Personal initiative

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Personal initiative (PI) is self-starting and proactive behavior that overcomes barriers to achieve a goal. [1] The concept was developed by Michael Frese and coworkers in the 1990s .

Contents

The three facets of PI – self-starting, future oriented, and overcoming barriers form a syndrome of proactive behaviors relating to each other empirically. Self-starting implies that the goals are set by an individual themselves and not by someone else. [2] [3] These self-started goals are often related to future orientation that involves having long-term focus and preparation for future demands and problems. Future demands can be met by proactive actions – 'pro' meaning preparatory or beforehand in Greek. Thus, a proactive approach attempts to get pre-signals signifying future obstacles and developing plans to prevent them. Implementation of long-term goals often leads to new setbacks. Initiative, therefore, implies that one will overcome these barriers actively and persistently.

PI stands in contrast to a passive approach, which is characterized by doing what one is told, giving up when faced with difficulties, and reacting to environmental demands. Proponents of PI have argued that it may become more important in future workplaces as they require a high degree of self-reliance. [2]

PI is often conceptualized as the behavioral component of the general proactivity concept; [4] it is also related but not identical to work engagement. [5]

Relevance

PI is developed as a performance outcome within the action (regulation) theory tradition. [6] While PI is consistently linked to higher work performance and innovativeness of individuals, [7] [8] it also interacts with other types of constructs of intrinsic motivation. [9] The PI concept was used to create an effective training tool, [10] which is now being used to help thousands of entrepreneurs and organisations in developing countries to improve their businesses. [11]

Climate

PI Climate refers to formal and informal organizational practices which guide and support a proactive, self-starting, and persistent approach toward work. [12] Studies have shown that individual personal initiative is related to idea generation, entrepreneurial success , and innovation implementation behavior. [13] [8] Similarly, a climate that fosters personal initiative helps to predict radical innovation as well as profitability of firms. As problems appear during the implementation of an innovation, innovation paired with a low level of climate for initiative may negatively affect company performance. [12] [14] [15]

There may be higher uncertainty with new production systems leading to unexpected problems and barriers that need to be overcome; PI climate helps here to avoid production breakdowns. [16] [17] For firm performance there is an interaction between process innovation and climate for personal initiative - climate for personal initiative functions as a moderator. Organizations that display a work environment characterized by personal initiative have a higher chance of promoting the effectiveness of process innovations. [18]

Facets of PI

PI suggests a model for training with action sequence goal setting, information gathering and prognosis, plan development and execution, plan monitoring, and feedback processing. The facet theory of PI depicted in the table provides a general concept of active performance from an action theory perspective. [6] [19] Every step of the action sequence can be supported by PI.

Facets of Personal Initiative
Action sequenceSelf-startingFuture orientedPersistence
Goals / redefinition of tasks
  • Develop goals that are unique and creative, rather than merely replicating those of others.
  • Predict future opportunities and problems and set goals to address them.
  • Even when frustrated, maintain existing goals.
Information collection and prognosis
  • Active labour market research and outreach.
  • Analyse the environment in search of relevant innovations and technologies.
  • Find out about upcoming potential problems or opportunities.
  • Accrue information on alternative actions.
  • Continue to seek out relevant information, even if it is challenging, complex or frustrating.
Planning and execution
  • Develop plans that demand one's own actions.
  • Develop contingency plan (Plan B).
  • Develop plans for potential opportunities
  • Go back to plan as quickly as possible in case of difficulties.
Monitoring and feedback
  • Actively search for feedback.
  • Use feedback and pre-signals to prepare for problems and opportunities
  • Keep looking for feedback even when it gets difficult (esp. negative feedback).

Training entrepreneurs

PI was used to create an effective training tool for entrepreneurs and micro-businesses in developing countries to improve their effectiveness. [10] [19] PI training has been studied with randomized controlled trials and shown to be successful. It leads to a proactive entrepreneurial mindset. [11] Participants learn ways to set themselves apart from other businesses, as well as to anticipate problems, overcome setbacks, improve opportunity planning skills, and do other long-term planning. Not every experiment on PI training was successful, however the impact of personal initiative training was higher in a large randomised controlled filed experiment than Traditional Business training. [11]

Consequences

Positive outcomes

Higher PI workers benefit positively in their careers via several avenues including: [20] [21] [22]

Potentially negative outcomes

PI can also have negative outcomes for employees. [27] Showing PI can be harmful on different levels: for the employees themselves, for teammates, and for the entire organization. If management expects employees to be proactive, it may burden employees with extreme aspirations. [28] On the organizational level, high PI among employees may reduce the possibility of the organizations to control and to socialize members of the organization.

Related Research Articles

Industrial and organizational psychology "focuses the lens of psychological science on a key aspect of human life, namely, their work lives. In general, the goals of I-O psychology are to better understand and optimize the effectiveness, health, and well-being of both individuals and organizations." It is an applied discipline within psychology and is an international profession. I-O psychology is also known as occupational psychology in the United Kingdom, organisational psychology in Australia and New Zealand, and work and organizational (WO) psychology throughout Europe and Brazil. Industrial, work, and organizational (IWO) psychology is the broader, more global term for the science and profession.

Work design is an area of research and practice within industrial and organizational psychology, and is concerned with the "content and organization of one's work tasks, activities, relationships, and responsibilities" (p. 662). Research has demonstrated that work design has important implications for individual employees, teams, organisations, and society.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Job satisfaction</span> Attitude of a person towards work

Job satisfaction, employee satisfaction or work satisfaction is a measure of workers' contentment with their job, whether they like the job or individual aspects or facets of jobs, such as nature of work or supervision. Job satisfaction can be measured in cognitive (evaluative), affective, and behavioral components. Researchers have also noted that job satisfaction measures vary in the extent to which they measure feelings about the job. or cognitions about the job.

Goal setting involves the development of an action plan designed in order to motivate and guide a person or group toward a goal. Goals are more deliberate than desires and momentary intentions. Therefore, setting goals means that a person has committed thought, emotion, and behavior towards attaining the goal. In doing so, the goal setter has established a desired future state which differs from their current state thus creating a mismatch which in turn spurs future actions. Goal setting can be guided by goal-setting criteria such as SMART criteria. Goal setting is a major component of personal-development and management literature. Studies by Edwin A. Locke and his colleagues, most notably, Gary Latham have shown that more specific and ambitious goals lead to more performance improvement than easy or general goals. The goals should be specific, time constrained and difficult. Vague goals reduce limited attention resources. Unrealistically short time limits intensify the difficulty of the goal outside the intentional level and disproportionate time limits are not encouraging. Difficult goals should be set ideally at the 90th percentile of performance,assuming that motivation and not ability is limiting attainment of that level of performance. As long as the person accepts the goal, has the ability to attain it, and does not have conflicting goals, there is a positive linear relationship between goal difficulty and task performance.

Transfer of training is applying knowledge and skills acquired during training to a targeted job or role. This is a term commonly used within industrial and organizational psychology.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Employee engagement</span> Relationship between an organization and its employees

Employee engagement is a fundamental concept in the effort to understand and describe, both qualitatively and quantitatively, the nature of the relationship between an organization and its employees. An "engaged employee" is defined as one who is fully absorbed by and enthusiastic about their work and so takes positive action to further the organization's reputation and interests. An engaged employee has a positive attitude towards the organization and its values. In contrast, a disengaged employee may range from someone doing the bare minimum at work, up to an employee who is actively damaging the company's work output and reputation.

Personal development or self-improvement consists of activities that develop a person's capabilities and potential, build human capital, facilitate employability, enhance quality of life, and facilitate the realization of dreams and aspirations. Personal development may take place over the course of an individual's entire lifespan and is not limited to one stage of a person's life. It can include official and informal actions for developing others in roles such as teacher, guide, counselor, manager, coach, or mentor, and it is not restricted to self-help. When personal development takes place in the context of institutions, it refers to the methods, programs, tools, techniques, and assessment systems offered to support positive adult development at the individual level in organizations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Onboarding</span> Management jargon for introducing new employees to employers policies and practices

Onboarding or organizational socialization is the American term for the mechanism through which new employees acquire the necessary knowledge, skills, and behaviors to become effective organizational members and insiders. In standard English, this is referred to as "induction". In the United States, up to 25% of workers are organizational newcomers engaged in onboarding process.

Greenberg (1987) introduced the concept of organizational justice with regard to how an employee judges the behavior of the organization and the employee's resulting attitude and behaviour. For example, if a firm makes redundant half of the workers, an employee may feel a sense of injustice with a resulting change in attitude and a drop in productivity.

Proactivity or proactive behavior refers to self-initiated behavior that endeavours to solve a problem before it has occurred. Proactive behavior involves acting in advance of a future situation, rather than reacting. It refers to taking control of a situation and making early changes, rather than adjusting to a situation or waiting for something to happen.

Training and development involve improving the effectiveness of organizations and the individuals and teams within them. Training may be viewed as related to immediate changes in organizational effectiveness via organized instruction, while development is related to the progress of longer-term organizational and employee goals. While training and development technically have differing definitions, the two are oftentimes used interchangeably and/or together. Training and development have historically been topics within adult education and applied psychology but have within the last two decades become closely associated with human resources management, talent management, human resources development, instructional design, human factors, and knowledge management.

Work engagement is the "harnessing of organization member's selves to their work roles: in engagement, people employ and express themselves physically, cognitively, emotionally and mentally during role performances". Three aspects of work motivation are cognitive, emotional and physical engagement.

Counterproductive work behavior (CWB) is employee's behavior that goes against the legitimate interests of an organization. This behavior can harm the organization, other people within it, and other people and organizations outside it, including employers, other employees, suppliers, clients, patients and citizens. It has been proposed that a person-by-environment interaction (the relationship between a person's psychological and physical capacities and the demands placed on those capacities by the person's social and physical environment.) can be utilized to explain a variety of counterproductive behaviors. For instance, an employee who is high on trait anger is more likely to respond to a stressful incident at work with CWB.

Cross-cultural psychology attempts to understand how individuals of different cultures interact with each other. Along these lines, cross-cultural leadership has developed as a way to understand leaders who work in the newly globalized market. Today's international organizations require leaders who can adjust to different environments quickly and work with partners and employees of other cultures. It cannot be assumed that a manager who is successful in one country will be successful in another.

Psychological safety is the belief that one will not be punished or humiliated for speaking up with ideas, questions, concerns, or mistakes. In teams, it refers to team members believing that they can take risks without being shamed by other team members. In psychologically safe teams, team members feel accepted and respected. It is also the most studied enabling condition in group dynamics and team learning research.

Narcissism in the workplace involves the impact of narcissistic employees and managers in workplace settings.

Entrepreneurial orientation (EO) is a firm-level strategic orientation which captures an organization's strategy-making practices, managerial philosophies, and firm behaviors that are entrepreneurial in nature. Entrepreneurial orientation has become one of the most established and researched constructs in the entrepreneurship literature. A general commonality among past conceptualizations of EO is the inclusion of innovativeness, proactiveness, and risk-taking as core defining aspects or dimensions of the orientation. EO has been shown to be a strong predictor of firm performance with a meta-analysis of past research indicating a correlation in magnitude roughly equivalent to the prescription of taking sleeping pills and getting better sleep. Still, some research has argued that EO does not enhance the performance for all firms. Instead, EO can be argued not to be a simple performance enhancing attribute but rather enhancing if it is applied under the right circumstances of the firm. In some cases, EO can even be disadvantageous for firms, if the situation of the firm does not fit with applying EO. Different situations can be the environment that the firm is situated within or internal situations such as structure and strategy.

Resistance to diversity efforts in organizations is a well-established and ubiquitous phenomenon that may be characterized by thoughts, feelings, or behaviors that undermine the success of diversity-related organizational change initiatives to recruit or retain diverse personnel. The use of such initiatives may be referred to as diversity management. Scholars note the presence of resistance to diversity before and after the civil rights movement; as pressures for diversity and social change increased in the 1960s, dominant group members faced workplace concerns over displacement by minorities.

Job crafting is an individually-driven work design process which refers to self-initiated, proactive strategies to change the characteristics of one's job to better align the job with personal needs, goals, and skills. Individuals engage in job crafting as a means to experience greater meaning at work, a positive work identity, better work-related well-being, and better job performance. As a topic of scientific inquiry, job crafting was built on research that suggests employees do not always enact the job descriptions that are formally assigned to them, but instead actively shape and utilize their jobs to fit their needs, values, and preferences. Classic job design theory typically focuses on the ways in which managers design jobs for their employees. As a work design strategy, job crafting represents a departure from this thinking in that the redesign is driven by employees, is not negotiated with the employer and may not even be noticed by the manager. This idea also distinguishes job crafting from other 'bottom-up' redesign approaches such as idiosyncratic ideals (i-deals) which explicitly involve negotiation between the employee and employer.

Jin Nam Choi is a Korean organizational psychologist, researcher, author, and academic. He is a professor of Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management at the Graduate School of Business of Seoul National University.

References

  1. ↑ Frese, Michael; Fay, Doris (2001-01-01). "4. Personal initiative: An active performance concept for work in the 21st century". Research in Organizational Behavior. 23: 133–187. doi:10.1016/S0191-3085(01)23005-6. ISSN   0191-3085.
  2. 1 2 3 Frese, Michael; Fay, Doris; Hilburger, Tanja; Leng, Karena; Tag, Almut (June 1997). "The concept of personal initiative: Operationalization, reliability and validity in two German samples". Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology. 70 (2): 139–161. doi:10.1111/j.2044-8325.1997.tb00639.x.
  3. ↑ Frese, Michael; Kring, Wolfgang; Soose, Andrea; Zempel, Jeannette (1996-02-01). "Personal Initiative At Work: Differences Between East and West Germany". Academy of Management Journal. 39 (1): 37–63. doi:10.5465/256630. ISSN   0001-4273.
  4. ↑ Parker, Sharon K.; Bindl, Uta K.; Strauss, Karoline (2010-07-01). "Making Things Happen: A Model of Proactive Motivation". Journal of Management. 36 (4): 827–856. doi:10.1177/0149206310363732. ISSN   0149-2063. S2CID   53962454.
  5. ↑ Lisbona, Ana; Palaci, Francisco; Salanova, Marisa (February 2018). "The effects of work engagement and self-efficacy on personal initiative and performance". Psicothema. 30 (1): 89–96. doi:10.7334/psicothema2016.245. PMID   29363476. S2CID   35758064.
  6. 1 2 Frese, Michael (2009). "Towards a Psychology of Entrepreneurship: An Action Theory Perspective". Foundations and Trends in Entrepreneurship. 5 (6): 437–496. doi:10.1561/0300000028. ISSN   1551-3114. S2CID   34796995.
  7. 1 2 Tornau, Katharina; Frese, Michael (2013). "Construct Clean-Up in Proactivity Research: A Meta-Analysis on the Nomological Net of Work-Related Proactivity Concepts and their Incremental Validities". Applied Psychology. 62 (1): 44–96. doi:10.1111/j.1464-0597.2012.00514.x. ISSN   1464-0597.
  8. 1 2 Frese, Michael; Teng, Eric; Wijnen, Cees J. D. (1999). "Helping to improve suggestion systems: predictors of making suggestions in companies". Journal of Organizational Behavior. 20 (7): 1139–1155. doi:10.1002/(SICI)1099-1379(199912)20:7<1139::AID-JOB946>3.0.CO;2-I. ISSN   1099-1379.
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  10. 1 2 Glaub, Matthias E.; Frese, Michael; Fischer, Sebastian; Hoppe, Maria (2014-04-30). "Increasing Personal Initiative in Small Business Managers or Owners Leads to Entrepreneurial Success: A Theory-Based Controlled Randomized Field Intervention for Evidence-BasedManagement". Academy of Management Learning & Education. 13 (3): 354–379. doi:10.5465/amle.2013.0234. ISSN   1537-260X.
  11. 1 2 3 Campos, Francisco; Frese, Michael; Goldstein, Markus; Iacovone, Leonardo; Johnson, Hillary C.; McKenzie, David; Mensmann, Mona (2017-09-22). "Teaching personal initiative beats traditional training in boosting small business in West Africa". Science. 357 (6357): 1287–1290. Bibcode:2017Sci...357.1287C. doi: 10.1126/science.aan5329 . hdl: 10986/28386 . ISSN   0036-8075. PMID   28935805. S2CID   206660431.
  12. 1 2 Baer, Markus; Frese, Michael (February 2003). "Innovation is not enough: climates for initiative and psychological safety, process innovations, and firm performance". Journal of Organizational Behavior. 24 (1): 45–68. doi:10.1002/job.179. ISSN   0894-3796.
  13. ↑ Binnewies, Carmen; Ohly, Sandra; Sonnentag, Sabine (December 2007). "Taking personal initiative and communicating about ideas: What is important for the creative process and for idea creativity?". European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 16 (4): 432–455. doi:10.1080/13594320701514728. ISSN   1359-432X. S2CID   7422062.
  14. ↑ Fischer, Sebastian; Frese, Michael; Mertins, Jennifer Clarissa; Hardt, Julia Verena; Flock, Thomas; Schauder, Juri; Schmitz, Michael; Wiegel, Jette (March 2014). "Climate for Personal Initiative and Radical and Incremental Innovation in Firms: A Validation Study". Journal of Enterprising Culture. 22 (1): 91–109. doi:10.1142/s0218495814500046. ISSN   0218-4958.
  15. ↑ Michaelis, Björn; Stegmaier, Ralf; Sonntag, Karlheinz (2010-05-04). "Shedding light on followers' innovation implementation behavior". Journal of Managerial Psychology. 25 (4): 408–429. doi:10.1108/02683941011035304. ISSN   0268-3946.
  16. ↑ Wright, Brett M.; Cordery, John L. (1999). "Production uncertainty as a contextual moderator of employee reactions to job design". Journal of Applied Psychology. 84 (3): 456–463. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.84.3.456. ISSN   1939-1854. PMID   10380425.
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  19. 1 2 Nsereko, Isa; Balunywa, Waswa; Munene, John; Orobia, Laura; Muhammed, Ngoma (2018-01-01). Del Giudice, Manlio (ed.). "Personal initiative: Its power in social entrepreneurial venture creation". Cogent Business & Management. 5 (1): 1443686. doi: 10.1080/23311975.2018.1443686 . hdl: 10419/206051 . ISSN   2331-1975. S2CID   158455115.
  20. 1 2 Seibert, Scott E.; Crant, J. Michael; Kraimer, Maria L. (1999). "Proactive personality and career success". Journal of Applied Psychology. 84 (3): 416–427. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.84.3.416. ISSN   1939-1854. PMID   10380421.
  21. ↑ Parker, Sharon K. (2016-12-01). Proactivity at Work: Making Things Happen in Organizations (1 ed.). Routledge. doi:10.4324/9781315797113. ISBN   978-1-315-79711-3.
  22. 1 2 Raabe, Babette; Frese, Michael; Beehr, Terry A. (April 2007). "Action regulation theory and career self-management". Journal of Vocational Behavior. 70 (2): 297–311. doi:10.1016/j.jvb.2006.10.005. ISSN   0001-8791.
  23. ↑ Aguinis, Herman; Kraiger, Kurt (January 2009). "Benefits of Training and Development for Individuals and Teams, Organizations, and Society". Annual Review of Psychology. 60 (1): 451–474. doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.60.110707.163505. ISSN   0066-4308. PMID   18976113.
  24. 1 2 Vos, Ans De; Clippeleer, Inge De; Dewilde, Thomas (2009). "Proactive career behaviours and career success during the early career". Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology. 82 (4): 761–777. doi:10.1348/096317909X471013. ISSN   2044-8325. S2CID   143860677.
  25. ↑ Krauss, Stefanie I; Frese, Michael; Friedrich, Christian; Unger, Jens M (September 2005). "Entrepreneurial orientation: A psychological model of success among southern African small business owners". European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 14 (3): 315–344. doi:10.1080/13594320500170227. ISSN   1359-432X. S2CID   143942664.
  26. ↑ Brandstätter, Veronika; Heimbeck, Dörte; Malzacher, Juliane; Frese, Michael (2003-01-01). "Goals need implementation intentions: The model of action phases tested in the applied setting of continuing education". European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 12 (1): 37–59. doi:10.1080/13594320344000011. ISSN   1359-432X. S2CID   55403005.
  27. ↑ Zacher, Hannes; Schmitt, Antje; Jimmieson, Nerina L.; Rudolph, Cort W. (2018-03-23). "Dynamic effects of personal initiative on engagement and exhaustion: The role of mood, autonomy, and support". Journal of Organizational Behavior. 40 (1): 38–58. doi:10.1002/job.2277. ISSN   0894-3796.
  28. ↑ editor., Parker, Sharon, editor. Bindl, Uta K. (2017). Proactivity at work : making things happen in organizations. ISBN   978-1-84872-563-8. OCLC   956946867.{{cite book}}: |last= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
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