The Issue of Motivating Entre(Intra)Preneurial Behavior

ABSTRACT The issue of motivating entre(intra)preneurial behavior is one of great importance to any society. The problem is that motivating human behavior is really not possible. Human behavior is motivated all the time; the real issue is to structure a business climate that fosters and rewards the excitement, enthusiasm and experimentation that accompanies entre(intra)preneurial behavior. A basic understanding of organizational climate, behavioral modification and the “deviant” behavior that makeup entre(intra) preneurial behavior can develop and nurture the joy and passion necessary for economics and human growth. The issue of restrictive environments and the role of staff groups in restricting creative, innovative entre(intra)preneurial behavior is one a leader-manager must be aware. The need for a more nearly accurate definition of entre(intra)preneur is one of the first hurdles to overcome in researching the issue of guiding entre(intra)preneurial behavior. There is a paradox in speaking or writing about motivating any kind of behavior, but especially, motivating entrepreneurial behavior. At the very outset, it should be very clear that academicians and practitioners who speak of “motivating” anyone are purely and simply dead wrong in the use of the term. Living human beings are motivated all the time. A much more comfortable way of discussing the issue is to speak about guiding or shaping motivated behavior. Then it is possible to research, comment and discuss the ways in which entrepreneurial or intrapreneurial behavior can be fostered, encouraged, guided or shaped. The issues and themes of many presentations on entrepreneurial and/or intrapreneurial behavior that are presented in textbooks, articles and symposia frequently begin with some discussion of the personality characteristics or the motivation of entre(intra)-preneurs, implying that these characteristics are narrowly distributed in the general population. Elsewhere (Winslow, 1984) I have speculated that innovation and creativity are widely distributed in the normal population, not narrowly, and further I would argue that non-innovative and non-creative behaviors are a maladjustment in humans brought on by the healthy ability of most of us to adapt and adjust to our environment. Herzberg (1982) has commented that … “all human behavior is adjusted behavior, therefore, all human behavior adjusts away from what is naturally healthy behavior.” In effect, all of us have adjusted away from normality, therefore, none of us are normal. An extension of this idea leads to the conclusion that all cultures choose the pathology, or the abnormal behavior, that will be defined as normal for that society. I believe that one of the fundamental motivations of human beings is to pursue their own growth in competence, skill and creativity; to act upon the world rather than to react to the world; and to shape the environment as well as be shaped by their surroundings. The human being operates always within this dilemma — “human behavior is influenced (shaped) by the environment, but it is an environment created and developed by human beings,” (Skinner, 1971). The above could lead to a discussion of whether the natural, normal, pristine human being is good or evil, a discussion of the importance of nature over nurture, or more directly to the more mundane central topic of this paper. One of the most creative current observers of organizational behavior, Peter Vaill (1985), has pointed out, that “behavioral scientists have a common trait, that is, they believe the art of applied behavioral sciences is the art of making lists.” I frequently define myself as an applied behavioral scientist, therefore, I will present my list of observations on Motivating (Shaping) Entre(Intra)preneurial Behavior.

• 1 The climate, atmosphere or environment must be created to allow the expression of entre(intra)preneurial activity.
• 2 The drive, motivation or spirit of entre(intra)-preneurship is broadly distributed in the general population.
• 3 Behavior is a function of its consequences (Skinner, 1971).
• 4 Entre(intra)preneurial environments have an aura of excitement, suspended belief and an impertenence toward conventional wisdom.
• 5 The entre(intra)preneurial activity, tested against “standard” behavior or conventional organizational policy frequently appears as deviant behavior.
• 6 The terms entre(intra)preneur are used very loosely and are becoming useless in discussing innovation, behavior, economic and/or organizational activity.

     

Psychometric properties of the Danish MCMI-I translation

A translation of the MCMI-I has been in use in Denmark for some years. An untested assumption in the interpretation of the pattern of test results is that the psychometric characteristics of the Danish and American versions are similar. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the psychometric properties of the questionnaire by using traditional psychometric analysis techniques on the results of a sample consisting of 423 patients and 179 normal controls. Coefficient alpha was calculated for the 20 clinical subscales of the test and the Danish results were strikingly similar to the original coefficients reported by Millon. Furthermore, factor analysis of the subscales showed a factor structure very similar to American findings, and it is concluded that the psychometric properties of the Danish MCMI are not significantly different from the original.     

SINGLE-ATTRIBUTE UTILITY ANALYSIS MAY BE FUTILE,BUT THIS CAN’T BE THE END OF THE STORY: CAUSAL CHAIN ANALYSIS AS AN ALTERNATIVE

Research on providing single-attribute utility analysis has shown moderate or even negative effects on the acceptance of selection and training tests by human resource decision makers. In this study, we contrasted the perceived utility of single-attribute utility analysis with causal chain analysis as an alternative way of conducting utility analysis. Causal chain analysis focuses on measuring the linkages between HRM interventions and organizational outcomes mediated by employee attitudes and customer perceptions. We compared 144 managers' reactions to both methods of utility analysis concerning the variables understandability, information quality, perceived usefulness, user information satisfaction, and intention to use. Causal chain analysis yielded higher results than single-attribute analysis for these variables, and a compound measure of these constructs supported this finding. This indicates that causal chain analysis is a valuable alternative method of communicating the utility of HRM interventions.     

Protean and boundaryless career attitudes and organizational commitment: The effects of perceived supervisor support

Despite the traditional sentiment that protean and boundaryless career attitudes indicate a decline in organizational commitment, little empirical evidence is available. The present study examined the relation of protean and boundaryless career attitudes to organizational commitment and whether the perceived supervisor support moderated these relationships. The results based on data from 380 employees demonstrate that organizational mobility preference is negatively related to all three dimensions of organizational commitment. Self-directed career management is positively related to affective and normative commitment and negatively related to continuance commitment, while values-driven career orientation is negatively related to normative commitment. Moreover, there is no significant evidence provided for a moderating effect of perceived supervisor support on the relationships between protean and boundaryless career attitudes and organizational commitment. Perceived supervisor support has only a main effect on affective and normative commitment.     

ON THE COHERENCE OF HIGHER‐ORDER BELIEFS

Let us by ‘first‐order beliefs’ mean beliefs about the world, such as the belief that it will rain tomorrow, and by ‘second‐order beliefs’ let us mean beliefs about the reliability of first‐order, belief‐forming processes. In formal epistemology, coherence has been studied, with much ingenuity and precision, for sets of first‐order beliefs. However, to the best of our knowledge, sets including second‐order beliefs have not yet received serious attention in that literature. In informal epistemology, by contrast, sets of the latter kind play an important role in some respectable coherence theories of knowledge and justification. In this paper, we extend the formal treatment of coherence to second‐order beliefs. Our main conclusion is that while extending the framework to second‐order beliefs sheds doubt on the generality of the notorious impossibility results for coherentism, another problem crops up that might be no less damaging to the coherentist project: facts of coherence turn out to be epistemically accessible only to agents who have a good deal of insight into matters external to their own belief states.     

Development of sense of coherence during two group interventions

Kähönen, K., Näätänen, P., Tolvanen, A. & Salmela‐Aro, K. (2012). Development of sense of coherence during two group interventions. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology 53, 523–527. Burnout is a serious occupational hazard. This study investigated the possibility to develop an effective salutogenic group intervention among employees suffering from severe burnout symptoms. Participants consisted of employees aged 31 to 59 years working in different public service occupations, such as police officers, tax officers, (and other public service officers), and assigned to three different groups: analytic (N = 25), psychodramatic (N = 24) and controls (N = 28). The intervention comprised 16 separate days over a nine‐month period. Changes in sense of coherence (SOC) were measured four times with the 13‐item Orientation to Life Questionnaire during the intervention and at six‐month follow‐up, and analyzed by general linear model (GLM) and using Cohen’s d to estimate effect sizes. Change in SOC between the three groups was statistically significant (F(4,148) = 2.65, p = 0.036). The psychodrama group showed a higher increase in SOC than the analytic group during the intervention, while the improvement in the analytic group was significant during the six‐month follow‐up. Total effect size from baseline to follow‐up was in the analytic group 0.71, in the psychodrama group 0.47, and in the control group from baseline to end of intervention 0.09. The results show that it is possible to improve SOC by group intervention in the occupational healthcare context. The dialogue‐based analytic method and action‐based psychodramatic method differ in their specific effects.     

The dynamics of search,impasse, and representational change provide a coherent explanation of difficulty in the nine-dot problem

The nine-dot problem is often used to demonstrate and explain mental impasse, creativity, and out of the box thinking. The present study investigated the interplay of a restricted initial search space, the likelihood of invoking a representational change, and the subsequent constraining of an unrestricted search space. In three experimental conditions, participants worked on different versions of the nine-dot problem that hinted at removing particular sources of difficulty from the standard problem. The hints were incremental such that the first suggested a possible route for a solution attempt; the second additionally indicated the dot at which lines meet on the solution path; and the final condition also provided non-dot locations that appear in the solution path. The results showed that in the experimental conditions, representational change is encountered more quickly and problems are solved more often than for the control group. We propose a cognitive model that focuses on general problem-solving heuristics and representational change to explain problem difficulty.