Online employer review platforms (ERPs) enable employees to evaluate their current and former companies anonymously online. Job-seekers can use the aggregated reviews to obtain information about potentially attractive companies and thus limit the number of suitable companies. However, the matching process between job-seekers and companies can only be effective if the information provided on ERPs is representative and can be trusted. This paper investigates specific characteristics of ERPs using the two large ERPs Kununu and Glassdoor as examples. It is argued that the ERP environment is very different from the well-known and -studied reputation system environment of online marketplaces, and that specific factors can potentially bias reviews on ERPs. Based on a new data set containing the Kununu and Glassdoor reviews of 114 major German employers, it is analyzed if and how design aspects of ERPs and other specific factors affect reviews. Results show that overall (and industry-specific), average review scores on Kununu and Glassdoor differ significantly from each other. Further results indicate that factors such as employees’ awareness of their impact on a company’s reputation also affect reviews. Suggestions are made on how ERPs could reduce the influence of these factors in order to present the aggregated information more effectively.

This study explores how a chatbot can be used to support coachees to define and implement goals. It examines how the chatbot has to be designed to ensure that its coaching is successful. In this context anthropomorphism - the transmission of human qualities to non-human objects - should increase the acceptance of the chatbot and the perceived effectiveness of the coaching. While there are several studies on the perceived humanity of chatbots, no research has investigated the effects of anthropomorphic chatbots on the success of coaching. In an online experiment, participants (n = 44) performed randomised coaching with either a high or low anthropomorphic chatbot. Operationalizing a model of the effects of solution-focused individual coaching, the coachees were surveyed. The analysis shows that they were significantly more satisfied with the highly anthropomorphic chatbot, and rated the relationship building as well as the effectiveness of the coaching higher than by the less anthropomorphic chatbot. Therefore, the anthropomorphic representation of a chatbot in an online coaching session has a strong impact on its success.

Can board-level co-determination promote Good Work? Good Work can be characterised by fair income, job security, opportunities for personal development, low stress and misuse, and high-quality work equipment. Good Work is not easy to measure, in part since it has a subjective aspect. For this reason, the indicators used in this paper are derived from data on corporate and personnel structures that are supportive of Good Work. Supplementing the numerous studies that exist on the impact of works councils on Good Work, this paper highlights how board-level co-determination can also have a strong positive influence. The paper uses data from the co-determination index (Mitbestimmungsindex), a new and innovative indicator that measures the extent to which co-determination is institutionally embedded within firms. Three examples illustrate the impact of board-level co-determination on Good Work: first, on the linking of elements of Good Work with the remuneration of directors in a highly co-determined corporation; second, on the independence of the member of the management board responsible for the personnel department; and third, on the level of vocational training in the companies.

Family firms are known for having a strong culture and shared values, which arise from the ways in which family traditions and dynamics influence the business. Value congruence is known for having positive effects on employees’ affective commitment, which is strongly connected to organisational performance. Thus, one can assume that a strong family influence on a business entails strong congruency between employees’ and firms’ values. To explore this topic in more depth, the present paper employs theoretical strands from family business research and person-organisation-fit theory. To examine the relationship between family influence, value congruence and their effect on affective commitment, this study conducted an online survey among 15 family firms that were categorized according to their family influence. The paper compared firms with weak and strong family influence in terms of employees’ value congruence and their affective commitment, as well as considered potential influencing factors such as leadership, management stewardship, and tenure. Different methods were used to analyse the data. The findings indicate that family firms with a strong family influence have higher levels of perceived value congruence and affective commitment among employees.

Organizations implement high-commitment human resource management (HRM) systems to increase work engagement as they provide employees with a sense of being looked after in the workplace. This relationship is rarely considered alongside the responsibility of management to look after employees beyond the workplace too in return for hard work and loyalty, as represented by paternalistic values. This study, therefore, investigates the effect of high-commitment HRM systems on work engagement, mediated by employees perceiving the HRM system to be distinctive, consistent, and consensual (i.e., a strong system), and moderated by employee belief in paternalistic values. Based on an empirical study of 384 employees, high-commitment HRM is found to increase work engagement as hypothesized. However, HRM system strength does not mediate this relationship as expected and instead is associated with lower levels of work engagement. When testing for the moderating effect of employee belief in paternalistic values, when this is low, high HRM system strength leads to lower levels of work engagement. These findings imply that strong HRM systems may be perceived as intrusive, as paternalism may be, for employees with low belief in paternalistic values.

Empowerment as a management technique builds on the assumption that employees desire more power. Consequently, to a large extent, research on employee empowerment has focused on defining the type of power that should be contained in empowerment, identifying relevant mediating and moderating effects of and for empowerment as well as empowerment's boundary conditions such as individual and social attributes. However, less research has dealt with communicative and relational aspects and how these may impact the outcome of employee empowerment. This paper uses an interactional perspective to conceptually analyse communicative meanings entailed in employee empowerment. Building on sociological theories of communicative interaction, it is argued that focusing on leaders’ and members’ ascriptions of meanings to each other’s communicative messages reveals paternalistic power structures that are of relevance for the failure and success of empowerment. A communicative analysis of common structural and psychological empowerment efforts suggests that members’ sensemaking of their roles and situations, as defined by formal (written) and informal (psychological) contracts, may not necessarily be in line with the communicative meanings intended by leaders’ actions, and vice versa.