Organizational Psychology

Purpose. Exploring the context of social capital in organizations is extremely important for both practitioners and researchers. Various theoretical and practical implication and application that demonstrate peculiarities of this phenomenon are presented in the literature. But, there is a lack of details about cognitive attitudes of social capital in organizations. The purpose of this paper is todevelop a conceptual model of cognitive social capital for organizations. Methodology. Based on thesocial-psychological approach which describes social capital as a system of employees’ relationship among them, partners and clients, a theoretical framework of organizational cognitive social capital has been created and presented. Findings. First of all, drawing on a variety of literatures, it is argued that there is a conceptual model of organizational cognitive social capital which consists of the following parts: 1) components of cognitive social capital, 2) positive and 3) negative factors influenced on the development of organizational social capital, 4) objectivation of social capital expressed through promotion, positive morale and corporate culture. Secondly, four dimensions of social capital are outlined in this paper: resource, network, economic and social-psychological. Resource aspect considers social capital as an aggregation of potential and actual resources owned by people. Economic approach studies competitive advantages which gain people including in social capital interactions. Network dimension highlights the importance of social networking. However, the networks are only communication channels which should be filled up with meaningful information. So, social-psychological approach explores a comprehensive content of social capital. Finally, facets and hierarchical levels of organizational social capital are analyzed. Implications for practice. Organizational cognitive social capital can be defined as an integrated semantic field which joins employees to reach actual targets and builds up company’s image for the internal and external environment. It is based on the trust, interaction norms (reciprocity, sense of equality, fairness), commitment to company goals and values. Originality. The concept of organizational cognitive social capital is introduced.