How employees are proactive in strategic behaviors

Abstract

In today’s world of work, employees do not just let change happen to them, instead, they proactively shape their work, as well as their organization and its fit with the environment. Research shows that proactivity may be beneficial to the individual, the team and the organization. However, despite the importance of proactivity in today’s organizations, research has predominantly focused on employees’ proactivity in shaping their internal work environment, by for example exploring how employees can expand the boundaries of their own roles. When confronted with an unpredictable and rapidly changing external environment, however, employees also need to proactively detect and shape opportunities in their external environment. In this doctoral research proposal, we therefore shift focus from internally to externally oriented proactivity, i.e., proactive strategic behavior, to (1) conceptualize the construct of proactive strategic behavior; and (2) develop the nomological network of the concept of proactive strategic behaviors by testing the antecedents and the consequences of proactive strategic behavior.