Looking back and falling further behind: The moderating role of rumination on the relationship between organizational politics and employee attitudes, well-being, and performance

An Empirical Study of Social Loafing Behavior among Public Officers in South Korea: The Role of Trust in a Supervisor, Perceived Organizational Support, and Perceived Organizational Politics

This study explored the effects of trust in a supervisor (TIS) on social loafing behaviors of employees. In addition, this study examined the mediating effect of perceived organizational support (POS) on the relationship between trust in a supervisor and employees' social loafing behaviors. It also examined the moderating effects of perceived organizational politics (POP) on the relationship between TIS and POS, TIS and social loafing behaviors, and POS and social loafing behaviors. Data were collected from local government employees in Korea, and the final sample was 260. Our results indicate that trust in a supervisor has indirect negative effects on social loafing behaviors mediated by POS. In addition, it was found that the effects of TIS on POS and POS on social loafing behaviors were moderated by POP. The results of this study contribute to the extant literature on social loafing behaviors. Moreover, the findings imply that political behaviors in organizations might induce social loafing behaviors.

Self-Reflection at Work: Why It Matters and How to Harness Its Potential and Avoid Its Pitfalls

It is difficult to fathom how an organization could be successful without its employees engaging in self-reflection. Gone would be its personnel's capacity to problem-solve, learn from past experiences, and engage in countless other introspective activities that are vital to success. Indeed, a large body of research highlights the positive value of reflection. Yet, as both common experience and a wealth of findings demonstrate, engaging in this introspective process while focusing on negative experiences often backfires, undermining people's health, well-being, performance, and relationships. Here we synthesize research on the benefits and costs of self-reflection in organizational contexts and discuss the role that psychological distance plays in allowing people to harness the potential of self-reflection while avoiding its common pitfalls.

Does organisational politics always hurt employee performance? Moderating–mediating model

Purpose

Drawing on the job demands-resources theory, this study investigates the mediating role of job satisfaction and the moderating roles of abusive supervision and perceived organisational support (POS) in the relationship between perception of organisational politics (POP) and employee job performance. This study hypothesised that employees with high POS and low abusive supervision can function effectively even in organisations with a high level of organisational politics.

Design/methodology/approach

The study was conducted anonymously on 408 employees, from companies operating in Poland which were completed using the computer-assisted telephone interview method. Statistical verifications of the moderation and mediation analyses were conducted with PROCESS macro.

Findings

The results showed that a high level of POP does not diminish employee performance when employees perceive low levels of abusive supervision and a high level of POS. Furthermore, the results revealed that job satisfaction mediates between POP and employee performance.

Originality/value

This study integrated research on politics, abusive supervision and POS to examine the collective impact of these variables on employee performance. The findings have important implications in terms of the potential buffering that can be applied to reduce the negative impacts resulting from POP.

Can qualitative job insecurity instigate workplace incivility? The moderating roles of self-compassion and rumination

Purpose

This study examines why and when qualitative job insecurity (JI) leads to instigated workplace incivility.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors collected data from 227 Chinese full-time employees from multiple organizations at two time points. Structural equation modeling was used to test hypotheses.

Findings

Results show that qualitative JI is positively related to instigated workplace incivility through negative emotions; this indirect relationship is weaker among employees with higher self-compassion and stronger among employees with higher rumination.

Originality/value

The authors shift the predominant focus on the predictor of instigated workplace incivility from quantitative JI to qualitative JI. Based on the transactional model of stress and the stressor–emotion model of counterproductive work behavior (CWB), they provide new theoretical insights on why qualitative JI affects workplace incivility and identify new boundary conditions that affect employees' reactions to qualitative JI.

Shifting Focus from Burnout and Wellness toward Individual and Organizational Resilience

Burnout is reported to be epidemic among physicians and medical trainees, and wellness has been the predominant target for intervention in academic medicine over the past several years. However, both burnout and wellness suffer from a lack of standardized definition, often making interventions difficult to generalize and extrapolate to different sites. Although well-meaning, current frameworks surrounding wellness and burnout have limitations in fully addressing the challenges of improving physician mental health. Wellness as a framework does not inherently acknowledge the adversity inevitably experienced in the practice of medicine and in the lives of medical trainees. During a crisis such as the current pandemic, wellness curricula often do not offer adequate frameworks to address the personal, organizational, or societal crises that may ensue. This leaves academic institutions and their leadership ill-equipped to appropriately address the factors that contribute to burnout. More recently, resilience has been explored as another framework to positively influence physician wellness and burnout. Resilience acknowledges the inevitable adversity individuals encounter in their life and work, allowing for a more open discussion on the tensions and flexibility between facets of life. However, emphasizing personal resiliency without addressing organizational resiliency may leave physicians feeling alienated or marginalized from critical support and resources that organizations can and should provide. Despite intense focus on wellness and burnout, there have not been significant positive changes in physicians' mental health. Many interventions have aimed at the individual level with mindfulness or other reflective exercises; unfortunately these have demonstrated only marginal benefit. Systems level approaches have demonstrated more benefit but the ability of organizations to carry out any specific intervention is likely to be limited by their own unique constraints and may limit the spread of innovation. We believe the current use of these conceptual lenses (wellness and burnout) has been clouded by lack of uniformity of definitions, an array of measurement tools with no agreed-upon standard, a lack of understanding of the complex interaction between the constructs involved, and an over-emphasis on personal rather than organizational interventions and solutions. If the frameworks of burnout and wellness are limited, and personal resilience by itself is inadequate, what framework would be helpful? We believe that focusing on organizational resilience and the connecting dimensions between organizations and their physicians could be an additional framework helpful in addressing physician mental health. An organization connects with its members along multiple dimensions, including communication, recognition of gifts, shared vision, and sense of belonging. By finding ways to positively affect these dimensions, organizations can create change in the culture and mental health of physicians and trainees. Educational institutions specifically would be well-served to consider organizational resilience and its relationship to individuals.

Please Like Me: Ingratiation as a Moderator of the Impact of the Perception of Organizational Politics on Job Satisfaction

Drawing from the negative impacts of the perception of organizational politics (POP) on the literature on organizational outcomes, the model proposed in this study examines a nonlinear relationship of POP on job satisfaction. In a similar way, ingratiation as a moderator variable is tested. Based on a survey of 240 state-owned enterprise employees in Indonesia, this study finds that POP exhibits an inverted U-shaped relationship with job satisfaction. Low and high levels of POP have a negative impact on job satisfaction. Nevertheless, our most intriguing finding is that ingratiation behavior not only strengthens POP’s effects on job satisfaction, but can also alter the direction of the relationship in which its shape is represented by a U-shape. This shape indicates that the employees who engage in high levels of ingratiation as a coping mechanism and adaptive strategy tend to do so when they perceive high degrees of POP. These results are then discussed from a cross-cultural perspective as an attempt to explain the legitimacy of ingratiation in Indonesia.

When does abusive supervision mitigate work effort? Moderating roles of cognitive reappraisal and rumination

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to examine the boundary condition roles of cognitive reappraisal and rumination in the link between abusive supervision and work effort.

Design/methodology/approach

Survey data were collected from 545 highly skilled employees of manufacturing companies. We excluded 161 of these questionnaires because they were incomplete and used 384 questionnaires in the analyses. To assess the validity of proposed hypotheses, we conducted hierarchical regression analysis.

Findings

The results indicate that cognitive reappraisal weakens the negative link between abusive supervision and work effort. Moreover, individuals who ruminate tend to exhibit reduced work effort when they experience abusive behavior from their supervisors.

Originality/value

This study is the first to investigate the moderating roles of cognitive reappraisal and rumination in the link between abusive supervision and work effort. The findings can help organizations understand the situations when abusive supervision decreases levels of work effort among employees and when subordinates maintain their levels of work effort.

An exploration of employee dreams: The dream-based overnight carryover of emotional experiences at work

OBJECTIVE

We sought to explore the manner in which daily challenge and hindrance stressors at work may be associated with mood the next day, through the mediating mechanisms of presleep rumination and moods experienced while asleep during dreams.

METHODS

A daily diary study in which 94 adults with full-time jobs completed 2 surveys per day for 2 work weeks. Each morning, participants reported the degree to which they engaged in rumination before sleep the previous night, the affective tone of their dreams, and their mood at that moment. Each evening participants reported their experiences of challenge and hindrance stressors at work that day.

RESULTS

Hindrance stressors were positively related to next-morning negative affect via the effects of rumination and negative affect in dreams. Challenge stressors negatively related to positive affect in the morning, via rumination and lowered positive affect in dreams. These results occurred above and beyond the effects of sleep quantity, sleep quality, and several other time-based control variables.

CONCLUSIONS

Dreams play an important role in how work stressors which are experienced in a given workday are associated with mood the next morning.

Self-regulation failure as a moderator of the pops–work outcomes relationships

Purpose

Drawing upon cognitive control theory, we examine the effects of self-regulation failure (SRF) on the relationships between perceptions of organizational politics (POPs) and tension, exhaustion, satisfaction, work effort, perceived resource availability and performance/contribution.

Design/methodology/approach

We test hypotheses across three unique studies (Study 1: 310 employees from various occupations; Study 2: 124 administrative/support employees; Study 3: 271 Chinese hotel managers) using hierarchical moderated regression analyses.

Findings

Across studies, results suggest that POPs had a minimal impact on work attitudes, behaviors and health-related outcomes when SRF was low. However, employees experiencing high SRF reported adverse consequences in high POPS settings.

Research limitations/implications

These studies relied on self-report data. However, we implemented design features to mitigate potential concerns and analytic techniques to determine method effects. This paper contributed to the POPs literature by explaining how SRF and POPs interact to impact meaningful work outcomes.

Practical implications

Leaders should receive training to help them identify and address indicators of SRF. Leaders can also implement intervention programs to help calm employees who experience SRF.

Social implications

Leaders should receive training to help them identify and address indicators of SRF. Leaders can also implement programs to help assist employees who demonstrate adverse effects from SRF.

Originality/value

This paper integrates the research on SRF and politics to examine the collective impact these variables have on workers. Our three-study package also addresses the call for more studies to examine how politics operate across cultures.

Goal-directed rumination and its antagonistic effects on problem solving: a two-week diary study

BACKGROUND

The tendency to repetitively and intrusively think about a particular negative event, goal failure, or problem (i.e., goal-directed rumination) is generally associated with impairments in well-being, thus decreasing performance in solving this failure. However, rumination is also associated with higher levels of resources invested in problem solving, likely leading to an improvement in performance.

OBJECTIVES

The current study thus examines the indirect effect of rumination via various mediators on subjective problem-solving performance in the everyday context.

DESIGN

Over a period of two weeks, 147 students completed a brief survey each evening (i.e., diary study).

METHODS

Data were analyzed by means of a multiple mediation model in the multilevel structural equation modeling (MSEM) framework.

RESULTS

The analyses revealed that perceived stress and negative mood negatively mediated the relationship between rumination and problem solving, while attention and effort positively mediated this relationship. Finally, both a negative direct and total effect of rumination on problem solving was observed.

CONCLUSIONS

Conclusively, goal-directed rumination exerted a negative indirect effect on subjective problem solving via perceived stress and negative mood, whereas it positively affected problem solving via attention and effort. Possible limitations and implications are discussed.

Academic performance: A longitudinal study on the role of goal-directed rumination and psychological distress

BACKGROUND

In this research, we examine the relationship between goal-directed rumination, psychological distress, and performance. Although previous research has largely contributed to our understanding of how these constructs are related, the direction of their relationships remains unclear.

OBJECTIVES

We argue that goal-directed rumination and psychological distress (conceived as perceived stress and strain) are reciprocally related, and that goal-directed rumination has a positive effect on performance when controlling for the negative effect of psychological distress.

DESIGN

We explored these relationships in a longitudinal field study, drawing on multiple sources: self-reports of 147 students on goal-directed rumination and psychological distress and objective ratings of academic performance.

METHOD

Based on structural equation modelling, we employed a random-intercept cross-lagged panel model and hierarchical regressions to examine our hypotheses.

RESULTS

We demonstrated that goal-directed rumination predicted perceived stress one week later but not vice versa, while its relationship to strain was less clear. Furthermore, goal-directed rumination positively predicted academic performance when we controlled for psychological distress.

CONCLUSIONS

We found evidence for a unidirectional relationship between goal-directed rumination and psychological distress, especially for perceived stress. Additionally, we observed that psychological distress diminishes the beneficial effect of goal-directed rumination on academic performance.

Perceived Organizational Politics, Engagement, and Stress: The Mediating Influence of Meaningful Work

The research aimed to assess proposed associations between organizational politics and employee engagement, employee stress (or more correctly 'strain'), and work meaningfulness. Very few studies have examined these associations. Confirmatory factor analyses established the dimensionality and reliability of the full measurement model across two independent samples (N = 303, N = 373). Structural equation modeling supported the proposed direct associations between organizational politics, operationalized as a higher order construct, and employee stress and employee engagement. These relationships were shown to be partially mediated by meaningful work. As such, politics had significant indirect effects on engagement and stress through meaningful work. The results also showed a significant and direct association between stress and engagement. Overall, the results shed important new light on the factors that influence engagement, and identify work meaningfulness as an important psychological mechanism that can help explain the adverse impact of organizational politics on employee engagement and stress. The results also support the dimensionality and validity of a new set of measures of perceived organizational politics focused on generalized perceptions about the use and abuse of relationships, resources, reputation, decisions, and communication channels. More generally, the results serve as a platform for further research regarding the negative influence of organizational politics on a range of individual and organizational outcomes.

Reorganizing Organizational Politics Research: A Review of the Literature and Identification of Future Research Directions

Organizational politics has been an oft-studied phenomenon for nearly four decades. Prior reviews have described research in this stream as aligning with one of three categories: perceptions of organizational politics (POPs), political behavior, or political skill. We suggest that because these categories are at the construct level research on organizational politics has been artificially constrained. Thus, we suggest a new framework with higher-level categories within which to classify organizational politics research: political characteristics, political actions, and political outcomes. We then provide a broad review of the literature applicable to these new categories and discuss the possibilities for future research within each expanded category. Finally, we close with a discussion of future directions for organizational politics research across the categories.

Work grit as a moderator of politics perceptions

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to test the interactive effects of grit (e.g. supervisor and employee) and politics perceptions on relevant work outcomes. Specifically, the authors hypothesized that supervisor and employee grit would each demonstrate neutralizing effects when examined jointly.

Design/methodology/approach

Three studies (N’s=526, 229, 522) were conducted to test the moderating effect across outcomes, including job satisfaction, turnover intentions, citizenship behavior and work effort. The authors controlled for affectivity and nonlinear main effect terms in Studies 2 and 3 following prior discussion.

Findings

Findings across studies demonstrated a unique pattern differentiating between grit sources (i.e. employee vs supervisor) and outcome characteristic (i.e. attitudinal vs behavioral). In sum, both employee and supervisor grit demonstrated neutralizing effects when operating in politically fraught work settings.

Research limitations/implications

Despite the single source nature of data collections, the authors took steps to minimize potential biasing factors (e.g. time separation, including affectivity). Future research will benefit from multiple sources of data as well as a more expansive view of the grit construct.

Practical implications

Work contexts have grown increasingly more political in recent years primarily as a result of social and motivational factors. Hence, the authors recommend that leaders investigate factors that minimize its potentially malignant effects. Although grit is often challenging to cultivate through interventions, selection and quality of work life programs may be useful in preparing workers to manage this pervasive source of stress.

Originality/value

Despite its practical appeal, grit’s impact in work settings has been under-studied, leading to apparent gaps in science and leadership development. Creative studies, building off the research, will allow grit to maximize its contributions to both scholarship and employee well-being.

Mitigating influence of transcendence on politics perceptions’ negative effects

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine how a cognitive process, transcendence, moderates the relationship between perceptions of organizational politics (POPs) and several work outcomes.

Design/methodology/approach

Participants across two studies (Study 1: 187 student-recruited working adults; Study 2: 158 information technology employees) provided a demographically diverse sample for the analyses. Key variables were transcendence, POPs, job satisfaction, job tension, emotional exhaustion, work effort, and frustration.

Findings

Results corroborated the hypotheses and supported the authors’ argument that POPs lacked influence on work outcomes when individuals possessed high levels of transcendence. Specifically, high levels of transcendence attenuated the decreases in job satisfaction and work effort associated with POPs. Additionally, transcendence acted as an antidote to several workplace ills by weakening the increases in job tension, emotional exhaustion, and frustration usually associated with POPs.

Research limitations/implications

This study found that transcendence, an individual-level cognitive style, can improve work outcomes for employees in workplaces where POPs exist. Future studies should use longitudinal data to study how changes in POPs over time affect individuals’ reported levels of transcendence.

Practical implications

Although it is impossible to eliminate politics in organizations, antidotes like transcendence can improve individuals’ responses to POPs.

Originality/value

This study is one of the first to utilize an individual-level cognitive style to examine possible options for attenuating the effects of POPs on individuals’ work outcomes.

Mitigating influence of transcendence on politics perceptions’ negative effects

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine how a cognitive process, transcendence, moderates the relationship between perceptions of organizational politics (POPs) and several work outcomes.

Design/methodology/approach

Participants across two studies (Study 1: 187 student-recruited working adults; Study 2: 158 information technology employees) provided a demographically diverse sample for the analyses. Key variables were transcendence, POPs, job satisfaction, job tension, emotional exhaustion, work effort, and frustration.

Findings

Results corroborated the hypotheses and supported the authors’ argument that POPs lacked influence on work outcomes when individuals possessed high levels of transcendence. Specifically, high levels of transcendence attenuated the decreases in job satisfaction and work effort associated with POPs. Additionally, transcendence acted as an antidote to several workplace ills by weakening the increases in job tension, emotional exhaustion, and frustration usually associated with POPs.

Research limitations/implications

This study found that transcendence, an individual-level cognitive style, can improve work outcomes for employees in workplaces where POPs exist. Future studies should use longitudinal data to study how changes in POPs over time affect individuals’ reported levels of transcendence.

Practical implications

Although it is impossible to eliminate politics in organizations, antidotes like transcendence can improve individuals’ responses to POPs.

Originality/value

This study is one of the first to utilize an individual-level cognitive style to examine possible options for attenuating the effects of POPs on individuals’ work outcomes.

Driving Away the Bad Guys

The previously uninvestigated role of work drive as a moderator of perceptions of politics–job outcomes relationships was examined in a series of field studies. Consistent with the underpinnings of sensemaking theory, we hypothesized that those with high levels of work drive would experience fewer adverse consequences when coupled with heightened perceptions of politics relative to those reporting less work drive. Across two independent studies, hypotheses were strongly supported. Specifically, perceptions of politics demonstrated a significant, direct influence on job satisfaction, job tension, and emotional exhaustion for those with less work drive in Sample 1 (municipal employees) and only a minimal impact for those with higher levels of drive. Results were replicated in Sample 2 (members of a management association). Implications of these findings for science and practice, strengths and limitations, and future research directions are discussed.