Political will, work values, and objective career success: A novel approach – The Trait-Reputation-Identity Model

Abstract

Individual-level political will in organizations and careers is recognized by many scholars as an important yet under-investigated construct. Only recently has a scale directly assessing political will been developed, and its validation process has just begun (Kapoutsis, Papalexandris, Treadway, & Bentley, 2017). We used the Trait-Reputation-Identity Model (McAbee & Connelly, 2016) and a triadic multisource design to explore and elucidate the nomological network of political will, including its link to objective career success. We found supporting empirical evidence for the construct (power striving) and criterion validity (hierarchical position and income) of the self-serving political will scale. However, our findings did not support the multi-rater convergence and the interpretation of the benevolent political will scale as representing an altruistic political motive. Hence, we suggest the development and validation of new items that directly relate to benevolence toward others at work. We further encourage researchers to develop and validate an additional scale assessing altruistic political will above and beyond self-serving and benevolent political will. We discuss additional implications, limitations, and directions for future research.