Reacting to Perceived Overqualification: Uniting Strain-Based and Self-Regulatory Adjustment Reactions and the Moderating Role of Formal Work Arrangements.

Thus far, research on perceived overqualification has focused on either maladaptive, strain-based versus more adaptive, self-regulatory reactions in isolation. Following person-environment fit theory, we seek to advance this one-sided focus by uniting both types of adjustment reactions and to consider their implications for perceived person-job fit, and performance and wellbeing outcomes. In line with theory, we also examine contextual boundary conditions in the form of indicators of formal work arrangements (i.e., permanent vs. temporary employment contract and job tenure). Utilizing three-wave data from 453 employees, we found that perceived overqualification indirectly and sequentially related to decreases in task performance, organizational citizenship behavior and job satisfaction via anger toward employment situation and lower levels of perceived person-job fit-thus reflecting the strain-based pathway. For the self-regulatory pathway, findings did not align with our initial proposition that the positive relationship between perceived overqualification and work organization (a form of structural job crafting whereby employees improve their work processes) would be weaker among temporary employees and those with longer tenure. Instead, having a temporary employment contract or having longer job tenure resulted in a negative relationship between perceived overqualification and work organization, which further contributed to a decrease in performance and satisfaction via lower levels of perceived person-job fit. Our study highlights the demotivating role of a temporary employment contract and long job tenure for overqualified employees to reorganize their work. In discussing our findings, we point to the importance of job stage and develop recommendations for managing overqualified employees.

Who will go the extra mile? Selecting organizational citizens with a personality-based structured job interview.

Employees' organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) are important drivers of organizational effectiveness. Yet, there exist no established tools for selecting employees with a propensity to engage in OCB. Given that personality traits describe typical behavioral tendencies and are established OCB predictors, we propose that personality assessment is a useful approach for selecting employees who are likely to exhibit OCB. To test this proposition, we developed a structured job interview measuring the Big Five traits and then compared this interview to a personality self-report measure to determine which method of personality assessment works best for selecting organizational citizens. Employees (N = 223) from various occupations participated in the structured job interview and completed the personality self-report in a simulated selection setting. We then obtained supervisor ratings of employees' OCB. Results supported the assumption that structured job interviews can be specifically designed to assess the Big Five personality traits and, most importantly, to predict OCB. Interview ratings of specific personality traits differentially predicted different types of OCB (i.e., OCB-compliance, OCB-helping, and OCB-initiative) and explained incremental variance in OCB over and above personality self-reports and verbal cognitive ability. Taken together, these findings expand our knowledge about dispositional predictors of OCBs, personality assessment in selection, and the design of job interviews.

I am nice and capable! How and when newcomers' self-presentation to their supervisors affects socialization outcomes.

Whereas meta-analytical research draws a relatively unfavorable picture of the usefulness of self-presentation on the job, our study challenges this view by highlighting the benefits of such behaviors during newcomer socialization. Drawing from social influence theory, the current study examines how and when newcomers' self-presentation, in the form of ingratiation and self-promotion, facilitates their socialization success (indicated by affective commitment, job performance, and promotability) by shaping their supervisors' relational and work-based socialization efforts. Data from a time-lagged field study of 355 newcomer-supervisor dyads provided support for the proposed model. In particular, we found that ingratiation was positively related to supervisor relational socialization effort, which in turn was positively related to newcomer affective commitment. Additionally, self-promotion was positively related to supervisor work-based socialization effort, which in turn was positively related to newcomer job performance and promotability. Drawing on social influence theory's notion that characteristics related to the influencer may further affect self-presentation effectiveness, we found that newcomers' interpersonal influence and work role clarity weakened the positive effects of newcomer self-presentation on supervisor socialization efforts. These findings illustrate how newcomers can achieve desirable socialization outcomes by enacting social influence on organizational insiders with self-presentation, extending the literatures on both self-presentation and newcomer socialization. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Making flow happen: the effects of being recovered on work-related flow between and within days.

This article examines variations of work-related flow both between and within days. On the basis of the effort-recovery model (Meijman & Mulder, 1998), we hypothesized that a person's relative day-specific state of being recovered (i.e., feeling refreshed) in the morning is positively related to subsequent day-level flow experiences during work. Taking into account research on circadian rhythms of human functioning, we further hypothesized that flow experiences follow a U-shaped pattern within the working day and that feeling recovered will affect this pattern. One hundred and twenty-one software professionals provided data on recovery at the start of the working day and on flow at 3 occasions during the day, for a period of 5 consecutive working days (resulting in 493 day-level and 1,340 occasion-level data points). Three-level multilevel models showed that relative day-level state of being recovered predicted day-level flow experiences in the hypothesized direction. The data did not support a general curvilinear, U-shaped main effect of flow experiences within the day. However, people in a relatively high state of being recovered in the morning experienced the predicted U-shaped pattern, whereas poorly recovered people experienced a gradual decrease in flow experiences over the course of the working day. This study emphasizes the importance of recovery during nonwork time for flow experiences within the entire working day, thereby extending research on task characteristics with personal resources when examining predictors of flow.

Catch me if I fall! Enacted uncertainty avoidance and the social safety net as country-level moderators in the job insecurity-job attitudes link.

Job insecurity is related to many detrimental outcomes, with reduced job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment being the 2 most prominent reactions. Yet, effect sizes vary greatly, suggesting the presence of moderator variables. On the basis of Lazarus's cognitive appraisal theory, we assumed that country-level enacted uncertainty avoidance and a country's social safety net would affect an individual's appraisal of job insecurity. More specifically, we hypothesized that these 2 country-level variables would buffer the negative relationships between job insecurity and the 2 aforementioned job attitudes. Combining 3 different data sources, we tested the hypotheses in a sample of 15,200 employees from 24 countries by applying multilevel modeling. The results confirmed the hypotheses that both enacted uncertainty avoidance and the social safety net act as cross-level buffer variables. Furthermore, our data revealed that the 2 cross-level interactions share variance in explaining the 2 job attitudes. Our study responds to calls to look at stress processes from a multilevel perspective and highlights the potential importance of governmental regulation when it comes to individual stress processes.