Emergence & Maintenance of Psychological Experiences of Community at Work
Author:
Charlotte Hughes ’27Co-Authors:
Faculty Mentor(s):
Neil Boyd, Management and OrganizationsFunding Source:
The Provost's OfficeAbstract
Recent scholarship has demonstrated that psychological experiences of community at work (i.e., a psychological sense of community and a sense of community responsibility) can enhance employee psychological and behavioral outcomes. Recent evidence also shows that psychological experiences of community are facilitated by a multitude of actions that can be enacted by executives, human resource professionals, and managers throughout an organization. These findings have helped scholars understand some of the factors that contribute to building experiences of community in organizations. However, very little empirical evidence exists on the dynamic nature of antecedent conditions that exist when experiences of community first form, and what factors lead to maintenance or changes in experiences of community over time. The present study attempted to study this research gap by investigating experiences of students who enrolled in a course where they were charged with forming and running a company for a semester. A mixed-methods study was employed that included surveys at six key moments throughout the semester, and interviews with a randomly selected small cohort of participants to understand factors and incidents that were present as experiences of community manifested, and during states of dynamic change. The findings help frame factors that scholars can empirically test in future studies, and that managers could use in building community at work.