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You wouldn't know it from our current crook- er - commander-in-chief but it pays to be humble , new research is showing. It’s good to be humble when you’re the boss – as long as that’s what your employees expect, according to newswise.com. Researchers studying workplaces in China found that some real-life teams showed more creativity if the employees rated their bosses as showing more humility. “Whether leader humility is a good thing really depends on the team members’ expectations,” says  Jia (Jasmine) Hu , lead author of the study and associate professor of  management and human resources  at The Ohio State University’s  Fisher College of Business . Humble leaders are most effective when team members expect a low degree of distance between the leaders and followers, Hu explains. When there is "low power distance" (I assume, this means when the boss is humble), employees share power with their boss in a collaborative way. But humility may be seen as a we...

Have a master's when everyone else in your department has only a bachelor's?  Don't get too ahead of yourself.  Your possible  over-qualification  for the job could actually hurt you. According to newswise.com, it may cause you to feel "pyschological strain." If you’re an employee who perceives you’re over-qualified for your position, chances are you’re unsatisfied with your job, uncommitted to your organization and experience psychological strain, according to a study co-authored by a faculty member from  Florida Atlantic University’s (FAU) College of Business . Perceived over-qualification – the belief that one has surplus skills compared to job requirements – can have negative implications for employees and employers alike, says  Michael Harari , Ph.D., assistant professor in FAU’s  Department of Management Programs . Harari, together with fellow researchers analyzed perceived over-qualification, synthesizing 25 years of research to clar...

Who hasn't panicked when there's a new boss? Big duh but whenever there's a change at work , employees tend to feel stress and distrust and may even want to quit. According to newswise.com, almost one-third of U.S. workers are cynical about organizational changes and management's motives. At a time of change and uncertainty across the country, American adults who have been affected by change at work are more likely to report chronic work stress, less likely to trust their employer and more likely to say they plan to leave the organization within the next year compared with those who haven’t been affected by organizational change, according to a survey released by the American Psychological Association, as reported by the website. Half of American workers say they have been affected by organizational changes in the last year, are currently being affected by organizational changes or expect to be affected by organizational changes in the next year, according to  ...

Some days you're the manager.  Some days you're the employee.  And some days you just don't feel like coming in to work at all. Sound like you? A new study has found that struggling with those different identities at work may just affect your job performance. According to newswise.com, employees who believe their different identities enhance each other are more productive than others, the study found. But workers who feel their identities are in conflict see a hit to their performance.  “We tend to think of our work role identities one at a time, as if they were completely separate,” says Steffanie Wilk , co-author of the study and associate professor of management and human resources at The Ohio State University’s Fisher College of Business . “But this research shows that the interactions are important. The way we manage and think about our different roles could be affecting how well we do our jobs.” People are familiar with the concept of identity confli...

Now, that's a surprise.  One in four U.S. employees are negatively affected by political talk at work this election season. I've lost (or chosen to lose) two friends for the person they're supporting.  And I can see how discussing that at work could be harmful to my co-workers, and certainly, me (especially if my boss, as is likely, would disagree!).  Younger workers in particular experiencing diminished productivity, more stress, according to newswise.com. This year’s extraordinary presidential campaign is taking a toll on American workers, some of whom report feeling stressed, argumentative and less productive because of political discussions on the job, according to a survey released today by the American Psychological Association. More than 1 in 4 younger employees reported feeling stressed out because of political discussions at work, and more than twice as many men as women said political talk is making them less productive, according to the survey f...

The Stones.  Rihanna.  The Weekend.  Kevin Gates.  Even, Raffi, for those of you with kids! But what would your workplace be like if you heard music from one of these musicians or groups? A new study says teamwork would grow. According to newswise.com, music at work increases cooperation.   From casual acoustic melodies at the coffee shop to throbbing electronic beats at teen clothing outlets, music is used to mold customer experience and behavior.But what about employees? Cornell researchers have found that music can have important effects on the cooperative spirits of those exposed to it.  They looked for ways music affected employees working three to a team, then played the music. When happy, upbeat music was played – researchers chose the “Happy Days” theme song, “Brown Eyed Girl” by Van Morrison, “Yellow Submarine” by the Beatles and “Walking on Sunshine” by Katrina and the Waves – team members were more likely to contribute to the group...

I guess we can't totally blame Trump.  But incivility in the workplace is becoming an epidemic, according to a new study. As reported at newswise.com, condescending comments, put-downs, and sarcasm have become commonplace, and here, well, okay, I won't blame Trump. OK, so I'm making fun, but it turns out this is a serious concern because experiencing such rude behavior, well, makes us rude, too.  And then it just spreads. The study found that it reduces our own self-control and makes us respond in kind.  And now what kind of a workplace do you have? "People who are recipients of rudeness at work feel mentally fatigued, as a result, because uncivil behaviors are somewhat ambiguous and require employees to figure out whether there was any abusive intent," say the authors.   "This mental fatigue, in turn, leads people to act uncivil toward other workers.  In other words, they pay the incivility forward." While curt remarks and other forms of incivi...

Well, I'll be.  Researchers have found a link between how you parent -- and how you behave in the workplace. Now, I don't think that means, since you give your kids a time-out when they're misbehaving, that you make your employees sit in a corner and think about what they've done, when they don't do the job you want. But a new study finds that the boss-employee relationship is similar to parent-child relationships, according to newswise.com. And if you're an employee having trouble with our boss, there’s a chance that your parents might share some of the blame, claims Dr. Peter Harms, a University of Alabama researcher. “It seems cliché, but, once again, we end up blaming mom for everything in life,” says Harms while laughing. “It really is about both parents, but because mothers are typically the primary caregivers of the children, they usually have more influence on their children.” In studying manager-employee relationships in the workplace,...

I know I've been there.  Hired to flip burgers when I have a B.S. in journalism and have spent many years in (high-paying) corporate environments.  But overqualified employees are a boon to businesses.  Of course.  A new study found that, while overqualified  — the condition of employees who believe that their qualifications exceed the requirements of their jobs — has been widely considered harmful for organizations (which is why most companies shy away from such job applicants), it's quite the opposite. Researchers spent six months conducting interviews and studies of 11 information technology companies in China and discovered that, "when individual employees feel that they are not the only ‘big fish in the pond,’ and when overqualification becomes a norm rather than exception within the group, they tend to have more favorable reactions toward their own over-qualification status and perform better," newswise.com reports. A lot of words to say we'...

Amazon.  Google.  Family Dollar Stores Inc. New York Mutual Life Insurance Company. What do these companies have in common?  Not what you think.  They're companies with the least loyal employees, according to a story at smartplanet.com. The story adds that it's not just unhappy employees leaving.  Even at companies where employees have the longest tenure (20 years, Eastman Kodak Co.), 55% are not satisfied in their jobs. And what's leading the reason band-wagon?  You'll never believe it.  The economy.  “As the economy continues to improve, jobs will become more plentiful,” said Katie Bardaro, lead economist for PayScale, as reported at smartplanet.com. “This creates options for people with in-demand skills, and the chance that top performers will jump ship increases. In this environment, companies will need to evaluate what causes employees to leave and improve these areas, such as pay, work environment, vacation policies, etc., before loya...

In the days I did it, it was looked down upon.  I'm talking about job-hopping.  I grew bored easily and within a year or two, was always ready to move on.  In my 25 years of working, I've had seven jobs -- though five of them were within my first seven years. Today job-hopping is common, if not expected.  And a new article by The New York Times' Steve Lohr tells why the ability to now crunch "big data" is allowing companies to not only get into their customers' minds, but their employees', as well, which is turning out to be almost as important. Joe McKendrick reports at smartplanet.com that, as a result of Lohr's exploration, "some conventional wisdom about worker productivity is already being shattered." The first?  Job-hoppers make great employees.  "A study of 20,000 hourly workers finds 'virtually no distinction in tenure between applicants that had held no jobs in the last five years and applicants that had held many jobs...