Mapping inspiration in human resources:  A systematic review of themes and approaches

Eligibility criteria

For the selection of the documents for the systematic review, the following inclusion criteria were determined:

Search strategy

To compile the studies analyzed in the systematic review, a search protocol was carried out. The databases used to carry out the intended bibliographic review were Ebscohost, ProQuest, Science Direct, and Scopus and the search was carried out from 15 June to 31 August 2022 on all databases. The analyzed period corresponded to the last nineteen years (2003-2022) and the search string used was: ‘inspiration’ OR ‘inspirational leadership’, OR ‘inspirational communication’ OR ‘inspire’ OR ‘inspirational’ OR ‘inspiring’, OR ‘inspired’ in English. The search was run by title, abstract, and keywords. The chosen descriptors were selected to characterize the research in the field of inspiration.

Based on the previously defined parameters, various documents were selected and exported to a specific folder in the Endnote software, which allowed duplicate documents to be identified based on the digital object identifier (DOI) and the bibliographic reference of the source. Subsequently, the articles whose title, keywords, abstract, and content were not directly related to the research questions or did not meet all the inclusion criteria previously described were refined.

Study selection

For every retrieved paper, the title, abstract, and keywords were confronted with the eligibility criteria. This phase evolved the reading of each abstract of the retrieved papers in an unblinded standardized manner by two researchers, independently. In cases where there was no consensus, the articles were retained for more careful analysis in the phase of full-text analysis.

Data collection process

We developed a data extraction sheet for the data collection process, considering the Systematic Review goals to ensure that all the pertinent data was retrieved. We The considered variables that started to be collected were the Article Data: type of publication, year, keywords and study variables. The study variables contributed significantly to identifying the emergent themes in the literature. To specifically understand the advancement in the methodological approaches in the literature, we also recorded instruments used, sample characteristics, and selection in the retrieved papers.

Assessment of risk of bias

The assessment of Risk of Bias of the retrieved papers is done using ROBIS Tool. It assesses both the risk of bias in a review and (where appropriate) the relevance of a review to the research question at hand. Specifically, it addresses 1) the degree to which the review methods minimised the risk of bias in the summary estimates and review conclusions, and 2) the extent to which the research question addressed by the review matches the research question being addressed by its user (e.g. an overview author or guideline developer). Bias occurs if systematic flaws or limitations in the design, conduct or analysis of a review distort the results. Evidence from a review may have limited relevance if the review question did not match the overview/guidelines question.

Conceptualization of inspiration

Although inspiration appears to be a conversant term, it has received little sustained attention in academia. It has been conceptualized narrowly within certain content domains (e.g., religious, creative, and interpersonal) or theoretical frameworks, as the authors indicated earlier in this study. The concept of inspiration has been employed in many disciplines including psychology (Thrash and Elliot, 2003), anthropology (Leavitt, 1997), theology (Aquinas, 1950; Canale,1994a, 1994b), education (Tjas et al., 1996), art and literature (Bowra, 1955; Harvey, 1999), engineering (Beer et al., 1997), management (Bass and Avolio, 1994; Dess and Picken, 2000), and communication (Frese et al., 2003; Rafferty and Griffin, 2004).

The year 2003 saw a seminal contribution in empirical research on inspiration. The significant section of empirical works on inspiration is ruled by two scholastic spaces: psychology and leadership. The three essential qualities of the state of inspiration are evocation, transcendence, and motivation, according to the tripartite conceptualization (Thrash and Elliot, 2003). Evocation suggests that inspiration is aroused by an external source and is involuntary. Inspiration involves the energization and direction of behavior. Transcendence suggests that inspiration attunes one toward something that is beyond one’s habitual limits enabling one to see better possibilities (Thrash and Elliot, 2003).

Although the tripartite conceptualization provides a useful characterization of the state of inspiration, important questions remain regarding the processes that give rise to these characteristics. Thrash and Elliot (2004) proposed that inspiration is a hybrid construct that emerges from the juxtaposition of two component processes. The first component involves an appreciation of and accommodation or adaptation to an evocative object which is referred to as ‘inspired by’. The second component involves a drive to imbibe the qualities demonstrated in the evocative object/person (referred to as ‘inspired to’).

The broad concept of inspiration discussed earlier can be directly extended to the sphere of creative action (Thrash and Elliot, 2003). Thrash and Elliot’s (2003) research related general trait inspiration to creativity. Even when creative self-concept was controlled, trait inspiration still predicted mean levels of self-reported creativity in daily life. Additionally, among a sample of inventors, the frequency of inspiration predicted the number of U.S. patents received. This latter finding is crucial since patents are a concrete measure of creative achievement (Thrash and Elliot, 2004). Thrash and Elliot (2003) reported inspiration could be an antecedent of creativity and that people’s creativity tends to depend on inspiration. Self-reported creativity and general state inspiration fluctuate within individuals, over time. This suggests that people could be more creative on days when they feel more inspired. In other words, inspiration could be studied as an antecedent of creativity.

Emergent themes

Trait assessment scale of inspiration

Inspiration is both a state and a personality attribute (Thrash and Elliot, 2004). These are thought to vary between and among individuals. Thrash and Elliot (2004) developed the inspiration scale (IS) as a trait assessment of inspiration. Even if the term ‘trait’ has many meanings, it relates to personal differences in the tendency to experience the condition of inspiration. The IS has two internally consistent four-item subscales: inspiration frequency and intensity. Both subscales have Cronbach’s coefficients of 0.90 or above, indicating that they are internally consistent. The IS demonstrates measurement invariance across time (two months) and demographics (patent holders and university grads), implying that the basic latent components have similar meaning across time and groups. Both subscales exhibit strong test-retest reliabilities of two months (r = 0.77). In a nutshell, the IS has outstanding psychometric properties. The intensity subscale was created as a status indicator (Thrash and Elliot, 2004; Thrash, Elliot et al., 2010).

Wellbeing

Thrash, Elliot et al. (2010) posited that inspiration promotes different forms of wellbeing, including ‘hedonic wellbeing’ (e.g., activated positive affect), which is ‘pleasure-oriented’, and ‘eudemonic wellbeing’ (e.g., self-actualization), which is ‘growth-oriented’. The component processes of being inspired by and to were theorized to foster gratitude and purpose in life, respectively, and gratitude and purpose were posited to mediate effects on a variety of wellbeing. Inspiration consistently resulted in enhancements in activated “positive affect, life satisfaction, vitality, and self-actualization” throughout a series of research designed for causal inference, including an experiment, two cross-lagged longitudinal studies, and a diary study (Thrash et al., 2010).

In a more recent study, Milyavskaya et al. (2012) found that inspiration predicts achievements of individual goals. They also highlighted that goal progress may act as an additional mediator of the impact of inspiration on wellbeing. According to Straume and Vittersø (2012), inspiration is a sign of eudemonic wellbeing in and of itself.

Role models

Lockwood et al. (2002) investigated inspiration in terms of good and negative role models using three experiments with three different populations. They used regulatory focus questionnaires, role model adjustment ratings, and motivation ratings. Hoyt and Simon (2011) looked at whether upward social comparisons to high-level female leaders had a detrimental impact on women’s self-perception and aspiration and discovered those female role models who contradicted the negative stereotype had a much more positive impact. People are motivated to compare themselves to superior role models to seek inspiration and hope (Hoyt and Simon, 2011). Role models at any level can be inspiring to the extent that individuals identify with them, consider their success as achievable, and “successfully disconfirm, at an explicit level, gender-stereotypical beliefs” (Hoyt and Simon, 2011).

Leadership

Molenberghs et al. (2015) and Waldman et al. (2011) studied the role of neuroscience in inspirational leadership and provided information on underlying brain processes associated with inspirational communication. Searle and Hanrahan (2011) used a phenomenological approach to study the lived and personal experiences of leaders, looking at inspiration as a psychological concept in the context of leadership. According to Rafferty and Griffin (2004), inspiring communication is one of the subdimensions of transformational leadership, in which leaders use inspirational appeals and emotive rhetoric to elicit followers’ motivation to move beyond self-interest for the good of the team Boies et al. (2015). Frese et al. (2003) presented and evaluated a management action training program that included inspirational vision communication as part of charismatic leadership training. They observed being inspirational as one aspect of charismatic leadership. Salas-Vallina and Fernandez (2017) investigated the relationship between inspirational leadership, participatory decision-making, and happiness at work. They found that participatory decision-making acts as a complete intermediary in the relation between inspired leadership and happiness at work. According to Mitchell and Boyle (2019), followers’ good moods tend to mediate the path between inspirational leadership and innovation, which could explain its various benefits. Inspiring leaders boost the team’s morale, which leads to more creative and flexible thinking. Mitchell and Boyle (2019) found that professional salience acts as a critical boundary condition in this relationship, with inspirational leaders increasing multidisciplinary team innovation through positive mood when a profession is salient. Salas-Vallina et al. (2020) looked at how inspirational leaders influence followers’ personality attributes and, as a result, their job happiness. Followers are motivated to actively learn by the intellectual stimulation provided by charismatic leaders. Leaders that instill a sense of responsibility and authority in their followers improve their employees’ quality of life (Salas-Vallina et al., 2020).

Social comparison

Burleson et al. (2005) and Lockwood et al. (2012) looked at the role of social comparison in understanding changes in a teen’s creative self-concept when looking at inspiration. They assessed unfavorable comparisons that created a sense of inferiority, as well as favorable parallels that instilled a sense of inspiration. They connected comparisons of inferiority to negative changes in self-esteem. They linked improvements in self-esteem to inspirational comparisons made during the training. Upward comparisons inspire people to make the transition to a new cultural setting, according to Lockwood et al. (2012).

Social learning

Xia and Li (2022) introduced a new pasture of the role of inspiration in facilitating people’s social learning and communication across settings. To advance the understanding of how people share what they know, they examined the association between the inspiring level of a given message and its likelihood of being shared. The researchers reported a positive association between them.

Advancement in methodological approaches

Instruments used

Thrash and Elliot (2003) developed the IS for their study. Subsequently, other authors (Thrash and Elliot, 2004; Thrash, Elliot et al., 2010; Thrash, Maruskin et al., 2010) used the IS for the research. Most authors (Hoyt, 2013; Hoyt and Simon, 2011; Lockwood et al., 2002, 2012; Parr et al., 2013; Souitaris et al., 2007; Stephan et al., 2015; Thrash et al., 2010; Van Kleef et al., 2015) used self-reported five-point scale to measure inspiration. Molenberghs et al. (2015) used the 204-item battery for visionary leadership (Kahan, 2002). Visionary leadership is transformative and based on the power of inspiration. Sosik and Dinger (2007) used Crowne and Marlowe’s (1960) social desirability scale-personal attributes shortened Reynolds’ (1982). Sosik and Dinger (2007) also used Good and Good’s (1972) 28-item dichotomously score to investigate inspiration through social power motivation. They also used Snyder and Gangestad’s 18-item scale to study the relationship between leaders’ personal attributes, leadership style, and inspirational vision themes. Table 2 offers an overview of the measurements used.

Sample characteristics and selection

The authors reviewed the characteristics of the sample to determine the commonalities and differences in the target respondents and the extent to which these were generalisable to populations of interest. They reviewed 26 papers, out of which 18 papers comprehensively discussed sample characteristics. Seven (of 26) papers did not indicate the gender of the respondents and two (out of 26) did not indicate the occupation of the sample. Table 3 provides an overview of sample criteria and characteristics.

Gender of the sample. The authors coded the gender information in the studies as female-only, male-only, mainly female, mainly male, and gender-balanced. Of the 26 studies, 18 studies were codable and the remaining five studies did not indicate any information about the gender of the sample. Three studies used only female samples; 10 studies used mainly females as the sample; four studies used mainly males, and only one study was gender balanced.

Occupation of the sample. 23 studies were codable as per the information indicated regarding the occupation. 12 (out of 23) studies where the occupation was coded indicated students were predominant in the sample selection. The researchers sub-coded the category of students as high school students and undergraduates wherein the latter was predominant. The sample of undergraduates included students of liberal arts, introductory psychology, personality psychology, science, and engineering. Two studies were based on a mixed sample. Six studies were coded as midlevel managers, fundraisers, customer service employees, public sector employees, focal leaders, and mixed. The sampling frames of the two studies were made up of allergy specialists from Spanish public hospitals and multidisciplinary healthcare teams based in the United Kingdom. Frontline banking personnel at Italian and Spanish banks were considered in one study.

Geographic region. 14 out of the 26 studies were codable for geographic regions. Seven (out of 14) were conducted in the United States, two studies each in Canada, Europe, India, and Australia, and one study in the United Kingdom.

The findings of the study are: