A conservation of resources perspective on career hurdles and salary attainment
Section snippets
Conservation of resources perspective on career hurdles
While this study examines a broad array of career hurdles, what they all have in common is that they curtail employees' ability to exert time and energy to obtain higher salaries (Tsaousides & Jome, 2008). For that reason, we draw on conservation of resources (COR) theory (Hobfoll, 1989, Wright and Hobfoll, 2004) to explain how the career hurdles we identify negatively impact salary attainment. COR theory posits that when there are threats of resource losses, individuals respond by conserving
Socio-demographic hurdles
Because of their socio-demographic backgrounds, individuals may face greater obstacles in attaining higher salary (Greenhaus, Parasuraman, & Wormley, 1990). Indeed, researchers have provided widespread evidence that socio-demographic characteristics affect individuals' ability to acquire high-paying jobs throughout their careers (Dreher and Cox, 1996, McCauley et al., 1980, Weber and Crocker, 1983). For instance, children from prosperous, well-educated families are more likely to receive higher
Scope of meta-analysis
We performed a comprehensive search for those field studies, published in or before 2013, that measured salary. As recommended by Rosenthal (1979), we also searched for unpublished studies, conference proceedings, and dissertations through such databases as the Digital Dissertation Consortium. Multiple keywords were used in the electronic search, such as salary, income, pay, wages, earning, remuneration, compensation, and career success.
Five criteria were used to refine the set of studies used
Effect sizes
Table 2, Table 3, Table 4, Table 5 present the corrected effect sizes for the relationships of the six groups of career hurdles with salary. We consider an average corrected correlation to be statistically significant when its 95% confidence interval does not include the value of zero. Following Rhoades and Eisenberger (2002), we interpret the strength of the correlations as follows: weak (.10 to .23), moderate (.24 to .36), and strong (.37 or above). Effect sizes less than .10 were considered
Discussion
The present meta-analysis provides preliminary support for the career hurdle perspective on salary attainment and the utility of COR theory in understanding the relationships between those hurdles and salary. Below, we review and provide explanations for the patterns of results uncovered.
Conclusion
Salary attainment continues to be a core indicator of individuals' career success. This study utilizes a career hurdle perspective to explain how individual-level, group-level, and organizational-level factors impede individuals' abilities to attain higher salaries. We hope that this perspective will stimulate more nuanced research on the correlates of salary attainment.
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2022, Human Resource Management ReviewCitation Excerpt :Repeated incidents of resource loss may permit “loss spirals” to gain momentum and strength (Hobfoll et al., 2018; Hobfoll & Lilly, 1993). Individuals who experience loss spirals become less aware of career development and other opportunities that may lead to resource gains (Ng & Feldman, 2014). Thus, if individuals considering a CT calculate that engagement in that CT will likely result in a resource surplus, they are more likely to make that CT.