Job Insecurity and Employees’ Taking Charge Behaviors: Testing a Moderated Mediation Model

Given the rapid changes in current technologies, business models, and work environments, organizations and managers increasingly rely on their employees’ proactive behaviors, such as taking charge, to gain competitive advantages. Taking charge involves a range of risky and future-oriented behaviors, and it requires employees to work hard to achieve them in the future. For employees with high job-insecurity, their job continuity in the future is threatened. Thus, they may not be willing to take risks to do additional work that is “future-oriented”. To our knowledge, the effect of job insecurity on employees’ taking charge has rarely been studied. As a result, the purpose of our study is to investigate whether, how, and when job insecurity will influence taking charge. Drawing on the conservation of resources theory and proactive motivation model, we develop a theoretical model. Moreover, we employed a multi-wave and multi-source survey to test our predictions. Based on the data from 194 full-time employees paired with their direct supervisors, the results provided consistent support for the proposed hypotheses. Specifically, the results indicate that job insecurity prohibits employees’ taking charge behaviors through deteriorating their work engagement. Furthermore, employees’ perception of interactional justice moderates the negative influence of job insecurity on their work engagement and, consequently, their taking charge behaviors. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Taking Charge After Stroke: A novel, community-based intervention to improve the lives of people with stroke

<p>Background and aims: Stroke is the third leading cause of disability worldwide. Despite the recent development of hyper-acute therapies for stroke, outcomes for people with stroke and types of rehabilitation interventions have remained unchanged. Rehabilitation in New Zealand is largely therapy-based and uses goal setting as a main component, but evidence for effectiveness of these methods is weak. Attempts to enhance the effects of rehabilitation using a stroke liaison officer or a caregiver to lead rehabilitation at home have had no effect on outcomes. However, self-management interventions have shown some promise. The Take Charge session is a novel, community-based, self-management intervention, which was shown to significantly improve both independence and health-related quality of life at 12 months following stroke in Māori and Pacific New Zealanders. We formalised the components of the Take Charge session, based upon Self Determination Theory and qualitative research about the importance of Taking Charge in recovery. This allowed us to retest the intervention in a different population of people with stroke. We hypothesised that: (1) the beneficial effect of the Take Charge session would be reproducible in a larger cohort of non-Māori, non-Pacific people with stroke, and (2) that two Take Charge sessions would have a greater positive effect on health-related quality of life than one alone. Methods: We randomised 400 people within 16 weeks of acute stroke who had been discharged to community living at seven centres in New Zealand to either a single Take Charge session (TCS 1, n = 132), two Take Charge sessions (TCS 2, n = 138), or a control intervention (n = 130). The primary outcome was the Physical Component Summary score (PCS) of the Short Form 36 (SF-36) at 12 months following index stroke, comparing any Take Charge session exposure to control. Secondary outcomes included the PCS of the Short Form 12 (SF-12) at six months, participation measured by the Frenchay Activities Index at six and 12 months, and activities measured by the Barthel Index at six and 12 months. Outcome measures were performed by an assessor masked to allocation. Results: At 12 months following stroke, participants in either of the Take Charge groups (TCS 1 + TCS 2) scored 2.9 (95% CI 0.95 to 4.9, p = 0.004) points higher (better) than control on the SF-36 PCS. This difference was statistically and clinically significant. The effect size remained significant when we adjusted for pre-specified baseline variables, including age, gender, and baseline stroke severity. Furthermore, SF-12 PCS at six months showed improvement in similar direction and effect size, and improvement in participation was statistically significant at 12 months. There was a positive dose effect with each exposure to the Take Charge session predicting a 1.9 (95% CI 0.8 to 3.1, p < 0.001) point increase in the 12-month SF-36 PCS. Subsequently, we conducted an individual patient meta-analysis of the Take Charge session, pooling data with the initial Māori and Pacific Stroke Study. The pooled effect of any exposure to the Take Charge session was 3.74 (95% CI 1.96 to 5.51) points greater than control. Conclusion: The Take Charge session – a simple, self-management intervention, improved healthrelated quality of life and participation at 12 months. This thesis provides evidence for implementing such an intervention into routine, post-stroke care, to improve the quality of life of people with stroke in the long term.</p>

Taking Charge After Stroke: A novel, community-based intervention to improve the lives of people with stroke

<p>Background and aims: Stroke is the third leading cause of disability worldwide. Despite the recent development of hyper-acute therapies for stroke, outcomes for people with stroke and types of rehabilitation interventions have remained unchanged. Rehabilitation in New Zealand is largely therapy-based and uses goal setting as a main component, but evidence for effectiveness of these methods is weak. Attempts to enhance the effects of rehabilitation using a stroke liaison officer or a caregiver to lead rehabilitation at home have had no effect on outcomes. However, self-management interventions have shown some promise. The Take Charge session is a novel, community-based, self-management intervention, which was shown to significantly improve both independence and health-related quality of life at 12 months following stroke in Māori and Pacific New Zealanders. We formalised the components of the Take Charge session, based upon Self Determination Theory and qualitative research about the importance of Taking Charge in recovery. This allowed us to retest the intervention in a different population of people with stroke. We hypothesised that: (1) the beneficial effect of the Take Charge session would be reproducible in a larger cohort of non-Māori, non-Pacific people with stroke, and (2) that two Take Charge sessions would have a greater positive effect on health-related quality of life than one alone. Methods: We randomised 400 people within 16 weeks of acute stroke who had been discharged to community living at seven centres in New Zealand to either a single Take Charge session (TCS 1, n = 132), two Take Charge sessions (TCS 2, n = 138), or a control intervention (n = 130). The primary outcome was the Physical Component Summary score (PCS) of the Short Form 36 (SF-36) at 12 months following index stroke, comparing any Take Charge session exposure to control. Secondary outcomes included the PCS of the Short Form 12 (SF-12) at six months, participation measured by the Frenchay Activities Index at six and 12 months, and activities measured by the Barthel Index at six and 12 months. Outcome measures were performed by an assessor masked to allocation. Results: At 12 months following stroke, participants in either of the Take Charge groups (TCS 1 + TCS 2) scored 2.9 (95% CI 0.95 to 4.9, p = 0.004) points higher (better) than control on the SF-36 PCS. This difference was statistically and clinically significant. The effect size remained significant when we adjusted for pre-specified baseline variables, including age, gender, and baseline stroke severity. Furthermore, SF-12 PCS at six months showed improvement in similar direction and effect size, and improvement in participation was statistically significant at 12 months. There was a positive dose effect with each exposure to the Take Charge session predicting a 1.9 (95% CI 0.8 to 3.1, p < 0.001) point increase in the 12-month SF-36 PCS. Subsequently, we conducted an individual patient meta-analysis of the Take Charge session, pooling data with the initial Māori and Pacific Stroke Study. The pooled effect of any exposure to the Take Charge session was 3.74 (95% CI 1.96 to 5.51) points greater than control. Conclusion: The Take Charge session – a simple, self-management intervention, improved healthrelated quality of life and participation at 12 months. This thesis provides evidence for implementing such an intervention into routine, post-stroke care, to improve the quality of life of people with stroke in the long term.</p>

Philippines’ study describes best traits of leaders in the Covid19 pandemic crisis according to employees

Purpose The authors wanted to find out what characteristics leaders required to inspire their employees during times of crisis Design/methodology/approach The study was conducted in the Philippines after the Government declared the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) in March, 2020. The authors found 155 participants (69% female) aged from 21 to 67 years old with an average of 37 from various sectors. The participants filled in online surveys with open-ended questions. The most important one was: “What traits or behaviors did your leaders exhibit during this crisis that were helpful to you and the organisation?” Qualitative analysis was used. Findings The authors divided the best qualities into three groups: The first was “attending to the person”; the second was “taking charge and showing the way”; the third was “sustaining the spirit”. Originality/value The authors felt their paper was important because it looked at employees’ perspectives, which was rare in earlier research. It also had practical implications, they said.

Initiative for self-control of blood sugar-diabetes in pregnancy

Our aim was to empower underprivileged women to self-control their blood glucose during pregnancy so that optimum blood glucose values and its monitoring can be achieved as outpatient care. A dedicated clinic was established for women with diabetes in pregnancy (DIP), that was focused on diabetes education and training of women. It was conducted by a team of a nutritionist, a trained midwife and residents. The challenges of unaffordability and language barrier were addressed. DIP clinic helped us cut down the cost of inpatient care. Awareness about DIP and its consequences on the baby motivated women to comply with medical nutrition therapy (MNT) and self-monitoring of blood glucose (SMBG). The women attained ownership and the feeling of fulfilment by taking charge of their blood glucose control for the benefit of their babies. This was a practical, cost-effective and successful health practice initiative of attaining glycemic targets in a lower middle-income population.

Ethnic Feminicide

This paper explores the missing and murdered indigenous women and girls epidemic in Washington State and how the state has failed to address the issue, underlining its complicity and impunity. It takes into account that this epidemic is part of a global crisis of femicide, drawing specifically on the Latin American term, feminicidios, or feminicide, the gender-based murders of women and the state’s impunity in these cases. This paper then names another form of femicide, ethnic feminicde, arguing that the missing and murdered indigenous women and girls epidemic falls under this crisis because of the underlying systemic racism and sexism in state institutions. This paper uses the indigenous methodologies of reframing and intervention, as described by Linda Tuhiwai Smith, to explore this epidemic, reframing it into a transnational feminist issue, not just and indigenous issue, and asking how Washington state, and America as a whole, can intervene, with indigenous leaders taking charge.