Chia-huei Wu

Professor Chia-Huei Wu studies proactive behaviour, personality development, work design, overqualification and employees' subjective well-being. He previously worked at London School of Economics and Durham University.

Research theme 1: Employee proactivity

In today’s global economy, organizations face complex environments that require rapid responses to changing external environments. To succeed within these increasingly uncertain operating environments, in addition to adapting to changes, employees can proactively respond to challenges to improve the work environment or themselves. For example, to face the anticipated challenge and industry trends, employees can create, introduce, and apply new ideas at work. They can make constructive suggestions to improve the work environment. Employees can also be proactive to advance their careers, for example, by actively building relationships with colleagues, seeking information and feedback from supervisors and senior colleagues for how to do jobs well, or negotiating job contents to fully utilize their skills and interests. However, not all employees are willing or able to take the initiative at work. Why some employees are more proactive than others? What makes some people more likely to initiate positive change within their organizations? What supervisors, team managers, and organizations can do to promote employees’ proactivity? Whether being proactive can always bring benefits to the individual and the team or organization? I conduct research to address these questions.

Representative work

• Xu, L., Liu, Z., Ji, M., Dong, Y, Wu, C. H. (in press). Leader perfectionism—friend or foe of employee creativity? Locus of control as a key contingency. Academy of Management Journal.
• Peng, K. Z., & Wu, C. H. (eds) (2021). Emotion and Proactivity at Work: Prospects and Dialogues. Bristol, UK: Bristol University Press. [Open Access]
• Wu, C. H., de Jong, J. P. J., Raasch, C. & Poldervaart S. (2020). Work process-related lead userness as an antecedent of innovative behavior and user innovation in organizations. Research Policy, 49, 103986.
• Wu, C. H. (2019). Employee proactivity in organizations: An attachment perspective. Bristol, UK: Bristol University Press
• Wu, C. H., Parker, S. K., Wu, L. Z. & Lee, C. (2018). When and why people engage in different forms of proactive behavior: Interactive effects of self-construals and work characteristics. Academy of Management Journal, 61, 293-323.
• Wu, C. H., Deng, H., & Li, Y. (2018). Enhancing a sense of competence at work by engaging in proactive behavior: The role of proactive personality. Journal of Happiness Studies, 19, 801-816.
• Wu, C. H., & Parker, S. K. (2017). The role of leader support in facilitating proactive work behavior: A perspective from attachment theory. Journal of Management, 43, 1025–1049.
• Duan, J., Li, C., Xu, Y., & Wu, C. H. (2017). Transformational leadership and employee voice behavior: A Pygmalion mechanism. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 38, 650-670.
• Wu, C. H., Liu, J., Kwan, H. K. & Lee, C. (2016). Why and when workplace ostracism inhibits organizational citizenship behaviors: An organizational identification perspective. Journal of Applied Psychology, 101, 362-378.
• De Jong J. P.J., Parker S. K., Wennekers, S., Wu, C. H. (2015). Entrepreneurial behavior in organizations: Does job design matter? Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 39, 981-995.
• Wu, C.-H., & Wang, Z. (2015). How transformational leadership shapes team proactivity: The mediating role of positive affective tone and the moderating role of team task variety. Group Dynamics: Theory, Research, and Practice, 19, 137-151.
• Wu, C. H., Parker, S. K., De Jong, J. P. J. (2014). Need for cognition as an antecedent of individual innovation behavior. Journal of Management, 40, 1511-1534.

Research theme 2: Work and Personality Development

Can work experiences shape our personality? If so, how? An increasingly prominent research line over recent years has started to indicate that personality is not fixed and it even changes in middle and late life. Work experiences have been proposed as triggers to drive personality change because what we do in our daily jobs shapes our beliefs and behaviors every day, and who we are in the long run. I am interested in the role of work experiences in shaping personality change. Using longitudinal data over multiple years, I have found that job autonomy, time demands, job satisfaction, job stress, and chronic job insecurity are factors associated with personality change. More studies will come to unpack how work can drive personality development.

Representative work

• Li, W.-D., Li, S., Feng, J. (J.), Wang, M., Zhang, H., Frese, M., & Wu, C.-H. (2021). Can becoming a leader change your personality? An investigation with two longitudinal studies from a role-based perspective. Journal of Applied Psychology, 106, 882-901.
• Wang Y., & Wu C. H. (2021). Work and Personality Change: What You Do Makes Who You Are. Bristol, UK: Bristol University Press.
• Wu, C. H., Wang, Y., Parker, S. K., & Griffin, M. A. (2020). Effects of chronic job insecurity on Big Five personality change. Journal of Applied Psychology,105(11), 1308-1326.
• Woods, S. A., Wille, B., Wu, C. H., Lievens, F., De Fruty, F. (2019) The influence of work on personality trait development: The demands-affordances transactional (DATA) model, an integrative review, and research agenda. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 110, 258-271.
• Wang, Y.,Wu, C. H., Parker, S. K., Griffin, M. A. (2018). Developing goal orientations conducive to learning and performance: An intervention study. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 91, 875-895.
• Wu, C. H. (2016). Personality change via work: A job demand-control model of big-five personality changes. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 92, 157-166.
• Wu, C. H., Griffin, M. A., & Parker, S. K. (2015). Developing agency through good work: Longitudinal effects of job autonomy and skill utilization on locus of control. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 89, 102-108.
• Wu, C. H., & Griffin, M. A. (2012). Longitudinal relationships between core self-evaluations and job satisfaction. Journal of Applied Psychology, 92, 331-342.

Other research publications

• Luksyte, A., Bauer, T. N., Debus, M., Erdogan B., & Wu, C. H. (in press). Perceived overqualification and collectivism orientation: Implications for work and non-work outcomes. Journal of Management.
• Yoshikawa, K., Wu, C. H., & Lee, H. (2020). Generalized Exchange Orientation: Conceptualization and scale development. Journal of Applied Psychology, 105, 294–311.
• Zhou, Y., Zou, M., Woods, S. A., & Wu, C. H. (2019). The restorative effect of work after unemployment. Journal of Applied Psychology, 104, 1195-1206.
• Deng, H., Guan, Y., Wu, C. H., Erdogan, B, Bauer., T. &, Yao, X. (2018). A relational model of overqualification: The role of interpersonal influence on overqualified employees’ social acceptance and performance. Journal of Management, 44, 3288-3310.
• Deng, H., Wu, C. H., Leung, K., & Guan, Y. J. (2016). Depletion from self-regulation: A resource-based account of the effect of value incongruence. Personnel Psychology, 69, 431-465.

Research interests

• Proactive behaviour at work
• Personality development and work
• Work design
• Leadership
• Subjective well-being
• Adult attachment
• Coaching and sport psychology

Education

• Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) The University of Western Australia (2010 — 2013)
• Mphil The University of Sheffield (2008 — 2011)
• M.S. National Taiwan University (2003 — 2006)