TY - JOUR
T1 - What do we measure and how do we elicit it? The case for the use of repertory grid technique in multi-party psychological contract research
AU - Sherman, Ultan P.
AU - Morley, Michael J.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2019, © 2019 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2020/3/3
Y1 - 2020/3/3
N2 - The psychological contract is a multi-faceted construct and, with the rise of gig work, increasingly the contract extends beyond the conventional employer-employee relationship to encompass multi-party exchanges. Against this backdrop, the question of what should be measured when assessing the contract and how it should be elicited remains a significant issue for scholars. We argue that the potential of psychological contract theory as an explanatory lens in understanding contemporary multi-party working relationships is constrained by two key limitations inherent in conventional measurement approaches. Firstly, such approaches have favoured singular rather than multiparty perspectives, and secondly, they have broadly accorded equal weight and significance to the content dimensions unearthed, despite the fact that they may differ markedly in how they are understood by each party to the employment relationship. In order to remedy these shortcomings, we make the case for adopting repertory grid technique as a methodological framework to address measurement limitations and to more rigorously assess the content of the complex multi-party psychological contract.
AB - The psychological contract is a multi-faceted construct and, with the rise of gig work, increasingly the contract extends beyond the conventional employer-employee relationship to encompass multi-party exchanges. Against this backdrop, the question of what should be measured when assessing the contract and how it should be elicited remains a significant issue for scholars. We argue that the potential of psychological contract theory as an explanatory lens in understanding contemporary multi-party working relationships is constrained by two key limitations inherent in conventional measurement approaches. Firstly, such approaches have favoured singular rather than multiparty perspectives, and secondly, they have broadly accorded equal weight and significance to the content dimensions unearthed, despite the fact that they may differ markedly in how they are understood by each party to the employment relationship. In order to remedy these shortcomings, we make the case for adopting repertory grid technique as a methodological framework to address measurement limitations and to more rigorously assess the content of the complex multi-party psychological contract.
KW - assessing employment relationship
KW - gig work
KW - methodology
KW - Psychological contract measurement: repertory grid technique
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85073989447&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/1359432X.2019.1668844
DO - 10.1080/1359432X.2019.1668844
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85073989447
SN - 1359-432X
VL - 29
SP - 230
EP - 242
JO - European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology
JF - European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology
IS - 2
ER -