Cognitive misfit of problem-solving style at work: A facet of person-organization fit

Based on Kirton's Adaption-Innovation Theory (1976, 1977) of problem-solving style at work, the construct of cognitive misfit was developed and proposed as one viable facet of Person-Organization fit. Cognitive misfit refers to the degree of mismatch between an individual's cognitive style of problem solving and the style demands of the work context. Relationships among cognitive misfit, job performance, and actual individual turnover after 3 years were examined in a sample of 253 engineers in either a Staff engineering function or a Research and Development (R&D) engineering function. The Staff function and the R&D function corresponded to a work context predominant in adaptive-style demands and a work context predominant in innovative-style demands, respectively. Results from logistic regression analyses showed that cognitive misfit was uncorrelated with job performance, but provided significant and substantial incremental validity in predicting actual turnover over the predictability provided by performance. Implications, limitations, and directions for future research were discussed in terms of levels of analysis issues and the current focus on Person-Organization fit in selection and organizational behavior research. (C) 1996 Academic Press.