About

Dr. Paul W. Mulvey is an Associate Professor in the Department of Management, Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the Poole College of Management, North Carolina State University. He holds a Ph.D. in Labor and Human Resources from The Ohio State University and a Bachelor's degree in Psychology from Lehigh University. Prior to his current appointment, he has taught at The Ohio State University and the University of Connecticut. His research, teaching, and consulting focus on reward systems and practices, work teams, leadership, recruiting, and retention. Dr. Mulvey has received several teaching awards, including NC State’s Outstanding Teaching Award, and is a member of the Academy of Outstanding Teachers. He has conducted research, consulted, and instructed executive education with over 60 organizations. His work has been featured in national media such as National Public Radio’s All Things Considered and USA Today. He has presented numerous papers at national and international conferences and published articles in management journals including the Academy of Management Executive, Academy of Management Journal, and others. Additionally, he is an original co-author of publications related to employee rewards and pay, funded and published by WorldatWork.

Research topics

• Political Science
• Psychotherapist
• Business
• Psychology
• Clinical psychology
• Philosophy
• Public relations
• Social psychology
• Aesthetics

Selected publications

• The Hidden Costs of Pay Transparency: The Development of a Model

  Compensation & Benefits Review · 2025-11-15

  articleSenior author

  The rising demand for greater pay transparency from governments and stakeholders compels a need to understand its repercussions on employee and organizational outcomes. While often presumed to benefit employees, increased pay outcome transparency, in particular, poses potential costs that necessitate careful exploration. Existing studies have focused on a broad variety of visible outcomes like pay dispersion, as well as potential negative consequences such as strained employee relationships and counterproductive work behaviors for those perceiving pay inequity. Given these disparate findings, there is a critical need for a broader conceptual framework to discern when and why transparency may yield adverse organizational outcomes through negative emotions. Drawing on Affect Theory of Social Exchange (ATSE) and incorporating the relatively new concept of undermet pay standing expectations (UMPSE), we highlight the distinct yet overlapping emotional pathways of anger and envy. Specifically, UMPSE-driven anger may give rise to broad retaliatory behaviors, directed both at the organization (e.g., reduced commitment and withdrawal) and at coworkers (e.g., displaced hostility). In contrast, envy produces a more targeted social response, generating retaliatory behaviors primarily toward colleagues through social undermining. By differentiating the broader retaliatory scope of anger from the more interpersonal focus of envy, our model advances understanding of the nuanced emotional dynamics shaping employee reactions to pay transparency. Furthermore, we propose that a positive organizational justice climate should moderate the influence of UMPSE on negative emotions and, in turn, mitigate undesirable behaviors. We discuss the practical implications for mitigating these negative emotions and counterproductive work behaviors.

  PublisherDOI

• Organisational integrity, trust, dissociative identity, and HR

  Edward Elgar Publishing eBooks · 2024 · 3 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding
  • Business
  • Psychology
  • Psychotherapist

  This chapter examines the relationship of organisational integrity and the recently developed construct of organisational dissociative identity disorder (ODID), with its effects on trust in the organisation. It then explores several causes of ODID, including environmental occurrences, self-promoting agendas, breaking of psychological contracts, and attraction, selection, attrition (ASA), as manifested in several different HR systems.

  PublisherDOI

• From the Complex Present to the Risk-Laden Future of Trust: Over the Mountain & Into the Frying Pan

  Academy of Management Proceedings · 2023-07-24

  article

  This symposium brings together preeminent scholars within the domain of organizational trust to develop novel constructs and methods in the trust literature, as well as to further explore trust in the turbulent workplace of the present and the potentially ominous future. The papers vary in levels of analysis and provide different perspectives on factors affecting trust or factors affected by trust.

  PublisherDOI

• Longitudinal Message Framing Intervention: The Benefits of Prevention Focus Framing During Change

  Academy of Management Proceedings · 2023-07-24

  articleSenior author

  Returning to in-person work and adapting to “the new normal” brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic creates a period of organizational dynamism which has the potential to be beneficial or disruptive. We develop and test competing hypotheses with a randomized trial longitudinal intervention in the context of an organization undergoing change in work arrangements. Based on regulatory focus theory, it is possible that either promotion or prevention focus may facilitate more favorable job satisfaction and affective commitment trajectories in times of change. We tested the effects of the randomized trail intervention with 240 university faculty members across five months. Results shows that prevention focus facilitated job satisfaction and affective commitment trajectories that were stable over the period of organization dynamism, while promotion focus facilitated trajectories of decline. Further, supplemental analysis showed that the effects of the intervention were contingent upon individuals’ affective experience of the pandemic. The effect size for the intervention was stronger for individuals who had an unfavorable pandemic experience, while the more favorable pandemic experience group showed no significant difference.

  PublisherDOI

• Restoring trust in employers: Diagnosing & treating the perception that an organization has “multiple personalities”

  Behavioral Science & Policy · 2023 · 2 citations

  • Political Science
  • Psychology
  • Public relations

  Maintaining employee trust is essential for the success of an organization. Employees who trust their employers perform better and are more likely to stay in their jobs. We have identified a phenomenon that we call organizational dissociative identity disorder that tends to erode employee trust. The phenomenon is somewhat analogous to the psychiatric diagnosis of dissociative identity disorder, in which a person appears to have multiple personalities. In the case of organizations, it is the perception of employees that dealing with their organization is like dealing with a person who has multiple personalities. Employees tend to experience this perception when they receive directives that seem inconsistent with one another or with previous directives, leading the employees to doubt the ability, the benevolence, the integrity, and often the fairness of their employer. This perception is most likely to occur after a period of organizational change. We propose ways to identify this situation and ameliorate its effects through carefully crafted communications of various types involving stakeholders at all levels of the organization.

  PublisherDOI

• Novel Perspectives on Employees’ Work-Family Dynamics

  Academy of Management Proceedings · 2022-07-06

  article

  Research devoted to the intersection of work and family has achieved increasing attention over the past several decades (Allen, Johnson, Kiburz, & Shockley, 2013; Kossek & Lautsch, 2018). An abundance of management research on work-family conflict, family-work conflict, flexible work policies, work-from-home arrangements, suggests that there is substantial need to understand how employees experience and negotiate the work/life interface (Greenberg & Landry, 2011; Premeau, Adkins, & Mossholder, 2007; Park, Liu, & Headrick, 2020). Issues around employees’ work-family dynamics have become increasingly salient during the COVID-19 pandemic as many employees saliently balanced work and family demands with oftentimes fewer support resources (Vaziri, Casper, Wayne, & Matthews, 2020). This symposium brings together a group of researchers investigating issues around the work/life interface with the intent of adding to this practical and theoretically important conversation. Specifically, this symposium highlights several novel perspectives on understanding work-family intersection. First, through adopting a temporal lens, it explores how employees may cognitively switch between highly integrated work and family domains and the outcomes of such switches over time, and how employees’ work-family balance changes over time. Second, from the perspective of workers’ identity and social gender roles, the symposium examines how partners’ evaluation of workers' performance or perception of workers’ interrole conflict affects workers’ outcomes such as performance, job satisfaction, and relationship satisfaction. Last but not least, this symposium takes workers’ family members into consideration and demonstrates the spillover effect of workers’ work-related experiences (such as burnout) on their children. Transitions between Integrated Work and Family Domains: A Theoretical Model of Domain Switching Presenter: Ekonkar Kaur; U. of Washington, Seattle Presenter: Marcus Butts; Southern Methodist U. Work-Life Balance over Time: Returning to Work and the Effects of Embeddedness and Future Focus Presenter: Ian Siderits; North Carolina State U. Presenter: Patrick Flynn; North Carolina State U. Presenter: Sean Noble; North Carolina State U. Presenter: Paul W Mulvey; North Carolina State U. The Carryover of Social Evaluations at Home to Self-Evaluations at Work Presenter: Lindsay Mechem Rosokha; Purdue U., West Lafayette Presenter: Kelly Schwind Wilson; Purdue U., West Lafayette Presenter: Heidi Marie Baumann; Bradley U. The Impact of Asymmetry in Interrole Conflict Perceptions within Couples on Workers' Outcomes Presenter: Xing Liu; Wayne State U. Presenter: Christina Hymer; U. of Tennessee, Knoxville Presenter: Viva Nsair; Western Michigan U. Faking Parents Make Faking Adolescents: A Parent-Child Model of Burnout Presenter: Jiajin Sophie Tong; School of Psychological and Cognitive Sciences Presenter: Drake Van Egdom; U. of Houston Presenter: Jing Zhang; California State U. San Bernardino

  PublisherDOI

• Mixed Signals: The Role of Organizational Dissociative Identity Disorder on Trust Over Time

  Academy of Management Proceedings · 2022-07-06

  articleSenior author

  For many employees, it can often feel like different parts of their organization have different expectations of what should be done and how. Mayer and Williams (2021) recently defined this perception as Organizational Dissociative Identity Disorder (ODID), or the degree to which an organization member believes that the organization itself or groups and individuals within the organization hold distinct values, incentives, and goals. This perception is believed to have a negative impact on the trust relationship between an employee and their organization, particularly over time. The current study set out to both: a) affirm the existence of ODID through the development of a psychometrically sound measure and b) examine the influence of perceptions of ODID on trust over time during a period of great uncertainty. We conducted a longitudinal study of university faculty over the course of five months to establish a measure of ODID and understand its role in explaining trajectories of trust over time. Support was found for the existence of two ODID factors, ODID-Demands and ODID-Values, and for the moderating influence of ODID-Values on trust over time. Acting on ODID by examining and realigning expectations between managers and subordinates might serve the needs of both employees and the organization, thus making for a better world.

  PublisherDOI

• Destructive Leadership Episodes

  Leadership · 2021-11-16

  book-chapterSenior author

  The main purposes of our chapter are to foster more thought about destructive leadership as a process rather than a person and about how to prevent or minimize negative impacts of toxic episodes. We focus on destructive leadership using the university as the organizational vehicle through which to examine it. The toxic triangle model frames our analysis of three university scandals: Nassar and Michigan State University; Sandusky and Pennsylvania State University; and the fake (“paper”) classes at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In addition to a destructive leader, susceptible followers and conducive environments must be present for destructive leadership outcomes to occur. Our analysis takes a holistic view of leadership and attempts to integrate the literature with work on leadermember exchange and whistleblowers. The time dimension over which toxic episodes unfold is also examined. We argue that additional interdisciplinary work is needed to integrate relevant literatures. The role of checks and balances need more careful examination to inform a broader analysis of conducive environments. Organizational leaders should consider how to strengthen internal checks and balances, such as boards of trustees, to limit toxic environmental influences.

  PublisherDOI

• Gender Bias and Venture Funding: Discussing Bias in the Entrepreneurship Classroom

  Entrepreneurship Education and Pedagogy · 2019-10-14 · 4 citations

  article

  We report on the findings from an in-class experiment that represents a learning innovation which can enable classroom-based conversations about bias in the domain of entrepreneurship. More specifically, the present learning innovation explores gender bias in venture funding with regard to entrepreneurship. In an introduction to entrepreneurship class, we randomly assigned students to one of the three experimental conditions—students evaluated an executive summary for a venture either written by a woman, or a man, or one in which the gender was neutral (i.e., the control group). Students acted as if they were considering an investment and reported whether, for example, the executive summary was well written as well as how much equity they would want in the venture as a potential investor. Overall, these results provide evidence consistent with the inference that the students sampled in this study did not use gender as a decision-making heuristic when evaluating entrepreneurial opportunities. We discuss the results of our experiment and describe (a) how to replicate this activity, (b) how to discuss this in the classroom, and (c) how to adapt this activity to explore other types of bias (e.g., race, ethnicity, weight-based, etc.).

  PublisherDOI

• Volunteering as a Source of Meaningfulness: From HR in Nonprofits to Employer-Sponsored Volunteering

  Academy of Management Proceedings · 2016-01-01

  article

  Previous research has demonstrated that aside from the value that volunteering brings to organizations and society at large, individual volunteers also benefit from their volunteering activities by experiencing enhanced personal satisfaction, social connectedness, and meaningfulness in both their paid and unpaid work. Organizations in both profit and nonprofit sectors have therefore become increasingly interested in identifying workplace practices designed to enhance meaningful experiences through encouraging people to volunteer their time to important causes. This symposium brings together leading scholars who will make a contribution to current debates on volunteering by (a) identifying different human resource management practices that can be implemented to increase participation and retention of volunteers within nonprofit organizations as well as paid sector organizations as part of employer-sponsored volunteering programs, (b) analyzing the positive outcomes that can be generated from both forms of volunteering with regards to individual volunteers and their respective organizations, and (c) exploring the type of spillover effects between employees’ job attitudes and their volunteering activities. How Inclusive are Voluntary Organizations? Presenter: Georg von Schnurbein; U. of Basel Presenter: Sibylle Studer; U. of Lucerne The Job Satisfaction and Volunteering Link: A Compensation Spillover Longitudinal Investigation Presenter: Jonathan Edward Booth; London School of Economics Presenter: Daniela Lup; London School of Economics Accelerating Volunteering through Employee Volunteer Programs Presenter: Benjamin J. Lough; U. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Presenter: Yvonne Siu Turner; Points of Light Corporate Institute The Relationship between Performance and Volunteering and the moderating Influence of Commitment Presenter: Alexander Gloss; North Carolina State U. Presenter: Paul W Mulvey; North Carolina State U. Presenter: Beth Ritter; North Carolina State U. Strategic HR Management of Volunteer/Employee Interchangeability: A Social Enterprise Case Study Presenter: Kunle Akingbola; Lakehead U.

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Howard J. Klein

  The Ohio State University

  10 shared

• Roger C. Mayer

  7 shared

• Beth Ritter

  5 shared

• Ian Siderits

  North Carolina State University

  4 shared

• Robert L. Heneman

  State Library of Ohio

  4 shared

• Jeffrey M. Pollack

  North Carolina State University

  4 shared

• Patrick J. Flynn

  4 shared

• Jon C. Carr

  North Carolina State University

  4 shared

Labs

• Poole College of ManagementPI

Education

• B.S., Psychology

  Lehigh University

Awards & honors

• Board of Governors Award for Excellence in Teaching Award (2…