Dr. Franklin Lartey - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Dr. Franklin Lartey

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies

How to cite this paper: Lartey, F. M. (2022). Using EENDEED to Measure Remote Employee Engagement... more How to cite this paper: Lartey, F. M. (2022). Using EENDEED to Measure Remote Employee Engagement: Influence of the Sense of Belonging at Work and the Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) on Virtual Employee Engagement. Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 10(2), 203-222. https://doi.org/10.4236/jhrss.2022.101013

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability , 2022

How to cite this paper: Lartey, F. M. (2022). Using EENDEED to Measure Remote Employee Engagement... more How to cite this paper: Lartey, F. M. (2022). Using EENDEED to Measure Remote Employee Engagement: Influence of the Sense of Belonging at Work and the Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) on Virtual
Employee Engagement. Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 10(2), 203-222. https://doi.org/10.4236/jhrss.2022.101013

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 2022

EENDEED (Enhanced Engagement Nurtured by Determination, Efficacy, and Exchange Dimensions) is an ... more EENDEED (Enhanced Engagement Nurtured by Determination, Efficacy, and Exchange Dimensions) is an instrument for measuring the engagement of both remote workers and traditional workplace employees. The purpose of this study was to validate the relationship between EENDEED and its three main theories, namely: 1) self-determination theory, 2) self-efficacy theory, and 3) social-exchange theory. This was done by looking at the relationships between EENDEED and three validated instruments: a) Balanced Measure of Psychological Needs (BMPN), b) General Self-Efficacy scale (GSE-6), and c) Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9), that are based respectively on self-determination theory, self-efficacy theory, and social exchange theory. Data were collected from 600 participants in the United States through an online survey. A structural equation model (SEM) was created to ascertain the relationship between EENDEED and the three validated instruments, thus their subtending theories. Findings suggested the existence of positive significant relationships between engagement as measured by EENDEED and BMPN, SGE-6, and UWES-9. Results indicated that for every 1 standard unit increase in the employee engagement as measured by EENDEED, there was an expectation to see an increase in BMPN, GSE-6, and UWES-9 scores by .55, .85, and .82 standard points respectively. This study provided support for external validity of EENDEED and confirmed the existence of positive and significant relationships between engagement of remote employees and traditional office workers as measured by EENDEED and 1) self-determination as measured by BMPN, 2) self-efficacy as measured by SGE-6, and 3) social exchange-based engagement as measured by UWES-9.

International Business Research, 2022

With the ongoing pandemic and technological evolutions, remote work has become the new normal. Ho... more With the ongoing pandemic and technological evolutions, remote work has become the new normal. However, existing employee engagement instruments do not take the remote aspect of work into account. This paper proposes a nine-item instrument for assessing employee engagement in general, and remote worker engagement specifically. The instrument was named EENDEED, for enhanced engagement nurtured by determination, efficacy, and exchange dimensions. It was grounded on three theories: (1) self-determination; (2) self-efficacy; and (3) social exchange. After generating the proposed scale grounded on the literature and theory, data were collected from 626 participants in the United States through an online survey. The dataset was split in two random samples of 405 and 195 cases respectively, after eliminating 26 cases with missing values. An exploratory factor analysis (EFA) on the larger sample helped discover its two-factor structure, namely PERFORMANCE and SELF-RELIANCE. A confirmatory f...

Journal of Human Resource Management, 2020

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 2019

Journal of Human Resources and Sustainability Studies, 2022

EENDEED (Enhanced Engagement Nurtured by Determination, Efficacy, and Exchange Dimensions) is an ... more EENDEED (Enhanced Engagement Nurtured by Determination, Efficacy, and Exchange Dimensions) is an instrument for measuring the engagement of both remote workers and traditional workplace employees. The purpose of this study was to validate the relationship between EENDEED and its three main theories, namely: 1) self-determination theory, 2) self-efficacy theory, and 3) social-exchange theory. This was done by looking at the relationships between EENDEED and three validated instruments: a) Balanced Measure of Psychological Needs (BMPN), b) General Self-Efficacy scale (GSE-6), and c) Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9), that are based respectively on self-determination theory, self-efficacy theory, and social exchange theory. Data were collected from 600 participants in the United States through an online survey. A structural equation model (SEM) was created to ascertain the relationship between EENDEED and the three validated instruments, thus their subtending theories. Findings suggested the existence of positive significant relationships between engagement as measured by EENDEED and BMPN, SGE-6, and UWES-9. Results indicated that for every 1 standard unit increase in the employee engagement as measured by EENDEED, there was an expectation to see an increase in BMPN, GSE-6, and UWES-9 scores by .55, .85, and .82 standard points respectively. This study provided support for external validity of EENDEED and confirmed the existence of positive and significant relationships between engagement of remote employees and traditional office workers as measured by EENDEED and 1) self-determination as measured by BMPN, 2) self-efficacy as measured by SGE-6, and 3) social exchange-based engagement as measured by UWES-9.

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 2021

This study investigated the impact of career planning, employee autonomy, and manager recognition... more This study investigated the impact of career planning, employee autonomy, and manager recognition on employee engagement through the lens of the social exchange theory. A survey of 120 employees in US small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) was conducted and a multiple regression model was created to answer the research questions seeking to know if career planning, employee autonomy, and manager recognition contributed to employee engagement and if so, to what extent. The results supported the theoretical model of social exchange as well as the hypothesized relationships. In other words, data confirmed the existence of a statistically significant relationship between the independent variables: career planning, employee autonomy, and manager recognition, and the dependent variable, employee engagement. Career planning was identified as a better contributor to engagement as compared to the other two predictors. Manager recognition, while contributing less than career planning, was d...

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 2021

In this study, the indicators of computer-mediated communication that affect engagement among rem... more In this study, the indicators of computer-mediated communication that affect engagement among remote knowledge workers were analyzed. After conducting an online survey of 133 remote knowledge workers in the U.S., a multiple regression statistical model was used to answer the research question seeking the extent to which empathy, expressiveness, and motivation contributed to remote employee engagement. Our findings suggested the existence of a statistically significant relationship between the independent variables Empathy, Expressiveness, and Motivation, and the dependent variable Engagement. This study contributed to knowledge by filling the gap in current literature as no previous attempt had been made on analyzing the relationship between engagement and the items identified here. Our findings have implications for researchers and practitioners in that they may assist in guiding future research and work design for remote knowledge workers in the digital and pandemic era. This stud...

Some studies related to customer satisfaction in the service industry use the SERVQUAL instrument... more Some studies related to customer satisfaction in the service industry use the SERVQUAL instrument developed by Parasuraman, Zeithaml, and Berry (1991). Similarly, some studies on customer loyalty use the Net Promoter System™ (NPS®) developed by Reichheld (2003). Even though many researchers acknowledge the existence of a relationship between customer satisfaction and loyalty, there is currently no empirical evidence demonstrating such relationship between SERVQUAL and NPS. In that regard, the research problem investigated by this study consisted of identifying the antecedents of customer satisfaction as measured by SERVQUAL that influenced customer loyalty as measured by the Net Promoter System™ in the context of the residential broadband service industry. To that effect, 208 broadband customers in the U.S. Midwest region were surveyed online, out of which 44.2% were males, and 55.8% females. A confirmatory factor analysis validated the latent structure of collected data in regards to SERVQUAL, indicating that it was appropriate to use its five factors as predictors in the study. An ordinal logistic regression model built on the collected data confirmed the existence of a statistically significant relationship between Empathy (one of the five factors of SERVQUAL) and the customer loyalty status (Wald χ2(1) = 4.663, p = .031, 95% CI [.010, .212]), suggesting that increasing empathy by one point increased the odds of becoming a promoter by 11.73%. The Pearson test of model fit showed that the overall model was predictive of the relationship, χ2(401) = 409.022, p = .380. This final model was validated using the Akaike information criterion (AIC), a single sample cross-validation model.

International Business Research, 2021

Small businesses are the predominant contributors to the U.S. economy, yet they face many challen... more Small businesses are the predominant contributors to the U.S. economy, yet they face many challenges to remain competitive and sustainable. There are several reasons a small business could fail, including a lack of human resources, limited financial resources, competition, technological advancements, disaster, and globalization. Improving employee performance by getting them engaged and productive in their work is an issue that cannot be overlooked for small businesses to function and remain competitive. There is limited empirical evidence that explains the dimensions of performance management and employee engagement in small businesses. However, how small businesses sustain their long-term performance remains uncertain. This study sought to bring together two previously distinct constructs: overall employee engagement and overall performance management, characterized by performance goals and development, a climate of trust, and feedback and recognition. The research was correlation...

International Business Research; Vol. 15, No. 2, 2022

With the ongoing pandemic and technological evolutions, remote work has become the new normal. Ho... more With the ongoing pandemic and technological evolutions, remote work has become the new normal. However, existing employee engagement instruments do not take the remote aspect of work into account. This paper proposes a nine-item instrument for assessing employee engagement in general, and remote worker engagement specifically. The instrument was named EENDEED, for enhanced engagement nurtured by determination, efficacy, and exchange dimensions. It was grounded on three theories: (1) self-determination; (2) self-efficacy; and (3) social exchange. After generating the proposed scale grounded on the literature and theory, data were collected from 626 participants in the United States through an online survey. The dataset was split in two random samples of 405 and 195 cases respectively, after eliminating 26 cases with missing values. An exploratory factor analysis (EFA) on the larger sample helped discover its two-factor structure, namely PERFORMANCE and SELF-RELIANCE. A confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed on the second sample, which confirmed the two-factor structure of EENDEED. A final study assessed the reliability and validity of EENDEED. Data were collected through an online survey of 162 employees in the U.S. A CFA was conducted, validating the two-factor structure of the instrument. Construct reliability of the factors and reliability of the scale were ascertained. Face validity, content validity, construct validity, and criterion validity were confirmed. This study fills the gap in current engagement measurements by including the remote worker dimension. Organizations will be better able to identify and address challenges faced by traditional workplace employees and remote workers.

International Business Research, 2021

The purpose of this study was to investigate if confidence, interest, authenticity, and lonelines... more The purpose of this study was to investigate if confidence, interest, authenticity, and loneliness as independent variables, could help predict employee engagement, the dependent variable. In this setting, the independent variables were indicators of the Balanced Measure of Psychological Needs (BMPN) and the dependent variable was obtained using the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9). After surveying 151 participants in the United States, 17 responses were removed from the final dataset during data and assumptions validation. A multiple regression model was created using the remaining 134 valid cases. Our findings confirmed the existence of a statistically significant relationship between confidence, interest, and authenticity in predicting employee engagement. Only, we could not establish a statistically significant relationship between loneliness and engagement, in contrast to some prior research studies. These findings have significant implications for practitioners and resea...

Journal of Business Administration Research

Organizations in the 21st century deal with constant changes such as globalization, technological... more Organizations in the 21st century deal with constant changes such as globalization, technological evolutions, regulatory changes, competition, and other unexpected events, among others. These challenges can be viewed and addressed through the lenses of contemporary theories. This paper selected three contemporary theories namely chaos, complexity, and contingency theories, and presented their foundations and characteristics by comparing and contrasting their key concepts. These concepts include nonlinearity, feedback, bifurcation, strange attractors, fractals, and self-organization for chaos theory; nonlinearity, dynamism, feedback, self-organization, emergence, and adaptability for complexity theory; and adaptation, equifinality, effectiveness, and congruency for contingency theory. Examples of studies and organizational applications of these theories were provided, and implications for scholars and organizational leaders were discussed. By explaining notions such as how the capaci...

International Business Research

In analyzing complex products, this study selected the company Goldman Sachs and one of its produ... more In analyzing complex products, this study selected the company Goldman Sachs and one of its product offerings, the synthetic collateralized debt obligation (synthetic CDO). The study later analyzed the ethical implications of providing such a complex product to customers. A review of the literature indicates that researchers identified this product and other associated derivatives of the mortgage backed securities as the main causes of the 2008 financial crisis in the United States of America. As such, Goldman Sachs’ offering of the product posed ethical and moral issues. An analysis of the company and its offering was done under the lenses of various ethical theories such as Kohlberg's theory of moral reasoning, the Kantian ethics, the utilitarian perspective, Friedman’s shareholder theory, the stakeholder theory, the market approach to consumer protection, and the contract view of consumer protection. Besides Friedman’s shareholder theory, all other theories judged the product...

Journal of Business Administration Research

In today’s competitive environment, broadband companies innovate to stay competitive, retain exis... more In today’s competitive environment, broadband companies innovate to stay competitive, retain existing customers, and attract new customers. A recent innovative product in this industry is the deployment of the gigabit Internet service over fiber optic networks as a solution to the growing bandwidth demands from consumers. One determinant of the decision to deploy such product is the expectation of a positive return on investment (ROI) determined among others by the penetration or take rate of the product or service. Like any product, the adoption of the gigabit Internet is influenced by the reaction of customers to this innovation. Some customers are early adopters of the product while others might not be interested in higher bandwidth Internet connections or will simply adopt the product at a later time. The purpose of this paper was to identify a model that best predicts future trends in the uptake of the gigabit Internet product over fiber-to-the home (FTTH). To that effect, this...

Journal of Business Administration and Research, 2020

Organizations in the 21 st century deal with constant changes such as globalization, technologica... more Organizations in the 21 st century deal with constant changes such as globalization, technological evolutions, regulatory changes, competition, and other unexpected events, among others. These challenges can be viewed and addressed through the lenses of contemporary theories. This paper selected three contemporary theories namely chaos, complexity, and contingency theories, and presented their foundations and characteristics by comparing and contrasting their key concepts. These concepts include nonlinearity, feedback, bifurcation, strange attractors, fractals, and self-organization for chaos theory; nonlinearity, dynamism, feedback, self-organization, emergence, and adaptability for complexity theory; and adaptation, equifinality, effectiveness, and congruency for contingency theory. Examples of studies and organizational applications of these theories were provided, and implications for scholars and organizational leaders were discussed. By explaining notions such as how the capacity of a system could be greater than the sum of the capacities of its subunits, this paper can act as a starting point for anyone seeking to understand the three theories or use them for research or organizational purposes.

International Journal of Strategic Information Technology and Applications, 2015

Many customer satisfaction studies in the service industry use SERVQUAL, an instrument developed ... more Many customer satisfaction studies in the service industry use SERVQUAL, an instrument developed by Parasuraman, Zeithaml, and Berry (1998). Similarly, many studies on customer loyalty use the Net Promoter System™ (NPS®) developed by . Even though researchers acknowledge a relationship between satisfaction and loyalty, there is currently no empirical evidence demonstrating such relationship using SERVQUAL and NPS. In that regard, this study analyzed the antecedents of satisfaction measured by SERVQUAL that influence loyalty as measured by NPS in the context of the residential broadband service industry. To that effect, 208 broadband customers in the U.S. Midwest region were surveyed online. A confirmatory factor analysis confirmed the latent structure of collected data, validating the use of the five SERVQUAL factors as predictors. An ordinal logistic regression (OLR) model built on the collected data confirmed the existence of a statistically significant relationship between Empath...

Journal of Human Resource Management, 2020

This study explored social capital theory by investigating the relationship between enterprise so... more This study explored social capital theory by investigating the relationship between enterprise social media use (ESM) as measured by an adapted instrument and employee belongingness as measured by the balanced measure of psychological needs (BMPN) scale of employees in USA, moderated by generational age groups. A survey of 155 employees from US corporations was conducted. The results support the theoretical model of social capital as well as three hypothesized relationships. While there was no significant relation between Social-related ESM use and employee belongingness, there was a statistically significant relationship between Work-related ESM use, age generation groups, and employee belongingness. Overall, Generation-X employees showed a higher belongingness score compared to Millennials, and even higher compared to Generation-Z employees. The results indicate that using an internal social media technology for work-related purposes can help employees feel that they belong and are a part of the social makeup of the organization. Work related social media use can also foster greater organizational social capital such as team building resulting in the achievement of organizational objectives and goals. These findings offer implications for research on social capital's value as an asset for the organization as well as enterprise social media's ongoing and ever-increasing value.

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies

How to cite this paper: Lartey, F. M. (2022). Using EENDEED to Measure Remote Employee Engagement... more How to cite this paper: Lartey, F. M. (2022). Using EENDEED to Measure Remote Employee Engagement: Influence of the Sense of Belonging at Work and the Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) on Virtual Employee Engagement. Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 10(2), 203-222. https://doi.org/10.4236/jhrss.2022.101013

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability , 2022

How to cite this paper: Lartey, F. M. (2022). Using EENDEED to Measure Remote Employee Engagement... more How to cite this paper: Lartey, F. M. (2022). Using EENDEED to Measure Remote Employee Engagement: Influence of the Sense of Belonging at Work and the Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) on Virtual
Employee Engagement. Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 10(2), 203-222. https://doi.org/10.4236/jhrss.2022.101013

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 2022

EENDEED (Enhanced Engagement Nurtured by Determination, Efficacy, and Exchange Dimensions) is an ... more EENDEED (Enhanced Engagement Nurtured by Determination, Efficacy, and Exchange Dimensions) is an instrument for measuring the engagement of both remote workers and traditional workplace employees. The purpose of this study was to validate the relationship between EENDEED and its three main theories, namely: 1) self-determination theory, 2) self-efficacy theory, and 3) social-exchange theory. This was done by looking at the relationships between EENDEED and three validated instruments: a) Balanced Measure of Psychological Needs (BMPN), b) General Self-Efficacy scale (GSE-6), and c) Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9), that are based respectively on self-determination theory, self-efficacy theory, and social exchange theory. Data were collected from 600 participants in the United States through an online survey. A structural equation model (SEM) was created to ascertain the relationship between EENDEED and the three validated instruments, thus their subtending theories. Findings suggested the existence of positive significant relationships between engagement as measured by EENDEED and BMPN, SGE-6, and UWES-9. Results indicated that for every 1 standard unit increase in the employee engagement as measured by EENDEED, there was an expectation to see an increase in BMPN, GSE-6, and UWES-9 scores by .55, .85, and .82 standard points respectively. This study provided support for external validity of EENDEED and confirmed the existence of positive and significant relationships between engagement of remote employees and traditional office workers as measured by EENDEED and 1) self-determination as measured by BMPN, 2) self-efficacy as measured by SGE-6, and 3) social exchange-based engagement as measured by UWES-9.

International Business Research, 2022

With the ongoing pandemic and technological evolutions, remote work has become the new normal. Ho... more With the ongoing pandemic and technological evolutions, remote work has become the new normal. However, existing employee engagement instruments do not take the remote aspect of work into account. This paper proposes a nine-item instrument for assessing employee engagement in general, and remote worker engagement specifically. The instrument was named EENDEED, for enhanced engagement nurtured by determination, efficacy, and exchange dimensions. It was grounded on three theories: (1) self-determination; (2) self-efficacy; and (3) social exchange. After generating the proposed scale grounded on the literature and theory, data were collected from 626 participants in the United States through an online survey. The dataset was split in two random samples of 405 and 195 cases respectively, after eliminating 26 cases with missing values. An exploratory factor analysis (EFA) on the larger sample helped discover its two-factor structure, namely PERFORMANCE and SELF-RELIANCE. A confirmatory f...

Journal of Human Resource Management, 2020

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 2019

Journal of Human Resources and Sustainability Studies, 2022

EENDEED (Enhanced Engagement Nurtured by Determination, Efficacy, and Exchange Dimensions) is an ... more EENDEED (Enhanced Engagement Nurtured by Determination, Efficacy, and Exchange Dimensions) is an instrument for measuring the engagement of both remote workers and traditional workplace employees. The purpose of this study was to validate the relationship between EENDEED and its three main theories, namely: 1) self-determination theory, 2) self-efficacy theory, and 3) social-exchange theory. This was done by looking at the relationships between EENDEED and three validated instruments: a) Balanced Measure of Psychological Needs (BMPN), b) General Self-Efficacy scale (GSE-6), and c) Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9), that are based respectively on self-determination theory, self-efficacy theory, and social exchange theory. Data were collected from 600 participants in the United States through an online survey. A structural equation model (SEM) was created to ascertain the relationship between EENDEED and the three validated instruments, thus their subtending theories. Findings suggested the existence of positive significant relationships between engagement as measured by EENDEED and BMPN, SGE-6, and UWES-9. Results indicated that for every 1 standard unit increase in the employee engagement as measured by EENDEED, there was an expectation to see an increase in BMPN, GSE-6, and UWES-9 scores by .55, .85, and .82 standard points respectively. This study provided support for external validity of EENDEED and confirmed the existence of positive and significant relationships between engagement of remote employees and traditional office workers as measured by EENDEED and 1) self-determination as measured by BMPN, 2) self-efficacy as measured by SGE-6, and 3) social exchange-based engagement as measured by UWES-9.

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 2021

This study investigated the impact of career planning, employee autonomy, and manager recognition... more This study investigated the impact of career planning, employee autonomy, and manager recognition on employee engagement through the lens of the social exchange theory. A survey of 120 employees in US small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) was conducted and a multiple regression model was created to answer the research questions seeking to know if career planning, employee autonomy, and manager recognition contributed to employee engagement and if so, to what extent. The results supported the theoretical model of social exchange as well as the hypothesized relationships. In other words, data confirmed the existence of a statistically significant relationship between the independent variables: career planning, employee autonomy, and manager recognition, and the dependent variable, employee engagement. Career planning was identified as a better contributor to engagement as compared to the other two predictors. Manager recognition, while contributing less than career planning, was d...

Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 2021

In this study, the indicators of computer-mediated communication that affect engagement among rem... more In this study, the indicators of computer-mediated communication that affect engagement among remote knowledge workers were analyzed. After conducting an online survey of 133 remote knowledge workers in the U.S., a multiple regression statistical model was used to answer the research question seeking the extent to which empathy, expressiveness, and motivation contributed to remote employee engagement. Our findings suggested the existence of a statistically significant relationship between the independent variables Empathy, Expressiveness, and Motivation, and the dependent variable Engagement. This study contributed to knowledge by filling the gap in current literature as no previous attempt had been made on analyzing the relationship between engagement and the items identified here. Our findings have implications for researchers and practitioners in that they may assist in guiding future research and work design for remote knowledge workers in the digital and pandemic era. This stud...

Some studies related to customer satisfaction in the service industry use the SERVQUAL instrument... more Some studies related to customer satisfaction in the service industry use the SERVQUAL instrument developed by Parasuraman, Zeithaml, and Berry (1991). Similarly, some studies on customer loyalty use the Net Promoter System™ (NPS®) developed by Reichheld (2003). Even though many researchers acknowledge the existence of a relationship between customer satisfaction and loyalty, there is currently no empirical evidence demonstrating such relationship between SERVQUAL and NPS. In that regard, the research problem investigated by this study consisted of identifying the antecedents of customer satisfaction as measured by SERVQUAL that influenced customer loyalty as measured by the Net Promoter System™ in the context of the residential broadband service industry. To that effect, 208 broadband customers in the U.S. Midwest region were surveyed online, out of which 44.2% were males, and 55.8% females. A confirmatory factor analysis validated the latent structure of collected data in regards to SERVQUAL, indicating that it was appropriate to use its five factors as predictors in the study. An ordinal logistic regression model built on the collected data confirmed the existence of a statistically significant relationship between Empathy (one of the five factors of SERVQUAL) and the customer loyalty status (Wald χ2(1) = 4.663, p = .031, 95% CI [.010, .212]), suggesting that increasing empathy by one point increased the odds of becoming a promoter by 11.73%. The Pearson test of model fit showed that the overall model was predictive of the relationship, χ2(401) = 409.022, p = .380. This final model was validated using the Akaike information criterion (AIC), a single sample cross-validation model.

International Business Research, 2021

Small businesses are the predominant contributors to the U.S. economy, yet they face many challen... more Small businesses are the predominant contributors to the U.S. economy, yet they face many challenges to remain competitive and sustainable. There are several reasons a small business could fail, including a lack of human resources, limited financial resources, competition, technological advancements, disaster, and globalization. Improving employee performance by getting them engaged and productive in their work is an issue that cannot be overlooked for small businesses to function and remain competitive. There is limited empirical evidence that explains the dimensions of performance management and employee engagement in small businesses. However, how small businesses sustain their long-term performance remains uncertain. This study sought to bring together two previously distinct constructs: overall employee engagement and overall performance management, characterized by performance goals and development, a climate of trust, and feedback and recognition. The research was correlation...

International Business Research; Vol. 15, No. 2, 2022

With the ongoing pandemic and technological evolutions, remote work has become the new normal. Ho... more With the ongoing pandemic and technological evolutions, remote work has become the new normal. However, existing employee engagement instruments do not take the remote aspect of work into account. This paper proposes a nine-item instrument for assessing employee engagement in general, and remote worker engagement specifically. The instrument was named EENDEED, for enhanced engagement nurtured by determination, efficacy, and exchange dimensions. It was grounded on three theories: (1) self-determination; (2) self-efficacy; and (3) social exchange. After generating the proposed scale grounded on the literature and theory, data were collected from 626 participants in the United States through an online survey. The dataset was split in two random samples of 405 and 195 cases respectively, after eliminating 26 cases with missing values. An exploratory factor analysis (EFA) on the larger sample helped discover its two-factor structure, namely PERFORMANCE and SELF-RELIANCE. A confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed on the second sample, which confirmed the two-factor structure of EENDEED. A final study assessed the reliability and validity of EENDEED. Data were collected through an online survey of 162 employees in the U.S. A CFA was conducted, validating the two-factor structure of the instrument. Construct reliability of the factors and reliability of the scale were ascertained. Face validity, content validity, construct validity, and criterion validity were confirmed. This study fills the gap in current engagement measurements by including the remote worker dimension. Organizations will be better able to identify and address challenges faced by traditional workplace employees and remote workers.

International Business Research, 2021

The purpose of this study was to investigate if confidence, interest, authenticity, and lonelines... more The purpose of this study was to investigate if confidence, interest, authenticity, and loneliness as independent variables, could help predict employee engagement, the dependent variable. In this setting, the independent variables were indicators of the Balanced Measure of Psychological Needs (BMPN) and the dependent variable was obtained using the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9). After surveying 151 participants in the United States, 17 responses were removed from the final dataset during data and assumptions validation. A multiple regression model was created using the remaining 134 valid cases. Our findings confirmed the existence of a statistically significant relationship between confidence, interest, and authenticity in predicting employee engagement. Only, we could not establish a statistically significant relationship between loneliness and engagement, in contrast to some prior research studies. These findings have significant implications for practitioners and resea...

Journal of Business Administration Research

Organizations in the 21st century deal with constant changes such as globalization, technological... more Organizations in the 21st century deal with constant changes such as globalization, technological evolutions, regulatory changes, competition, and other unexpected events, among others. These challenges can be viewed and addressed through the lenses of contemporary theories. This paper selected three contemporary theories namely chaos, complexity, and contingency theories, and presented their foundations and characteristics by comparing and contrasting their key concepts. These concepts include nonlinearity, feedback, bifurcation, strange attractors, fractals, and self-organization for chaos theory; nonlinearity, dynamism, feedback, self-organization, emergence, and adaptability for complexity theory; and adaptation, equifinality, effectiveness, and congruency for contingency theory. Examples of studies and organizational applications of these theories were provided, and implications for scholars and organizational leaders were discussed. By explaining notions such as how the capaci...

International Business Research

In analyzing complex products, this study selected the company Goldman Sachs and one of its produ... more In analyzing complex products, this study selected the company Goldman Sachs and one of its product offerings, the synthetic collateralized debt obligation (synthetic CDO). The study later analyzed the ethical implications of providing such a complex product to customers. A review of the literature indicates that researchers identified this product and other associated derivatives of the mortgage backed securities as the main causes of the 2008 financial crisis in the United States of America. As such, Goldman Sachs’ offering of the product posed ethical and moral issues. An analysis of the company and its offering was done under the lenses of various ethical theories such as Kohlberg's theory of moral reasoning, the Kantian ethics, the utilitarian perspective, Friedman’s shareholder theory, the stakeholder theory, the market approach to consumer protection, and the contract view of consumer protection. Besides Friedman’s shareholder theory, all other theories judged the product...

Journal of Business Administration Research

In today’s competitive environment, broadband companies innovate to stay competitive, retain exis... more In today’s competitive environment, broadband companies innovate to stay competitive, retain existing customers, and attract new customers. A recent innovative product in this industry is the deployment of the gigabit Internet service over fiber optic networks as a solution to the growing bandwidth demands from consumers. One determinant of the decision to deploy such product is the expectation of a positive return on investment (ROI) determined among others by the penetration or take rate of the product or service. Like any product, the adoption of the gigabit Internet is influenced by the reaction of customers to this innovation. Some customers are early adopters of the product while others might not be interested in higher bandwidth Internet connections or will simply adopt the product at a later time. The purpose of this paper was to identify a model that best predicts future trends in the uptake of the gigabit Internet product over fiber-to-the home (FTTH). To that effect, this...

Journal of Business Administration and Research, 2020

Organizations in the 21 st century deal with constant changes such as globalization, technologica... more Organizations in the 21 st century deal with constant changes such as globalization, technological evolutions, regulatory changes, competition, and other unexpected events, among others. These challenges can be viewed and addressed through the lenses of contemporary theories. This paper selected three contemporary theories namely chaos, complexity, and contingency theories, and presented their foundations and characteristics by comparing and contrasting their key concepts. These concepts include nonlinearity, feedback, bifurcation, strange attractors, fractals, and self-organization for chaos theory; nonlinearity, dynamism, feedback, self-organization, emergence, and adaptability for complexity theory; and adaptation, equifinality, effectiveness, and congruency for contingency theory. Examples of studies and organizational applications of these theories were provided, and implications for scholars and organizational leaders were discussed. By explaining notions such as how the capacity of a system could be greater than the sum of the capacities of its subunits, this paper can act as a starting point for anyone seeking to understand the three theories or use them for research or organizational purposes.

International Journal of Strategic Information Technology and Applications, 2015

Many customer satisfaction studies in the service industry use SERVQUAL, an instrument developed ... more Many customer satisfaction studies in the service industry use SERVQUAL, an instrument developed by Parasuraman, Zeithaml, and Berry (1998). Similarly, many studies on customer loyalty use the Net Promoter System™ (NPS®) developed by . Even though researchers acknowledge a relationship between satisfaction and loyalty, there is currently no empirical evidence demonstrating such relationship using SERVQUAL and NPS. In that regard, this study analyzed the antecedents of satisfaction measured by SERVQUAL that influence loyalty as measured by NPS in the context of the residential broadband service industry. To that effect, 208 broadband customers in the U.S. Midwest region were surveyed online. A confirmatory factor analysis confirmed the latent structure of collected data, validating the use of the five SERVQUAL factors as predictors. An ordinal logistic regression (OLR) model built on the collected data confirmed the existence of a statistically significant relationship between Empath...

Journal of Human Resource Management, 2020

This study explored social capital theory by investigating the relationship between enterprise so... more This study explored social capital theory by investigating the relationship between enterprise social media use (ESM) as measured by an adapted instrument and employee belongingness as measured by the balanced measure of psychological needs (BMPN) scale of employees in USA, moderated by generational age groups. A survey of 155 employees from US corporations was conducted. The results support the theoretical model of social capital as well as three hypothesized relationships. While there was no significant relation between Social-related ESM use and employee belongingness, there was a statistically significant relationship between Work-related ESM use, age generation groups, and employee belongingness. Overall, Generation-X employees showed a higher belongingness score compared to Millennials, and even higher compared to Generation-Z employees. The results indicate that using an internal social media technology for work-related purposes can help employees feel that they belong and are a part of the social makeup of the organization. Work related social media use can also foster greater organizational social capital such as team building resulting in the achievement of organizational objectives and goals. These findings offer implications for research on social capital's value as an asset for the organization as well as enterprise social media's ongoing and ever-increasing value.