Volunteering is prevalent and on the rise in the United States, but little research has examined the connection between individuals’ volunteering and their jobs. In the absence of that research, it remains unclear whether employees volunteer to build on meaningful work experiences or to compensate for the lack of them. Similarly, it remains unclear whether volunteering is beneficial to the job in some way or if it is a distraction, akin to "moonlighting." In this manuscript, several theoretical perspectives from the multiple domain literature – particularly, compensation, enhancement, and resource drain – are employed across two studies to examine the intersection between volunteering and work domains. Results suggested that volunteering was associated with both volunteer and job meaningfulness, and that the pull of meaningful volunteer work was even stronger when employees had less meaning in their jobs. The results further revealed benefits of volunteering for employers. Volunteering was related to job absorption but not job interference, and was therefore associated with better performance on the job. Implications of these findings for future theorizing on volunteering are discussed.

Research on employee recruitment has shown that an organization’s corporate social performance (CSP) affects its attractiveness as an employer, but the underlying mechanisms and processes through which this occurs are poorly understood. We propose that job seekers receive signals from CSP that inform three signal-based mechanisms that ultimately affect organizational attractiveness: job seekers’ anticipated pride from being affiliated with the organization, their perceived value fit with the organization, and their expectations about how the organization treats its employees. We hypothesized that these signal-based mechanisms mediate the relationships between CSP and organizational attractiveness, focusing on two aspects of CSP: an organization’s community involvement and pro-environmental practices. In an experiment (N = 180) we manipulated CSP via a company’s web pages. In a field study (N = 171) we measured CSP content in the recruitment materials used by organizations at a job fair and job seekers’ perceptions of the organizations’ CSP. Results provided support for the signal-based mechanisms and we discuss the implications for theory, future research, and practice.

Developing leaders is what business schools aspire to contribute to society. The pledge to do so features prominently in mission statements, web pages and course brochures—and it is as appealing as it is controversial. While large numbers of students flock to undergraduate, MBA and executive programs that promise to transform them into “leaders,” the last decade has seen a mounting wave of criticism of what happens in those programs. Questions have been raised from outside and within management academia not only about whether and how business schools truly fulfill their promise to develop leaders, but also about what kind of leaders their graduates become and on whose behalf—with whose interests at heart—they lead.

For all the fascination and controversy that surrounds leadership, there is broad consensus on two key points. First, becoming a leader is not just a matter of acquiring a body of knowledge and practicing a requisite set of skills. It entails deeper personal work. That is, it requires acquiring a clear sense of oneself—an identity—as a leader, and aligning it with one’s personal values, history and purpose. The second point of consensus is that becoming a leader—and staying one—is a social endeavor. It requires understanding, connecting and giving voice to, the social context that ultimately grants or denies one’s permission to lead. Learning to lead, in short, is not an abstract matter. The only way to do it is through experiences—of leading as well as of following—and ongoing reflection on those experiences to distil lessons that may in turn inform future practice.