IUPUC faculty member Thomas Clerkin, Ph.D., presented two papers at the November 2009 30th International Industrial Relations & Human Resources Conference in Louisville, Ky.

His first paper, “Estimating Managerial Potential: Cross Cultural Assessment Issues,” was nominated for a Best Paper award and will be published in the Conference Proceedings.

“This paper addresses the problem of the global talent shortage of high-quality senior managers and executives and programs used in industry to identify management potential early in careers (EIMP) to address this concern,” Clerkin said. “The issues being that the EIMP selection tools, e.g., cognitive ability tests, personality tests, assessment-center exercises, weighted biographical data were typically developed in Western Europe or The United States.  Many of them were validated using Western research samples but they are now being used by global organizations in other parts of the world to evaluate non-Western managers and professionals.  The issue is whether or not assessment tools developed in one ethnic or cultural context will predict managerial career success and attainment, with comparable accuracy, when applied in a different cultural context.”

The second paper “The Impact of Contribution Motive on Conflict of Top Management Team Goal Setting: A Scale Development” was also nominated for a Best Paper award and will be published in the Conference Proceedings.

Clerkin proposes that the quality of the decisions made by top management teams and the acceptance of these decisions by the organization arguably influence firm performance. Of decisions made by top management teams, the setting of goals for the organization is of critical importance.  The paper examines a study which tests a model that looks at the effects of two types of conflict and moderating variables that can impact the quality of decision-making. Finally, the article proposes a model that identifies an additional construct that more fully specifies the impact of conflict on decision-making. It also reports the results of a pilot scale development study that shows support for this revised model.