The Structure and Function of Human Capital Emergence

8/2/2019 The Structure and Function of Human Capital Emergence

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Robert E. PloyhartUniversity of South Carolina

Jeff A. WeekleyKenexa

Kathryn BaughmanGeorge Mason University


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Discussion OutlineThe Structure and Function of Human Capital Emergence: A Multilevel

Examination of the Attraction-Selection-Attrition Model

Abstract

Theoretical Background and Hypothesis

The ASA Model and Human Capital

Homogeneity Hypothesis

Multilevel Theory

Present Study: Integrating the ASA model with Multilevel Theory

Findings

Methods

Setting, Participants, and Procedures

Measure


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Results Analyses

Hypothesis tests

Discussion

Theoretical Implication

Managerial Implication

Limitation


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The ASA Model and Human Capital

Human Capital refers to the aggregate Knowledge, Skills,Abilities and other competencies of an organizationsworkforce KSAO.

The ASA Model is a person based model of theorganization, meaning that it is grounded in the view thatthe structures, processes, and cultures of organizationsreflect their job incumbents collective personality.(Schneider, 1987)

A powerful framework for understanding the creation ofhuman capital is the attraction-selection-attrition (ASA)model. (Schneider, 1987)


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Homogeneity Hypothesis According to the ASA Model, through the process of

attracting, selecting, and retaining individuals, an

organization increasingly moves toward homogeneity in

knowledge, skills, abilities and other competencies.

Members of the same organization (individuals within

organizations) should be more similar in shared

personality than members of different organizations(individuals between organizations).


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Multilevel Theory It is not clear how to best conceptualize homogeneity,

measure it or understand its effects (Schneider et al.,

1995).

Multilevel research addresses the inherent nested nature of

organizational behavior, conceptualizing individuals as

nested within groups, groups nested within organizations

and so forth.

Bond strengthadjacent levels are more tightly coupled

and interconnected than levels that are farther apart.


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Emergencelow level constructs (e.g. individual

attitudes) form higher level constructs (e.g. organizationalclimate).

Two structures of emergence:

Composition Modelfocuses on consensus

- within unit observations will be similar that they can beadequately aggregated and represented by a units mean

score.

Compilation Modelfocuses on dissensus

- show how variance in lower-level observationsrepresent a higher level construct that can be estimated as a

units standard deviation.


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Integrating ASA Model with

Multilevel Theory Five factor model to describe individual level personality

to explain organizational collective personality (Costa &

McCrae, 1992)

1. Emotional stability

2. Extraversion

3. Openness

4. Agreeableness

5. Conscientiousness


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Findings Emotional stability

- Jobs and organizations with higher mean levels of

emotional stability will have members more likely to work

together and back each other up resulting to higherindividual performance and satisfaction.

- In contrast, greater variance in job and organizational-

level emotional stability should negatively relate to

individual performance and satisfaction. (Moynihan &

Peterson, 2004;Stewart, 2004)


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Conscientiousness

- Teams with more conscientious members are morereliable and hard working, and they are more likely to

adopt task-oriented norms that would positively relate to

individual performance and satisfaction

- In contrast, greater variance in job and organizational-

level conscientiousness should negatively relate to

individual performance and satisfaction because of

compensation for unreliable co-workers.


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Agreeableness

- Individuals within jobs and organizations containingmore agreeable members should exhibit better service

performance and satisfaction because their co-workers are

more likely to assist and help with service provision.

- Variability in team members agreeableness negatively

relates to team attitudes and performance because it

contributes to more conflict and less cohesion and

communication.


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Extraversion

- Team-level mean extraversion has been linked to teamcohesion, reduced conflict viability and performance

resulting to positive relationships to individual satisfaction

and performance. (Barrick et al., 1998; Neuman & Wright,

1999)- Job and organizational-level variance in extraversion

should show negative relationships to individual

satisfaction and performance because of lower

communication that disrupts individual behavior. (Barricket al., 1998; Barrick, Stewart, & Piotrrowski, 2002)


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Methods Setting, Participants, and Procedures

Participants: 9, 603 employees from 85 jobs

in 12 organizations

Note: organizations all had multiple,

geographically distributed stores; from

service sector


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Participants in Organizations

Retail60 jobs in 9 organizationsHospitality20 jobs in 2 organizations

Health care2 jobs in 1 organization

That is, the theory was that individuals are nested

within jobs that are nested within organizations.

Individuals in a particular job within an organization

should have more similar personalities than

individuals from similar jobs but different

organizations. (Ployhart et al, 2006: 667)
http://asa0002.pdf/http://asa0002.pdf/


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Service occupations share a number of team like

interaction processes, such as the need forcoworkers to back each other up during times of

peak demand, to work together for better service

provision, and share knowledge about customersand services to enhance the service experierience

(Schneider & Bowen, 1992, 1995; Ryan &

Ployhart. 2003).

Service organizations have always facedconsiderable challenges in attracting, selecting,

and retaining people (Hatch and Clinton, 2000).


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Race and Gender (Voluntary Basis)

Race data were missing for 1, 966 individualsGender data were missing for 1, 002 people

Race PercentageWhite 84

African-American 7.9

Hispanic 5.4

Asian 1.8

Native American o.8

Gender(Sex)

Percentage

Female 53.7

Male 47.3


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Measures

SatisfactionHackman and Oldhams (1975) three-item measure (two items

tapping overall satisfaction and one item pertaining to

intentions to quit)

The type of job satisfaction measure did not greatly affect thevalidity of the personality-job satisfaction relationship (Judge

et al, 2002) findings: reasonable degree of generalizability

Performance

Supervisory ratings of customer service (20 items; Example:Responds immediately to any and customer requests)

Citizenship performance (30 items; Example: Volunteers for

things that are not required)

Note: The researchers only had 3, 925 participants


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items: based on job analysis and on comprehensive reviews

of service and contextual performance; 5-point scale

Personality

Personality profile (25 items)developed by Kenexa, an

HR consulting firm(Table 2)

Two studies have demonstrated the construct validity of

these measures.

1. Goldhabers (1992) five-factor-model trait adjectivetrait

2. Goldhabers (1999) 50-item Likert measure of the five-

factor model


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Results Overview of the AnalysesThree-level Random Co-efficient Model (RCM) to estimate

the significance of the personality predictors at individual,job, and organization levels

Hypothesis Test (Table 3)Hypothesis 1

We expected job-level composition to be stronger thanorganizational-level composition

Testing(2 ways):

1. They examined the intraclass correlation (ICC[1]) from theRCM for each personality trait

2. They conducted Multivariate Analysis of Variance(MANOVA) using the personality constructs as the dependentvariable and job type as the categorical independent variable
http://mlm_day4.pdf/http://asa0002.pdf/http://asa0002.pdf/http://mlm_day4.pdf/http://mlm_day4.pdf/http://mlm_day4.pdf/


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Results: Supports Hypothesis 1 and suggest that composition

within organization follows hierarchy and it is nested.Emotional stability, extraversion, agreeableness, and

conscientiousness can be used to distinguish between jobs and

organizations. (Ployhart et al, 2006: 670)

(Table 4)


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For job satisfaction, there were significant relationships for

individual-level emotional stability, job mean emotionalstability, and organizational mean emotional stability.(Ployhart et al, 2006: 670)

For job performance, there were significant relationships forindividual, job mean, organizational mean, and organizational

variance emotional stability, and a significant organizationalmean by variance interaction. (Ployhart et al, 2006: 670)

Figure 1: Organizational mean and performance were morestrongly related when variance was lower (Ployhart et al, 2006:670).

For job satisfaction and job performance, there weresignificant relationships for individual-level conscientiousness,

job mean conscientiousness, and organizational meanconscientiousness. (Ployhart et al, 2006: 670)


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For job satisfaction, relationships were significant only

for individual-level, job-mean-level, and job variance

agreeableness. (Ployhart et al, 2006: 671)

For job performance, relationships were significant only

for individual and job mean agreeableness. (Ployhart et

al, 2006: 671)

For both job satisfaction and performance, there were

significant relationships for individual-level, job mean,

and variance scores, and their interaction, and fororganizational mean extraversion. (Ployhart et al, 2006:

671)


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Discussion Such a multilevel integration addresses several recent calls

for building bridges between micro and macro levels ofHR research

Argues that homogeneity is really a form of emergence

Multilevel theory composition process operate inhierarchical manner, emerging more strongly at lowerlevels

Individuals with more emotional stability,

conscientiousness, agreeableness, and extraversion = moresatisfaction and performance

More variance less satisfaction and lower performance


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Theoretical Implication The consequences of homogeneity may be better

conceptualized in terms of a units variance rather than

mean, and such a conceptualization would require a

fundamental change in the framing and testing the ASA

model. (Ployhart et al, 2006:673)

A multilevel ASA model provides an important vehicle

for such integration because it describes why marco HR

practices should influence the emergence of human

capital. (Ployhart et al, 2006:673)


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Managerial Implications Classic individual level approach - firms hire individuals

with more emotional stability, conscientiousness,

agreeableness, and extraversion

Recruitment phase: emphasis of 4 traits (part of

organizations personality) attract and retain

individuals with similar personalities

Selection phase: selection = job-specific factors +matching personality of applicant and coworkers in job

and organization


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Limitations 1. Researchers should clearly seek to replicate these

findings with different measures and samples. (Ployhart

et al, 2006:674)

2. The personality and satisfaction measures werecollected in the same session and may have been affected

by common source bias. (Ployhart et al, 2006:673)

3. We cannot be sure homogeneity was not affected by

participants responding to the personality measures in themanner consistent with what they believed the

organization expected or valued, rather than with their true

personalities. (Ployhart et al, 2006:673)


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4. We did not examine the processes through which job-

and organization-level personality were expected to affect

job satisfaction and performance. (Ployhart et al,

2006:673)

5. Our data were cross-sectional, and we did not examine

the longitudinal processes through which emergence

occurs. (Ployhart et al, 2006:673)

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The Structure and Function of Human Capital Emergence