Workplace Peers Research Articles

Examining the mediating role of support resources in the self-efficacy and career satisfaction relationship among professional women in a developing economy

This study explored the mediating role of perceived organisational support and social support in the relationship between self-efficacy and career satisfaction among professional women. The participants comprised a non-probability sample of 606 professional women (white = 62%; black women of colour = 38%; mean age = 35.41 years, SD = 8.39 years) in early adulthood and established career stage, employed in the financial, engineering and human resources fields. Professional women completed standardised measures of perceived organisational support, social support, self-efficacy, and career satisfaction. Mediation analysis results showed that perceived organisational support and social support improved the relationship between women’s self-efficacy and their career satisfaction. Support resources from the workplace peers, family, and significant others may promote the interaction between self-efficacy and the career satisfaction of professional women. Findings imply that there is a need for organisations to provide supportive initiatives to promote self-efficacious beliefs and career satisfaction among professional women.

Information Transmission in Groups: Peer Influence in High-Stakes, Irreversible Financial Decisions

Abstract We study the influence of workplace peers on a high-stakes, irreversible retirement plan choice. Mid-career U.S. military personnel choose between higher future pension pay-outs, or an immediate bonus plus lower future pay-outs. With peers defined as those who have locked-in their choices and personnel assignment rules ensuring that peer groups are exogenously formed, we capture the causal impact of peers. Greater peer take-up of the bonus, which is difficult to compare to the alternative plan but often extremely costly over one's lifetime, discourages choosers from selecting the bonus. Peers are especially impactful within professional, race, and gender groups.

Office Warfare: Exploring the Role of Employee Political Affiliation in the Workplace

Despite the likely outsized presence of politics in the workplace, research on how one's political ideology or affiliation shapes their time at work has been extremely limited. Collectively, the research to date showcases that how employees present their political stance to others, and how similar their political stance is to their workplace peers, is likely to shape their time at work and erode important workplace outcomes. To advance research on the role of employee political stance in the workplace, we bring together four research teams all pursuing research questions related to how employees make conscious or unconscious efforts to manage their political ideology or affiliation to others at work. These works are likely to advance scholarship on the role of political stance at work, and also test the boundaries of identity management theories in considering political stance as a potentially stigmatizing identity characteristic. Distal Consequences of Expressing a Political Identity at Work Presenter: Ashley N. Robinson; The U. of Memphis Presenter: Alex Lindsey; U. of Memphis Presenter: Kristen Price Jones; U. of Memphis Fighting an Uncivil War: Does Passion for Politics lead to Consequences for Employees? Presenter: Hayden DuBois; U. of Texas At Arlington Presenter: David F. Arena; U. of Texas At Arlington Presenter: Karen Landay; U. of Missouri - Kansas City Presenter: Shona G. Smith; U. of Texas At Arlington Job Identification, Political Ideology, and Employee Well-Being Presenter: Ryan Scott Teschner; U. of Texas at Dallas Presenter: Riki Takeuchi; U. of Texas at Dallas Presenter: Nan Guo; U. of Texas at Dallas - Jindal School of Management COVID-19 Pandemic Protocols and the Surfacing of Political Identities at Work Presenter: Hoda Vaziri; U. of North Texas Presenter: Artemis Boulamatsi; U. of North Texas Presenter: Virginie Lopez Kidwell; U. of North Texas Presenter: Danielle Cooper; U. of North Texas Presenter: Julie Irene Hancock; U. of North Texas

Understanding hotel employees' subjectivity towards workplace peer interactions: A Q methodology approach

Many studies examining the relationships between customers and service providers in hospitality have gained attention due to the various human interactive characteristics of the industry. In the hotel industry, which provides services through teamwork, employee relationships are very important. However, research on interaction among workplace peers in the field is scarce. The objective of this study is to identify hotel employees’ subjectivity toward workplace peer interaction conflict and facilitation and to extract the themes of subjectivities and significances from the human resource management viewpoint using a Q methodology approach. A total of 35 hotel employees were included in the P-set and participated in the Q sorting process. Respondents were all Korean nationals who had been working in a hotel in the past 12 months or more. As a result, five types of hotel employees

Friends with bankruptcy protection benefits

We show information spillovers limit the effectiveness of targeted debt relief programs. We study individuals who learn about the likelihood of debt relief from the recent experiences of workplace peers filing for bankruptcy protection. Peers granted bankruptcy can discharge debts, while peers facing dismissal lose all protections. Exploiting the random assignment of judges to bankruptcy cases, we determine that individuals with a “dismissed peer” are significantly less likely to file for bankruptcy or enter foreclosure. We highlight a novel channel relating social networks to household finances and identify additional costs of granting individual debt relief imposed on lenders.

Are Vascular Surgery Trainees Satisfied and are They Using the Right Factors to Choose a Training Program?

Medical students and residents often evaluate training sites in vascular surgery with minimal exposure to those programs. We sought to identify factors associated with vascular surgery trainee satisfaction in relation to their current work environment and how they made their rank list. All integrated residents and fellows currently in United States vascular training programs were queried using an anonymous electronic survey for variables of their current training environment, factors that influenced their rank order list, and satisfaction. Questions were graded on a Likert scale. Continuous, ordinal, and categorical variables were respectively analyzed using the two-sample t-test, Mann-Whitney U-test/Wilcoxon rank sum test, and Fisher's exact test. A total of 166 of 517 (32%) trainees completed the survey with equal distribution across postgraduate years. Respondents reported high rates of satisfaction with their training program overall (84%), including 88% (n=83) of residents and 78% (n=56) of fellows. Several work environment variables were associated with both resident and fellow satisfaction including program-funded trips for conferences and presentations (P=0.027 for residents; P=0.001 for fellows), diversity of operative cases (P=0.024; P<0.001), perception of a strong supportive social network at the hospital (P=0.006; P=0.001), and perception of appreciation by attending surgeons (P<0.001; P<0.001). Fellows who felt appreciated by nursing staff (P=0.047), ancillary staff (P=0.013), and patients were more likely to be satisfied (P=0.011); however, this was not true for integrated residents. Social outings with nontrainee family and friends were associated with satisfaction for fellows (P=0.002) but not integrated residents (P=0.138), whereas social outings with vascular trainees were associated with satisfaction for integrated residents (P=0.047) but not fellows (P=0.375). Similarly, satisfied integrated residents were more likely to have close relationships with their vascular cotrainees (P=0.035) than fellows (P=0.349). No rank list factors were found to be predictive of current trainee satisfaction for integrated residents. Rank list factors associated with fellow satisfaction included recommendation of the institution from a mentor (P<0.001), success of program graduates (P=0.002), faculty (P=0.014), perceived program prestige (P=0.040), and amount of early operative exposure (P=0.042). Vascular surgery trainees report a high level of satisfaction with their training program. Fellow satisfaction was more dependent on the perception of their workplace peers than integrated residents. Satisfied integrated residents were more likely to have close relationships with their vascular cotrainees than fellows.

Friends with Bankruptcy Protection Benefits

We show information spillovers limit the effectiveness of targeted debt relief programs. We study individuals who learn about the likelihood of debt relief from the recent experiences of workplace peers filing for bankruptcy protection. Peers granted bankruptcy can discharge debts, while peers facing dismissal lose all protections. Exploiting the random assignment of judges to bankruptcy cases, we determine that individuals with a dismissed peer'' are significantly less likely to file for bankruptcy or enter foreclosure. We highlight a novel channel relating social networks to household finances and identify additional costs of granting individual debt relief imposed on lenders.

The burden of being poor: Stress at the belly of the matter

Medical students and residents often evaluate training sites in vascular surgery with minimal exposure to those programs. We sought to identify factors associated with vascular surgery trainee satisfaction in relation to their current work environment and how they made their rank list.All integrated residents and fellows currently in United States vascular training programs were queried using an anonymous electronic survey for variables of their current training environment, factors that influenced their rank order list, and satisfaction. Questions were graded on a Likert scale. Continuous, ordinal, and categorical variables were respectively analyzed using the two-sample t-test, Mann-Whitney U-test/Wilcoxon rank sum test, and Fisher's exact test.A total of 166 of 517 (32%) trainees completed the survey with equal distribution across postgraduate years. Respondents reported high rates of satisfaction with their training program overall (84%), including 88% (n = 83) of residents and 78% (n = 56) of fellows. Several work environment variables were associated with both resident and fellow satisfaction including program-funded trips for conferences and presentations (P = 0.027 for residents; P = 0.001 for fellows), diversity of operative cases (P = 0.024; P < 0.001), perception of a strong supportive social network at the hospital (P = 0.006; P = 0.001), and perception of appreciation by attending surgeons (P < 0.001; P < 0.001). Fellows who felt appreciated by nursing staff (P = 0.047), ancillary staff (P = 0.013), and patients were more likely to be satisfied (P = 0.011); however, this was not true for integrated residents. Social outings with nontrainee family and friends were associated with satisfaction for fellows (P = 0.002) but not integrated residents (P = 0.138), whereas social outings with vascular trainees were associated with satisfaction for integrated residents (P = 0.047) but not fellows (P = 0.375). Similarly, satisfied integrated residents were more likely to have close relationships with their vascular cotrainees (P = 0.035) than fellows (P = 0.349). No rank list factors were found to be predictive of current trainee satisfaction for integrated residents. Rank list factors associated with fellow satisfaction included recommendation of the institution from a mentor (P < 0.001), success of program graduates (P = 0.002), faculty (P = 0.014), perceived program prestige (P = 0.040), and amount of early operative exposure (P = 0.042).Vascular surgery trainees report a high level of satisfaction with their training program. Fellow satisfaction was more dependent on the perception of their workplace peers than integrated residents. Satisfied integrated residents were more likely to have close relationships with their vascular cotrainees than fellows.

Teachers Teaching Teachers: The Role of Workplace Peer Effects in Financial Decisions

AbstractThis paper studies the role of workplace peers in the transmission of information pertinent to an important household financial decision: the mortgage refinancing choice. Exploiting commonalities in teaching schedules of school teachers in Texas to identify peer groups, we find that refinancing activity among teachers’ peers increases their likelihood of refinancing by 20.7%. The effect of peers increases with the potential savings realized upon refinancing and is stronger among younger teachers. Peers also affect teachers’ choice of lender. Overall, our findings suggest that peer interactions greatly reduce a household’s cost of acquiring and processing financial information.Received March 6, 2017; editorial decision July 31, 2018 by Editor Itay Goldstein. Authors have furnished an Internet Appendix, which is available on the Oxford University Press Web site next to the link to the final published paper online.

Individual and peer effects in retirement savings investment choices

This paper explores the role of a member's peers in the member's propensity to make a change to their retirement savings investment strategy. Given that evidence indicates that the majority of individuals do not seek professional financial advice, we investigate whether workplace peers may be influential in member retirement savings investment strategy behaviour. We explore three ways a peer influence may manifest. First, we examine whether the likelihood that an individual makes an investment strategy change is related to what their work place peers do. Second, we explore whether the workplace gender composition (critical mass) is associated with the individual member's likelihood of changing investment strategy. Building on the second, our third interest is in the role of gender critical mass as a moderator of a member's gender on choice. The results suggest that member investment decisions are influenced by their peers' behaviour, especially the behaviour of workplace peers of the same gender. Workplace gender composition, on the other hand, does not alter member decisions.

The incongruity of workplace bullying victimization and inclusive excellence

PurposeBullying occurs frequently—and with significant negative outcomes—in workplace settings. Once established, bullying endures in the workplace, requiring the interaction of a bully perpetrator and an intended target who takes on the role of victim. Not every target becomes a victim, however. The purpose of this study is to investigate the processes by which targets, intended objects of bullies’ affronts, become victims, those individuals who experience ongoing emotional injury in response to bullies’ affronts, and to clarify how bullying victimization impedes inclusive excellence in the workplace. DesignThe design for this study was pragmatic utility, an inductive research approach grounded in assumptions of hermeneutics. MethodsThe pragmatic utility process involved the investigators’ synthesis of descriptions from a broad, interdisciplinary published literature. Integrating knowledge from their previous research and practice experiences with the pragmatic utility process, they derived qualitative features of victims’ experiences, differentiating target from victim in bullying encounters. FindingsFor those targets who ultimately are victimized, response to bullies’ affronts extends far beyond the immediate present. Redolence of personal, lived experience revives bygone vulnerabilities, and naïve communication and relationship expectations reinforce a long-standing, impoverished sense. That sense couples with workplace dynamics to augment a context of exclusion. ConclusionFindings suggest that, as Heidegger contended, we are our histories. Personal history demonstrates a significance influence on the manifestation of bullying victimization, acting to distance them from their workplace peers and to impede inclusive excellence.

Driving in force: The influence of workplace peers on commuting decisions on U.S. military bases

We investigate the role of social influence in the commute to work. Using instruments to address the endogeneity of commute decisions and a dataset of U.S. military commuters on 100 military bases over the period 2006–2013, we show that workplace peers positively influence one another's decisions to drive alone to work and carpool to work. All else equal, an increase in the fraction of peers who drive alone of 10 percentage points increases the probability of driving alone by 6.05 percentage points. An increase in the fraction of peers who carpool of 10 percentage points increases the probability of carpooling by 5.14 percentage points. To examine whether conventional measures of social status and seniority predict who exerts the strongest influence on others, we disaggregate the dataset into subgroups and identify which subgroups have the greatest influence and which are most susceptible to influence. Results show that in commute decisions, intra-group influence can be more important than inter-group influence. This suggests that workplace travel interventions that seek to shift employees away from driving alone or toward carpooling may be most effective if communicated by one's own peer group.

Clinical Communities at Johns Hopkins Medicine: An Emerging Approach to Quality Improvement

Clinical communities are an emerging approach to quality improvement (QI) to which several large-scale projects have attributed some success. In 2011 the Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality established clinical communities as a core strategy to connect frontline providers from six different hospitals to improve quality of care, patient safety, and value across the health system. CLINICAL COMMUNITIES: Fourteen clinical communities that presented great opportunity for improvement were established. A community could focus on a clinical area, a patient population, a group, a process, a safety-related issue, or nearly any health care issue. The collaborative spirit of the communities embraced interdisciplinary membership and representation from each hospital in each community. Communities engaged in team-building activities and facilitated discussions, met monthly, and were encouraged to meet in person to develop relationships and build trust. After a community was established, patients and families were invited to join and share their perspectives and experiences. ENABLING STRUCTURES: The clinical community structure provided clinicians access to resources, such as technical experts and safety and QI researchers, that were not easily otherwise accessible or available. Communities convened clinicians from each hospital to consider safety problems and their resolution and share learning with workplace peers and local unit safety teams. The clinical communities engaged 195 clinicians from across the health system in QI projects and peer learning. Challenges included limited financial support and time for clinicians, timely access to data, limited resources from the health system, and not enough time with improvement experts.

Contemporaneous peer effects, career age and the industry involvement of academics in biotechnology

This study explores the role of contemporaneous peer effects in driving an academic's involvement with industry. Specifically, we examine the influence of workplace peers and personal collaborators and how these effects are moderated by the career age of the scientist. Moreover, we look at situations in which both types of social influence are incongruent and the academic is faced with “dissonance”. Based on survey data of 355 German academics in the field of biotechnology and publication data from the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE), we find that the scientist's involvement with industry increases with the orientation of the scientist's department toward industry (“localized peer effect”). This effect turns out to be moderated by the scientist's age, such that the localized peer effect decreases with age and finally turns negative for very senior scientists. Moreover, we find that a scientist's involvement increases with the industry orientation of the scientist's co-authors (“personal peer effect”), irrespective of the scientist's age. In case both types of social influence are incongruent, younger scientists will revert to localized norms while more experienced scientists will orient themselves more toward their personal collaborators.

Social identity and the transition to entrepreneurship: The role of group identification with workplace peers

What role does social identity play in the transition from employed work to entrepreneurship? It was expected that social identity affects the cognitive processes that, according to the theory of planned behavior (TPB), underlie the formation of entrepreneurial intentions. Focusing on academic scientists' intentions to commercialize research knowledge, we investigated social identity (scientists' group identification with their workplace peers in academia) as a moderator in the TPB model. Our hypotheses were tested in a sample of 488 German scientists. The data revealed that entrepreneurial intentions were predicted by attitude, social norms, and perceived control and that group identification was negatively associated with perceived control. Multi-group structural equation modeling further showed that group identification moderated the TPB-intention link. Scientists with low group identification based their entrepreneurial intentions not so much on social norms and attitudes but on their self-initiative and control beliefs. Among scientists with high group identification, in turn, entrepreneurial intentions were mainly a function of social norms. These results, in sum, illustrate the long-neglected importance of identification with, and social cohesion within, peer groups at the workplace for the transition to entrepreneurship.

Teaching &amp; Learning Guide for: ‘Because they tip for shit!’: The Social Psychology of Everyday Racism in Restaurants

Teaching &amp; Learning Guide for: ‘Because they tip for shit!’: The Social Psychology of Everyday Racism in Restaurants

Workplace Peers and Entrepreneurship

We examine whether the likelihood of entrepreneurial activity is related to the prior career experiences of an individual’s co-workers, using a unique matched employer-employee panel dataset. We argue that coworkers can increase the likelihood that an individual will perceive entrepreneurial opportunities as well as increase his or her motivation to pursue those opportunities. We find that an individual is more likely to become an entrepreneur if his or her co-workers have been entrepreneurs before. Peer influences also appear to be substitutes for other sources of entrepreneurial influence: we find that peer influences are strongest for those who have less exposure to entrepreneurship in other aspects of their lives.

Workplace Peers and Entrepreneurship

We examine whether the likelihood of entrepreneurial activity is related to the prior career experiences of an individual's coworkers, using a unique matched employer–employee panel data set. We argue that coworkers can increase the likelihood that an individual will perceive entrepreneurial opportunities as well as increase his or her motivation to pursue those opportunities. We find that an individual is more likely to become an entrepreneur if his or her coworkers have been entrepreneurs before. Peer influences also appear to be substitutes for other sources of entrepreneurial influence: we find that peer influences are strongest for those who have less exposure to entrepreneurship in other aspects of their lives.