Capitalizing on proactive personality over organizational socialization tactics in newcomer learning: A meta-analytic investigation.

Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol 111(7), Jul 2026, 901-915; doi:10.1037/apl0001351
The evolving workplace dynamics make it difficult for organizations to meet the customized learning needs of newcomers through standardized socialization programs. Consequently, attention has shifted toward leveraging newcomer proactivity as another pathway for facilitating newcomer learning. However, it remains unclear whether and when newcomer proactive personality can produce desired learning outcomes as organizational socialization tactics. We conducted a meta-analysis encompassing 85 independent samples (N = 24,293) to directly address this issue. Our findings indicate that proactive personality accounts for additional variance in newcomer learning outcomes beyond organizational socialization tactics. Importantly, the relative effectiveness of newcomer proactive personality compared to organizational socialization tactics is less salient among veteran (vs. neophyte) newcomers and in higher (vs. lower) individualistic cultures. Our findings also show that newcomer proactive behaviors serve as the crucial mechanism linking organizational socialization tactics and newcomer proactive personality to individual learning outcomes. Implications for how to facilitate newcomer learning are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)