Employee indifference and inaction against abusive supervision. An explanation based on organizational identification theory
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/ER-07-2017-0169 |
| Published date | 01 October 2018 |
| Date | 01 October 2018 |
| Pages | 981-998 |
| Author | Yucheng Zhang,Stephen J. Frenkel |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour,Industrial/labour relations,Employment law |
Employee indifference and inaction
against abusive supervision
An explanation based on organizational
identification theory
Yucheng Zhang
School of Economics and Management, Hebei University of Technology,
Tianjin, China, and
Stephen J. Frenkel
UNSW Business School, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to investigate how part-time waiters perceive and respond to abusive
supervision by the owner-manager of a small restaurant.
Design/methodology/approach –An ethnographic approach was used to collect data. One of the authors
worked as a participant observer for three months. In addition, 13 interviews and three focus group
discussions were conducted.
Findings –Data analysis showed how neutral identification based on a primary identity—liu xu sheng
(overseas student)—overshadows employees’occupational identity (waiter), which helps waiters to cope
with abusive supervision.
Originality/value –Development and application of the concept of neutral organizational identification
orientation encourages emotional suppression and reframing, leading to waiters’indifference and
acquiescence in abusive supervision. Implications are drawn for theory and the practice of managing
part-time and temporary workers.
Keywords Ethnography, Abusive supervision, Chinese restaurant, Neutral organizational identification,
Waiters
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
This paper is about employees’responses to abusive supervision which has been shown to
constitute a serious organizational problem. This is evidenced in the meta-analysis of Zhang
and Liao (2015) based on 35,239 respondents employed in various industries across the USA and
several countries in the Asia-Pacific area. The authors showed that abusive supervision has
detrimental consequences for employees, including stress, health problems and poor performance.
While our knowledgeof employees’activebehavioral responses to abusivesupervision has
expanded through studies of workplace aggression (Dupre et al., 2006) and withdrawal of
organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) (Shoss et al., 2013; Zellars et al., 2002), passive
employee responses, includingemployee silence (Whitesideand Barclay, 2013), have probably
been more widespread and yet attracted much less research attention (Kish-Gephart et al.,
2009; Lazarus and Folkman, 1984). In this paper, we seek to address this important gap by
invoking social identity theory to explain why part-time employees remain indifferent and
passive in response to abusive supervision (Ashforth et al., 2013; Ashforth and Mael, 1989).
To explore this issue, we employ the concept of neutral organizational identification—which
Employee Relations
Vol. 40 No. 6, 2018
pp. 981-998
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0142-5455
DOI 10.1108/ER-07-2017-0169
Received 26 July 2017
Revised 21 December 2017
11 February 2018
Accepted 16 February 2018
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0142-5455.htm
This work was supported by the Young Scientists Fund of the National Natural Science Foundation of
China (Grant Nos 71602163 and 71702043), and Young Scientists Fund from the Ministry of Education
of Humanities and Social Sciences Project in China (Grant No. 16YJC630171). In addition, thanks to
Sanne Frandsen for helpful comments on a previous draft.
981
Employee
indifference
and inaction
refers to the explicit absence ofidentification and disidentification with thefocal organization.
Kreiner and Ashforth (2004) theorized that employees who define themselves as neutral
toward the organization (and its goals, values, mission) are less likely to feel engaged in and
contribute to the organization than employees who explicitly identify or disidentify.
Our study makes a three-fold contribution to the literature on employees’responses to
abusive supervision. First, in contrast to extant quantitative studies, we use an ethnographic
approach to reveal the meaning that employees give to abusive supervision and how the
adoptionof a neutral identificationorientation enables employeesto continue working without
resentment. Second, our theory and analysis enable the conditions for employees’passive
indifferenceto be identified and explored. Employees’neutral identification was found to be a
boundary condition regarding their passive response. Third, our study responds to recent
calls for research investigating the influence of societal factors on organizational behavior
(e.g. Côté, 2011). We take employees’other social roles into account. This is accomplishedby
showing how NI is an attitude common among employees whose central life interest lies
outside of work, a condition that may be morelikely among young, part-time employees and
those approaching retirement (Kreiner and Ashforth, 2004).
2. Employees’responses to abusive supervision
Supervisor abuse has been shown to be associated with employees’dissatisfaction and
psychological distress, including emotional exhaustion and somatic health complaints (Tepper
et al., 2007). Employees’behavior is also adversely affected. Zellars et al. (2002) found that
employees withdrew their discretionary behavior, i.e. OCBs, in response to abusive supervision,
and in some cases, employees displayed aggression toward their supervisors and co-employees
(Inness et al., 2005) and engaged in counter-productive behavior (Duffy et al., 2002).
These studies focus on the more visible, active employee responses (Yagil et al., 2011),
revealing that employees use different behavioral strategies to address psychological
distress (Tepper et al., 2007) that typically reflects unequal social exchange (Thau and
Mitchell, 2010). Aggression arising from such relationships may be buffered by high power
distance (i.e. a belief that inequality in power between supervisors and employees
is legitimate) (Lian, H., Ferris and Brown, 2012; Lian, H.W, Ferris and Brown, 2012), or
sustained by a norm of aggression that is learned through social interaction with
co-employees (Tepper et al., 2008). These studies assume that employees identify
with their work roles and/or the organization (Ashforth and Mael, 1989). However, such
identification may be limited by personal goals unrelated to work or to a lack of fit between
work-related goals and current opportunities (Ashforth et al., 2008). This may restrict the
influence of abusive supervision on employee attitudes and behavior. It is this line of
reasoning which we pursue in the research reported below. However, it is necessary to first
distinguish various employee identification orientations, for as we shall see, one of these is
crucial for understanding how employees in our study responded to abusive supervision.
3. Types of employee identification orientations
The study of organizational identification derives from the social identity theory. Tajfel et al.
(1971) experiments seeking to maximize the difference between in-group and out-group members
led to the development of the concept of social identification. Ashforth and Mael (1989) applied
this concept to organizations, highlighting the antecedents, consequences and implications of
organizational identification for studies in organizational behavior. These authors also suggested
threepossiblefields—socialization (Hogg and Terry, 2000), role conflict (Vora et al., 2007) and
intergroup relations (Tajfel, 1978)—where the social identity theory could usefully be employed.
Four types of organizational identification orientations have been proposed, including
identification, disidentification, ambivalent identification and neutral identification.
Ashforth and Mael (1989) developed the concept of organizational identification to
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