Advanced Search

Journal Navigation

Journal Home

Subscriptions

Archive

Contact Us

Table of Contents

Sign In to gain access to subscriptions and/or personal tools.
Management Learning
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow References
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Right arrow Citation Map
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in Web of Science
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to Saved Citations
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Right arrow Request Reprints
Right arrow Add to My Marked Citations
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Right arrow Citing Articles via Scopus
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Branzei, O.
Right arrow Articles by Fredette, C.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
 Add to CiteULike   Add to Complore   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati   Add to Twitter  
What's this?

Effects of Newcomer Practicing on Cross-level Learning Distortions

Oana Branzei

Richard Ivey School of Business, University of Western Ontario, Canada, obranzei{at}ivey.uwo.ca

Christopher Fredette

Schulich School of Business, York University, Canada, cfredette{at}schulich.yorku.ca

This article fuses variance generation and suppression arguments with the micro-underpinnings of collective learning to bring the socio-emotional context of learning to the foreground. We take a practice-based perspective on cross-level learning distortions to explore non-recursive trade-offs between variance generation and variance suppression as newcomers adapt to established groups and as groups react to newcomers. Our typology first disaggregates the effects of sociality and emotionality to describe four patterns of context-contingent individual practicing: experimenting, emulating, bracketing and impersonating. We then explain why groups operating in distinct contexts may systematically ignore or discount two specific types of individual departures from collective norms: outliers (infrequent, significant deviations) and clusters (frequent, incremental changes). Our theoretical predictions add value to managers by unpacking the contextual contingencies that systematically pattern individual and collective learning and by suggesting specific interventions for preventing or alleviating learning disorders.

Key Words: context-contingent learning • cross-level learning distortions • micro-underpinnings of collective learning • newcomer practicing patterns • practice-based learning

Management Learning, Vol. 39, No. 4, 393-412 (2008)
DOI: 10.1177/1350507608093711


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to Technorati Technorati   Add to Twitter Twitter    What's this?