About CEI-OB
Co-directed and co-founded by Mr. Sheng Yan at GEC Academy and Dr. Yeun Joon Kim, Associate Professor at Cambridge Judge Business School (CJBS), this initiative was established to provide a fundamental research platform to support scientific development of Organizational Behavior (OB) studies. With the diverse participant pool provided by GEC, CEI-OB aspires to contribute to the understanding of human psychology and behaviors at the workplace.
For GEC students who are interested in participating in research, please CLICK HERE to see more details.
Background
The enterprise reformation of China has created its unique forms of entrepreneurship, corporate governance, and labor management. The new idiosyncratic system has not only attracted practitioners and investors, but also academic researchers. Among the fields these researchers specialize in, Organizational Behavior (OB) stands as the one investigating the ways of management and human resource management in China.
Organizational behavior (OB) is "the study of human behavior in organizational settings, the interface between human behavior and the organization, and the organization itself" (Moorhead and Griffin, 1995, p. 4). Understanding these social processes from a micro-perspective is essential for improving how employees at different positions (e.g., C-suite, line managers, interns) contribute to an organization’s sustainability and success. OB researchers often conduct experimental studies by creating laboratory environments mimicking the workplace. Collaborative Experimentation Initiative for OB Studies (CEI-OB) between GEC and Dr. Yeun Joon Kim, Associate Professor at Cambridge Judge Business School (CJBS) aims to provide a fundamental research platform for various experimental studies in order to support scientific development.
Dr. Kim at CJBS aspires to contribute to our understanding of individual and group behavior within organizations as well as translating academic knowledge into practical application. The topics for experimental studies in CEI-OB include creativity, innovation, culture, leadership, and followership.
The establishment of CEI-OB is valuable for Dr. Kim and his colleagues to conduct multiple experimental and field studies. Together, GEC Advanced Study Institute (GEC-ASI) and Dr. Kim will carry out in-depth OB research with samples from Chinese organizations and enterprises.
Current Projects
CEI-OB will conduct experiments to understand human psychology and behavior.
In the first phase, the lab will have the following research projects*,
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Task Transition Study: The goal of this study is to examine the performance of different individuals on different type of tasks (e.g., problem-solving task, decryption task) as well as when and why they are motivated to switch to a different type of task. Participants will be asked to work on several tasks and answer some questions about themselves.
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Mock Job Application Study: In this study, we explore how different people describe their leadership styles when applying for a job. To make it more realistic and engaging, we will present participants with a real job posting of a leader position (e.g., project manager at Microsoft), and participants will be asked to prepare a resume and a cover letter for that position.
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Leadership Preference Study: What we aim to understand in this project is individual’s preference for leaders. What are some characteristics and behaviors individuals would like to see in a leader? Participants will be randomly asked to do one of the following tasks: 1) express their preferences for leadership styles by answering a questionnaire, 2) write a short paragraph to describe the leaders they find effective, and 3) select from a pool of words or phrases that depict effective leaders.
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* These projects involve multiple research methods, largely (but not exclusively) experimental, survey, and qualitative. Participation from the student pool is completely voluntary, and there will be no negative or positive influence on their marks or performance rating if they choose not to participate. Because each project adopts different research agendas and methods, participants are expected to engage in various experimental activities across different experimental studies, such as working on experiment tasks and/or answering questionnaires. The length of the experiments also varies; some can be finished in an hour while others may last weeks and involve multiple waves of data collection. The data generated from the experiments will be stored confidentially and safely on a device or a folder with encryption. The data can only be accessed by researchers from GEC Advanced Study Institute (GEC-ASI) and Dr. Kim and his colleagues.