DSpace at VNU: Antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery: cross-country evidence in Higher Education

DSpace at VNU: Antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery: cross-country evidence in Higher Education tài liệu, giáo á...

This article was downloaded by: [University of Oklahoma Libraries] On: 28 January 2015, At: 04:18 Publisher: Routledge Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK The International Journal of Human Resource Management Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rijh20 Antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery: cross-country evidence in Higher Education Hong T.M Bui a c a , Afam Ituma & Elena Antonacopoulou a Business School, Bournemouth University , Poole , UK b Business School, Liverpool University , Liverpool , UK b c Vietnam National University , Hanoi , Vietnam Published online: 04 Apr 2012 To cite this article: Hong T.M Bui , Afam Ituma & Elena Antonacopoulou (2013) Antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery: cross-country evidence in Higher Education, The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 24:1, 167-194, DOI: 10.1080/09585192.2012.669781 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2012.669781 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the “Content”) contained in the publications on our platform However, Taylor & Francis, our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content Any opinions and views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors, and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sources of information Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of the Content This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes Any substantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/page/termsand-conditions The International Journal of Human Resource Management, Vol 24, No 1, January 2013, 167–194 Antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery: cross-country evidence in Higher Education Hong T.M Buia,c*, Afam Itumaa and Elena Antonacopouloub Business School, Bournemouth University, Poole, UK; bBusiness School, Liverpool University, Liverpool, UK; cVietnam National University, Hanoi, Vietnam Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 a This paper contributes to our understanding of personal mastery by providing fresh insights from a cross-national study in Higher Education (HE) It presents findings from a rich sample of informants in two well-established universities in the UK and Vietnam, and develops a framework that illustrates the antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery in the two cultures The multi-level analysis performed provides valuable insights that extend our current understanding of personal mastery beyond the individual level as it is traditionally theorized Instead, we are able to show that a number of contextual conditions at the organizational, industry and the national culture that may also have a bearing on the way personal mastery is cultivated By contributing a richer account of the multifaceted nature of personal mastery, the paper draws attention to a range of implications for both future research and practice In particular, it invites practitioners in HE to apply the theories they develop in practice Keywords: Higher Education; organizational learning; personal mastery Introduction The aim of this paper is to examine the antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery In recent years, human resource development (thereafter HRD) has been the subject of considerable empirical and theoretical attention The literature in this area has highlighted the importance of HRD in generating and sustaining competitive advantage (Barney 1991; Grant 1996) A key aspect of HRD that has attracted substantial interest is the concept of personal mastery (Kristof-Brown and Stevens 2001; Garcia-Morales, Llorens-Montes and Verdu-Jover 2007) Although there is variety of definitions of personal mastery in the literature, a common threat is the way personal mastery is conceptualized by focusing on individual self-concepts of values, goals, personal and professional development (Senge 1990; Senge, Ross, Smith, Robert and Kleiner 1994; Garcia-Morales et al 2007) The importance of personal mastery for organizations has become crucial in the context of what has become known as the knowledge-based economy The knowledgebased economy is characterized by a rapid expansion of knowledge-intensive industries and by a marked increase in the importance of creating and exploiting knowledge and information in all sectors of the economy (Nonaka and Takeuchi 1995) Against this background, Senge argues that ‘organizations learn only through individuals who learn Individual learning does not guarantee organizational learning But without it no organizational learning occurs’ (1990, p 139) This suggests that personal mastery is *Corresponding author Email: hbui@bournemouth.ac.uk ISSN 0958-5192 print/ISSN 1466-4399 online q 2013 Taylor & Francis http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2012.669781 http://www.tandfonline.com Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 168 H.T.M Bui et al inextricably linked with organizational learning and innovation Such views have prompted scholars to call for greater understanding of the nature of personal mastery (Pham, Taylor and Seeman 2001; Garcia-Morales et al 2007) Despite an increasing recognition of the importance of personal mastery in the knowledge-based economy, scholarly research on personal mastery is still in its nascent stage In essence, the interest in this area has not been matched with equivalent empirical attention The sparse studies in this area have collected data from industries such as food farming, manufacturing, construction and services (Llorens-Montes, Garcia-Morales and Verdu-Jover 2004; Garcia-Morales et al 2007) To our knowledge, there has been no prior empirical study that has examined personal mastery within the Higher Education (thereafter HE) context The HE context is a particularly interesting, due to the sociopolitical forces that affect the common and distinct trends in different aspects of scholarly practice in HE institutions across different cultures Moreover, it should be noted that the HE sector invests both human and financial capital in research, and focuses on knowledge creation and dissemination that can be important aspects for understanding the complexities of personal mastery Furthermore, there is an increasing demand for HE globally, which has consequently contributed to academics becoming more mobile transcending across geographical borders for both teaching and research These issues are important as they fuel ongoing concerns about the impact of management education and research on management practice and call for a more careful examination of the core capabilities of practitioners in HE such that their scholarly practices can be better understood (Antonacopoulou 2009) The study reported in this paper aims to go some way to address these issues by developing a conceptual framework that integrates the antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery within the HE context The analysis in the paper develops and empirically substantiates the hypothesized relationships of the antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery within the HE context, by comparing a UK university and a Vietnamese university On the basis of the analysis of the findings, the paper contributes an empirically informed theoretical foundation to guide future research on personal mastery as a phenomenon In doing so, it extends our understanding of personal mastery beyond the individual forces that have hitherto been the focus of attention and, instead, reveals the much richer set of forces at the organizational level Given the focus on the HE sector and the considerations of the national culture, the analysis alludes to these additional forces that act as antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery and the merit further consideration There is a shortage of studies that compare the national context of HE, and we feel that as globalization continues to shape the character of HE, the need to understand the role of national culture becomes more critical This paper, therefore, examines personal mastery from an international comparative perspective using very similar samples from substantially different cultures: the UK, an individualistic western culture (Hofstede 1993, 2001), and Vietnam, an Eastern collectivist culture (Theˆm 1999; Vu’o’ng 2001) We are confident that this approach will provide a more _ comprehensive understanding of personal mastery and its role in scholarly practice in HE and beyond The remainder of this paper is organized as follows Firstly, a brief review of the literature is presented based on which appropriate hypotheses are developed Secondly, the research methods used in this study are discussed The third section presents and analyses the findings of the study The final section concludes with a discussion of the findings and a review of the implications for future research and scholarly practice in HE Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 The International Journal of Human Resource Management 169 Research background Personal mastery has attracted a growing interest in recent years in the management field, especially due to its association with learning capability In particular, this concept has been predominantly associated with organizational learning and the learning organization (Senge 2006; Garcia-Morales et al 2007) However, when examined more systematically we note that personal mastery appears in a number of sciences, and unsurprisingly has varied conceptualizations and a relatively loose theoretical foundation In behavioural development and education, it is understood as achievement-related behaviour from childhood to adolescence and adulthood (Berry and West 1993) According to Berry and West (1993), personal mastery is a special domain through which to understand cognitive self-efficacy Personal mastery, in medical and social behaviour, refers to ‘ the extent to which people see themselves as being in control of the forces that importantly affect their life’ (Pearlin, Menaghan, Lieberman and Mullan 1981, p 340) For the purposes of our analysis, we will retain the focus in the management field and will examine the concept of personal mastery as currently defined: ‘ the capacity to grow and learn on a personal level’ (Garcia-Morales et al 2007, p 547) Personal mastery enables people to explore deeper their personal vision, into what they truly desire, and focus all their efforts on developing their personal and professional skills and capacities (Senge 1990; Senge et al 1994) Common to these views is the notion that personal mastery is concerned with an internal locus of control, self-belief and ongoing personal and professional development Building on the broad conceptualization noted above, Senge (1990) notes that personal mastery is divided into different components, including personal vision, personal purpose, managing creative tension between vision and current reality (cognitive dissonance), obviating the impact of mental models that are contrary to personal mastery, commitment to truth and understanding of the subconscious He further argues that it is not a natural given, nor an end-state Instead, it is a developmental process that occurs along a continuum, and, as such, an individual can never fully achieve personal mastery It can be argued, however, that personal learning can also lead to specific outcomes (e.g new skills, self-efficacy, modified knowledge) as postulated in the current study However, Senge’s concept of personal mastery leaves several questions unaddressed (Bokeno 2009) that require further research on the topic Much of the work on personal mastery has focused on the West (particularly North America and Europe) and has highlighted the ways in which personal mastery affects a range of personal and organizational outcomes At an individual level, results from several western-based studies suggest that personal mastery enhances individual wellbeing and better physical health outcomes, including a lower incidence of coronary heart disease (Karasek, Baker, Marxer, Ahlbom and Theorell 1981), better self-rated health and functional status (Seeman and Seeman 1983), and a lower mortality risk (Seeman and Lewis 1995) It also moderates how a predictable versus unpredictable environment is perceived and negotiated (Aspinwall and Taylor 1997) From an organizational perspective, personal mastery has been found to lead to a higher probability of innovation and learning for organizations (Garcia-Morales et al 2007) From a slightly different perspective, Pearlin et al (1981) argue that elevated economic strains are closely associated with the decline of mastery, and the worsening of mastery is related to an increase in depression Other work, however, argues that personal mastery can also lead to negative outcomes For example, the work of Rodin (1986) and Thompson, Cheek and Graham (1988) suggests that, under some circumstance, higher beliefs in personal mastery can be associated with poorer health outcomes Some authors (e.g Senge 2006) have also noted that organizations 170 H.T.M Bui et al Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 resist encouraging personal mastery because of cynicism, and a fear that personal mastery will threaten the established order of a well-managed organization Our review of the personal mastery literature reveals that two key limitations are evident Firstly, despite widespread scholarly and applied interest, understanding of personal mastery as a key aspect of learning capability remains narrowly bounded and work in this area is fragmented As such, there is a crucial need for an integrative framework that links the antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery Secondly, there is a paucity of studies that have examined personal mastery across units and levels of analysis; hence, there is scope to understand the role of context – organizational, sectors, national culture and its bearing on the development of personal mastery This study sets out to address these concerns A conceptual model of the antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery in the HE sector This study develops an integrative model of personal mastery by testing some hypotheses about the antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery that is schematically presented in Figure Acknowledging that there are many concepts potentially influencing personal mastery, we selected seven concepts for the antecedents and five concepts for the outcomes that have attracted substantial theoretical and empirical analyses in the literature Hence, personal mastery is hypothesized to be influenced by a set of antecedents such as competence, personal values, personal vision, motivation, individual learning, training and development, and organizational culture Consistent with the work of Bui and Baruch (2010), the model also hypothesizes that personal mastery can lead to high individual performance, self-efficacy and work– life balance This model has been examined in HE in the UK and Vietnam Thus, we include organizational and sectoral characteristics, as well as ANTECEDENTS OUTCOMES Development & training Administration performance Personal vision Teaching performance Competence PERSONAL MASTERY Individual learning Research performance Self-efficacy Motivation Personal values Work-life balance Org culture Figure Hypothesized model of antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 The International Journal of Human Resource Management 171 the national culture as moderating factors on the antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery, to acknowledge the potential influence of context As indicated in Figure 1, our model brings together in a systematic way the individual, organizational and societal level of analysis This approach is consistent with previous studies of learning practices that adopt a multilevel approach (see Antonacopoulou 2006) to representing the dynamic complexities of learning capability development We integrate various points from the literature about the aspects of personal mastery in a model that guide the development of a set of hypotheses we subsequently tested In the following section, we discuss the components of the model and the relationships between the various aspects of personal mastery The various aspects of personal mastery selected for further examination are variables that have attracted attention in the literature in their own right The intention is to provide an informed understanding of the chosen variables as antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery Antecedents of personal mastery Organizational culture Organizational culture describes the fundamental assumptions of an organization’s values, beliefs, norms, symbols, language, rituals and myths that give meaning to organizational members and are expected to guide people’s behaviour (Tyler and Gnyawali 2009) An organizational culture that is open, trustworthy, collective and empowering, and that supports learning is a lever for personal mastery (Watkins and Marsick 1993; Senge 1996) The personal mastery process cannot begin until the organizational culture issues are understood (McKenna 1992) Research has shown that organizational culture in HE has entered ‘ a decline in which it will lose some of the vitality it has enjoyed among academics and even be discredited by practical people for failing ‘to deliver the good’ (Bate 1990, p 83) Cultural archetypes and unique institutional cultures should also be taken into consideration when dealing with culture-related factors (Kezar and Eckel 2002) Organizational culture is highly influenced by the societal culture in which it is embedded (Dimmock and Walker 2000; Hofstede 2001) No direct comparison between the UK and Vietnamese culture has been found in the comparative management literature The UK, however, is highly scored as individualistic (Hofstede 1993, 2001; House, Hanges, Javidan, Dorfman and Gupta 2004), while Vietnam is seen as a collectivist culture (Theˆm 1999; Grinter 2006) In this study, we employ House et al.’s (2004) cultural dimension scores for the Anglo societal cluster to refer to the UK’s cultural dimensions and Confucian Asia cluster to Vietnam’s Vietnam is geographically close to China and has had cultural interactions with China for thousands of years through the Chinese invasions throughout Vietnam’s 4000-year history Therefore, we argue that Vietnam should be included in the Confucian Asia cluster, in which the institutional collectivism score is higher than that of the Anglos societal cluster (House et al 2004) The two universities that are under examination in this study are both well established in their own context The British university has a strong international reputation for research excellence Although the Vietnamese university is one of the biggest HE institutions in the country, it operates in a weak competitive market compared to its UK counterpart It is under a transition process from teaching to research orientation From a very close relation between organizational culture and societal culture, we hypothesize that: Hypothesis 1a: Organizational culture is positively associated with personal mastery, and that the relationship is stronger within the UK university than within its Vietnamese counterpart Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 172 H.T.M Bui et al Competence Although personal mastery goes beyond competence, it is grounded in competence (Senge 1990; Senge et al 1994) The term competence has multiple definitions (LeDeist and Winterton 2005) Within the context of the current study, competence is viewed as capability exercised in acting successfully in a job or a situation (Gherardi 2000) Competences, including emotional intelligence, interpersonal skills and systems thinking actively, contribute to personal mastery (Marquardt 1996) and modified knowledge Competence also receives attention through various developmental forms in HE around the world (Weigel, Mulder and Collins 2007) In HE, the UK was the first to introduce occupational standards, based on five levels of competence (Weigel et al 2007) No evidence of competence among HE employees in Vietnam has been found There is, however, a significant gap between employees’ competence and the demands of businesses in Vietnam (Nguyen, Truong and Dirk 2011) Thus, we hypothesize that: Hypothesis 1b: Competence is positively associated with personal mastery, and that the relationship is stronger among the UK employees than among their Vietnamese counterparts Personal values Personal values are defined as a relatively permanent perceptual framework that shapes and influences the general nature of an individual’s behaviour (England 1967) Personal values have been studied for a long time (Feather 1975; Kahle 1983) Kahle (1983) suggested a list of positive personal values such as internal individual values (e.g selfrespect and self-fulfillment), external values (e.g security and a sense of belonging) and internal interpersonal values (e.g warm relationships with others, fun and enjoyment of life) These values are an important component of personal mastery (Bui and Baruch 2010) The impact of personal values is thought to be of special relevance in educational systems Educators are regarded as moral guides and exemplars, whose standards are perhaps ‘ a little above the level of the rest of society’ (Haydon 1997, p 5) Robertson (1991) stresses that employees bring their values into the work setting Personal values seem to relate to in-group collectivism, defined by House et al (2004), as the degree to which individuals express pride, loyalty and cohesiveness in their organizations or families In House et al.’s (2004) study, the Confucian Asians in-group collectivism scores higher than the Anglos Therefore, we hypothesize that: Hypothesis 1c: Personal values are positively associated with personal mastery, and that the relationship is stronger among the Vietnamese employees than among their UK counterparts Motivation Motivation has been studied to explain why humans are inspired to certain things (Deci 1975; Siebold 1994; Kanfer and Ackerman 2000) An individual with high personal mastery would be self-motivated (Ng 2004) In addition, with sufficient motivation inspired by the organizational culture, employees may be willing to commit themselves to personal and professional development, which would result in better individual performance and higher individual satisfaction (Mumford 1991) Research has also been carried out on motivation in educational settings (Vallerand, Pelletier, Blais and Briere 1992; Osteraker 1999; Pintrich and Schunk 2002) In general, with sufficient motivation, staff might be willing to commit themselves to personal and professional development, which results in better individual The International Journal of Human Resource Management 173 performance and more individual happiness In relation to national culture, House et al (2004) highlight the importance of individuals’ interests and needs for understanding goalrelated behaviour in relation to employee motivation in individualist cultures rather than collectivist cultures Therefore, we hypothesize that: Hypothesis 1d: Motivation is positively associated with personal mastery, and that the relationship is stronger among UK employees than among their Vietnamese counterparts Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 Individual learning Individuals are the primary learning entities enabling organization transformation (Dodgson 1993, p 377) Individual learning can promote personal mastery (Gong, Huang and Farh 2009) In other words, personal mastery implies an individual taking ownership of individual learning (Damanpour 1991) Continuous learning and/or lifelong learning is part of a commitment to personal mastery (Davies 1998) and to organizational change (London and Smither 1999) Academic scholars are highly qualified in terms of formal education; however, much of their post-degree learning is informal (Knight, Tait and Yorke 2006), and may occur via conferences, working with PhD students, self-learning, learning at work and learning through peers (Baruch and Hall 2004) Individual learning is found to be inconsistent in its implementation in the West (Rolling-Magnusson 2001) Culture may also have an impact, as individual learning is underpractised in Far Eastern academic institutions (Xiaozhou 2001) Also, based on the development of HE in the UK in comparison to Vietnam, we hypothesize that: Hypothesis 1e: Individual learning is positively associated with personal mastery, and that the relationship is stronger among the UK HE employees than among their Vietnamese counterparts Personal vision Personal mastery cannot be built without personal goals and vision (Senge 1990) Personal vision is the groundwork for continually expanding personal mastery (Senge 1990) For those with a high level of personal mastery, a vision is a calling, not just a good idea, and behind their goals is a sense of purpose (Appelbaum and Goransson 1997) The difficulty, according to Senge (1990), is that people often confuse goals and vision Vision is developed on the basis of goals (Senge et al 1994) Personal vision relies not only on individuals, but also on the support of their employing organizations There is an increased confidence in the staff’s personal vision when universities develop as learning organizations (Wheeler 2002) If people have the right personal values, are motivated to work in HE and committed to lifelong learning, they are also more likely to develop a personal vision (Senge et al 1994) In relation to cultural dimensions, the Confucian Asia’s future orientation scores as high as the Anglo’s If, however, we take academic mobility into consideration as an indicator of personal vision for HE employees, we can see that the UK employees are more likely to adapt to constant changes caused by society, organizations and/or their academic mobility motives We therefore hypothesize that: Hypothesis 1f: Personal vision is positively associated with personal mastery, and that the relationship is stronger among the UK employees than among their Vietnamese counterparts Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 174 H.T.M Bui et al Training and development Training and development (thereafter T&D) is believed to be important for employees’ personal mastery (Senge et al 1994) Research also shows the effect of T&D on personal mastery (Blackman and Henderson 2005) Professional development will benefit from T&D when these balance personal and organizational priorities (Antonacopoulou 2000) The universities can support staff through various T&D programmes If T&D is carried out effectively, staff will gain the most benefit from their professional development (Blackmore and Castley 2005) In a study, Minarik, Thorton and Perreault (2003) find that the rate at which teachers leave their jobs far exceeds the erosion rate in private industry They argue that one of the main reasons for this erosion is a lack of professional development In countries, such as the UK, HE makes T&D a top priority (Dalin 1998) T&D in HE in Vietnam does not appear in the literature, but in other sectors in Vietnam it remains insufficient (Nguyen et al 2011) Thus, we hypothesize that: Hypothesis 1g: Development and training is positively associated with personal mastery, and that the relationship is stronger among the UK employees than among their Vietnamese counterparts Outcomes of personal mastery On the basis of the five antecedents of personal mastery, we argue that there are three key outcomes of personal mastery in the HE context These are personal performance, selfefficacy and work –life balance Personal performance Previous research suggests that personal mastery influences performance (Nonaka and Takeuchi 1995; Glynn 1996) Garcia-Morales et al (2007) investigate several influences on performance in large, medium and small enterprises, and find that personal mastery has a positive and direct impact on individual and organizational performance According to House et al.’s (2004) study, the Anglo performance orientation score is as high as that of Confucian Asia Looking at the performance in the HE world, however, the UK employees’ performance exceeds that of their Vietnamese counterparts We therefore hypothesize that: Hypothesis 2a: Personal mastery is positively associated with personal performance, and that the relationship is stronger among the UK employees than among their Vietnamese counterparts Self-efficacy Self-efficacy refers to the ‘ conviction that one can successfully execute the behaviour required to produce outcomes’ (Bandura 1977, p 191) It is an individual difference that refers to a person’s perception of his or her own level of mastery within a limited task domain (Chowdhury 1993) Self-efficacy is strengthened through personal mastery (Bandura 1982) As self-efficacy has been more intensively researched in the Anglo cultures than in the Confucian Asia cultures, we argue that employees in the UK have a higher level of self-efficacy than their counterparts in Vietnam Consequently, we hypothesize that: The International Journal of Human Resource Management Hypothesis 2b: 175 Personal mastery is positively associated with self-efficacy, and that the relationship is stronger among the UK employees than among their Vietnamese counterparts Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 Work – life balance Personal mastery starts with the clarified understanding of what are the important things in people’s lives and how they lead their lives in the service of these aspirations (Senge 2006) Personal mastery facilitates the belief that people’s professional, personal, social and spiritual lives should not be in conflict, but can be integrated into a consistent, wellrounded, peacefully coexistent whole This has been demonstrated in empirical research (Ozbilgin and Healy 2004; Doherty and Manfredi 2006) In addition, based on House et al.’s (2004) findings that collectivistic societies have a slower space of life, lower heart attack rates and lower divorce rates than individualistic societies, we hypothesize that: Hypothesis 2c: Personal mastery is positively associated with work –life balance, and that the relationship is stronger among the Vietnamese employees than among their UK counterparts In combination with the sets of Hypotheses and 2, the following hypotheses will also be tested Hypothesis 3a: Hypothesis 3b: Hypothesis 3c: Personal mastery mediates the relationship between its antecedents and individual performance Personal mastery mediates the relationship between its antecedents and self-efficacy Personal mastery mediates the relationship between its antecedents and work –life balance Research methods Data collection and sampling Two universities in the UK and Vietnam were chosen to collect data for several reasons First, these two universities were well established in each own country’s HE context Second, they both had strong reputation in science and technology Third, they had a similar structure of schools and size of employees Those similarities could produce meaningful international comparisons Stratified random sampling was used to ensure representativeness (Wiersma and Jurs 2005), and to decrease bias in the data as it eliminates subjectivity in choosing a sample (Fink 1995, p 10) First, a number of schools/departments were selected at random within the UK university, including school of environment and earth science, school of computing and technology, school of maths, school of business, school education, school of language and literature, school of history, and registry office (including managing board, administrators and assisted staff) After that questionnaires were sent to academic and non-academic staff of all levels in those schools The equivalent schools/departments were selected in the Vietnamese university Participation in the research is voluntary and confidential The survey was presented in English and Vietnamese, with a combination of three translation techniques (back-translation, committee approach and pre-test procedures) being used to ensure accuracy and appropriateness (Brislin 1976; Sperber, Devellis and SD N 80 307 0.141* 0.071 0.024 0.048 5.76 0.93 685 0.152* 4.49 1.24 677 0.094 13 Note: Alpha coefficients are presented on the diagonal: *p , 0.05 (two-tailed); **p , 0.01 (two-tailed); Crobach alpha values are in parentheses 0.142* 0.129** 0.539** 0.418** 0.271** 0.314** 0.398** 0.520** 0.206** 0.278** 0.438** (0.69) 12 4.73 1.19 686 0.170* 11 0.068 0.137** 0.278** 0.207** 0.298** 0.266** 0.170** (0.72) 0.213** 0.182** 0.588** 0.650** 0.411** 0.426** 0.125** 0.236** (0.81) 0.005 0.440** 0.407** 0.256** 0.366** 0.564** 0.468** 0.207** 0.282** (0.83) 10 6.11 0.74 685 0.164* 0.212** 5.53 0.98 685 0.287** 0.287** 5.15 1.20 685 0.118 0.034 0.416** 0.571** 0.420** 0.547** (0.76) 0.565** 0.266** 0.108** 0.187** 0.366** (0.90) 0.177** 0.389** (0.83) 0.172** 0.166** 0.511** (0.85) 0.002 0.320** 0.565** 0.376** (0.86) 0.217** 0.243** 0.046 0.100* (0.78) 5.67 1.07 685 0.181** 5.82 0.95 685 0.268** 5.98 0.95 685 0.162* 0.019 4.73 1.37 687 0.075 3.68 2.03 410 5.43 4.79 1.26 219 M Descriptive statistics and Pearson correlational matrix Administration performance Teaching performance Research performance Development and training Personal vision Competence Individual learning Motivation Organizational culture 10 Personal values 11 Self-efficacy 12 Work – life balance 13 Personal mastery Table Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 180 H.T.M Bui et al The International Journal of Human Resource Management 181 Table Prediction of personal mastery Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 UK university Qualifications Tenure Job’s roles Development and training Personal vision Competence Individual learning Motivation Organizational culture Personal values Model F R2 R 2change Fchange Durbin-Watson Vietnam university Both universities Model Model Model Model Model Model 2 0.096** 0.147* 0.058* 0.049 0.215** 0.040 0.203** 0.002 0.028 0.011 20.012 0.054 20.006 0.202** 20.042 0.147** 20.006 0.024 0.161** 0.001 0.240** 0.206** 0.132* 0.070 0.158** 0.324** 4.834** 0.42 0.113 21.233** 0.395 0.353 27.120** 2.013 0.146** 0.098* 0.020 0.038 0.229** 20.070 0.229** 20.045 0.008 0.233** 0.158 0.002 0.344** 20.133** 0.397 0.395 28.651** 2.014 6.061** 0.027 0.103* 50.694** 0.441 0.414 67.946** 1.985 Note: Results are unstandardized regression coefficients, N ¼ 341 for Vietnam, N ¼ 346 for the UK, N ¼ 687 for both countries *p , 0.05; **p , 0.01 The predictions of the proposed outcomes of personal mastery are shown in Tables – The three control variables are entered into Model 1, and the respective independent variables are entered into Model In this study, there are three different types of individual performance, namely administration performance for non-academic employees, teaching performance for those who have teaching roles, and research performance for academic employees who research and publications The coefficient of administration performance is non-significant in the aggregate sample (0.136) with non-significant increases in R (0.016) and non-significant Fchange (3.367) The coefficient of administration performance is non-significant among the UK employees Interestingly, it is quite significant among the Vietnamese counterparts (0.383*) with an increase in R (0.091) The coefficient of administration performance is quite significant in the aggregate sample (0.086*) It is negative but non-significant among the UK employees (2 0.008) It is, again, significant among the Vietnamese counterparts (0.215**) with an increase in R (0.091) The coefficient of research performance is quite significant in the aggregate sample (0.156*) It is quite significant in both sub-samples and higher among the UK employees (0.288*) than their Vietnamese counterparts (0.254*) Therefore, Hypothesis 2a is partially supported The coefficient of self-efficacy is significant in the aggregate sample (0.221**) with quite significant increases in R (0.072) and significant Fchange (52.238**) The coefficient of self-efficacy is significant among the UK employees (0.165**) It is, however, even higher among the Vietnamese counterparts (0.349**) Thus, Hypothesis 2b is partially supported The coefficient of work – life balance is significant in the aggregate sample (0.440**) with significant increases in R (0.186) and significant Fchange (153.397**) The coefficient of work –life balance is significant among the UK employees (0.369**) with significant 5.614** 0.097 0.016 3.676 2.028 6.181** 0.081 217 0.002 0.318** 0.048 0.136 0.021 0.334** 0.059 * 3.523* 0.046 0.015 4.646* 1.839 p , 0.01 ** Model 20.005 0.110* 0.028 0.086* 304 3.111* 0.031 0.002 0.118* 0.034 Model Teaching performance Note: Results are unstandardized regression coefficients, N ¼ 687 p , 0.05; Qualifications Tenure Job’s roles Personal mastery Model F R2 R 2change Fchange DurbinWatson N Model Model Administration performance Table Predictions of the outcomes in both universities 406 34.021** 0.207 26.738** 0.215 0.008 4.085* 1.964 0.420 0.605** 0.157** 0.156* ** ** 20.410 0.636** 0.160** Model Model Research performance 4.250* 0.019 0.071 0.015 0.015 16.494** 0.91 0.072 52.238** 1.894 ** Model 2 0.063 0.017 0.016 0.221** 684 ** Model Self-efficacy Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 3.638* 0.016 0.055* 0.045 0.011 Model 684 41.707** 0.202 0.186 153.397** 1.870 0.039 0.019 0.007 0.440** Model Work– life balance 182 H.T.M Bui et al 20.034 0.317** 20.050 0.143 5.09** 4.51** 0.104 0.122 0.018 2.667 2.131 137 0.050 0.346** 0.068 Model 0.836 0.020 0.014 0.123 20.049 p , 0.01 ** 0.014 0.124 0.047 0.008 0.625 0.020 0.012 2.108 Model 128 Model Teaching performance Note: Results are unstandardized regression coefficients, for the UK *p , 0.05; Qualifications Tenure Job’s roles Personal mastery Model F R2 R 2change Fchange Durbin-Watson N Model Administration performance Table Predictions of the outcomes in the UK university Model 2 0.522** 0.639** 0.047 0.288* 16.159** 13.967** 0.202 0.226 0.025 6.103* 2.113 197 20.538** 0.679** 0.071 Model Research performance Model 2 0.092** 0.060 0.030 0.165** ** 7.109 9.265** 0.059 0.099 0.040 14.863** 1.883 346 0.107** 0.084 0.039 Model Self-efficacy Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 Model 20.061 20.106 0.023 0.369** 2.436 13.702** 0.021 0.140 0.119 46.514** 1.873 345 0.095* 0.051 0.044 Model Work – life balance The International Journal of Human Resource Management 183 2.744* 0.098 80 0.134 0.290 0.083 0.383* 4.357* 0.189 0.091 8.395* 2.080 20.121 0.302 20.080 Model 20.012 0.119 0.084* 0.215** 4.387* 8.182** 0.073 0.164 0.091 18.222** 1.531 176 20.016 0.116 0.086* Model Teaching performance Note: Results are unstandardized regression coefficients, for Vietnam *p , 0.05; **p , 0.01 Qualifications Tenure Job’s roles Personal mastery Model F R2 R 2change Fchange Durbin – Watson N Model Model Administration performance Table Predictions of the outcomes in the Vietnam university Model 2 0.304** 0.621** 0.159* 0.254* 17.518** 14.522** 0.212 0.230 0.018 4.570* 1.868 209 0.314** 0.637** 0.178* Model Research performance Model 20.034 20.072 0.001 0.349** 0.529 12.096** 0.005 0.132 0.127 46.568** 1.912 338 0.034 0.061 0.006 Model Self-efficacy Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 Model 2 0.031 0.074 0.015 0.453** 1.277 18.202** 0.012 0.186 0.174 68.169** 1.920 339 0.031 0.086 0.012 Model Work– life balance 184 H.T.M Bui et al Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 The International Journal of Human Resource Management 185 increases in R (0.119) It is, again, even higher among the Vietnamese counterparts (0.453**) with significant increases in R (0.174) Thus, Hypothesis 2c is partially supported Table presents the regression results for the set of Hypotheses 3, the mediating role of personal mastery with the antecedents and outcomes in both universities The three control variables are entered into Model 1, the respective independent variables are entered into Model and personal mastery is entered into Model Table shows significant reductions in R 2, significant Fchange and coefficients in the respective regressions All the coefficients of the antecedents show a reduction from Model 2s to Model 3s The coefficient values of personal mastery reduce to non-significant with the outcomes of teaching performance and self-efficacy They show that personal mastery fully mediates the relationships between its antecedents and teaching performance, and self-efficacy With the prediction of work –life balance, the coefficient value of personal mastery reduces from 0.440** to 0.122*, showing that personal mastery partially mediates the relationship between its antecedents and work– life balance Hypotheses 3b, 3c and part of Hypothesis 3a are supported With the prediction research performance, the coefficient value of personal mastery increases from 0.156* to 0.213*, showing that personal mastery does not mediate the relationship between its antecedents and research performance, i.e part of Hypothesis 3a is rejected Analysis of findings The study reported in this paper set out to explore the antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery within the HE context comparing a UK and a Vietnamese university The analysis of the data collected reveals eight important insights that we discuss in turn Individual learning The relevant literature suggests that active individual learning is one of the key factors that make professional development effective (Knight et al 2006) Unlike what has been argued and found in research about the relationship between individual learning and personal mastery so far (Dodgson 1993; Gong et al 2009), this research finds that individual learning is not positively associated with personal mastery One of the reasons might be that the level of individual learning among employees in HE exceeds the level of personal mastery In addition, the majority of HE employees are well qualified and committed to lifelong learning Personal mastery, however, depends not only on individual factors, but also on organizational factors such as T&D and organizational culture (Senge et al 1994) Personal values Personal values are not significantly associated with personal mastery in the UK sample, but they are in the Vietnamese one One reason may be that in a collectivistic culture like Vietnam, people value self-respect and warm relationships with others perhaps more than their counterparts in the UK That said, a general observation is that informants across both cultures appreciate security, self-fulfilment and a sense of accomplishment Personal vision and motivation Personal vision and motivation not have an impact on personal mastery in the Vietnam sample A traditional view of working in HE mainly sees jobs in HE as stable, respectful 2.392** 0.118 0.003 0.814 1.972 2.634** 0.116 0.082 5.292** 15.607** 0.248 0.040 4.030** p , 0.01 ** 33.578** 0.208 0.150 0.092 20.034 0.311* 0.621 0.165** 20.163* 20.356** ** 0.630 0.163** Model 20.412** ** 14.494** 0.257 0.009 4.457* 1.955 0.132 0.213* 0.069 20.103 0.275* 0.580 0.157** –0.214* 20.364** ** Model Research performance Model Note: Results are unstandardized regression coefficients *p , 0.05; 2.064* 0.034 0.110 20.010 0.124* 0.004 0.188* 0.046 0.041 0.038 0.194** 0.007 0.134* 0.037 20.041 0.008 0.138* 0.032 20.031 20.003 0.120* 0.039 Model Model Model Teaching performance Mediating effect of personal mastery Qualifications Tenure Job’s roles Development and training Personal vision Competence Organizational culture Personal values Personal mastery Model F R2 R 2change Fchange DurbinWatson Table 3.992* 0.018 20.069 0.021 0.017 ** Model 0.472** 20.027 0.476** 20.015 84.988** 0.513 0.495 131.19** 75.781** 0.514 0.001 1.547 1.943 0.063 0.037 0.301** 0.307** 0.067 20.033* 20.024 0.018 20.027 Model 20.034* 20.018 0.018 20.018 Model Self-efficacy Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 3.800* 0.017 20.056* 0.054 20.010 Model 40.496** 0.335 0.317 61.452** 0.121* 0.109* 0.292** 0.189** 20.033 0.068 20.008 0.155** Model 37.304** 0.343 0.008 37.304** 1.887 0.108 0.122* 0.095* 0.255** 0.169** 20.030 0.049 20.007 0.125** Model Work–life balance 186 H.T.M Bui et al The International Journal of Human Resource Management 187 and undemanding This view seems to remain unchanged, hence requiring no strong personal vision for pursuing a career in HE at all This also explains why motivation is not strongly associated with personal mastery in the Vietnamese university Because of a lack of personal vision regarding career, informants are not intrinsically motivated enough for professional development The picture is different in the UK where HE employees are intrinsically and intentionally highly motivated at work, which other studies also find to be no least motivated by the fast-changing HE context stimulating innovations in scholarly practices (Marginson 2006) Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 Competence, T&D and organizational culture Competence, T&D and organizational culture are essential antecedents of personal mastery (McAuley 1994; Garet, Porter, Desimone, Birman and Yoon 2001; Knight et al 2006) This finding shows the importance of organizational factors’ impact on personal mastery The concept of personal mastery has gone beyond the individual boundary since Senge developed it as ‘personal growth and learning’ (1990, p 141) Personal mastery develops from the combination of personal attributes such as personal vision and competence, and organizational characteristics such as organizational culture and T&D Administrative performance Administrative performance is one of the outcomes of personal mastery in the case of Vietnam, but not in the case of the UK The results show, however, that in the UK the longer administrative staff worked for the university, the better they perform, which is not the case in Vietnam This finding emphasizes the importance of personal and professional development in improving performance, especially in Vietnamese HE Teaching performance Teaching performance is also one of the outcomes of personal mastery in the case of Vietnam, but not in case of the UK In Vietnam, those who are senior lecturers and professors seem to teach better than lecturers and academic managers This is obvious as lecturers, who are often new in academia, not have much teaching experience Academic managers in the Vietnamese university would also have teaching as well as managerial responsibilities It appears that their workload hardly allows them to invest sufficient time in teaching In the case of the UK university, teaching performance is not associated with personal mastery This poses a question of why personal mastery is not associated with teaching performance among UK academics that merits further empirical investigation Research performance Research performance is another outcome of personal mastery in both the UK and Vietnam universities The results in both countries also show that the higher qualifications of the academics, the better their research performance; and the longer they work for the university, the better they perform in terms of research Particularly in the case of Vietnam, professors and researchers perform research better than lecturers and senior lecturers This is due to the way universities in Vietnam operate, researchers are there exclusively and limited to performing research practices and would not engage in other scholarly practices (e.g teaching, administration) It is slightly different in the case of the UK university when 188 H.T.M Bui et al researchers might have less research input than professors and senior lecturers as they are often in the early stage of their academic career Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 Self-efficacy and work –life balance Self-efficacy and work–life balance are the outcomes of personal mastery in both universities This finding once again finds support in previous studies (Ozbilgin and Healy 2004; Baruch, Bell and Gray 2005) that also show that pursuing personal mastery through higher level of education is good for individuals Higher qualifications significantly impact employees’ selfefficacy in the UK The situation is different in Vietnam where a PhD was not required to be a lecturer in many schools At the time of the data collection, more than half of the Vietnamese academic staff did not have a PhD In contrast, the majority of academics in the university in the UK had PhDs This study shows a strong positive link between personal mastery and work–life balance Taken together, the results lend a significant empirical support to the conceptual framework of personal mastery in the HE context, i.e personal vision, competence, values, motivation, organizational culture and T&D tend to be positively related to personal mastery, whilst personal mastery is likely to lead to higher individual performance in teaching and research, higher level of self-efficacy and better work– life balance The findings also show that unlike what has been stated by Damanpour (1991) and Gong et al (2009), individual learning is not always positively related with personal mastery In addition, personal mastery though tends to lead to higher individual performance, it also depends on the type of performance For example, personal mastery is more likely to be positively associated with academic performance than administration performance Comparing the two universities, the findings lend support to a stronger relationship between organizational culture and personal mastery, motivation and personal mastery, personal vision and personal mastery within the UK university than its Vietnamese counterparts, and a stronger relationship between personal values and personal mastery, personal mastery and work–life balance among the Vietnamese employees than its UK counterparts The relationship between T&D and personal mastery is pretty similar within two universities, indicating no differences in the two cases for this relationship However, the results show surprisingly stronger relationships between competence and personal mastery, personal mastery and self-efficacy among the Vietnamese employees The explanation of these stronger relationships among the Vietnamese employees than their UK counterparts lies in the finding of the relationship between organizational culture and personal mastery This relationship was stronger in the UK university than that in the Vietnamese university, indicating a more important role for organizations as well as organizational culture in its employees’ personal mastery In the case of the Vietnamese university, personal mastery, therefore, relies more on individuals rather than the organization Consequently, the Vietnamese employees evaluated the relationships of competence with personal mastery, and personal mastery with self-efficacy higher than their UK counterparts Discussion Returning to our model in Figure 1, the findings of our study show that personal mastery plays a mediating role in the relationships between the antecedents and research performance, and between the antecedents and self-efficacy It is very significant in the relationship between the antecedents and teaching performance It does not, however, really have any important role in the relationship between the antecedents and work – life balance What we now know given these insights, that we did not know before, is that Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 The International Journal of Human Resource Management 189 developing personal mastery would be beneficial for both the organization and its employees, as personal mastery is positively associated with performance We would argue that this alignment between organizational and employee benefits in relation to performance is also explained through a more engaged approach to performing work due to the positive relationship between personal mastery work – life balance It could be argued, therefore, that personal mastery could be an integral aspect of HRM strategy, especially if the focus is on enhancing employee engagement (Townsend and Gebhardt 2008) On this basis, if one adopts an organizational-level perspective, it is not surprising that investment in personal mastery may be conceived of as a win-win HR strategy aligning organizational and individual development needs On closer examination we note that qualifications play an important role in research performance and self-efficacy, but not in administration performance, teaching performance or work– life balance The higher the qualifications of employees, the better research they perform and the higher level of self-efficacy they are in That shows in the tendency of HE recruiting PhD-qualified academics Moreover, the length of employees’ tenure has a positive impact on the development of their personal mastery and on their performance, but not on their self-efficacy and work –life balance This is particularly so in HE in the UK, where the longer administrators have worked, the better they perform, regardless of any form of personal and professional development In this sense, HR managers should value long-serving employees In contrast, it might not be true among academics Furthermore, positions in the organization not really have any impact in the framework of personal mastery Personal mastery can be developed regardless of a person’s positions in their organization It mainly relies on their personal perception of their personal mastery Finally, individual factors, namely personal vision, personal values and competence in HE, have developed further than the organizational factors To improve personal mastery in HE, universities would be encouraged to pay more attention to T&D and organizational culture An open, dynamic, proactive, accommodating, friendly and group-orientated culture in HE helps to promote personal mastery by fostering the antecedents of its development and providing a platform for utilizing its outcomes This marks the core of the contribution that this paper makes to the ongoing debate It enriches our understanding of personal mastery as a phenomenon by recognizing that its antecedents and outcomes are mutually bounded by personal as well as contextual forces in the organization (university), the industry (HE) and the society (the UK and Vietnam) in which it is cultivated Conclusions This paper represents one of the first attempts to comprehensively examine the antecedents of personal mastery and its associated outcomes within the HE context Of particular significance is that our study contributes insights from a cross-national perspective by comparing the UK and Vietnam Building on previous research, this study offers an integrative framework of personal mastery that advances theoretically the literature in this area to include not only individual characteristics, but also wider contextual forces (at the organizational, industry and societal levels) that influence personal mastery As we have and uniquely modelled, there are theoretical and empirical reasons to expect individual and contextual factors to influence personal mastery Findings of this study show support for many of the predicated associations with personal mastery Our key finding is that organizational characteristics (e.g T&D and organizational culture) contribute to personal mastery as significantly as individual characteristics such as personal vision, personal Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 190 H.T.M Bui et al values and competence Our findings are congruent with past research pointing to a positive association between personal mastery and individual personal performance, self-efficacy and well-being Not withstanding that we recognize and are fully accountable that the results of the study may have been bounded by some methodological limitations, such as the problem of construct equivalence (Sears 1951), we are confident that through the evaluation and modification of the questionnaire by conducting a pilot study in Vietnam (i.e to ensure that Vietnamese participants understood the questionnaire and responded to it in a similar fashion to the UK respondents) we have improved the validity of the findings from the study Moreover, we also recognize that although the response rate for this study was relatively high, the UK data and Vietnam data are drawn from one, albeit large and well-established, HE institution, respectively Such a sample may well limit the generalizability of the findings beyond this specific research context Thus, the limited nature of our sample precludes definitive conclusions and the findings should be interpreted with caution The generalizability of our study beyond the selected context remains an empirical question that remains to be addressed in future research A more inclusive sample reflecting different demographics would have been desirable Equally we encourage future research to adopt a longitudinal approach with data from multiple sources This will be useful in examining the causal status of the relationships examined The measure of personal mastery could also be revisited in future research in response to the changing context of globalization These limitations notwithstanding, this paper provides a sound base for enriching personal mastery theory and research, and can provide practitioners in the HE context useful insights about their approach to engaging with their scholarly practices It also provides senior managers in HE institutions with a greater opportunity to more actively support the development of personal mastery as this is no longer simply the prerogative of individuals and their recruitment to a position, but an approach to engaging employees such that the practices they perform contribute to both their personal development and that of the organization as well We hope that by encouraging new connections to be formed in the way the antecedents and outcomes of personal mastery are understood, there is scope for also aligning closer theory and practice This is especially significant in the context of our analysis of these issues in HE as it provides scope to demonstrate that we can apply the theories we develop in practice References Antonacopoulou, E (2000), ‘Employee Development Through Self-Development in Three Retail Banks,’ Personnel Review, 29, 4, 491–508 Antonacopoulou, E.P (2006), ‘The Relationship Between Individual and Organisational Learning: New Evidence from Managerial Learning Practices,’ Management Learning, 37, 4, 455– 473 Antonacopoulou, E.P (2009), ‘Impact and Scholarship: Unlearning and Practising to Co-Create Actionable Knowledge,’ Management Learning, 40, 4, 421– 430 Appelbaum, S.H., and Goransson, L (1997), ‘Transformational and Adaptive Learning Within the Learning Organization: A Framework for Research and Application,’ The Learning Organization, 4, 3, 115– 128 Aspinwall, L.G., and Taylor, S.E (1997), ‘A Stitch in Time: Self-Regulation and Proactive Coping,’ Psychological Bulletin, 121, 3, 417– 436 Avolio, B.J., Zhu, W., Koh, W., and Bhatia, P (2004), ‘Transformational Leadership and Organizational Commitment: Mediating Role of Psychological Empowerment and Moderating Role of Structural Distance,’ Journal of Organizational Behavior, 25, 951– 968 Bandura, A (1977), ‘Self-Efficacy: Toward a Unifying Theory of Behavioral Change,’ Psychological Review, 84, 2, 191–215 Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 The International Journal of Human Resource Management 191 Bandura, A (1982), ‘Self-Efficacy Mechanism in Human Agency,’ American Psychologist, 37, 2, 122– 147 Barney, J (1991), ‘Firm Resources and Sustainable Competitive Advantage,’ Journal of Management, 17, 99 – 120 Baruch, Y (1996), ‘Self-Performance Appraisal vs Direct Manager Appraisal – A Case of Congruency,’ Journal of Managerial Psychology, 50, 50– 65 Baruch, Y., Bell, M.P., and Gray, D (2005), ‘Generalist and Specialist Graduate Business Degrees: Tangible and Intangible Value,’ Journal of Vocational Behavior, 67, 51– 68 Baruch, Y., and Hall, D.T (2004), ‘The Academic Career: A Model for Future Careers in other Sectors?’ Journal of Vocational Behavior, 64, 241– 262 Baruch, Y., and Holtom, B.C (2008), ‘Survey Response Rate Levels and Trends in Organizational Research,’ Human Relations, 6, 8, 1139– 1160 Baruch, Y., and Peiperl, M.A (2000), ‘The Impact of an MBA on Graduates’ Career,’ Human Resource Management Journal, 10, 2, 60 – 90 Bate, P (1990), ‘Using the Culture Concept in an Organizational Setting,’ Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 26, 1, 83– 106 Berry, J.M., and West, R.L (1993), ‘Cognitive Self-Efficacy in Relation to Personal Mastery and Goal Setting Across the Life Span,’ International Journal of Behavioral Development, 16, 2, 351– 379 Blackman, D., and Henderson, S (2005), ‘Why Learning Organizations Do Not Transform,’ The Learning Organization, 12, 1, 42 – 56 Blackmore, P., and Castley, A (2005), Developing Capability in the University, London: Leadership Foundation for Higher Education Bokeno, R.M (2009), ‘Marcus on Senge: Personal Mastery, the Child’s Mind, and Individual Transformation,’ Journal of Organizational Change Management, 22, 3, 307–320 Brislin, R.W (1976), ‘Comparative Research Methodology: Cross-Cultural Studies,’ International Journal of Psychology, 11, 3, 215– 229 Bui, H.T.M., and Baruch, Y (2010), ‘Creating Learning Organizations: A Systems Perspective,’ The Learning Organization, 17, 3, 208– 227 Byrne, B (2001), Structural Equation Modelling with AMOS: Basic Concepts, Applications and Programming, Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Chowdhury, J (1993), ‘The Motivational Impact of Sales Quotas on Effort,’ Journal of Marketing Research, 30, 28 – 41 Churchill, G.A., and Peter, J.P (1984), ‘Research Design Effect on the Reliability of Rating,’ Journal of Marketing Research, 16, 360– 375 Conway, J.M., and Huffcutt, A.I (2003), ‘A Review and Evaluation of Exploratory Factor Analysis Practices in Organizational Research,’ Organizational Research Methods, 6, 2, 147– 168 Dalin, P (1998), School Development Theories and Strategies, London: Cassell Damanpour, F (1991), ‘Organizational Innovation: A Meta-Analysis of Effects of Determinants and Moderators,’ Academy of Management Journal, 34, 3, 555– 590 Davies, D (1998), ‘The Virtual University: A Learning University,’ Journal of Workplace Learning, 10, 4, 175– 213 Deci, A.L (1975), Intrinsic Motivation (3rd ed.), New York: Plenum Press Dimmock, C., and Walker, A (2000), ‘Developing Comparative School Leadership and Management: A Cross-Cultural Approach,’ School Leadership and Management, 20, 2, 143– 160 Dodgson, M (1993), ‘Organizational Learning: A Review of Some Literatures,’ Organization Studies, 14, 3, 375– 394 Doherty, L., and Manfredi, S (2006), ‘Action Research to Develop Work– Life Balance in a UK University,’ Women in Management Review, 21, 3, 241– 259 England, G.W (1967), ‘Personal Value Systems of American Managers,’ Academy of Management, 10, 1, 53 – 68 Feather, N (1975), Values in Education and Society, New York: Free Press Field, A (2005), Discovering Statistics Using SPSS (2nd ed.), London: SAGE Fink, A (1995), How to Sample in Surveys, London: SAGE Forssen, M., and Haho, P (2001), ‘Participative Development and Training for Business Processes in Industry: Review of 88 Simulation Games,’ International Journal of Technology Management, 22, – 3, 233– 262 Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 192 H.T.M Bui et al Garcia-Morales, V.J., Llorens-Montes, F.J., and Verdu-Jover, A.J (2007), ‘Influence of Personal Mastery on Organizational Performance Through Organizational Learning and Innovation in Large Firms and SMEs,’ Technovation, 27, 547– 568 Garet, M.S., Porter, A.C., Desimone, L., Birman, B.F., and Yoon, K.S (2001), ‘What Makes Professional Development Effective? Results from a National Sample of Teachers,’ American Educational Research Journal, 38, 4, 915– 945 Gherardi, S (2000), ‘Practised-Based Theorizing on Learning and Knowing in Organizations,’ Organization, 7, 2, 211– 223 Glynn, M.A (1996), ‘Innovative Genius: A Framework for Relating Individual and Organizational Intelligences to Innovation,’ Academy of Management Review, 21, 1081– 1111 Gong, Y., Huang, J.-C., and Farh, J.-L (2009), ‘Employee Learning Orientation, Transformational Leadership, and Employee Creativity: The Mediating Role of Employee Creative Self-Efficacy,’ Academy of Management Journal, 52, 4, 765– 778 Grant, R.M (1996), ‘Toward a Knowledge-Based Theory of the Firm,’ Strategic Management Journal, 17, 109– 122 Grinter, L.E (2006), ‘Vietnam’s Thrust into Globalization: Doimoi’s Long Road,’ Asian Affairs: An American Review, 33, 3, 151– 165 Haydon, G (1997), Teaching About Values: A New Approach, London: Cassell Hayman, J (2005), ‘Psychometric Assessment of an Instrument Designed to Measure Work Life Balance,’ Research and Practice in Human Resource Management, 13, 1, 85 – 91 Hofstede, G (1993), ‘Cultural Constraints in Management Theories,’ The Executive, 7, 1, 81 – 93 Hofstede, G (2001), Culture’s Consequences, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage House, R.J., Hanges, P.J., Javidan, M., Dorfman, P.W., and Gupta, V (eds.) (2004), Culture, Leadership, and Organizations: The GLOBE Study of 62 Societies, London: Sage Jung, D.I., Chow, C., and Wu, A (2003), ‘The Role of Transformational Leadership in Enhancing Organizational Innovation: Hypotheses and Some Preliminary Findings,’ Leadership Quarterly, 14, 525– 544 Kahle, L.R (1983), Social Values and Social Change: Adaptation to Life in America, New York: Praeger Kahle, L.R., Beatty, S.E., and Homer, P (1986), ‘Alternative Measurement Approaches To Consumer Values: The List of Values (LOV) and Values and Life Style (VALS),’ Journal of Consumer Research, 13, 3, 405– 409 Kamakura, W.A., and Novak, T.P (1992), ‘Value-System Segmentation: Exploring the Meaning of LOV,’ Journal of Consumer Research, 19, 1, 119– 132 Kanfer, R., and Ackerman, P (2000), ‘Individual Differences in Work Motivation: Further Explorations of a Trait Framework,’ Applied Psychology: An International Review, 49, 3, 470– 482 Karasek, R., Baker, D., Marxer, F., Ahlbom, A., and Theorell, T (1981), ‘Job Description Latitude, Job Demands and Cardiovascular Disease: A Prospective Study of Swedish Men,’ American Journal of Public Health, 71, 7, 694– 705 Kezar, A., and Eckel, P.D (2002), ‘The Effect of Institutional Culture on Change Strategies in Higher Education,’ Journal of Higher Education, 73, 4, 435– 460 Kline, R.B (2005), Principles and Practice of Structural Equation Modeling, New York/London: Guilford Press Knight, P., Tait, J., and Yorke, M (2006), ‘The Professional Learning of Teacher in Higher Education,’ Studies in Higher Education, 33, 3, 319– 339 Koberg, C.S., Boss, R.W., Senjem, J.C., and Goodman, E.A (1999), ‘Antecedents and Outcomes of Empowerment,’ Group & Organization Management, 24, 1, 71 –91 Kristof-Brown, A.L., and Stevens, C.K (2001), ‘Goal Congruence in Project Teams: Does the Fit between Member’s Personal Mastery and Performance Goals Matter?’ Journal of Applied Psychology, 86, 6, 1083–1095 LeDeist, F.D., and Winterton, J (2005), ‘What is Competence,’ Human Recourse Development International, 8, 1, 27 – 46 Llorens-Montes, F.J., Garcia-Morales, V.J., and Verdu-Jover, A.J (2004), ‘The Influence on Personal Mastery, Organisational Learning and Performance of the Level of Innovation: Adaptive Organisation versus Innovative Organisation,’ International Journal of Innovation and Learning, 1, 101– 114 Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 The International Journal of Human Resource Management 193 London, M., and Smither, J.W (1999), ‘Empowered Self-Development and Continuous Learning,’ Human Resource Management, 38, 1, – 15 MacKinnon, D.P., Lockwood, C.M., Hoffman, J.M., West, S.G., and Sheets, V (2002), ‘A Comparison of Methods to Test Mediation and Other Intervening Variable Effects,’ Psychological Methods, 7, 1, 83–104 Marginson, S (2006), ‘Dynamics of National and Global Competition in Higher Education,’ Higher Education, 52, 1, – 39 Marquardt, M.J (1996), Building the Learning Organization, New York: McGraw-Hill McAuley, J (1994), ‘Exploring Issues in Culture and Competence,’ Human Relations, 47, 4, 417– 430 McKenna, S.D (1992), ‘A Culture Instrument: Driving Organizational Learning,’ Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 13, 6, 24 –29 Minarik, M.M., Thornton, B., and Perreault, G (2003), ‘Systems Thinking Can Improve Teacher Retention,’ The Clearing House, 76, 5, 230–234 Miron, E., Erez, M., and Naveh, E (2004), ‘Do Personal Characteristics and Cultural Values that Promote Innovation, Quality, and Efficiency Complete or Complement Each Other,’ Journal of Organizational Behavior, 25, 2, 174– 199 Mumford, E (1991), ‘Job Satisfaction: A Method of Analysis,’ Personnel Review, 20, 3, 11 – 19 Ng, P.T (2004), ‘The Learning Organization and the Innovative Organization,’ Human Systems Management, 23, 93 – 100 Nguyen, T.N., Truong, Q., and Dirk, B (2011), ‘Training and Firm Performance in Economies in Transition: A Comparison Between Vietnam and China,’ Asia Pacific Business Review, 17, 1, 103– 119 Noe, R.A (2002), Employee Training and Development (2nd ed.), Columbus, OH: McGraw-Hill Nonaka, I., and Takeuchi, H (1995), The Knowledge Creating Company, Oxford: Oxford University Press Nunnally, J.C (1978), Psychometric Theory (2nd ed.), New York: McGraw-Hill Osteraker, M.C (1999), ‘Measuring Motivation in a Learning Organization,’ Journal of Workplace Learning, 11, 2, 73 – 77 Ozbilgin, M., and Healy, G (2004), ‘The Gendered Nature of Career Development of University Professors: The Case of Turkey,’ Journal of Vocational Behavior, 64, 358– 371 Pearlin, L.I., Menaghan, E., Lieberman, M., and Mullan, J.T (1981), ‘The Stress Process,’ Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 22, 4, 337– 356 Pham, L.B., Taylor, S.E., and Seeman, T.E (2001), ‘Effect of Environmental Predictability and Personal Mastery on Self-regulatory and Physiological Processes,’ Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 27, 5, 611– 620 Pintrich, P.R., and Schunk, D.H (2002), Motivation in Education: Theory, Research and Applications, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Merrill Preston, C.C., and Colman, A.M (2000), ‘Optimal Number of Response Categories in Rating Scales: Reliability, Validity, Discriminating Power, and Respondent Preferences,’ Acta Psychologica, 104, – 15 Reed, H.A (2001), Ukrop’s as a Learning Organization: Senge’s Five Disciplines Realized in a Medium-Sized Company, Charlottesville: University of Virginia Rindova, V.P., Williamson, I.O., Petkova, A.P., and Sever, J.M (2005), ‘Being Good or Being Known: An Empirical Examination of the Dimensions, Antecedents and Consequences of Organizational Reputation,’ Academy of Management Journal, 48, 6, 1033– 1049 Robertson, D.C (1991), ‘Corporate Ethics Programs: The Impact of Firm Size,’ in Market Morality and Company Size, eds B Harvey and H Van Luijk, G Corbetta, Dordrecht: Kluwer, pp 119– 136 Rodin, J (1986), ‘Aging and Health: Effects of the Sense of Control,’ Science, 233, 4770, 1271– 1276 Rolling-Magnusson, S (2001), ‘Legislation and Lifelong Learning in Canada: Inconsistencies In Implementation,’ The Canadian Journal of Higher Education, 31, 3, 23 – 31 Sears, R (1951), ‘A Theoretical Framework for Personality and Social Behaviour,’ American Psychologist, 6, 9, 476–482 Seeman, M., and Seeman, T.E (1983), ‘Health Behavior and Personal Autonomy: A Longitudinal Study of the Sense of Control in Illness,’ Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 24, 2, 144–160 Downloaded by [University of Oklahoma Libraries] at 04:18 28 January 2015 194 H.T.M Bui et al Seeman, T.E., and Lewis, S (1995), ‘Powerlessness, Health, and Mortality: A Longitudinal Study of Older Men and Mature Women,’ Social Science and Medicine, 41, 4, 517– 525 Senge, P.M (1990), The Fifth Discipline the Art & Practice of the Learning Organization, Milsons Point, NSW: Random House Australia Senge, P.M (1996), ‘Leading Learning Organizations,’ Training & Development, 50, 12, 36 –37 Senge, P.M (2006), The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization (2nd ed.), London: Random House Senge, P.M., Ross, R., Smith, B., Robert, C., and Kleiner, A (1994), The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook: Strategies and Tools for Building a Learning Organization, New York: Doubleday Currency Shalley, C.E., and Gilson, L.L (2004), ‘What Leaders Need to Know: A Review of Social and Contextual Factors that Can Foster or Hinder Creativity,’ The Leadership Quarterly, 15, 33 – 53 Siebold, G.L (1994), ‘The Relation Between Soldier Motivation, Leadership, and Small Unit Performance,’ in Motivation Theory and Research, ed H.F O’Neil, Drillings Hove: Lawrence Erlbaum, pp 171– 190 Sperber, A.D., Devellis, R.R., and Boehlecke, B (1994), ‘Cross-Cultural Translation: Methodology and Validation,’ Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 25, 501– 524 Spreitzer, G (1995), ‘Psychological Empowerment in the Workplace: Dimensions, Measurement, and Validation,’ Academy of Management Journal, 38, 5, 1442– 1465 Tabachnick, B.G., and Fidell, L.S (2001), Using Multivariate Statistics (4th ed.), Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon Theˆm, T.N (1999), Fundamental Vietnamese Culture, Ho Chi Minh: Education Publishing Thompson, S.C., Cheek, P.R., and Graham, M.A (1988), ‘The Other Side of Perceived Control: Disadvantages and Negative Effect,’ in The Social Psychology of Health, eds S Spacapan and S Ashkamp, Newbury Park, CA: Sage, pp 359– 383 Tierney, P., and Farmer, S (2002), ‘Creative Self-Efficacy: Its Potential Antecedents and Relationship to Creative Performance,’ Academy of Management Journal, 45, 6, 1137– 1148 Townsend, P., and Gebhardt, J (2008), ‘Employee Engagement Completely,’ Human Resource Management International Digest, 16, 3, 22 – 24 Tyler, B.B., and Gnyawali, D.R (2009), ‘Managerial Collection Cognitions: An Examination of Similarities and Differences of Cultural Orientations,’ Journal of Management Studies, 46, 1, 94 – 126 Vallerand, R.J., Pelletier, L.G., Blais, M.R., and Briere, N.M (1992), ‘The Academic Motivation Scale: A Measure of Intrinsic, Extrinsic and Motivation in Education,’ Educational and Psychological Measurement, 52, 4, 1003– 1017 Vu’o’ng, T.Q (2001), Vietnamese Culture: Exploring and Understanding, Hanoi: Literature _Publishing Watkins, K.E., and Marsick, V.J (1993), Sculpting the Learning Organization: Lessons in the Art of Systemic Change, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Weigel, T., Mulder, M., and Collins, K (2007), ‘The Concept of Competence in the Development of Vocational Education and Training in Selected EU Member States,’ Journal of Vocational Education and Training, 59, 1, 53 – 66 Wheeler, L.L (2002), Building a Learning Organization: A Native American Experience, Fielding: Fielding Graduate Institute Wiersma, W., and Jurs, S.G (2005), Research Methods in Education (8th ed.), New York: Allyn & Bacon Xiaozhou, X (2001), ‘The Role of the University in Life-Long Learning: Perspectives from the People’s Republic of China,’ Higher Education Policy, 14, 313– 324 ... Mulder, M., and Collins, K (2007), ‘The Concept of Competence in the Development of Vocational Education and Training in Selected EU Member States,’ Journal of Vocational Education and Training, 59,... of knowledge-intensive industries and by a marked increase in the importance of creating and exploiting knowledge and information in all sectors of the economy (Nonaka and Takeuchi 1995) Against... selected at random within the UK university, including school of environment and earth science, school of computing and technology, school of maths, school of business, school education, school of