There is a growing interest in conceptualising employee voice across various theoretical disciplines - including Human Resource Management (HRM), Organizational Behaviour (OB), Industrial Relations ...(IR) and Labour Process (LP) – which approach the phenomena from diverse ontological anchor points. However, few consider the antithesis of voice, employee silence. This paper aims to advance a conceptual framework of voice and silence based on the inter-disciplinary integration of OB, IR and LP perspectives. Such an integrated approach may offer scholars, policy advocates and HR audiences a more reflective understanding of the social and psychological antecedents of employee voice and silence. The framework advances a critical pluralist view of employee silence by drawing on the concept of ‘structured antagonism’, which has been neglected in HRM and OB studies. A suggested future research agenda is outlined to help better integrate diverse approaches on employee voice and silence.
•The article presents an integration of Organizational Behaviour (OB) Industrial Relations (IR) and Labour Process (LP) perspectives to understanding employee voice and silence.•OB contributions include elements such as voice efficacy, psychological safety, image, identity, managerial behaviours, collective sense-making and emotions.•IR/LP insights build the concept of structured antagonism that underpin a deeper heuristic approach to HRM.•Employee silence may reflect worker strategies of ‘getting-back’, ‘getting-by’ and ‘getting-on’.•Silence may be mediated by intentional and/or unintentional silence.
Ein Vergleich der Arbeitsbedingungen im öffentlichen und privaten Sektor zeigt, dass beim Staat vor allem die Arbeitszeitregelungen beschäftigtenfreundlicher sind und der Schutz der Arbeitskräfte ...durch Tarifverträge und betriebliche Mitbestimmung umfassender ausfällt. Doch bei der Entlohnung bietet der Staat nur für Frauen Vorteile, während Männer sich in der Privatwirtschaft besserstellen als bei öffentlichen Arbeitgebern. Um im zunehmenden Wettbewerb um Arbeitskräfte bestehen zu können, sollte der öffentliche Dienst seine Bedeutung als Arbeitgeber stärker herausstellen, seine Attraktivität weiter steigern und vermehrt versuchen, Beschäftigte zu halten.
A comparison of working conditions in the public and private sectors shows that working time regulations in the public sector are more employee-friendly and that the protection of the workforce through collective agreements and co-determination is more comprehensive. However, in terms of wages, the public sector only offers advantages for women, while men are better off in the private sector. In order to persist in the growing competition for employees, the public sector should emphasise more strongly its importance as an employer, further boost its attractiveness for employees, and reinforce its attempts to retain employees.
Nearly all of the scholarship in the area of leader-follower relationships hinges on one construct: Leader-Member Exchange (LMX). Given the central role of this construct in leadership and ...organizational studies, it is critical that LMX be clearly understood and both measured and analyzed in a valid manner. This critique identifies systemic conceptual (e.g., unclear definition and unclear nomological net), measurement (e.g., measures that do not capture LMX's theoretical foundations and misalignment between conceptualization and measurement) and treatment (e.g., endogeneity) issues associated with the construct. Collectively, these issues lead us to conclude that the LMX construct is incapable of serving the needs of the theories it has traditionally served, and as currently constituted, is unlikely to advance leadership theory and practice in significant or meaningful ways. We conclude with recommendations for how scholars can move forward with the opportunity and challenge of replacing the LMX construct.
HEAVY IS THE HEAD THAT WEARS THE CROWN FOULK, TREVOR A.; LANAJ, KLODIANA; TU, MIN-HSUAN ...
Academy of Management journal,
04/2018, Volume:
61, Issue:
2
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Recognizing that powerholders operate in dynamic relational and interdependent work contexts, we posit that the effects of psychological power on powerholders are more complex than currently depicted ...in the literature. Although psychological power prompts behaviors and perceptions that harm the powerless, these reactions are not without consequence for the actor. We integrate the social distance theory of power with consent-based theories of power to posit that, although psychological power elicits negative behaviors and perceptions, these same reactions hurt leaders’ subsequent well-being. To explore this possibility, we conducted an experimental experience sampling study with a sample of managerial employees whom we surveyed for 10 consecutive workdays. We find that leaders enact more abusive behavior and perceive more incivility from others on days when they are exposed to psychological power compared to days when they are not. Leaders higher in agreeableness are less affected by psychological power. In turn, abusive behavior and perceived incivility harm leaders’ subsequent well-being as indicated by their reduced need fulfillment and ability to relax at home. We discuss theoretical implications for research on psychological power, abusive leadership, perceived incivility, and leader well-being, as well as practical implications for employees and their organizations.
THE SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF VOICE McCLEAN, ELIZABETH J.; MARTIN, SEAN R.; EMICH, KYLE J. ...
Academy of Management journal,
10/2018, Volume:
61, Issue:
5
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Open access
This paper explores the impact of two types of voice and gender on peer-rated social status and subsequent leader emergence. Across two studies—a three-wave field study and an experiment—we find that ...speaking up promotively, but not prohibitively, is positively and indirectly related to leader emergence via status, and that this relationship is conditional on the gender of the speaker. Specifically, men who spoke up promotively benefited the most in terms of status and leader emergence, not only compared to men who spoke up prohibitively, but also compared to women who spoke up promotively. This research extends our understanding of the outcomes of voice by articulating how it impacts one’s place in his or her group’s social structure, and ultimately whether he or she is seen as a leader. We also add to our understanding of leader emergence by suggesting that talking a lot or participating at a high level in a group may not be enough to emerge as a leader—it also depends how you do it and who you are.
When organizations crowdsource ideas, they select only a small share of the ideas that contributors submit for implementation. If a contributor submits an idea to an organization for the first time ...(i.e., is a newcomer), and the organization does not select the idea, this may negatively affect the newcomer's relationship with the organization and willingness to submit ideas to the organization in future. We suggest that organizations can increase newcomers' willingness to submit further ideas by providing a thus far understudied form of feedback: rejections. Though counterintuitive, we suggest that rejections encourage newcomers to bond with an organization. Rejections signal contributors that an organization is interested in receiving their ideas and developing relationships with them. To test our theory, we examine the crowdsourcing of 70,159 organizations that received ideas from 1,336,154 contributors. Using text analysis, we examine differences in how rejections are written to disentangle the mechanisms through which rejections affect contributors' willingness to continue to interact with an organization. We find that receiving a rejection positively impacts newcomers' willingness to submit ideas in future. This effect is stronger if the rejection includes an explanation and is particularly pronounced if the explanation matches the original idea in terms of linguistic style.
Although leader-member exchange (LMX) was identified in the literature nearly 40 years ago, a comprehensive empirical examination of its antecedents and consequences has not been conducted. The ...authors’ examination included 247 studies, containing 290 samples, and 21 antecedents and 16 consequences of LMX quality. Results indicated that while leader behaviors and perceptions, follower characteristics, interpersonal relationship characteristics, and contextual variables represent significant groups of LMX antecedents, leader variables explained the most variance in LMX quality. Moderator analyses revealed that the particular LMX scale, country of participants, and work setting studied did not produce meaningful influences on the relationships in the meta-analysis. However, power distance and individualism did moderate some of these relationships. To provide continuity with the LMX meta-analyses and conceptual reviews that have focused on LMX consequences, the authors tested a number of mediation models. The results demonstrated that LMX frequently plays a mediating role in the relationships where mediation could be tested.
Organizational scholars concur that supportive work relationships can attach employees to their workplace and improve the quality of organizational life, but they lack insights into how or why this ...occurs. Moreover, models of social support focus on what relationships provide without considering the fit between what people need and receive from their work relationships. Addressing these limitations, we developed and tested a theoretical model of relational attachment at work using a complementary fit perspective. After validating measures, we tested, extended, and replicated our model in three field studies. Results revealed that employees became more attached to their organization and experienced more beneficial outcomes when they had stronger psychological attachment to others at work. This relational attachment was not driven by general social support, but, rather, by "relational needs fit," which reflects employees' experience of having their needs met by their work relationships. However, receiving more personal support than what was wanted or needed intruded into employees' privacy boundaries and created a "too close for comfort" reaction whereby they pulled back from their work relationships. This "too much of a good thing" finding indicates that, while positive relationships at work are effective, social support should be tailored to individuals' needs.
In a series of qualitative and quantitative studies, we developed a model of the functions of positive work relationships, with an explicit focus on the role that these relationships play in employee ...flourishing. Stories that employees told about positive relationships at work revealed that relationships serve a broad range of functions, including the traditionally studied functions of task assistance, career advancement, and emotional support, as well as less studied functions of personal growth, friendship, and the opportunity to give to others. Building on this taxonomy, we validated a scale—the Relationship Functions Inventory—and developed theory suggesting differential linkages between the relationship functions and outcomes indicative of employee flourishing. Results revealed unique associations between functions and outcomes, such that task assistance was most strongly associated with job satisfaction, giving to others was most strongly associated with meaningful work, friendship was most strongly associated with positive emotions at work, and personal growth was most strongly associated with life satisfaction. Our results suggest that work relationships play a key role in promoting employee flourishing, and that examining the differential effects of a taxonomy of relationship functions brings precision to our understanding of how relationships impact individual flourishing.
Drawing on self-regulation theory, we contribute to the abusive supervision literature by testing supervisors' self-regulation impairment as a key mediator of the relationship between subordinate ...deviance and abusive supervision. Further, given that the process underlying the relationship between subordinate deviance and abusive supervision may be explained by social exchange theory, we examine the differential strength of supervisor self-regulation impairment versus social exchange as mediating mechanisms. We also explore the moderating effects of subordinate performance and supervisor bottom-line mentality (i.e., a one-dimensional frame of mind that revolves around securing bottom-line outcomes to the neglect of competing priorities) on the relationship between subordinate deviance and supervisor self-regulation impairment. We found that supervisor self-regulation impairment mediated the relationship between subordinate deviance and abusive supervision, and the indirect effect was stronger in the presence of high subordinate performance and high supervisor bottom-line mentality. We then replicated these findings in a longitudinal field study across four time periods, and demonstrated that self-regulation impairment provides a stronger explanation for the relationship between subordinate deviance and abusive supervision than social exchange. The theoretical and practical implications of our research are discussed.
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