Individual Adaptability to Changes at Work

New Directions in Research

David Chan

• Éditeur: Routledge
• Année: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781135055011
• Édition: 1
• Sujet: Business
• Sous-sujet: Management

Individual adaptability to changes at work refers to an individual's response to new demands or ill-defined problems created by uncertainty, complexity, mergers, and any rapid change in the work situation. Today, one of the key factors for an individual's success is said to be adaptability. In the past two decades there has been increasing interest in the research on individual adaptability, and this is one of the first academic volumes to look at this important topic. Specific contexts examined include work-family conflict, retirement, career management and intercultural interaction at the workplace. The book will provide a comprehensive and integrated analysis of the conceptual, assessment and contextual issues that will help identify the current trends and emerging themes in adaptability research.

Part I

Conceptualizing and Assessing Individual Adaptability

1 Adapting to Rapid Changes at Work

Definitions, Measures and Research

Neal Schmitt and David Chan

Individual adaptability to changes at work refers to the effectiveness of an individual’s response to new demands resulting from the novel and often ill-defined problems created by uncertainty, complexity and rapid changes in the work situation (Chan, 2000). In recent years, practitioners and organizational leaders have repeatedly emphasized the importance of individual adaptability as we face various novel demands associated with changes in technology, the increased use of teams to accomplish work, the increased diversity of the workforce, the shift to knowledge-based industries and other challenges at the workplace. Correspondingly, in the past two decades, there has been increasing interest in the research on individual adaptability. The studies often focus on the conceptualization and measurement of the adaptability construct/process or the role of adaptability in specific contexts (e.g., newcomer adaptation, team functioning, career management, work-family conflict, retirement). The purpose of this chapter is twofold. First, we review the conceptualizations and measures of individual adaptability. Second, we discuss the various models of adaptability and the associated research findings.

Conceptualizing Individual Adaptability

One way to conceptualize individual adaptability is to distinguish between construing adaptability as a performance construct and as a personal characteristic. When adaptability is construed as a performance construct, the focus is on the behavioral outcome of the adaptation process. For example, Smith, Ford, and Kozlowski (1997) conceptualized adaptability as an individual’s successful responses to changes in the nature of some task, which are preceded by the individual recognizing changes in the task and altering their work strategies to cope with the changes. A similar performance-based conceptualization is offered by DeShon and Rench (2009), who defined adaptability as the recognition of the cues that indicate a change has occurred and that one must change by altering one’s cognitions, affect or behaviors. Pulakos, Arad, Donovan and Plamondon (2000) defined individual adaptability in terms of the behaviors that meet the demands of a changed environment or a new situation. Adopting a performance-based conceptualization of individual adaptability, Pulakos et al. presented a taxonomy of adaptive performance. The authors content-analyzed over 1000 critical incidents from 21 different military and non-military jobs, and proposed eight dimensions of adaptive performance: handling emergency or crisis situations, handling work stress, dealing with uncertain and unpredictable work situations, solving problems creatively, learning new work tasks, technologies and procedures, interpersonal adapt-ability, cultural adaptability and physical adaptability.

When adaptability is construed as a personal characteristic, the focus is on individual differences in traits or trait-like constructs that are expected to predict effective behaviors or successful outcomes in the adaptation process. For example, Ployhart and Bliese (2006) conceptualized adaptability as an individual’s ability, skill, disposition, willingness and/or motivation to change or fit different task, social and environmental features. Sternberg and his colleagues construe individual adaptability as practical intelligence, which appears to involve a combination of task knowledge and situation knowledge that may be gained through experiences gained through real-world contexts (Sternberg, Wagner, and Okagaki, 1993; Wagner and Sternberg, 1985). Individual adaptability is often conceptualized in studies of situational judgment tests as individual differences in the ability to make effective judgments or responses to practical work-related situations (Chan and Schmitt, 2002). Yet other researchers have construed individual adaptability in terms of personality traits and motivational constructs. For example, Crant (2000) construed individual adaptability in terms of a proactive personality that predisposes the individual to take initiative to effect changes in the environment or create new circumstances. Dweck (1986) construed individual adaptability in terms of a learning goal motivation that orientates the individual to learn from errors and attempt to master a task.

The distinction between performance construct and personal characteristic is an important one. As shown below, some models of adaptability focus on the performance constructs, whilst other models focus on the personal characteristics. We need to be cognizant of this difference in focus. Ignoring the distinction and difference in focus may lead to misleading or at least inadequate comparisons of different models of adaptability.

Another way to conceptualize individual adaptability is to distinguish between the “can do” and “will do” aspects of adaptability. When adaptability is construed as a performance construct, the “can do” aspect refers to the individual’s maximum performance, whereas the “will do” aspect refers to the individual’s typical performance. When adaptability is construed as a personal characteristic, the “can do” aspect refers to the individual’s ability-based traits (e.g., cognitive ability, situational judgment ability) whereas the “will do” aspect refers to the preference- or tendency-based traits (e.g., personality, motivational constructs).

As shown below, the trend in the research on individual adaptability suggests that both “can do” and “will do” are critical aspects of adaptability. To be adaptive, one must have the ability or skills to adapt, but also the willingness, motivation or preference to adapt.

Measuring Individual Adaptability

The summary of attempts to define or conceptualize individual adaptability in the previous section should also guide the manner in which adaptability is measured in research and interventions directed to increase workforce capabilities in this domain. In this section of the chapter, we explore the ways in which adaptability has been operationalized. There has been significant effort on measuring and predicting workers’ ability to adapt to the various demands of the workplace. However, there has been less emphasis on measuring adaptability as work performance. Measuring adaptability as an individual characteristic has been attempted using a variety of tools, including biodata, situational judgment tests, assessment centers and structured interviews.

Use of biodata to measure the capability to adapt on the part of federal investigative agents is described by Schmitt, Jennings, and Toney (1999). They reported success in developing a 12-item measure of adaptability. The alpha coefficient of this measure was .76 and its corrected correlations with other biodata measures ranged from .28 to .56. Correlations with Big Five dimensions ranged from .12 to .55; the correlations with the Paulhus (1991) measures of social desirability and impression management were .46 and .27 respectively. These data indicate a degree of discriminant validity, but also the fact that the measures are likely also a function of social desirability. Relatively low correlations with rated technical job performance and motivation of .10 and .05 were also reported.

Biodata have also been used in a series of studies designed to assess college student potential (Schmitt et al., 2009). In this study, internal consistency of the adaptability measure was .65. Again, reasonable levels of discriminant validity were reported with respect to other biodata measures. Correlation with a composite of self-rated college performance collected three and a half years later was .28, and with a measure of organizational citizenship behavior was .20, but correlation with cumulative GPA was only .05. In both cases, the biodata items included relatively objective indices of past experiences that would have required adaptation to changing circumstances in various aspects of their lives as well as self-reports of their reactions to these situations. Examples of some of these adaptability items are presented in Table 1.1

A different frame of reference is demanded by situational judgment measures of adaptability. Respondents are asked to consider a situation that requires adaptation, and indicate what action of several presented they are most and least likely to take. Examples of two situational judgment designed to measure adaptability are provided in Table 1.2. Similar open-ended questions are often asked in structured interviews designed to address adaptability. Obviously there are important differences between situational judgment items and interview items, in that the interview respondent must construct an answer (instead of choosing available options), and they must respond orally and are rated by an interviewer against a definition and rating scale that reflects degrees of judged adaptability.

Table 1.1 Biodata Items Used to Measure Adaptability

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How difficult has it been for you to continue with something after being interrupted and having to take care of something else?

A. Very easy

B. Easy

C. Not easy but not difficult

D. Difficult

E. Very difficult

How do you tend to feel when you make plans and someone you are counting on doesn’t show up or fails to meet his/her responsibility?

A. Extremely disappointed

B. Very disappointed

C. Somewhat disappointed

D. Not very disappointed

E. Not at all disappointed

How easy has it been for you to solve or deal with problems that you never faced before?

A. Very easy

B. Easy

C. Not easy but not difficult

D. Difficult

E. Very difficult

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Yet another approach is used in assessment centers, in which participants are often placed in different types of simulations (known as exercises in the assessment center literature) that require adaptive behavior, and then observed and rated by a group of trained assessors. Within each exercise, the assessors rate each candidate on several dimensions. Many of the dimensions commonly rated in assessment centers (e.g., flexibility, stress tolerance, system thinking) have conceptual definitions that are highly similar to the different aspects of the conceptual meaning of adaptability. It seems reasonable to use the dimension scores, the exercise scores or the overall assessment center rating as measures of individual adaptability. Similar to the situational judgment scores, the assessment center scores are likely to be measuring multidimensional performance reflecting the multiple traits.

The situational judgment item, the interview question, and the assessment center rating vary in the degree to which actual adaptive responses are required. In the latter two methods, much depends on the definition of adaptability provided to the rater/interviewer and her/his ability to accurately judge the respondents’ adaptive capability. One example of the definition and rating scale used in a structured situational interview is provided in Table 1.3. In this case, the person’s ability to handle dangerous and unpredictable situations was being assessed.

Table 1.2 Examples of Situational Judgment Items Used to Measure Adaptability

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You have just started a new part-time job, and feel like you are having difficulty fitting in. What would you do?

a. Talk to the supervisor about your feelings and get suggestions for solutions.

b. Focus on getting to know workers on an individual basis. (B)^a

c. Change yourself to fit in with the group of people. (W)

d. Try to do a good job at work so they have no official reason to dislike you.

e. Continue to be yourself and just keep trying to fit in. (B)

f. Give it some more time. Leave if you’re still unhappy or find a better job.

You have been promoted to supervisor of a new department. You are excited about the opportunity and are looking forward to starting work. On your first day, you realize that everyone in the department is of a different race than you. It is clear that they are not happy with you supervising their department and don’t expect you to last very long. You want to gain their trust and respect but are not sure what to do.

a. Try to be nice to everyone and just get your work done.

b. Work hard to gain their trust, realizing it will take time.

c. Be frank about your plans for the department and let them know you are available for any discussions they might want to have.

d. Meet with them and focus on challenging performance goals for the department that will hopefully get the employees excited. (B)

e. Speak to the HR Dept and request to be reassigned to a more compatible department. (W)

f. Immediately hold a meeting, state the obvious, and demand that you be judged on the quality of your work and not the color of your skin.

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^aB and W in parentheses refer to the alternatives judged to be the best and worst alternative actions, and are the scored options.

Finally, another approach to measuring adaptability as a personal characteristic is to develop self-report measures which are similar to traditional personality inventories, but attempt to tie the item content to specific adaptability performance dimensions. An example is the I-Adapt measure described ...

Table des matières

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Series page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• About the Editor
• About the Contributors
• Series Foreword by Kimberly Elsbach
• Preface
• Part I Conceptualizing and Assessing Individual Adaptability
• Part II Contexts of Individual Adaptability
• Part III Concluding Observations
• Author Index
• Subject Index