PurposeUsing conservation of resources theory (COR), the authors test the combined effects of cynicism and psychological capital on counterproductive work behaviors (CWBs) mediated through emotional exhaustion.Design/methodology/approachThe authors use a time-lagged independent source sample (N = 181) consisting of employee–peer dyads from service industry in Pakistan.FindingsModerated mediated regression analyses indicated that emotional exhaustion mediates the relationship between organizational cynicism and counterproductive work behaviors. Psychological capital moderates the relationship between organizational cynicism and emotional exhaustion such that organizational cynicism is positively related to exhaustion when psychological capital is low. Furthermore, conditional indirect effects show that emotional exhaustion mediates the relationship between organizational cynicism and counterproductive work behaviors only when employees' psychological capital is low.Originality/valueThe study suggests new mechanisms and boundary conditions through which cynicism triggers CWBs. The authors discuss the implications of the study’s findings and suggest possible directions for future research.

Rooted in research into personality, we propose that the Big Five traits would be related to fear of COVID‐19 (FOC), which in turn would lead to heightened job burnout, reduced job satisfaction, and decreased performance. Utilizing a three‐wave time‐lagged design, we collected our data from employees working in the United States and Canada ( N = 300 × 3). We found good support for our hypotheses. Extraversion, neuroticism, and conscientiousness had significant direct effects on FOC. Fear of COVID‐19 was positively related to job burnout and negatively related to job satisfaction and performance. Extraversion, neuroticism, and conscientiousness had significant indirect effects on burnout, job satisfaction, and job performance via FOC. Hence, this study identifies a key mechanism, an individual's worry about losing their valuable resources (e.g. their health, and that of their family members and friends, etc.), through which selected dimensions of personality might affect employees' work outcomes. We discuss our findings and provide suggestions for future research in this domain.

This study proposed protégé’s ego-resiliency as a parsimonious predictor of perceived mentoring. Uncertainty-avoidance and collectivism orientations were hypothesized as boundary conditions of this relationship. An additive multiple moderation model was developed using conservation of resource theory. Data were collected from 193 employees of a large Southeast Asian commercial bank. Results of structural equation modeling indicated that protégé’s ego-resiliency was positively related to perceived mentoring. This positive relation was stronger for protégés who held weaker uncertainty-avoidance orientations and was stronger for those who held collectivistic orientations. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.

Purpose It is commonly observed in trainings that all trainees do not get satisfied with the performance of the trainer. The usual way to increase the satisfaction of trainees is a stress on improving task communication of the trainer. It is based on the assumption that effective task communication essentially fosters training effectiveness. This study aims to provide preliminary evidence that effective task communication can also obstruct training effectiveness besides promoting it. To achieve this objective, the authors hypothesized a dual-process model of training effectiveness based on uncertainty reduction theory. Design/methodology/approach This was a field study in which the authors collected time-lagged data from seven trainings. The trainings were designed to impart technical knowledge of multilevel analyses to professional social science researchers. Confirmatory factor analysis for ordinal indicators was used to test the measurement properties of the model and scales. Structural equation modeling for ordinal indicators was used to test hypotheses. Findings This study provided evidence of an overall positive effect of the trainer’s task communication on the trainee’s communication satisfaction. A complex mediation analysis also revealed the existence of two opposite psychological processes. While the first process transmitted the positive effect of task communication to communication satisfaction, the other process diminished this positive effect. Implications for the theory and practice of training are discussed. Originality/value Training scholars and practitioners universally believe that an effective task communication of trainers essentially promotes training effectiveness. This study has provided empirical evidence that this assumption is an incomplete picture of a complex reality that requires further investigation.

Applying belongingness and attachment theories, we explore the association between employees' perception of psychological contract breach and counterproductive work behaviors, while also considering the mediating effect of workplace ostracism and the moderating role of attachment styles (i.e., attachment anxiety and attachment avoidance). Time‐lagged data from full‐time personnel working in telecommunications and transportation sectors in North America were collected at three different time points with an interval of 3 weeks between each wave. A total of 272 responses from the three measurement points were retained for our analysis. In support of what was hypothesized, our study's findings show that perception of contract breach fueled workplace deviance through the anticipated effect of workplace ostracism. Furthermore, and in line with what we assumed, the mediating effect of workplace ostracism was reinforced by employees' fear of rejection and abandonment in relationships (i.e., attachment anxiety). The role of attachment avoidance, however, was not found to moderate the indirect effect, contrary to our expectations. In conclusion, embedded in belongingness and attachment theorizing, this study offers empirical evidence of how workplace ostracism is a crucial mechanism that helps to explain the indirect effect through which psychological contract breach triggers counterproductive work behaviors. Furthermore, our findings illustrate how this relationship is conditional on attachment anxiety observed in employees.