Nightmare Careers
Socialization
In the socialization (or: onboarding) phase, new employees (including those who applied for a leadership position) get to evaluate the actual level of trait activation and outcome activation that the job and the organization offer. This phase is important for the establishment of a psychological contract, an informal set of reciprocal expectations between an employee and his/her organization. These expectations cover the kind of behaviors that are allowed and/or expected at work and the kind of outcomes expected of an employee. Based on these informally and/or formally communicated expectations, new employees/leaders learn whether the organization affords or constrains TNT-based behaviors and what outcomes result from such expressions of the TNT. An example of an onboarding activity is ethics training. Although the effect of limited ethics training has been found to be transient, more exhaustive and in-depth ethics training has been found to have a longer lasting effect on ethical decision-making and to have a positive effect on the perceived ethical culture of an organization. Although it is unlikely that ethics training changes a person's personality, it does make an employee aware of the norms and values of an organization, which may limit the expression of nightmare traits (i.e., prevents trait activation) and which may limit expectations that positive outcomes may result from the expression of nightmare traits (i.e., prevents outcome activation). Because the socialization phase for leadership positions is often short and new leaders are often expected to make changes to their team and/or organization, a potential danger is that ethics training or attention to ethical dilemmas have limited effect and that the first thing TNT leaders do is to try to make their mark by changing the culture of the organization to fit their personality.