Phd in PSYCHOLOGY AND SOCIAL NEUROSCIENCE

Thesis title: Third party employment relationships: the role of psychological characteristics, attitudes, and individual perceptions

Nowadays’ turbulent labor market has increasingly characterized by uncertainty and unpredictability, asking both individuals and organizations to be highly adaptable and change-responsive (i.e., King, 2004; Sullivan & Baruch, 2009). In this regard, a recent trend is rising, which calls for the intervention of third parties. These third parties, which generally take the form of agencies, are committed to ensuring that job supply and demand are matched both at the time of entry into employment and on an ongoing basis. The intermediation of agencies between the individuals and the labor market is a step away from the more traditional employee-employer relationship and deserves particular consideration. Hence, the general purpose of the present contribution is to acquire empirical knowledge about the role played by the agencies and their relationship with the psychological characteristics, attitudes, and individual perceptions that are most involved. In particular, this contribution specifically focused on two trends that has grown in the past few years: youth unemployment and agency work. Although these two topics present many differences, there is one focal aspect they have in common, namely the intervention of third-party agencies. Regarding youth unemployment, what has attracted the major concerns from the institutions is the NEET phenomena. This acronym describes those youths who are “not in employment, education, or training” (i.e., European Commission, 2020a; Yates, & Payne, 2006). These youths stand at higher risk of social exclusion, unemployment, or precarious work arrangements (Bynner & Parsons, 2002; Boeren, Mackie, & Riddell, 2020; Tamesberger & Bacher, 2020). Therefore, NEETs become a key target for European labor market policies (i.e., Pascual & Martín, 2017) such as the “Youth guarantee” program (European Commission, 2020b) which aims to improve NEETs employability (i.e., Boeren et al. 2020; Council of the European Union, 2013; Mascherini, 2012; Schröer, 2015). In Italy, a number of employment agencies have been charged with carrying out activities under the program by providing youths with quality employment, education, or training. Therefore, the main purpose of the employment agencies is to connect youths to a first/new job. On this point, past research has recognized the beneficial role of both personal resources and contextual support in enhancing employability, even of those who were not employed (i.e., Brouwer, Bakker, & Schellekens, 2015; De Battisti, Gilardi, Guglielmetti, & Siletti, 2016; Knabe & Rätzel, 2010). Therefore, it is crucial to understand how the effort of the employment agencies are perceived and their interplay with youths’ personal resources to enhance perceived possibilities to get a job and, ultimately, to foster employment. This is the main goal of the first study (“How a youth may find a job: the role of positivity, perceived employability, and support from employment agencies”), which has been conducted in a sample of youths involved in the “Youth guarantee” program. On the other hand, agency work represents a widespread strategy that can be used by the organizations to increase flexibility, competitiveness and reduce costs by using employees from an agency, in response to changing business conditions (Connelly & Gallagher, 2006; Galais & Moser, 2009). In this particular work arrangement, the agency acts as an intermediary between the worker and the client organization that offers temporary placements, sending the worker to the client, where he performs his daily work activities (Coyle-Shapiro, Morrow & Kessler 2006; Gallagher & McLean Parks, 2001; Van Breugel, Olffen & Olie, 2005). This doubled work relationship entailed by agency workers both with the agency and with the client organization engenders complexity concerning the meaning of their organizational membership and commitment (Galais & Moser, 2009; McLean Parks, Kidder & Gallagher, 1998). The second study (“Dual commitment profiles and job satisfaction among agency workers”) focuses on this topic and, adopting a person-centered approach, has identified agency workers’ commitment profiles and investigates the implications of being in these profiles concerning job satisfaction. Finally, agency work has mostly been understood as a “contingent” or “temporary” work arrangement (i.e., Gallagher & McLean Parks, 2001) and issue related to job insecurity (the concern about the continued existence of the job in the future; Sverke, Hellgren, & Näswall, 2002) has been widely studied in this sector (i.e., Chambel & Sobral, 2019; De Cuyper, Notelaers, & De Witte, 2009). In Italy, however, agencies can sign either fixed-term or permanent contracts with its employees. Research from traditional employee-employer settings revealed a moderating role of the type of contract in the relationship between job insecurity and outcomes, that has been explained drawing from the psychological contract theory (i.e., De Cuyper & De Witte, 2006, 2007). Therefore, the third study (“The impact of job insecurity on job attitudes and self-rated performance among temporary and permanent agency workers”) aims to corroborates this finding within the agency work setting using a large sample of Italian agency workers.