accompanied by strategies to remove workplace stressors that negatively impact care recipients in poor health.

Employer reluctance to hire disabled people narrows the economic and vocational opportunities of disabled people. This study investigates employer hiring decisions to identify which mainstream employers are most likely to hire disabled people. The study reports findings from interviews with 87 employers in urban and regional South Australia. Analysis reveals differences across groups of employers based on their previous hiring behaviour. Communication from employment support agencies should specifically address concerns of non-hirers and light hirers. Long-term financial concerns present strong but surmountable barriers to light hirers employing disabled people. Policy mitigating long-term employer concerns could attract employers to hire disabled people for the first time (non-hirers) or return to hiring (light hirers) disabled people. Negative employers (antagonists) and employers already sustaining ongoing workplace relationships with disabled people (loyals) have insurmountable reasons to not hire any (or more) disabled people and should not be targeted. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Purpose – Delivering negative feedback to employees is highly problematic for managers. Negative feedback is important in generating improvements in employee performance, but likely to generate adverse employee reactions. However, if managers do not address poor performance, good performers may become demoralized or exit the organization. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how managers communicate negative feedback and the factors that drive their choice of tactic. Design/methodology/approach – The authors use interview data from practicing line managers with experience in delivering negative feedback to learn whether their tactic choices are consistent with Implicit (“best practice”) or Contingency (“best fit”) theory. Findings – The authors identify five negative feedback tactics: evidence, emotive and communication tactics are foundation tactics while evidence + communication and evidence + emotive tactics are bundles of the foundation tactics. Managers apply a “best fit” approach from a set of “best practice” negative feedback options. The choice of negative feedback tactic is driven by the manager’s assessment of the “best fit” with the employee’s personality. Research limitations/implications – Most of the managers believed that their negative feedback tactic had been effective. Future researchers should investigate which negative feedback tactics employees regard as most effective. Practical implications – A best fit approach to the delivery of negative feedback requires organizations to give managers discretion in the delivery of negative feedback. Managers may mis-assess fit which can undermine the effectiveness of the appraisal process. Originality/value – The authors focus on how negative feedback is communicated by managers. Existing research focusses on reactions to negative feedback without taking into account how it is delivered.

As the workforce ages, and people retire later in life, organizations will need to develop strategies to engage their mature-age workers. We used a stereotype threat framework to investigate the impact of threat-inducing (young manager, young work group, manual occupation) and threat-inhibiting (high performance practices, mature-age practices) contextual cues on mature-age worker engagement. A total of 666 mature-age employees in Australia described their work experiences in three surveys administered over a three year period. Results indicated that mature-age employees who experienced stereotype threat in the workplace reported lower engagement 11-12 months later. All of the contextual cues had an impact on stereotype threat and exerted indirect (mediated by stereotype threat) effects on engagement. However, the effects of manager age were moderated by organizational practices. Diversity conscious mature-age practices moderated the indirect effect of manager age, so mature-age practices were particularly beneficial in counteracting negative cues associated with young managers. But diversity blind high performance practices moderated the direct effect of manager age, so high performance practices were especially helpful in generating engagement among mature age workers with older managers. We recommend that organizations adopt both diversity blind and diversity conscious practices into their diversity management portfolios. The two types of practices are complementary and have additive effects on mature-age worker engagement. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Approximately twenty per cent of the world’s population has some form of disability, but workforce participation of people with disability has been intractably low. In an effort to improve the economic and social participation of people with disability, the Australian Government introduced legislation in2013 designed to provide individualised support and encourage communities and employers to be more receptive to people with disability. The authors surveyed 1,230 workforce members and 715 employer decision-makers at three points in time (2010, 2012, and 2014) to examine how attitudes to people with disability and employer hiring behaviour are changing in response to the legislation. The evidence demonstrated that both groups are experiencing greater contact with people with disability, reporting more positive interactions with people with disability, and endorsing more reasons for employers hiring people with disability. However, these positive attitudes have not been accompanied by improvements in hiring: there was a decline in decision-makers’ hiring of people with disability from 2012 to 2014. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

The unfolding model emphasizes the role of shocks (jarring events that initiate exit cognitions) in the turnover process. In contrast to earlier survey-based research, we used exit interviews to classify organizational leavers along the model's paths. The data provide support for the model but highlight several aspects of shocks not addressed by previous research. Employees on the same path may experience distinctly different shock subgroups (e.g., work or nonwork), some employees require shock combinations (e.g., push and pull shocks) to motivate leaving, and some dissatisfied employees experience shock-like events (final straws) that confirm previous exit cognitions rather than initiate them. The research demonstrates how organizations can use exit interviews to better understand their employee exit patterns. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.