Year: 2014
Type: book-chapter
Abstract: As a result of the increased frequency and complexity of interpersonal interactions in today's workplaces, researchers and practitioners have stated that today's workers need to be interpersonally adaptive (Griffin, Neal, & Parker, 2007;Mumford, Campion, & Morgeson, 2007;Pulakos, Arad, Donovan, & Plamondon, 2000).Now, more than ever, today's worker must interact effectively with others in the workplace.One aspect of this reflects the predominance of service-oriented organizations in many economies (Zeithaml & Bitner, 1996).Within these organizations workers are required to spend a considerable part of their day engaged in social interactions and managing social relationships with customers (Schneider, 1994), and with teams (Kozlowski & Ilgen, 2006).Further, increases in globalization (Javidan, Dorfman, de Luque, & House, 2006), boundaryless organizational structures (Macy & Izumi, 1993), and workplace diversity (Mahoney, 2005), require workers to engage in more complex and dynamic interpersonal interactions.Traditionally, a 'person-focused' construct, such as interpersonal skills (e.g., Klein, DeRouin, & Salas, 2006), is used to measure an individual's effectiveness within an interpersonal interaction.Interpersonal skills assess the goal-directed behaviors an individual performs, such as effectively negotiating, and demonstrating warmth and friendliness.Interpersonal skills represent a range of behaviors that are appropriate across most interpersonal interactions.Though a particular interpersonal skill is appropriate for INTERPERSONAL ADAPTABILITY 3 most interpersonal interactions, it may not always be appropriate within a specific interpersonal interaction.As an example, let's say a manager is required to train a new direct report while ensuring that a critical service deliverable is met.The manager begins by using coaching skills (i.e., interpersonal skill), allowing the direct report to initiate his own learning and exploration.If the direct report quickly demonstrates confidence and proficiency at meeting the critical service deliverable, then the manager's initial coaching approach would be appropriate and there is no need to adjust his/her approach.However, the direct report may show tremendous anxiety towards self-directed learning.Or the direct report may demonstrate that he is unable to learn the job quickly enough to meet the critical service deliverable.In such situations, it would be more appropriate for the manager to adapt to a different training style (e.g., directive communication), and delegate the service deliverable to another employee.By correctly perceiving the situation (i.e., employee's anxiety, task will not be completed effectively), and adjusting skills and strategies (i.e., directive learning style from coaching learning style, stop using critical service deliverable as training opportunity) the manager can meet the goals of the situation (i.e., develop the new direct report, meet client service deliverable).The limitation of using person-focused constructs is that they only assess the person.Interpersonal skills assess what the manager did, without taking into account the demands that dynamically occur within situation (e.g., response of employee), and the
Authors: Tom Oliver, Filip Lievens
Language: English
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2591075061