Counselors are currently being scrutinized as to their place in a community college setting. Administrative units are questioning whether counselors are necessary, and whether they should maintain their past role. But before changes are made, the full scope of the role needs to be examined. Previous studies have concentrated on role definition, looking primarily at which tasks counselors perform and their job satisfaction. I first examine the counselor's role using a role definition format to provide a baseline of data to compare with other studies. Then I considered three other elements--intangible services, professionalization, and the bureaucratic setting--that I proposed were contributing to the uncertain position of counselors in community colleges. This is a qualitative case study of community college counselors. Personal interviews with counselors were utilized as the primary source of data. The case study institution is a large, urban, multi-campus community college. Results indicate that counselors are satisfied with their generalist role of providing primarily career and academic counseling, providing a very small percentage of personal counseling and providing a variety of other services. This is unlike the literature which suggests that counselors are dissatisfied with the generalist role and prefer a more specialized personal counseling role. The counselors in this study were frustrated by their perceived role by other groups. They felt misunderstood and unappreciated. Consequently, they searched for ways to make their services more visible and understandable. They also relied heavily on their professional status to validate their role. But rather than emphasizing their traditional professional counseling characteristics like the use of a theoretical body of knowledge or specialized training and certification, they underscored their similarity to the instructional faculty who command the highest professional status in community colleges. The counselor's role was also highly effected by bureaucratization. The very nature of bureaucracies induces human interaction that is brief and efficient, but not necessarily meaningful. Improving human interaction is where counselors need to focus their efforts, rather than dwelling on professional status. And, administrators must also consider human interaction rather than just dividing tasks and measuring the number of students served.

As organizations face stiff competition and changing environments their structure and systems can become less effective to a point at which they require radical change. It is becoming clear that change is often inevitable. However, radical change is difficult. The popular term "reengineering" is used to describe a process by which organizations undergo the challenging radical process change that is critical to remaining competitive. Although the processes of reengineering appears to have more potential than other change methods that merely tweak a poor system or apply outdated principles, it can often fail. A critical step in the reengineering process is the design of the "to-be" model, however no research has been done on how this should be achieved. It appears that improving this step can have a dramatic impact on the success of the reengineering effort as a whole. This study developed a method for creating "to-be" models and tested it with an organization undergoing reengineering. The method used the latest computer support including both group support systems and animated simulation. The design of the "to-be" models was framed as a group problem solving process and therefore the focus theory of group productivity was used to guide the design of the process, including selection of computer support tools. Because so little is known about the process of creating "to-be" models, this study used an exploratory action science approach. What is known about organizational change is that it takes place in a politically charged arena where individuals have strong vested interests in its outcomes. This environment is difficult to create in the laboratory and therefore the research was conducted using a real organization undergoing reengineering. Results suggest that the combined use of collaborative technology and process animation gives organization members a better understanding of current processes and problems associated with them and helps to generate significant ideas for process improvement. Because groups viewing a process animation have sometimes been observed to focus on incremental improvement at the expense of radical change, special attention must be given to facilitation methods and idea generation techniques that are designed to elicit radical change ideas.

The purpose of this study was: (1) to measure and compare the differences in the levels of anger in unemployed workers who have been laid off due to company or plant closure and unemployed workers who have been laid off due to a reduction in force (RIF) and (2) to compare the relationship between level of anger and length of time with an employer prior to layoff. The population for this study consisted of 52 male and female adults over 21 years of age, residents of Arizona, who had been laid off or had received advance notification of impending layoff. The State-Trait Anger Expression Inventory (STAXI) was the instrument used in this study to measure levels of anger. Additionally, two demographic questions were asked concerning reason for layoff and number of years with the company that laid the individual off. None of the hypotheses were supported by the data. Discussion, implications, and recommendations for further research are also presented.

No abstract available. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2009.

<p> Innovation is essential for organizational survival and effectiveness and often requires a balance between managing existing competencies, skills, and resources, and pursuing newer and radical aspirations. Organizational leaders play an important role in fostering innovation in the workplace and striking a unique equilibrium between these competing priorities to maximize individual creativity and organizational innovation outcomes. By employing path analyses, this study examined the relationship between two leadership styles&mdash;transformational leadership (TFL) and leader-member exchange (LMX) and two forms of organizational innovation (exploration and exploitation). The study also investigated the role that individual and organizational variables played in explaining the leadership-innovation relationship. </p><p> Results suggested positive but non-significant relationships between leadership styles and organizational innovation due to the high correlations and overlap between the two leadership styles. Follower autonomy was positively and significantly related to exploration innovation. When analyzed separately, positive and significant associations were found for both leadership styles and organizational innovation. Results of this study suggest the equal importance of transformational and relational styles of leadership towards fostering both forms of organizational innovation. In particular, organizational support for innovation was found to mediate the leadership-innovation relationship, suggesting the importance of social mechanisms in translating the effects of leadership into innovation outcomes for the organization.</p>

<p> Employee engagement is a relatively new construct in academic literature and an increasingly popular idea in practice. Proponents of employee engagement claim a strong positive relationship between engagement and business success, both at the firm and individual levels, and outcomes including retention, productivity, profitability, and customer loyalty and satisfaction. Despite numerous academic and practitioner publications on employee engagement, no consistently-accepted conceptualization of the construct or its sub-dimensions exists, and there is an ongoing debate regarding whether the employee engagement construct is a new idea or a re-hashing of old ideas. Similarly, no consistently-accepted tool to measure employee engagement exists. In the absence of consistent conceptualization and measurement, relationships between employee engagement and its antecedents and outcomes cannot be empirically tested. Drawing on prior literature and practitioner interviews, the present study defines employee engagement as an attitude towards one&rsquo;s work at one&rsquo;s company, comprising feelings of vigor, dedication, and absorption; cognitive appraisals of psychological empowerment; and motivation to act, both within role and extra role, in the service of the organization&rsquo;s goals. In addition, the present study validates a self-report instrument to measure this conceptualization of employee engagement, using construct and scale validation procedures accepted in marketing and information systems literature.</p>

<p> Firefighters are known for putting their own lives on the line in order to protect others' lives and property. The events of September 11^th, 2001, pointed this out to the entire nation. The fact that firefighters are willing to run into burning buildings while others are trying to get out, or face situations that others find horrific, points to the fact that these individuals are motivated to serve and put service above self. However, even firefighters deal with issues of chronic stress and burnout. Considering the critical role firefighters play in society, it is important to delineate what motivates them to persevere in their chosen field. Firefighters across the country may be either volunteers, typically in smaller rural settings, or paid professionals in urbanized communities. This dissertation provided research into intrinsic and extrinsic motivation relative to professional firefighters in a union environment. Through quantitative research involving a nonexperimental design with a validated and reliable survey instrument, fire chiefs and union represented firefighters were queried as to the degree that firefighters were intrinsically or extrinsically motivated. The results showed that firefighters were, for the most part, motivated through intrinsic means. However, the collected data also demonstrated that extrinsic motivation through forms of recognition is also desired by firefighters. The overall result of this research provides options for fire service leaders to consider in maintaining a highly motivated cadre of firefighters, and thus reducing the potential for chronic stress and burnout to occur. </p><p> <i>Keywords:</i> Firefighters, intrinsic motivation, extrinsic motivation</p>

<p> As our nation has become more aware of severe, yet usually rare, crisis events in schools, the need for crisis planning is more evident. Although the severity of crises can differ greatly (e.g., school shooting versus physical assaults), crisis preparedness is an essential component of schools' responsibilities in order to effectively respond to a variety of situations. A total of 70 participants, from multiple states across the United States, completed an online questionnaire about demographic characteristics, resources for school crisis planning, and training on crisis topics. Participants also submitted a copy of their school's crisis plan to be evaluated using a recently developed checklist to assess the comprehensiveness of plans. The results indicated that school crisis plans were often lacking recommended components in the prevention, intervention, and postvention areas. Further analyses revealed that demographic variables did not significantly impact the variation in plan quality, and the total training score did not significantly predict plan quality. However, the regression analysis for the total resources score was significant in predicting plan quality. Another important finding of this research was that plans often included essential crisis procedures that were not included on the checklist used for evaluation. These results hold several implications for schools. First, schools should be revising and updating crisis plans on a regular basis. The lack of certain components based on the checklist should be taken into account when revising these plans. Schools may also want to invest in factors that will positively influence their crisis planning. The current study suggests that resources are a significant predictor of plan quality, and thus this should be an area where schools focus time and funding. </p>

<p> The purpose of this quantitative, survey-based study was to investigate the relationship between anger and hatred in an effort to learn more about how to understand and curb the problem of workplace violence. In particular, perfectionism was examined as a possible mediator of the relationship between anger and hatred. The study was conducted on a sample of 1,192 people. The statistical techniques of correlation, partial correlation, linear regression, and principal components analysis (PCA) were used to examine the relationship between variables in the study. The following conclusions were reached: (a) The correlation between hatred and anger was significant (<i>p</i> &lt; .001) but weak (R = .298), and these values changed slightly (R=.221) when controlling for the influence of perfectionism; (b) PCA revealed hatred and anger to be highly distinct from each other; (c) PCA revealed that the sub-scales of anger and hatred were sensitive to differences in how anger and hatred are felt and expressed; (d) the relationship between anger and motivation was not significant (<i>p</i> = &lt; .001); (e) the relationship between hatred and motivation was not significant (<i>p</i> = &lt; .001); (f) anger and hatred were not multicollinear in their association with motivation; and (f) for younger subjects, anger was a weaker predictor of hatred, while for older subjects anger was a stronger predictor of hatred. Based on these findings, the main conclusion of the study is that existing theories that associate anger and hatred might require revision based on further analysis of the differences between anger and hatred</p>

<p> This non-experimental quantitative study using structural equation modeling and the theory of planned behavior examined the relationships between latent variables, affective commitment and continuance commitment, and manifest variables, career intent and retention incentive decision behavior. The sample consisted of 598 U.S. Army Captains (14% of population) who met inclusion criteria of being commissioned in 2005 and answered all questions on the archival U.S. Army Research Institute's 2007 Survey of Officer Careers. Using fit indices such as RMSEA at 0.068 and the Bentler CFI at 0.93 the final model was considered an acceptable-to-good fit, where each increase of 1 point in career intent significantly predicted increased retention incentive decision behavior by 1/7 of a point (<i>b</i> = 0.142,<i>p</i> &lt; .0001, &beta; = 0.409). An increase in 1 point in affective commitment predicted increases in career intent by almost 2 points (<i>b</i> = 1.86, <i>p </i> &lt; .0001, &beta;= 0.457) and each point increase of continuance commitment increased career intent by a little over 1/2 a point (<i> b</i> = 0.612,<i>p</i> &lt; .0001, &beta; = 0.234). There were three conclusions from this study. First, the final model extended the theory of planned behavior to the attitudes and intentions of Captains who were presented a retention incentive lending insights into remuneration for retaining entry-level employees for continued service in closed personnel systems. Second, affective commitment and continuance commitment were significant predictors of increases in career intent, and high career intent was a significant predictor of a taking a retention incentive, as the theoretical model predicted. Third, Army senior leaders were successful in retaining Army Captains with higher organizational commitment and career intent than those Captains who did not take an incentive. Four recommendations were made for Army practice: a.) continue the longitudinal survey, b.) continue to monitor external conditions and the effects on retention, c.) link leadership climate to retention, d.) tailor retention programs on retaining mid-grade officer talent. Three recommendations for future research include: a.) add non-native commitment to the longitudinal study, b.) consider the effects of remuneration on the profession of arms, and c.) analyze additional intervening variables in the model. </p>