Exploring the role of employee entitlement in counterproductive work behaviour

[摘要] ENGLISH SUMMARY : The prevalence and considerable financial costs associated with counterproductive work behaviours warrants a deeper understanding of these behaviours. Counterproductive workbehaviours are employee behaviours that deliberately undermine the interests and goals of the organisation. These behaviours manifest in many forms with examples including bullying, sexual harassment, cyberloafing, tardiness, fraud, absenteeism, and substance abuse. These days, human resources practitioners and business leaders often report high levels of entitlement attitudes among employees, which may influence employees' decision to engage in counterproductive behaviours.Employee entitlement is a relatively new construct in academic literature and therefore lacking consistent conceptualisation and measurement. In this study, employee entitlement is defined as excessive self-regard connected to a belief in the automatic right to privileged or preferentialtreatment at work regardless of performance. Due to the reported negative consequences of employee entitlement and the lack of empirical work on this topic, an exploration of theconstruct and its impact on the psychological contract was warranted in the South African context. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to explore the role of employee entitlementin counterproductive work behaviours and its implication on the psychological contract. More specifically, this study explored the inclusion of the employee entitlement construct in the Bordia, Restubog and Tang's (2008) psychological contract breach, revenge andcounterproductive work behaviours model.This study employed an ex-post facto correlation design, and data were collected from the employees of a higher education institution in South Africa. Respondents were invited to complete an online questionnaire. The final sample consisted of 308 employees. Partial least squares structural modelling (PLS) was used as the primary statistical analysis technique to evaluate the relationships between the latent constructs. The findings of this study show that there is a positive and significant relationship between psychological contract breach, revengeand counterproductive work behaviours. In addition, revenge was found to mediate the relationship between employee entitlement and counterproductive work behaviours. However, the validation of the employee entitlement measurement model did return less than acceptable model fit, suggesting the need for further validation of the measure. Moreover, insights areprovided on how managers and practitioners can more effectively manage workplace situations which foster perceptions of employee entitlement, the management of the psychological contract and as a result reduce employees' engagement in counterproductive work behaviours.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University