Sexual misconduct reporting: the silencing effects of hegemonic masculinity

Purpose

Drawing on hegemonic masculinity theory, this study provides evidence supporting how gender, race and sexual identity, may shape the rates of sexual misconduct reporting, by keeping those targets who traditionally enjoy positions of power (i.e. white, cisgender men) silent.

Design/methodology/approach

Across 3,230 gender harassment, 890 sexual advance harassment and 570 sexual assault incidents that occurred within a traditionally masculine organization, the authors conducted tests of independence and hierarchical regression analyses to examine whether targets' social identity characteristics (i.e. sex, race, sexuality and gender alignment), predicted the reporting of sexual misconduct.

Findings

Although reporting rates varied based on the type of incident, white men were less likely than their colleagues to report workplace sexual misconduct. In general, men were approximately half as likely as women to report. Lower rates of reporting were similarly seen among all white (vs BIPOC) targets and all cisgender and heterosexual (vs LGBT) targets, when controlling for other identity characteristics.

Originality/value

Research on sexual misconduct has largely privileged the experiences of (white, heterosexual) women, despite knowledge that men, too, can experience this mistreatment. This research broadens this lens and challenges the notion that sexual misconduct reporting rates are uniform across employee groups. By articulating how the pressures of hegemonic masculinity serve to silence certain targets – including and especially white, cisgender men – the authors provide means of better understanding and addressing workplace sexual misconduct underreporting.

Come and say what you think: reducing employees' self-censorship through procedural and interpersonal justice

BACKGROUND

Self-censorship in an organization may be defined as a conscious decision by employees to refrain from expressing opinions, criticism or suggestions in situations of perceived irregularities. There are at least two reasons for this decision: firstly, the fear that speaking up would prompt negative consequences, and secondly, the belief that it would not bring about a change in the situation. Procedural justice in an organization may encourage employees to limit that silence, thereby diminishing fear and undermining the belief that change is impossible.

PARTICIPANTS AND PROCEDURE

A set of three studies (total number of participants N = 710) was conducted in order to determine whether procedural justice predicts self-censorship and also to define the role of interpersonal justice in this relationship. It was assumed that procedural justice, while useful in the formation of an impartial and rigid legal system within an organization, is constrained by its disregard for personal relations.

RESULTS

It was found that when employees perceive a work environment as providing influence over procedures, they declare less self-censorship motivated by fear and resignation. In high interpersonal justice conditions the role of procedural justice in predicting employee self-censorship as well as employee silence beliefs increases.

CONCLUSIONS

Both fair treatment of all employees and the contextual and need-centered nature of such treatment should be integrated if self-censorship is to be reduced. The results confirm this conclusion for self-censorship (decision) and employee silence beliefs (belief that relations within the organization do not encourage people to speak up).

Can we talk? Why employees fail to report negative events to their managers

Purpose

The purpose of this research is to understand why and under what conditions employees are likely to partake in a particular type of silence, known as the Hierarchical MUM Effect (HME). This phenomenon occurs when subordinates are reluctant to share bad news with their supervisors, which can lead to deleterious outcomes in organizations due to a lack of communication. The authors also seek to find which conditions minimize HME.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors surveyed employees in a large healthcare organization across three weeks. The authors analyzed their results using the SPSS PROCESS macro.

Findings

The authors’ findings suggest one way to minimize a lack of upward communication is to empower employees, via a high-quality LMX relationship, and move away from a bottom-line mentality focus. Employees who are empowered show lower instances of withholding information via HME. A low bottom-line mentality enhanced this relationship.

Originality/value

The authors expand understanding of antecedents to a particular type of silence, the HME, defined as purposefully withholding information from a supervisor or sharing information in a way that silences the dirty details of a situation (i.e. equivocating). Although a wealth of research examines the deleterious consequences of a high BLM, the authors highlight the positive work outcomes associated with a low BLM.

Effects of demographic, occupational, and practice environment variables on organizational silence among nurse managers

AIM

To define nurse managers' organizational silence behaviors and examine the demographic, occupational, and practice environment factors that may influence their silence.

BACKGROUND

Organizational silence is affected by organizational structures, policies and procedures, team structures, and practice environments. Whether nurse managers' behaviors affect the organizational silence and practice environment in particular has not been thoroughly studied.

METHODS

This cross-sectional study was conducted using an online survey of 169 nurse managers working in a group of private hospitals in Turkey. Data were collected using the Nurse Manager Practice Environment Scale, the Organizational Silence Behavior Scale, and a questionnaire with 16 sociodemographic and job-related questions, and descriptive statistics, correlations, and regression analyses were used to analyze the data.

RESULTS

Nurse managers exhibited acquiescent silence and silence for the protection of the organization. There was a negative correlation between scores on the two scales. Regression analysis showed that nurse managers' organizational silence was affected by the two subscales of nurse managers' practice environment and the ability to express opinions openly.

CONCLUSION

Positive work environment and being able to express opinions comfortably decrease the level of organizational silence of nurse managers. Implications for nursing and health policy: In order to reduce organizational silence behaviors, along with open-door policies and a corporate culture where ideas can be expressed freely, health institutions should implement measures to ensure a positive work environment that empowers administrative leaders to create a culture of patient safety and culture of generativity. Regulating the roles and responsibilities of nurse managers at the institutional level and implementing appropriate nursing laws and regulations at the national level will facilitate changes to improve their management practices.

Why do nurses choose to stay silent?: A qualitative study

AIM

This study aimed to explore nurses' views and experiences regarding remaining silent.

BACKGROUND

Silence is a barrier for organizational improvement and can occur for many reasons; it cannot be simply defined as the opposite of speaking out.

METHOD

An exploratory qualitative design was used for this study. Data were collected using semi-structured interviews in 2016 with 24 nurses who were recruited by using a snowball sampling method.

RESULTS

Three themes emerged as a result of the thematic analysis: fear, silence climate and disengagement. The first theme contained three subthemes: avoidance of being seen as a troublemaker, financial loss and reluctance to reveal lack of ability or knowledge. The results indicated that nurses remained silent when they felt unsupported or psychologically unsafe in their work environment.

CONCLUSION

Encouraging nurses to express their opinions is essential for creating a psychologically safe nursing work environment and an organizational climate that supports open communication. Because the majority of healthcare professionals are nurses, they can act as role models and change agents for other nurses if they are encouraged to share their ideas and opinions without fear of retribution.

Multiple foci of commitment and employee silence: A role theory perspective

Voice enhances whereas employee silence compromises organizational effectiveness and efficiency. We assert that individuals with different foci of commitment vary in their conceptualization of voice behaviors as integral to their roles, which in turn, influences voice behaviors. Integrating silence and voice literatures under the overarching framework of role theory, we investigated the mediating role of voice role conceptualization in the relationship between multiple foci of commitment and employee silence and whether this mediation was moderated by perceptions of organizational politics. Data collected from 437 working adults from United States and China were used to test our moderated mediation model. Results indicated support for mediation and moderated mediation for the team commitment and silence relationship through its impact on voice role conceptualization, controlling for career commitment, and organizational commitment. We discuss implications of results for theory and practice, and offer suggestions for future research.

Linking authentic leadership, moral voice and silence—A serial mediation model comprising follower constructive cognition and moral efficacy

Authentic leadership is widely considered a positive form of moral leadership that emphasizes a leader’s self-awareness, self-concordance, and modeling of self-regulatory behaviors. It is expected that authentic leaders foster moral employee behavior. However, empirical evidence for this assumption with a clear focus on the moral domain is still rather scarce. Furthermore, little is known about mediating mechanisms, especially pertaining to self-regulation of followers. Our research focused on two important facets of moral employee behavior: voice and silence. We (a) examined relationships between authentic leadership, moral voice, and two major forms of moral silence (quiescent and acquiescent) and (b) tested follower constructive cognition and moral efficacy as self-regulatory mechanisms in a serial mediation model. We conducted a cross-sectional study with employees from different organizations ( n = 295). As expected, analyses indicated that authentic leadership is positively related to self-reported voice and negatively to self-reported silence on moral issues. Pertaining to the outcomes quiescent moral silence and moral voice, results revealed a serial mediation effect via constructive cognition and moral efficacy. Furthermore, unique indirect effects of each mediator were found. Thus, authentic leadership can enhance moral behavior mediated by follower constructive cognition and moral efficacy. Based on these insights, new interventions for overcoming silence and promoting voice in organizations can be designed.

Investigating voice in action teams: a critical review

Team communication is considered a key factor for team performance. Importantly, voicing concerns and suggestions regarding work-related topics-also termed speaking up-represents an essential part of team communication. Particularly in action teams in high-reliability organizations such as healthcare, military, or aviation, voice is crucial for error prevention. Although research on voice has become more important recently, there are inconsistencies in the literature. This includes methodological issues, such as how voice should be measured in different team contexts, and conceptual issues, such as uncertainty regarding the role of the voice recipient. We tried to address these issues of voice research in action teams in the current literature review. We identified 26 quantitative empirical studies that measured voice as a distinct construct. Results showed that only two-thirds of the articles provided a definition for voice. Voice was assessed via behavioral observation or via self-report. Behavioral observation includes two main approaches (i.e., event-focused and language-focused) that are methodologically consistent. In contrast, studies using self-reports showed significant methodological inconsistencies regarding measurement instruments (i.e., self-constructed single items versus validated scales). The contents of instruments that assessed voice via self-report varied considerably. The recipient of voice was poorly operationalized (i.e., discrepancy between definitions and measurements). In sum, our findings provide a comprehensive overview of how voice is treated in action teams. There seems to be no common understanding of what constitutes voice in action teams, which is associated with several conceptual as well as methodological issues. This suggests that a stronger consensus is needed to improve validity and comparability of research findings.

The Mediating Effect of Perceived Stress and Moderating Effect of Trust for the Relationship Between Employee Silence and Behavioral Outcomes

Employees withholding their opinions is pervasive in organizations. However, the individual outcomes of employee silence have not been frequently investigated. Previous studies have found that there are detrimental effects of employee silence and building on this research stream, the study viewed perceived stress as an underlying mechanism linking employee silence to task performance and deviant behavior. Moreover, this study explored the moderating effect of interpersonal trust in the relationship between employee silence and perceived stress. Using a sample of 231 white-collar employees from China, this study found perceived stress to mediate the relationships between employee silence and task performance and deviant behavior. Also, coworker trust was found to moderate the relationship between employee silence and perceived stress. As coworker trust moderated the relationship, supplementary analyses further found mediated moderation for the model.

The moderating role of message content in the formation of employee voice

Research on employee voice has highlighted the different nature of promotive and prohibitive voice. However, only few studies have explicitly analysed the implications of this distinction for showing voice. Therefore, to enhance our knowledge regarding the formation of employee voice, our article focuses on the moderating role of the message content. In a scenario-based study, we show that employees’ decision to speak up might differ depending on what the message is about. In addition, we found evidence that some effects might be the same for both promotive and prohibitive voice, indicating that the distinction between both types of message content might be more complex than research currently assumes. The findings underline the need for more comparative research on the different natures of promotive and prohibitive voice.

When Do Followers Compensate for Leader Silence? The Motivating Role of Leader Injustice

Leaders are important for overcoming silence in organizations, because they can serve as role models and facilitate voice, for example, by being just. However, at times, leaders themselves remain silent. In such instances, trickle-down models of leadership and role-modeling theory suggest that leader silence results in follower silence. Drawing on research on laissez-faire leadership and coping, we challenge these approaches proposing that team members can compensate for their leader’s silence. This compensatory effect, in turn, is proposed to be contingent on followers’ justice perceptions, although in a counterintuitive way: Drawing on the fairness heuristic and collective action research, we propose that perceiving the leader as unjust makes it less likely that followers use their leader as a role model and can motivate followers to overcome fear and resignation, eventually resulting in followers’ speaking up in cases when leaders fail to do so. Results from two studies in organizations support our assumption that jointly considering leader and follower silence can reveal surprising effects and thus inspire new research complementing current approaches to overcome silence and its detrimental effects for organizations and their stakeholders. Additionally, we discuss theoretical and practical implications regarding the role of leaders, followers, and context as antecedents of silence.

Authentische Führung

Zusammenfassung. Zur Erfassung authentischer Führung fehlt im deutschen Sprachraum ein transparent validiertes Messverfahren. Der vorliegende Beitrag soll mit einer deutschen Adaption des Authentic Leadership Inventory von Neider und Schriesheim (2011) diese Lücke schließen. Nach der Übersetzung des Originals wurde das Deutsche Inventar Authentischer Führung (DIAF) in drei Stichproben (Ngesamt = 705) geprüft und modifiziert. In konfirmatorischen Faktorenanalysen konnte die theoretisch postulierte Binnenstruktur mit vier Komponenten bestätigt werden: Selbstbewusstheit, Transparenz in Beziehung zu anderen, verinnerlichte moralische Perspektive und ausgewogene Informationsverarbeitung. Die internen Konsistenzen der Gesamtskala (16 Items) und Einzelkomponenten lagen im guten bis sehr guten Bereich. Es wurden erwartungskonforme Zusammenhänge zu anderen Führungsskalen gefunden (positive Korrelationen zu ethischer Führung und Leader Member Exchange, negative Korrelationen zu destruktiver Führung). Das Instrument zeigte bedeutsame Zusammenhänge zu zentralen organisationalen Ergebniskriterien (Wohlbefinden, Arbeitsengagement, individuelle Leistung) und inkrementelle Validität über andere Führungsskalen hinaus. Insgesamt kann das DIAF als ökonomisches und valides Verfahren zur Erfassung authentischer Führung eingesetzt werden.

How does leadership influence incident reporting intention in healthcare? A dual process model of leader–member exchange

Building on social exchange and social identity theory, we examined how leader–member exchange (LMX) influences intention to report incidents in healthcare organizations through two different mechanisms. Using survey data of 15 hospitals in Germany ( N = 480) and multilevel structural equation modelling, we found as expected that LMX positively related to reporting-specific trust and organizational identification of employees. However, only reporting-specific trust but not organizational identification was directly related to incident reporting intention. Furthermore, top management support for patient safety moderated the link between LMX and reporting-specific trust, indicating a compensatory mechanism of top management support for followers with a low-quality leadership relationship. In addition, codification of patient safety regulations moderated the link between organizational identification and incident reporting intention. As expected, the institutionalization of patient safety norms through a strong follow-through of the organization is related to increased reporting only for employees with high organizational identification. Results are discussed in terms of how safety leadership can be enacted at both the supervisory and top management level in order to promote safety behaviour in healthcare organizations.

Using observational research methods to study voice and silence in organizations

The current article offers a behaviour-based perspective on employee voice and silence in organizations. Specifically, we outline two observational approaches to study the dynamics of voice and silence in real time: coding of voice behaviour using a behavioural instrument, and behavioural rating scales. In an exemplary study, we sampled repeated measurements of voice and silence behaviour based on videotaped supervisor–subordinate interactions during annual appraisal interviews. Both approaches provided insights into temporal processes of silence and voice. At the conversational event level, behavioural coding revealed significant sequential patterns between supervisor behaviour and subordinate voice. Findings showed that supervisors’ listening behaviour played a central role in stimulating subordinate voice at the event level of conversational conduct, whereas discussing the subordinates’ past performing, sharing knowledge and procedural statements had the opposite effect and were significantly less likely to initiate subordinate voice. Finally, our results indicated better reliabilities for voice in contrast to silence when observer ratings were used. We discuss strengths and limitations of both approaches and outline how they complement traditional survey measures. Moreover, we provide recommendations for steering more effective appraisal interviews.

Voices from across the divide: An industrial relations perspective on employee voice

In this commentary we note that there is increasing interest in the topic of employee voice; however, we argue that there has been little effort to broaden our existing conceptualizations of voice, which are artefacts of disparate disciplines. The siloed approach, we argue, applies in particular to the view of voice in the field of organizational behaviour (OB) which dominates much of this special issue. We explain how taking an Industrial Relations (IR) perspective on voice can add value to our understanding by looking at voice as a means to challenge management, or as a vehicle for employee self-determination

Employee silence in the context of unethical behavior at work: A commentary

This special issue of the German Journal of Human Resource Management reflects and reinforces the growing global interest in organizational studies of employee silence. Attention to this multidimensional concept has been steady since its introduction as the withholding of expressed evaluations of work circumstances to persons able to effect change with two initial dimensions - quiescent silence (fear and anger-based) and acquiescent silence (futility and resignation-based) - following unjust events (Pinder & Harlos, 2001). However, an unprecedented confluence of trends across law, justice, and governance worldwide underlies current strong concern about employee silence of ethical issues in organizations, including how we understand (un)ethical work behavior and protection for employees, organizations, and society. To sustain interest and impact, rigorous and relevant research is needed. This calls for intellectual diversity and open-mindedness to spur studies of employee silence while resisting paradigmatic isolation or privilege, concept proliferation and confusion, level-of-analysis slippage (e.g., equating employee silence with organizational silence), and other challenges. Advancing employee silence-ethics linkages depends on expanding theories using multiperspective, integrative approaches and testing models that span social, cognitive, and emotional elements in processes of silence. Better knowledge of employee silence promises a more healthy and motivated workforce, more successful and sustainable organizations, and more vibrant and engaged societies.