Should supervisors communicate goals or visions? The moderating role of subordinates' psychological distance

Vanderstukken, Arne; Schreurs, Bert; Germeys, Filip; Broeck, Anja Van den; Proost, Karin

doi:10.1111/jasp.12626

Cited by 18 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 53 publications

(119 reference statements)

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“…The vision leaders provide is the idealized future end state of an organization; as such, it is abstract and distant in time (Carton et al, 2014;Kirkpatrick, 2009). We argue that followers respond to a leader's vision communication by adapting their construal level from a lower, present-oriented construal of their work towards a higher, future-oriented construal level (Berson et al, 2015;Vanderstukken et al, 2019). The communication of a temporally distant desirable goal like a vision requires followers to focus on the big picture rather than on the details of working on one narrow goal followed by the next one (Berson et al, 2015).…”

Section: Turning Visions Into Resultsmentioning

confidence: 97%

Turning visions into results: unraveling the distinctive paths of leading with vision and autonomy to goal achievement

Maran

Baldegger

Klösel

2021

LODJ

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PurposeLeading with vision while granting employees autonomy is one effective organizational response to the demands of a dynamic external environment. The former is thought to align followers' behavior by providing guidance, the latter to increase variance in their behavior by relinquishing control; both exert beneficial but distinct effects on organizational performance. What has remained uncharted heretofore is how these leader behaviors shape their followers' cognition and, subsequently, yield improvements in performance. The authors argue that a leader's vision communication transforms followers' cognitive representation of their work. This not only enables them to specify their goals in alignment with the vision (goal clarity) but also to locate the meaning of their work within the bigger picture of the vision (construal level). By contrast, perceived autonomy in terms of power-sharing might directly affect followers' work engagement more narrowly.Design/methodology/approachThe authors tested the model on a sample of 408 employees from eleven enterprises of a holding company. In the survey, employees reported perceived vision communication and autonomy provided by their leader. Furthermore, the authors assessed the employees' goal attainment. To capture how employees represent their daily work activities, the authors measured their construal level and their goal clarity.FindingsThe results show that both perceived vision communication and granted autonomy improve employees' goal achievement. Moreover, two processes mediate the relationship between vision communication and goal achievement in followers: first, specifying goals in terms of clarity; second, composing a higher-level mental construal of their work. In contrast, no mediation of empowering leader behaviors was found.Originality/valueBetter goal achievement through visionary leadership is therefore achieved through cognitive alignment of followers, while leader-granted autonomy acts as a motivational tool directly on performance.

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Section: Turning Visions Into Resultsmentioning

confidence: 97%

Turning visions into results: unraveling the distinctive paths of leading with vision and autonomy to goal achievement

Maran

Baldegger

Klösel

2021

LODJ

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“…A higher intensity is possible when distance is greater. Sweet spots in leader-follower interactions related to the dimensions of leadership distance have also been substantiated empirically (Vanderstukken et al, 2019 ; Gouldman and Victoravich, 2020 ; Hernández et al, 2020 ).…”

Section: Theoretical Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 84%

Working Under the Gun: A Theoretical Analysis of Stressors Associated With the Re-negotiation of Norms and Control of Work Tasks During COVID-19

Kant

Norman

2021

Front. Psychol.

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The COVID-19 pandemic has led many of the world's nations to impose numerous preventive and mitigative measures to increase social distance, including various forms of home isolation and quarantine. A central premise for the current paper is that the COVID-19 situation is likely to constitute a massive re-negotiation of social and organizational norms, which may lead to psychological distress at the individual, family and interpersonal level. Virtually overnight, people have to re-define what is expected and deemed appropriate by a given group member in a certain social setting. This goes for all kinds of general social interaction, such as societal, even multinational medical demands on social distancing. Simultaneously it also goes for a sudden, gargantuan re-division of labor in a complex global system. We provide a theoretical analysis of the potential consequences of re-negotiation of norms from the perspective of four sets of psychological theory: Theory of professions; organizational strategic crisis responses; the job-demands-resources model; and theories addressing the interplay between norm violations and psychological distance. From these theories we derive three suggestions that the discussion centers around: (1) The COVID-19 situation leads to a massive re-negotiation of norms related to work, (2) The COVID-19 situation diffuses the demarcation between the various professional arenas and the private sphere, and this diffusion enhances the stress associated with norm conflict, and (3) Norm conflicts are enhanced by digitalization. Our discussion centers on potential stressors associated with the renegotiation of norms, and also includes a few suggestions for practice. For each theoretical suggestion, we give examples of how the suggestion may manifest itself with respect to (a) the work task, (b) the individual's relationship to their leader and/or organization, and (c) interpersonal relationships. We finally point to some theoretical and applied implications.

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“…We suggest quality interactions that increase meeting members knowledge of each other and of their shared goals in the group will be important in entitativity for virtual meetings. Indeed, construal theory researchers find that leaders who facilitate knowledge of others and communicate goals while attending to psychological distance are the most effective (Berson et al, 2015; Vanderstukken et al, 2019; Wilson et al, 2013). Therefore, although the enactment of the antecedents may be different, entitativity in virtual meetings will still be necessary for success.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Perceiving meetings as groups: How entitativity links meeting characteristics to meeting success.

Blanchard¹,

McBride²,

Allen³

2022

Psychology of Leaders and Leadership

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We test entitativity, a group member’s feeling of groupness, as a theoretical explanation of successful meetings. Specifically, characteristics known to contribute to meeting success (e.g., participation and meeting relevance) are tested as specific instances of entitativity antecedents (interactivity and similarity of goals). Entitativity is further tested as a link to positive meeting outcomes. We explore entitativity as a potential mediator for meeting outcomes. Finally, we examine how support for dissent is important in meeting entitativity. Structural equation modeling using data from a sample of 279 MTurk participants supports our hypotheses linking meeting characteristics and entitativity perceptions. Further, the results show the importance of entitativity for positive meeting outcomes. We also demonstrate that support for dissent is good for entitativity when meeting relevance is low. When meeting relevance is high, and support for dissent is low, entitativity is high but it may make it more difficult for the group to handle conflict. Our study implies that entitativity is a theoretical explanation for why meeting characteristics lead to successful meetings. Further implications for theory and practice in entitativity and in the context of workplace meetings are discussed.

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Should supervisors communicate goals or visions? The moderating role of subordinates' psychological distance

Cited by 18 publications

References 53 publications

Turning visions into results: unraveling the distinctive paths of leading with vision and autonomy to goal achievement

Turning visions into results: unraveling the distinctive paths of leading with vision and autonomy to goal achievement

Working Under the Gun: A Theoretical Analysis of Stressors Associated With the Re-negotiation of Norms and Control of Work Tasks During COVID-19

Perceiving meetings as groups: How entitativity links meeting characteristics to meeting success.

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