Impression management is a critical concept to understand many organizational phenomena. Although social psychologists have devoted substantial attention to impression management by an individual, practical implications for managers have been much limited, if any. That is because the subjects of experimental studies conducted by the social psychologists have been typically undergraduate students, and the duration of impression management very short. And though impression management is believed to be influenced strongly by individualistic/collectivistic culture, Korean studies have failed to address this difference fully in both quantity and quality.
Among many impression management dimensions, this study covered assertive impression management toward supervisors, for it can deliver important implications in organizations. Based on the previous social psychology and management literature, the author developed a framework for describing the impression management toward supervisors. The author considered many factors affecting impression management, including self-monitoring, need for dominance, need for affiliation, locus of control, level of education, leadership by supervisors, power of supervisors, physical distance from supervisors, justice, commitment, job characteristics, and the number of team members. The perceived similarity, liking, and performance evaluation by the supervisors were investigated as outcomes of impression management. And self-monitoring of the supervisors was examined as a moderating variable of the relationship between impression management and the outcomes.
Using self-report data from 180 R&D professionals and their 49 supervisors from 10 public and private research institutes, this study extended previous researches examining long-term effects of impression management in organizations. As expected, self-monitoring, need for dominance, need for affiliation, power of supervisors, commitment, and job characteristics were shown to have relationships with impression management. Ingratiation was confirmed as a positive factor affecting the liking of supervisors. This study reported that leadership and justice had meaningful relationships with impression management, and that self-monitoring of supervisors moderated impression management and the outcomes, but the direction was contrary to the hypotheses. The author suggested that previously conceived impression management's manipulative nature should be reconsidered.
In additional analyses, this study found that the period with current supervisors determined the level of impression management toward supervisors. The strongest factors affecting impression management were examined through stepwise regression analysis. And structural equation modeling was conducted using LISREL VIII. Limitations of this study and the suggestions for further researches were discussed.
