Human Resource Dependence and Organizational Demography: A Study of Minority Employment in Private Sector Companies

This study examines the extent to which firms’ human resource dependence explains the representation of Black employees in nonmanagement, management, and top-management jobs. Human resource dependence is a firm-level construct describing the degree to which an organization has difficulty procuring and maintaining supplies of human resources. Indicators of human resource dependence in 154 private sector firms explained the representation of Black employees in nonmanagement and management-level jobs but did not predict Black employee representation in top-management jobs. The results provide new insights into characteristics of firms that shape the demographic makeup of the workplace.

’n Vergelykende studie na die vlak en oorsake van werkstres by ’n groep geletterde en ongeletterde swartwerknemers

Acomparable study intoworkstress amongst a group of literate and illiterate black employees. Despite the fact that the South African black employee experience a broad spectrum of stressors, there is limited research which describes their actual levels and typical causes of stress. It was decided then to identify and to compare South African literate and illiterate black employees’ level and causes of stress. This information could help psychologists/employers to maintain a distinctive approach in communicating and handling problems with the distinguish groups. In order to identify black employees’ level and causes of stress the Experience of Work and Life Circumstances questionnaire was applied on an occasional sample of 60 persons. Opsomming Nieteenstaande die feit dat die Suid- Afrikaanse swart werknemer aan ’n bree spektrum van stressors blootgestel word, bestaan daar relatief min navorsing wat hul werklike vlak en tipiese oorsake van stres uitwys. Derhalwe is besluit om geletterde en ongeletterde swart werknemers se vlakke en oorsake van stres te identifiseer en te vergelyk. Met die inligting sal dit veral sielkundiges enwerkgewers in staat stel om’n effektiewe benadering ten opsigte van die kommunikasie en hantering van problememet die onderskeie groepe te kan handhaaf. Die Ervaring van werk -en lewensomstandighede vraelys is op ’n geleentheidsteekproef van 60 persone.

Racial and Gender Differences in Perceptions of Fairness: When Race is Involved in a Job Promotion

The present study examined 106 black and 69 white undergraduates' (82 males and 93 females) perceptions of fairness in an ambiguous situation where one stimulus person (a male employee) was seen as promoted over another and race was the only manipulated variable. The 2 (race of subject) × 2 (sex of subject) × 2 (race of promoted employee) × 2 (race of non-promoted employee) factorial analysis of variance indicated that, as expected, not only did race of the evaluator influence perceptions of fairness but it also interacted with race of the stimulus persons. As predicted, black subjects perceived more unfairness operating in the situations than white subjects, and they saw the promoted employee as less qualified than white subjects did. As expected, black subjects perceived the white employee's promotion over the black employee as the most unfair while white subjects saw no difference among the situations. An expected sex difference was found: females were more likely than males to perceive the company's decision as unfair. Black subjects were more favorable to the use of quotas than whites, and blacks believed there had been more discrimination and less progress in the last decade.