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The well-being and mental health of principals is being threatened by changing working conditions such as a broader variety of roles and tasks. In this article, we argue that social capital might buffer against declining (mental) health. The purpose of this study was to investigate the potential influence of social capital, including both internal (bonding) and external (bridging and linking) social capital, on principals’ well-being. A longitudinal study was set up across three waves of data. Questionnaires were collected from 2084 Australian principals and 829 Irish principals, across six and two timepoints, respectively. The hypotheses were tested using a longitudinal path model approach using maximum likelihood estimation in lavaan for R. In line with our hypotheses, the results indicated that principals who reported higher levels of either internal or external social capital also reported higher levels of well-being. More specifically, support from colleagues outside the school and supervisor support (external social capital) and collaboration and trust in management (internal social capital) predicted well-being positively across time. The results of this study highlight the importance of having social support from colleagues and supervisors and possibilities for collaboration to maintain well-being as a school principal.

PurposeThis study examines whether learning climate relates to employability competences through social informal learning (i.e. feedback, help and information seeking).Design/methodology/approachMultiple regression analyses and structural equation modeling were used to test direct and indirect effects in a sample of 372 employees working in two Dutch governmental institutes.FindingsThe analyses confirmed that learning climate has an indirect effect on employability competences through feedback, help and information seeking. More specifically, the findings suggest that learning climate is important for employees' engagement in proactive social informal learning activities. Engaging in these learning activities, in turn, relates to a higher level of employability.Originality/valueThis study employs an integrative approach to understanding employability by including the organization's learning climate and employees' social informal learning behavior. It contributes to the extant literature on professional development by unraveling how proactive social informal learning relates to employability competences. It also provides new insights on learning climate as a determinant for social informal learning and employability.

This research examines the social side of learning among professionals in the fast evolving and knowledge intense field of consultancy. Its first aim is to unravel social informal learning by proposing a new, integrated framework of workplace learning. Its second aim is to explore the role of learning climate for social informal learning behavior among consultants. Our qualitative inquiry using interviews based on the critical incident technique illustrates that consultants engaged in deliberative and reactive learning, thereby indicating a clear intention to learn. The source of learning was often the direct colleagues and direct supervisor, which highlights the relevance of close proximity of other individuals. The consultants mainly learned from others in a passive manner, followed by proactive and collaborative learning. Finally, this study shows that granting professionals responsibility and autonomy in their learning process as well as having a leader who facilitates learning are important elements of a learning climate that enhances social informal learning. We conclude with recommendations for organizations and directions for future research.

Today's world of work is forcing companies to change their approach to learning. Their talent strategy needs to foster self-directed learning (SDL) as a process. SDL is an instructional process in which people take the primary responsibility in learning situations. To enhance job performance, their talent strategy must also include tools that support effective competence development, such as personal development plans (PDPs). In this study, we consider the effectiveness of talent strategy of this nature, by analysing longitudinal data on 3,661 employees working in 16 countries, extracted from an electronic talent management system. Two path analyses were conducted to study the relationships between SDL exercised within a PDP practice and job performance, and to test the research hypotheses. Results validate the hypotheses, confirming that SDL as a process within PDP practice positively impacts job performance. However, while the results confirm the importance of setting learning goals and including informal learning activities when exercising SDL process within the PDP practice, they do not confirm the need to integrate other components of SDL as a process. It can be concluded that learning strategy is key to job performance, and that informal learning is of particular importance. Value-added recommendations for practice are discussed.

Employees’ feedback-seeking networks at work are important for employees’ learning and employability. Earlier studies often neglected the specific characteristics of the different relationships an individual employee has at work. We conduct social network analyses in seven samples to study inter-individual differences in feedback-seeking relationships in detail. We investigate 2,058 feedback-seeking relationships of 118 employees to study how similarity-attraction affects the composition of feedback-seeking networks at work and how the composition of these feedback-seeking networks influences employees’ employability. This research study aims to contribute by taking into account both the mechanisms that shape feedback-seeking networks and the effects of this on employability. The results show that similarity-attraction affects feedback-seeking in the workplace and that having a largely homogeneous feedback-seeking network has detrimental effects on employability.

In different streams of literature employability has been defined in different, often related ways. We take an interdisciplinary approach, combining insights from research on higher education and workplace learning, taking a Western perspective. In doing so we take a multi-dimensional, competence-based approach. Our approach to conceptualizing employability responds to research from both disciplines arguing for a need of integrating approaches to employability, for a unified overview of conceptual frameworks and agreement on definitions of the concept. We conclude that models of employability from these different disciplines can reinforce each other. Certain dimensions of employability are less taken into account in one discipline, while receiving a lot of attention in the other. Hence, our work opens new avenues for conceptual and empirical research on employability in both domains. Moreover, it might influence how researchers and practitioners research and support (lifelong) learning for employability, both in higher education and in the workplace.

Fluctuating demands and fast changing job-requirements require organizations to invest in employees so that they are able to take up new tasks. In this respect, fostering employees' employability is high on the agenda of many organizations. As a prerequisite for creating employability, many scholars have focused on the role of social informal learning. In this study, we extend this perspective and examine the relationships between task variety, social informal learning, and employability. We hypothesized that task variety is a catalyst for social informal learning, which in turn enhances employees' employability. We contribute empirical evidence for this mechanism. However, while task variety leads to social informal learning and, subsequently, the competences needed for employability, task variety also may have negative direct effects on employability. We discuss the implications of these findings for future research and practice.

Social approaches to work-related informal learning, such as proactive feedback-seeking, help-seeking and information-seeking, are important determinants of development in the workplace. Unfortunately, previous research has failed to clearly conceptualize these forms of learning and does not provide a validated and generally applicable measurement instrument. We set out to develop and validate such a scale measuring social approaches to work-related informal learning. We collected data in four organizations in Austria and the Netherlands, with a total sample size of 895 employees. These data were used to conduct exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, which showed four distinct factors: feedback-seeking from the supervisor, feedback-seeking from colleagues, help-seeking and information-seeking. In conclusion, the scale we developed is valid in a range of contexts and thus is an appropriate tool for research as well as human resource development practice.

Due to developments in the current dynamic business environment which is more global and competitive than ever, employees’ lifelong learning and the way organizations support their continuous development are pivotal. Many organizations introduce personal development plans (pdps) to support employees’ learning, however, not always taking into account their personal characteristics. This study had a twofold purpose as it was designed to explore on the one hand the relationship between pdps in the workplace with employee’s undertaking of learning activities and perceived performance, and on the other hand the possible moderating role of employee self-directedness on this relationship. For this study, data collected by means of a questionnaire at two different organizations were used, one organization foregoing profit and one non-profit activity. The results indicated significant positive relations between the individual supporting factor ‘employee learning and reflection’ and the undertaking of learning activities and perceived performance and between employee self-directedness and the undertaking of learning activities and perceived performance. The same accounted for the moderating effect of employee self-directedness on the interaction between learning and reflection and perceived performance. Some findings were surprising, nevertheless resulted in valuable insights and implications for practice.

In this study, we examined how social informal learning and formal learning of faculty staff in higher education relate to their employability. Data were collected from 209 faculty staff members working at a Dutch university. Results showed that social informal learning was related to the employability of faculty staff. Further analysis revealed that especially external information seeking and acting upon feedback from colleagues and not formal learning predicted the employability of faculty staff. The finding suggests that institutes of higher education should especially foster the professional development of their faculty staff by stimulating exchange of information and seeking and using feedback with colleagues in a proactive manner.

Contains fulltext : 150455.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) Development of professional expertise is the process of continually transforming the repertoire of knowledge, skills and attitudes necessary to solve domain-specific problems which begins in late secondary education and continues during higher education and throughout professional life. One educational goal is to train students to think more like experts and approach the mastery of a subject as an expert would. Helping students to develop professional expertise and evaluating whether classrooms are conducive to the development of expertise is difficult and time-consuming. At present, there is no instrument that measures all the core classroom factors that influence specifically the development of professional expertise. This paper describes the development and validation of an instrument that measures the extent to which educators create a Supportive Learning Environment for Expertise Development, the SLEED-Q. A sample of 586 secondary school students (14–18 years-old) was used for validation. Both exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were carried out. Examination of the fit indices indicated that the model seemed to fit the data well, with the goodness-of-fit coefficients being in recommended ranges. The SLEED-Q, consisting of seven factors with 30 items, the SLEED-Q has potential as an instrument for examining how conducive learning environments are to development of professional expertise in secondary school settings. The implications of the results and potential paths for future research are considered. 03 november 2015

Purpose – The topic of informal learning at work has received increasing attention in the past years. The purpose of this study is to explore in which informal learning activities employees engage and what are the drivers for informal learning. Design/methodology/approach – Semi-structured interviews were taken from ten human resources (HR) and ten marketing employees working at a German machinery manufacturer. Findings – Employees mostly learn informally by talking or collaborating with others, searching information online, feedback giving and seeking from colleagues and supervisors and reading. Next, it was found that organizational drivers, task and job drivers, personal drivers and formal learning influenced employees’ informal learning. Background characteristics on the contrary were not found to influence informal learning. Overall, within these categories, the following drivers had the greatest influence on informal learning: commitment to learning and development, feedback as well as interactions with and support from colleagues and supervisors. Research limitations/implications – The design of this exploratory qualitative study brings some limitations. Based on the findings, suggestions for future quantitative and intervention studies are done. Practical implications – The results show how human resources development (HRD) professionals could better support employees’ engagement in informal learning and gives an overview of the determinants that could be influenced and in turn have a positive effect on employees’ informal learning. Originality/value – This study is one of the first studies unraveling informal learning as perceived by employees. It develops a comprehensive framework for categorizing drivers for informal learning.

Personality, emotional intelligence, and learning style are generally considered important success factors and career determinants in hospitality management. This study assesses the influence of these antecedents on the development of expertise in hospitality management. Correlational, ANOVA and hierarchical regression analyses demonstrated that (a) There is limited growth on cognitive performance measures while students are in school, however performance increases after a period in the workplace; (b) Personality, learning style and emotional intelligence showed zero to low correlations with cognitive performance; and (c) Extroversion, conscientiousness, emotional management and theorist learning style showed moderate positive correlations with several performance measures. The findings are partially in alignment with previous studies showing that personality, emotional intelligence and learning style play a role in expertise development in hospitality. It might be concluded that personality, emotional intelligence and learning style do seem important, they are not as important as has been argued in previous research.

Purpose – The demographic shift and the rapid rate of innovations put age and employability high on policy makers’ and human resource managers’ agenda. However, the authors do not sufficiently understand the link between these concepts. The authors set out to investigate the relationship between age and employability and aim to identify motivational mediators of this relationship. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the roles of future time perspective and goal orientation. Design/methodology/approach – The authors conducted quantitative, cross-sectional survey research (n=282) in three Dutch and Austrian organizations. The authors used structural equation modeling to investigate the relationships between chronological age, future time perspective, goal orientations, and employability. Findings – Future time perspective and goal orientation strongly relate to employability. The authors found indirect relationships between age and employability via perceived remaining opportunities. Research limitations/implications – The results question the often simplistic use of chronological age in employability and human resource management research. Therefore, the authors call for more research to investigate the relationship between age and employability more deeply. Practical implications – The findings contribute new insights for the career development issues of an increasingly older workforce. This shifts the focus from age, a factor outside our control, to motivation. Originality/value – This study contributes evidence for the relationships of chronological age, future time perspective, and goal orientation with employability. It extends literature by criticizing the prevalent use of chronological age and investigating mediation effects.

In today's time of demographic change and rapid innovation, age and employability as well as the role of learning and development are high on the agenda of human resource managers and chief learning officers. However, existing research has failed to integrate these concepts in a clear model and offers little explanation of how the concepts may be linked exactly. In this conceptual paper we show how chronological age, despite its poor characteristics as a predictor, might still affect employability indirectly. Specifically, we propose that employees' motivation – in terms of future time perspective and goal orientation – and formal and informal learning activities need to be considered. Since an individual's chronological age cannot be changed, it is important to recognize these mediating variables, which may be targeted more easily by human resource development or age management initiatives.

This study examines the nature of hospitality managers’ knowledge when solving typical hotel management problems. In a cross-sectional study, data were collected from first-, fourth-, and eighth-semester students and compared with experts who had seven to ten years of experience working as hospitality managers. Three typical hospitality management cases were used to measure the way in which participants with different levels of education and experience cognitively represented the cases. Participants' recall and problem solving processes were also assessed. Through a method of proposition analysis, the data were scored and then evaluated using one-way analysis of variance. The results point to knowledge as an important element in performance on hospitality management tasks. Hospitality experts' recall and problem solving abilities in this study were strengthened by their rich and broad knowledge base of facts, concepts and inferences which they used to abstract information from the cases and then accurately solve the problem.data source: data sets by 1st author

This study was conducted to investigate which pitfalls users of personal development plans (PDPs) perceive in business and governmental organisations with mandatory PDP use. Hundred and thirty-one written statements of PDP users across three Dutch organisations were analysed and categorised into nine pitfalls. Next to an overall lack of use and incentives for use, PDP users emphasised the need for the tool to be properly implemented and supported in terms of learning and reflection, instruction and feedback, and having a motivating supervisor. Implications for practice include the need to commit to the tool on an organisational, supervisor and individual learner level.

PurposeThis study aims to examine the effects of using a personal development plan (PDP) on the undertaking of learning activities and the employee's job competencies.Design/methodology/approachData from Dutch pharmacy assistants was collected (n=2,271). Analyses of variance (ANOVAs) as well as regression analyses were conducted on this dataset.FindingsThe results indicate that PDP users undertook more learning activities in the past than non‐users, but using a PDP does not stimulate users to plan more learning activities in the future. Furthermore, PDP users do not score themselves significantly higher on job competencies than non‐PDP users.Research limitations/implicationsFuture research should investigate the effectiveness of PDPs for the undertaking of learning activities and job competencies in a broader sample, involving multiple‐raters and focusing more closely on one essential feature of the PDP practice: the feedback given by a supervisor and/or colleague or coach when discussing the PDP.Practical implicationsThe results stress the value of a PDP as a feedback tool. The tool could add significant value to the learning and development process of the pharmacy assistant, however, if it would be used as a feed‐forward instrument as well. In other words, the tool should more often be used to get an overview of desired future plans, plan future careers, and the undertaking of learning activities in order to reach these future goals.Originality/valueIn order to promote employees' learning and development, more and more companies are starting to implement PDPs. Empirical studies researching the effectiveness of PDPs in the workplace are scarce, however.

Background: Research on the relation between teaching and learning approaches has been mainly conducted in higher education and it is not yet clear to what extent the results can be generalised when it comes to secondary education. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to research how students in secondary education perceive their teachers’ approaches to teaching in different disciplines, and how this relates to their own learning approaches. Additionally, differences in teaching approaches between mathematics and language teachers were investigated. Sample: The participants in this study were 128 students randomly selected at two secondary schools in two different cities in the Netherlands. Both schools are located in a city with more than 200,000 inhabitants. The students are spread across three different educational levels: lower secondary vocational education (VMBO, 12–18 years), higher secondary education (HAVO, 12–18 years) and academically oriented vocational education (VWO, 12–18 years). Design and methods: In this cross-sectional study, instead of teachers’ self-reporting, teaching approaches were measured by student perceptions, which were gathered by means of a questionnaire (N=128). Hierarchical regression analyses were conducted to identify whether perceived teacher approaches predicted students’ learning approaches. Finally, analysis of variance (ANOVA) and analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) were carried out to explore differences in how students in mathematics and Dutch-language courses perceived the teaching approaches of their teachers and which learning approaches they consequently adopted. Results: Results indicate that a teacher-centred approach predicts a surface approach to learning and a student-centred approach predicts a deep approach to learning. Next, it was found that students in Dutch-language courses perceive their teachers as more student-centred, and are hence more likely to adopt a deep approach to learning than students in mathematics courses. Conclusions: These results suggest that when schools aim to support students in developing deep-learning approaches, attention on a school level should be paid to teachers’ approaches to teaching.

Today, organizations are increasingly implementing assessment tools such as Personal Development Plans. Although the true power of the tool lies in supporting the employee's continuing professional development, organizations implement the tool for various different purposes, professional development purposes on the one hand and promotion/salary raise/selection/accountability purposes on the other (Smith and Tillema 2001). The study presented here aims at a better understanding of how the purpose of the Personal Development Plan (PDP), as perceived by the employee, influences the extent to which s/he undertakes learning activities and consequently leads to improved performance. Data were collected from 286 employees working in a regional Dutch governmental office and 81 experts from an international organization that is specialized in medical technology (N=367). Data were analyzed by conducting hierarchical regression analyses. Results indicate that perceiving the PDP either as a learning and development tool or as a promotion and selection tool, positively predicts the undertaking of learning activities and the employee's performance. Follow-up regression analysis indicated that the most powerful predictor of undertaking learning activities and a high-quality performance is the extent to which employees perceive PDPs as serving learning and development purposes. The results of this study suggest that if an organization wants their employees to learn by undertaking learning activities and in turn perform better, the tool should in the first place be introduced and used as a learning and development tool.

Confronted with the speed of technological advancements and increasing global competition, organizations have come to realize that their employees' continuous learning drives business success. A popular tool to support and enhance continuous learning is the personal development plan (PDP). Despite its popularity, empirical evidence of the effectiveness of the PDP is scarce. To date, most of the research on the practice of the PDP is conducted within educational (students) and health (general practitioners) settings and not within business environments. Moreover, research methodology is restricted to qualitative methods and survey research is rare. For that reason, we developed and validated a questionnaire to assess PDP practice. To develop the questionnaire, we relied on literature on portfolio assessment in the educational context and the workplace (health and education); to validate it, we collected data in three independent organizations. To assess the factor structure of the questionnaire, exploratory principal component factor analyses with direct oblimin rotation were conducted on data sets from two organizations. Factor reliability was computed using Cronbach's alpha coefficient. The principal component analysis resulted in a 35-item questionnaire containing five factors each with high internal validity. Cronbach's alphas ranged between 0.63 and 0.91. Next, a confirmatory factor analysis was conducted on an independent sample of 287 employees, working in a third organization. The results from this analysis were used to further refine the instrument. The present instrument provides a reliable and valid measure of the employee's perception of the PDP practice in the workplace, consisting of four scales and 19 items.

In the current search for tools that encourage and assess learning and development, personal development plans (pdps) are being used ever more frequently by organizations. A pdp is an assessment tool used by the employee to reflect on, to document the competencies s/he has been working on and to present his/her plans for further development. This study conducted among employees working in a governmental organization in the netherlands (n = 287) focused on the pdp practice as conceptualized by three supporting conditions: learning and reflection, information and feedback and the motivating supervisor. It examined which of these features enhance the undertaking of learning activities, expertise-growth, flexibility towards changing circumstances and performance. Results from the hierarchical regression analyses indicate that a motivating supervisor, information and feedback and reflection by the employee on the basis of his/her pdp affect whether or not a pdp contributes to the four measured output variables. Next, by conducting mediation analyses evidence is found for the mediating role of undertaking learning activities in the relation between the pdp practice and two output variables.

The present article analyzes social engagement as an outcome of higher education. It can be conceived as an attitude that by definition only manifests itself over time, and should therefore not be assessed or measured during the years of study or at graduation. The argument is being made that social engagement should be understood in terms of conditions for social engagement. Based on a conceptual framework three such conditions are being proposed: an interest in social and political issues, self-efficacy, and a positive disposition towards applied skills and knowledge. The present study consists of the design and validation of a tool for measuring these conditions. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, performed on two consecutive samples of freshmen college students, resulted in the conditions for social engagement questionnaire, which measures conditions for social engagement along four scales: political interest, social analysis, valuing application and self-efficacy.

More than 3 million students study outside their home country, primarily at a Western university. A common belief among educators is that international students are insufficiently adjusted to higher education in their host country, both academically and socially. Furthermore, several groups of international students experience considerable amounts of stress while adapting to the culture of the host-institute. Several researchers argue that studies on adaptation of international students should widen its focus to the underlying mechanisms that leads towards this "misalignment". In a cross-institutional comparison among 958 students at five business schools in the Netherlands, differences in academic performance between local and international students were identified by focussing on their levels of academic and social integration. Students' academic integration was measured with the Students' Adaptation to College Questionnaire (SACQ), while students' social integration was measured with a newly developed and validated questionnaire. The results indicate that the degree of academic success of international students is multi-faceted. International students with a (mixed) western ethnic background perform well on both academic and social integration, and also attained higher study-performance in comparison to domestic students. In contrast, international students with a non-Western background are less integrated compared to other international students. Nevertheless, they have a similar study-performance. Finally, academic adjustment is the main predictor of study-performance for Dutch, Western and Mixed-Western students. Social adjustment was negatively related to study-performance. The lack of fit for predicting long-term study success of non-Western students indicates that their academic and social integration processes are more complex and non-linear.

Employees in countries with advanced industrial economies need to continuously develop their competences to sustain their employability - that is, to have a set of competences that enables them to maintain or find an adequate job. But how should efforts to enhance employability progress in the context of the demographic shift? Previous research suggests that employees’ perspective about their future working life may influence their motivation to engage in learning activities. The study reported and discussed here investigates how employees’ perceptions of the future as a time of opportunities and limitations affects their engagement in learning from others and, in turn, their employability. We tested our model empirically in two Austrian consultancies (n = 167). We find that focus on opportunities in the future explains engagement in learning from others and, subsequently, differences in employability. The informants’ perspectives about the future may be a helpful alternative to the measurement of chronological age, which is problematic from a conceptual point of view.