Perceived Promotional Opportunities in Veterans Affairs Hospitals

Abstract

Pre vi ous stud ies using rela tional demog ra phy the ory have hypoth e sized that being demograph i cally dis sim i lar has a neg a tive impact on indi vid ual per cep tions of advance ment oppor tu ni ties. The authors inves ti gate whether an orga ni za tion's social con text, lead ers' char ac ter is tics, and geo graphic loca tion off set, or even reverse, the neg a tive effects of being dis sim i lar. Data were col lected through two sur veys: a 1995 sur vey of 2,252 employ ees from 139 treat ment units in 38 Depart ment of Vet erans Affairs (VA) psy chi atric hos pi tals, and a 1999 sur vey of the 38 VA hos pi tals' admin is tra tive offices. The authors used nested lin ear regres sion anal y sis to test the hypoth e ses. Unlike pre vi ous stud ies, the results indi cate that the more dis sim i lar an indi vid ual is with regard to age and race, the more pos i tive his or her per cep tions of advance ment oppor tu ni ties. They conclude that the equal employ ment oppor tu nity pol i cies pur sued by pub lic sec tor orga ni zations, such as the VA, may alter the rela tion ship between demo graphic dis sim i lar ity and per cep tions of advance ment oppor tu ni ties.As orga ni za tions have been merged, acquired, reengineered, down sized, outsourced, and relo cated to for eign coun tries, the link between an orga ni za tion and its employ ees has become more ten u ous than it was in the past. In this envi ron ment, orga ni za tions whose mem bers feel that their posi tions offer steady advance ment oppor tu ni ties may 269 This work was sup ported

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