Abstract. The present study investigated the appropriateness of Antonovsky's model, in which generalized resistance resources (GRRs) facilitate an individual's sense of coherence (SOC); which in turn is assumed to sustain health. The proposed model was tested using a sample of 320 Finnish persons (132 of them were men and 188 women) aged 65-69 years. The GRRs investigated were family income, cognitive functioning, years of formal education, marital status, and physical exercise. Health was measured by means of a multidimensional indicator composed of physical, social and mental health. Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) within the framework of LISREL models were used to test the hypothesized model. The results showed that good cognitive functioning and physical activity in the whole sample, and marital status in men, were associated with a strong SOC, which in turn was positively related to physical, and especially, social and mental health.
Worries about leadership among highly educated professionals: Associations with career aspirations and personal work goals.
We investigated how highly educated professionals' worries about leadership roles relate to their career aspirations and personal work goals. Altogether 1151 professionals without leadership positions participated in the survey study. Participants with a high number of leadership-related worries were not planning to pursue leadership positions. Instead, their goals included increasing personal well-being or ending their career. Vice versa, participants with least leadership-related worries strived for career advancement. These findings indicate that worries about leadership should be acknowledged in education and training programs and in career planning, so that worries would not prevent motivated and suitable individuals from seeking leadership positions.
Latent profile analysis (LPA) is a person-centered method commonly used in organizational research to identify homogeneous subpopulations of employees within a heterogeneous population. However, in the case of nested data structures, such as employees nested in work departments, multilevel techniques are needed. Multilevel LPA (MLPA) enables adequate modeling of subpopulations in hierarchical data sets. MLPA enables investigation of variability in the proportions of Level 1 profiles across Level 2 units, and of Level 2 latent classes based on the proportions of Level 1 latent profiles and Level 1 ratings, and the extent to which covariates drawn from the different hierarchical levels of the data affect the probability of a membership of a particular profile. We demonstrate the use of MLPA by investigating job characteristics profiles based on the job-demand-control-support (JDCS) model using data from 1,958 university employees clustered in 78 work departments. The implications of the results for organizational research are discussed, together with several issues related to the potential of MLPA for wider application.
In: European journal of work and organizational psychology: the official journal of The European Association of Work and Organizational Psychology, Band 26, Heft 4, S. 514-526
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the moderating role of goal conflict in the relationship between the contents of managers' personal work goals and occupational well-being (burnout and work engagement). Eight goal categories (organization, competence, well-being, career-ending, progression, prestige, job change, and employment contract) described the contents of goals. Goal conflict reflected the degree to which a personal work goal was perceived to interfere with other life domains.
Design/methodology/approach – The data were drawn from a study directed to Finnish managers in 2009 (n=806). General linear models were conducted to investigate the associations between goal content categories and occupational well-being and to test whether goal conflict moderates the relationship between goal content categories and occupational well-being.
Findings – Career-ending goals related to significantly higher burnout than progression goals. Participants with organization, competence, or progression goals reported the highest goal conflict, whereas participants with well-being, career-ending, or job change goals reported lower goal conflict. Goal conflict was found to have a moderating role: in a high-goal conflict situation, participants with organizational, competence, and progression goals reported lower occupational well-being, whereas participants with job change goals reported higher occupational well-being.
Originality/value – The research highlights that both the contents and appraisals (e.g. goal conflict) of personal work goals should be taken into account when investigating the relationship between personal goals and well-being at work.