CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Most employees in organizations
today engage in one deviant behaviour or the other which violates
organizational norms and threatens the well-being of their organization and
such deviants include; theft, fraud, lateness to work, putting up laiz-affair
attitude, wasting raw materials during production, making long unnecessary
calls while on duty, destroying properties belonging to their organization and
co-worker and so on. Every employee has personal goal, aspiration and
expectations which they wish to achieve while working in their organization and
when these goals, aspirations and expectations are not met, they (employees)
tend to believe that they are not being treated well by their organization. Employees
tend to make “psychological contracts” with their employers (organizations)
right form the first day they are employed. Once these goals and expectations of
employees are not met, the (employees) perceive a breach in psychological
contract with the organization (Chiu & Peng, 2008). Employees may resort to
workplace deviant behaviours as one of the ways to express their grievances to
either the organization or coworkers for the unfair treatment to they received.
One of the critics is that workers most time perceive that they are treated in
a bad manner even when they are not.
Workplace
deviance may arise when the worker’s perceive that their organization has
mistreated them in some manner. Workplace deviance may be viewed as a form of
negative reciprocity. This is consistence with the proverbial maxims, which states
thus, “an eye for an eye”, or “tooth for tat’;, a concept which almost
all employees strongly believe is a suitable approach to most situations in
their organizations (Anderson & Pearson, 1999). Workplace deviance is a
phenomenon which occurs in several organizations not withstanding the age,
levels/position, of an employee. Research has suggested that manager’s
behaviour influences employees’ ethical decision making and organizational
behaviour of employees who perceive being treated respectfully and valued, such
individuals are less likely to resort to workplace deviance.
Griffin
and O’ Leary-Kelly, (2004) defined workplace deviance as a voluntary behaviour
that violates institutional norms and in doing so threatens the well-being of
the organization. Workplace deviance could be described as a deliberation or
intentional desire to cause harm to an organization. Robinson and Benneth,
(1995) defined workplace deviance as a voluntary behaviour by employees that
violate significant company norms, policies or rules and threatens the well
being of the organization. Employees who perceive treatment they receive from
their organization as “unfair” tend retaliate to their organization by engaging
in workplace deviance. Employees see workplace deviance as a means of pay back,
or balancing inequity by themselves in a way of causing harm to their
organization. These deviant workplace behaviours include; withholding effort,Coworker backstabbing, withholding
information, stealing, acting rudely to co-workers and management, lateness to
work, wasting raw-materials during production, involving in demonstration,
tarnishing rather than protect organizational image outside, sabotage,
destroying organizational properties and so on.
Workplace deviance include those
behaviours that are directed at the organization which includes, theft,
sabotage, lateness to work, making calls while on duty, putting little effort
into work (duty) and so on. Other deviant behaviours directed at individuals in
the workplace like supervisors, co-workers management include; playing pranks,
acting rudely, arguing during duties, stealing individual (co-workers)
properties, fighting and so on. Workplace deviance could be also addressed as
uncivil behaviours which are characteristically rude, discourteous, displaying
a lack of respect for others.
Bennet
and Robison (2000), classified workplace deviance into four types which
include; product deviance, property deviance, political deviance and personal
aggression. Product deviance is a type
of deviant behaviours are directed to the production department of an
organization with examples like; making unnecessary phone calls during work
time, intentionally slow working, telling stories during work period being
wasteful with raw material and so on. Property deviance is a type of deviant
behaviour is directed at destroying Organizational property, stealing
properties belonging to the organization and co- worker. Political deviance
occurs when managers and supervisors asks employees to engage in overtime work
and also additional duties beyond their job description of such employee not
considering such employees plight. This behaviour shows management and
supervisors’ willingness to have a full political control over subordinates
during and after work period. Most times supervisors direct employees to engage
in overtime or extra work time without payment or any form of compensation.
These behaviours include, fighting with employees, sexual harassment, verbal
aggression, that brings insult to supervisors, management and co-workers.
Managers and supervisors most time misuse their power or authority on their
sub-ordinate which may trigger negative reaction or emotions in the workplace
deviance and ultimately lead to personal aggressive behaviour from such
employee.
Robinson and Bennet, (1995) also
identified two types of workplace deviance which is based on deviance target,
they include; interpersonal and organizational deviants. Pulich and Tourigny,
(2004) supports that interpersonal deviances are misconduct behaviours targeted
at specific stakeholders such as the supervisors and co-workers. Other examples
of the interpersonal deviance include, gossiping about co-workers, blaming
co-workers, backstabbing (Pulich & Tourigny, 2004). The second type of the work place deviant
based on the deviance target is the Organizational deviance which workers
direct or aim at the Organizational property or production. Employees engage in
this type of deviant behaviours which include, stealing Organizational
properties, withholding efforts and information, wasting raw materials during
production and so on (Robinson & Benneth, 1995). Tangirala and Ramannjam,
(2008) described employee “silence” as form of Organizational deviance
behaviour in which that employee intentionally or unintentionally withhold any
type of information that might be useful to the organization due to the
injustice or unfair treatment they receive from their organization. Recently,
due to the development in information and technology in the workplace, a new
deviance known as “cyber loafing” had emerged because it is carried out on the
internet. During work hours, employees engage in non work related task instead
of work related task on the internet using the computer and their mobile
phones. Example is employees who chat in the social network such as face book,
twitter, badoo, nimbuzz and so on (Zoghbi, 2006).
There are numerous consequences of
workplace deviance which include; reduction in productivity, increase in
absenteeism, job dissatisfaction, sabotage, decrease in employees’ morale,
turnover, decrease in quality of products, counter productivity, financial
involvement and so on. Employees sometimes suffer from psychological effects
such as anxiety, anger, and irritability which may lead to physical aggression
(Fitzgerald, 2002). Deviant workplace behaviours are both pervasive and
costly not only in term of finance but also in social
and psychological perspectives (Peterson, 2002). The negative consequences
of deviant behaviours to work organization are significant (Vardi & Winer, 1996), therefore, this explains why deviant behaviours
within organization should not be neglected anymore. Researchers suggest that
workplace deviance is a reaction to inequity in the workplace or employers’
violation of obligation owned to employees (Greenberg & Scott, 1996).
Workplace deviance could occur in the organizations/ workplace where working
environment is hostile, unconducive, and also where employees feel
powerlessness, voiceless, perceives unfairness and inequity (lack of
Organizational justice) in the workplace. Employees feel cheated when they
perceive absence of Organizational injustice (distributive, procedural,
interactional and informational justice) (Blau & Anderson, 2005). When
employees are not treated in an unfair manner, workplace deviance could be the
resultant outcome.
There
are many factors which could propel employees towards engaging in workplace
deviant but the researcher is interested in two among others which include; Organizational
justice and Workplace deviance. The issue of fairness which is known as
organizational justice has being a very key concern to all employees. Vardi and
Wiener, (1996) stated that workplace deviant behaviours were
related with the perception of inequity and mistreatment (organizational
justice) in Organizations. According to
Folger, (1977), employees’ response to work depends on the type of treatment
they receive which may be either fair of unfair. Also, employees’ attitude and
commitment to work most times is determined by their perception of the level of
Organizational justice that exists in their organization (workplace).
Organizational justice is based on Adams’ (1963:1965), equity theory, also to current work
of (Greenburg, 1987; Folger, 1977). It’s root could be also traced to the
Homan’s, (1961) Social exchange theory. Adam, (1963), explained that man
suffers from cognitive dissonance when things do not go in the manner they are
expected. When an employee do not get reinforcement or reward he/she expects
from their employed organization, such employee’s private, family, social,
emotional and other personal aspect of life would be affected and in return, it
would effect his/her performance at their workplace and general commitment to
work.
Organizational
justice was first used by Greenburg, (1996) as a concept expressing the
employees’ perception about how fair they were treated by their organization
and how these perceptions affected loyalty and satisfaction in terms of
Organizational behaviour. When employees perceive that there is no favourable,
“outcome”, such as, attractive salary, promotion, incentives, and also
organization treating workers with dignity, respect, and so on, their
perception about the “outcome” will be seen as unfair, and this could motivate
them to indulge in workplace deviant behaviour in a quest to restore equity
within them selves. The civic virtue of employees depends on their perception
of the level and form of existing organizational justice in their workplace. An
employee’s civic virtue is the levels of employees’ reaction persuading the
management of organization behave properly (Organ, 1988). Eskew, (1993)
supports the view of the organizational behavioural scientists which believe
that the interest in employee’s perception about Organizational justice has
increased in the last ten (10) years. Organizational justice in workplaces is
based on fairness in perception. Moreover, in organizations, employees’
perception of unfairness results to negative reactions such as, withdrawal,
absenteeism, theft, tardiness, resistance to change, and retaliatory
behaviours.
The issue of fairness is a key concern to virtually
all individuals in our society. Every employee in their work settings often try
to strike a balance to know whether the rewards they receive from their
organization match their contributions to the organization or the rewards
received by their colleagues (Adams, 1965; Leventhal, 1976). Employees in
organizations also judge the fairness of the decision making procedures used by
Organizational representatives, to see whether those procedures are consistent,
unbiased, accurate, correctable, and representative of worker concerns and
opinion (Greenberg, 1986; Leventhal, 1980; Thibant & Walker, 1975).
Employees go to the extent of considering the interpersonal treatment they
receive as procedures are implemented by authority figures (Bies & Moag,
1986; Greenberg, 1993). Organizational justice researches in our organizations
(workplace) could help us explain why employees retaliate against inequitable
outcome or inappropriate processes and interactions (Alsalem & Alhaiani,
2007).
Different groups of scholars studied
Organizational justice had explain and classify it in several models or
dimensions. Some scholars classified and explained Organizational justice into
four models or dimensions namely; Distributive justice, Procedural,
Interactional and Informational justice. The researcher in the study explains
Organizational justice according in three models or dimension. The first
dimension of Organizational justice is the Distributive justice, according to
Adams, (1965), it is refer to as an employee’s perceptions of the extent to
which the outcome he or she receive from their organization such as pay,
salary, allowances and so on are fair. He was of the view that a fair
distribution within allocation processes is established when outcomes comply
with internal norms such as equity (Adams,
1965), equality, or need (Deutsch, 1975; Leventhal, 1976). This dimension tend
to focus more on outcome, satisfaction or the evaluation of some final decision
concerning an individual more than attitude about the system (McFarlin &
Sweeney, 1992; Sweeney & McFarlin, 1993). Distributive justice is related
to workplace deviance because when employees perceives that the extent to which
the outcome he/she receives pay such as salary and allowances from their
organization is not fair, they would like to strike a balance or earn equity by
themselves and this may result to workers engaging in work place deviance in
other to retaliate the unfair treatment they get from their Organization. This
describes and explains why employees individually engage in workplace deviance
such as; lateness to work, being wasteful with raw materials, destroying
organizational properties, laiz affair attitude to work, insulting supervisors
and co-workers.
The second dimension is
the Procedural justice, which according to Greenberg, (1990), concerns that
fairness of the ways to determine the distribution and determining job
involvement in organization. This dimension of Organizational justice is very
important and explains how employees meet their socio-emotional needs through
human resources management polices and practices like reward allocation,
organizational justice and employee’s support programs which are available in
their organization. Procedural justice examines the perceptions of fairness
about the processes and procedures used to make allocation decisions (Folger
& Greenberg, 1985). Procedural justice has been shown to predict various
important organizational behaviours and attitudes such as performance
(Cropanzano & Prehar, 1999) and organizational commitment (Folger &
Konovsky, 1989; McFarlin & Sweeney, 1992). Procedural justice has been
shown to be related to identify concern of individuals (Tyler & Blader,
2003) and this is because it moves the employees to check whether they are
full-fledged and respected members of a group or organization (Tyler &
Lind, 1992). Fairness in decisions concerning resources distribution should have
a strong cumulative effect on perceived organizational support and perhaps job
involvement by indicating a concern for employee’s welfare (Shore & Shore
1995).
Procedural justice perceptions are
affected by the extend to which employees believe they have a voice in the
decision making process (Thibault & Walker, 1975) and when decision making
is perceived as consistent, ethical, lacking bias, possible to appeal, and based on accurate
information (Leventhal, Karuza & Frye, 1980). Recent meta-analysis studies
have found that Procedural justice can predict counterproductive behaviours
(Cohen-Charash & Spector, 2001, in Forret & Love, 2008), non
cooperative management behaviour (Rahim, Magner & Shapiro, 2000, in
Forret & Love, 2008), and aggression directed at one’s supervisor
(Greenberg & Barling, 1999, in Forret & Love, 2008). Employees are
likely to retain positive attitudes towards their organization when the
procedures determining the decision were fair, moreover when the decision
itself resulted in an unfavourable outcome (McFarlin & Sweeney, 1993;
Schanbroeck, May & Brown, 1994). Whenever employees in any organization
perceive that they don’t have a voice or contribution in decision and policies
making in their organization, most times employees engage in workplace deviance
regularly to show their grievances about the poor level of Procedural justice
in such Organization. These employees may decide to demonstrate their
grievances through destruction of properties, indulging in strike actions or
rejecting or resisting Organizational change in their organization. The third
model or dimension is the Interactional justice which is referred to as an
individual’s perception of fair treatment by an organization’s decision makers
(Bies & Moag, 1986) and this includes; treating employees with dignity,
honesty and respect, as part of interpersonal justice while Informational
justice treatment include; providing explanations for procedures and negative
events) components (Colquitt, 2001 & Greenberg, 1993). It is important to note
that Organizational justice should have a strong symbolic function which is to
provide information about the value and respect given to individuals
(employees) by their organization as suggested by Tyler & Lind, (1992).
Researchers overtime had adopted this approach were by the human resource
decisions, policies and practices are evaluated in terms of employees’
perceived of Organizational justice by and then those perceived feeling are
measured with job commitment in non-profit organizations to know it’s outcome.
Perceived Organizational justice and support are related to not only job
involvement, but to job satisfaction and Organizational identification process
(Jones, 2007).
Many
organizations today have a zero or little employee-employer relationship, organizational
friendly culture, family friendly policy and support programs which are part of
the Procedural justice, and this affects the behaviour of the employees in
workplaces. Few organizations today had improved on their employees’ family friendly
and support programs, Organizational culture and policies while other
organizations had decided not to improve on theirs. The family is a very
important domain in every individual’s live and it has a very high influence on
employees’ work live. This is the reason organizations and their management
should put in their best in other to help employees manage their roles from the
work and family domains. Organizations today need to improve the welfare of
employees and introduce supportive programmes which include employees’
work-family friendly cultures and policies to reduce the work-family conflict
which are caused by multiple role conflict thereby reducing workplace deviance
which are it’s product.
Every
individual employee is faced with multiple roles in life and these roles emerge
from the two warring domain (family and work) which compete with each other.
Katz and Kahn, (1978) suggested that conflict arises when individuals engage in
multiple roles that are incompatible. When these multiple roles compete with
each other, they end up causing conflict in the life of employees. According to
Kahn, Wolfe, Quinn, Smock and Rosenthat, (1964) roles are the result of
expectations of others about appropriate behaviour in a particular position in
life. Role conflict is therefore described as a psychological tension that is
aroused by conflicting pressures. Greenhause and Bentell, (1985); Cinamen and
Rich, (2002) defined work-family conflict as a “form of inter-role conflict in
which the role pressure from the work and family domains are mutually
incompatible in some respect”. Balancing multiple roles can increase the
interpersonal and intrapersonal conflict experience by employees (women and
men) and simultaneously maintain professional and personal responsibilities. Work
and family domain are two central components in people’s lives and thus demand
a great deal of time and energy to manage their multiple responsibilities. In
addition, work and family role can have a meaningful impact on psychological
wellbeing and satisfaction of employees (Kossek & Ozeki, 1998;
Schwartizberg & Dytell, 1996). Work-family conflict occurs when “roles
pressures associated with membership in one organization (work) are in conflict
with pressures, steaming from membership in other group (family)” (Kahn, Wolf,
Quinn, Smock & Rosen, 1964). From the work-family perspective, conflict
reflects the degree to which work demands interfere with family
responsibilities. Similarly, family-work conflict (FWC) occurs when
responsibilities associated with one’s family roles interfere with work related
role demands. The tasks and roles related to family domain include; childcare,
the care of an aging parent, household responsibilities, as well as additional
responsibilities that may arise as a result of one’s role within the family
while the tasks and roles related to the work domain include; hours of paid
work, and can additionally include overtime work, work related travel, and work
obligations that are fulfilled at home.
Work-family
conflict can be time-based, strain-based or behavioural basedaccording to Greenhaus and Benthall,
(1985). The conflict between these two domains could be time-based when role
pressure steaming from the two different domain (work and family) compete for
the individual’s limited time as suggested by Greenhaus and Bentall (1995).
Nevertheless, work-family conflict could be said to be strain-based when it
occurs as result of a strain experiences in one role domain interfering with
effective performance of role behaviours in the other domain Greenhaus and
Bentall, (1995). According to Greenhaus
and Bentall, (1995), they suggested also that work-family conflict could be
behavioural-based when conflict steaming from incompatible behaviours demanded
by competing roles from different domain interfering with other domain (work
and family). The most common among the three types of conflict, is the time
based conflict, this is because it is based on the scarcity hypothesis of time
which suggests that the sum of human energy is fixed and that multiple roles
inevitably reduce the time and energy available to meet all role demands, thus
creating strain (Goode, 1960) and work conflict (Marks, 1977).
It
has been documented that employees with significant dependent elderly parents,
young children or employees with large number of family members tend to report
higher levels of work-family conflict; Frone, Rusell, and Cooper, (1992);
Greenhaus, Guteck, Searle and Klepa, (1992). It is very necessary to strike a
balance between the two domains to reduce conflict in life of employees. These
conflict employees face each day results to; increase turnover, increase
absenteeism, reduction in performance, poor physical, mental and psychological
health etc., Barnett and Baruch, 1985; Barnett and Marshall, 1992; Roskies and
Carrier, (1994), believed that multiple roles have been associated with
positive outcome which include; higher self-esteem and life satisfaction while (Frone,
Russell & Cooper, 1991; Kopelman, Greenhaus & Connolly, 1983; Watkins
& Pulich, 1995) suggested that the perceptions of insufficient time and
energy to successfully perform work and family roles which results to
work-family conflict has associated with job and family dissatisfaction,
depression, life stress, work and family tension.
The work domain have other
organizational factors which increases the occurrence of work-family conflict
which include; unfair organizational injustice which employees perceive in the
workplace, management method and system, organizational policies, the personality
of the decision makers and supervisors, workplace culture, working environment
(unconducive), work timing, work over load and stress (Galinsky, Bond &
Friedman, 1996; Greenhaus & Bentell, 1985; Thompson, Beauvais, &
Lyness, 1999). If these factors are allowed to crossover or spillover from
family domain to the work domain it will result to conflict in the work domain
and vice visa. Recently, family-work conflict has been examined from a system
perspective demonstrating that one member of a couple’s experience of
family-work conflict can significantly impact on their partner’s experience of
work-family conflict (Hammer, Allen & Grigsby, 1997). The work and family
“cross over effect” of stress and strain from one member of a dyad to the other
have been recently presented in a theoretical model developed by Westman,
(2001).
The work-family (WFC) and
family-work conflict (WFC) is a very important area of study because both
employers and employees struggle with multiple roles (Baruch & Barnett,
1987). These roles includes; employees’ personal life, taking care of children,
aged parent and relatives apart from work and social roles such as carrying out
the daily work duty, attending official and social meetings among others.
Researchers have suggested that family conflict has been associated with a
member of dysfunctional outcomes (Bacharch, Baruberger, & Conley, 1991),
decreased family and occupational well-being (Kinnuen & Manuo, 1998). The
domain flexibility hypothesis predicts that the work domain is a greater source
of conflict than the family domain for both men and women. The “domain salience
hypothesis” predicts the family domain is a greater source for women and the
work domain is greater source of conflict for men, (Isreal, 1993). Other
dysfunctional outcome of work-family conflict include, anxiety, depression,
poor health and family relationship, increase interpersonal conflict, divorce
and for family-work conflict (FWC), examples include; absenteeism, tardiness,
loss of talented employees, raw materials waste and so on.
Nevertheless, much of the
organizational psychological researches carried out on work-family conflict has
been based on the premise that multiple roles inevitable create stress and
strain to employees (Chapman, IngerSoll – Dayton & Neal 1994; Frone,
Russell & Cooper, 1992; Golf, Mount & Jamison, 1990). Also, employees’
attitude and commitment to work many a time is determined by employees’
perception of the type of organizational justice that exist in such
organization (workplace). Employees’ tend to be more committed to work, by
protecting organizational property, being less wasteful during production and
also not sabotaging their organization if they perceive “fair” treatment from
their organization.
In
quest to understand more about the work-family conflict another group of
researchers has found evidence of positive spillover, both from these research
studies supported the enhancement hypothesis supply of energy is abundantly and
expendable (Mark, 1977). This goes ahead to explain that one could expand his
energy to do more roles when organized and planned with less conflict.
Employees who plans and arrange their selves well could carry out roles are
duties with less conflict. Baruch and Barnett, (1987), found that women who
have multiple life roles such as motherhood in the family, work duties in the
office, were found to be less depressed and have higher self-esteem than women
and men who have fewer life roles. Furthermore, Gutek, Searle and Klepa (1992)
found out from their research work that women experience greater work-family
conflict more than their male counterpart.
Statement of the
Problem
Workplace
deviant, a regular phenomenon which occurs in our organizations daily had
caused so many problems to organizations and their employees. These deviant behaviours
had lead to destroying and stealing both the organizational and other employees’
properties causing financial losses to organizations, fraud, decreased
employees’ morale, increased turnover rate, decreased productivity and so on
(Evention, Jolton & Mastangelo, 2007; Hollinger & Clark, 1982). Employees
most times resort to engage in deviance such as fraud, absenteeism, lateness to
work, insolence, cyber loafing, employee silence, raw material wasting, strike
actions, destroying properties belonging to their organization and their
employee as a way of showing their grievances.
Different
organizational management had tried their best to see how they can minimize the
rate at which employees engage in deviant behaviours but have not achieved much
because there are many other factors that enhance the rate at which workers
engage into workplace deviant behaviours rather than just motivation and
provide conducive working environment alone (Vardi & Weiner, 1982; Markus
& Schuler, 2004). Among many other factors which may motivate or enhance
employees to indulge in workplace deviance, the researcher is interested in
only two of them namely, organizational justice and work-family conflict. Bases
on this, the researcher would want to investigate the following;
(1) Whether the four dimensions of
organizational justice:
(a)
Procedural, (b) Distributive, (c)
Interpersonal justice and (d) Informational justice, will predict the occurrence of workplace deviance
among non academic staff of University
of Nigeria Nsukka.
(2)(a) Whether work-family conflict will
predict workplace deviance.
(b) Whether family-family conflict will
predict workplace deviance.
Purpose of the Study
Since organizational justice and
work-family conflict enhances the rate at which worker engagement into
workplace deviance in organizations are still going on, the researcher would
like to investigate the following:
- Whether the four dimensions of
organizational justice
- Procedural
justice (b) Distributive justice (c) Interpersonal justice and
- Informational
justice, will predict the occurrence of workplace deviance among non academic
staff in University
of Nigeria Nsukka.
- (a) Whether work-family conflict will
predict the occurrence of workplace
deviance among non academic staff in University of Nigeria
Nsukka.
(b)
Whether family-work conflict will predict workplace deviance among non academic
staff in University
of Nigeria Nsukka.
Operational Definition
of Terms
Organizational justice:
Refers to in the study as the employees’ perception of fairness and unfairness
in an organization and is measured by the organizational justice scale
developed by Colquitt, (2001)
Work-family conflict: Refer
to in the study as the extent to which an employee’s work interferes with his
or her family role which is measured by work-family conflict scale by Carlson,
Kacmar and Williams (2000).
Work-place deviance: Refers to in the study as a voluntary behaviour of organizational members (employees) that violates significantly organizational norms which threatens the organizational well-being and is measured by workplace deviance behaviour scale by
