Chapter - 4 DEVIANT WORKPLACE BEHAVIOUR: PREVALENCE AND EXTENT

Transcription

1 Chapter - 4 DEVIANT WORKPLACE BEHAVIOUR: PREVALENCE AND EXTENT 4.1 OVERALL STATUS OF DEVIANT WORKPLACE BEHAVIOUR The first objective of this study was to identify the overall status of deviant workplace behaviour in the corporate sector. In other words what percentage of the sampled employees of the corporate sector in this research is actually involved in deviant workplace behaviour? Thus, collected responses were analyzed to calculate the percentage of sample reporting to have engaged in any of the 45 deviant workplace behaviour checklist items. A total of 495 employees responses on deviant workplace behaviour statements were obtained on a five-point scale and summarized as percentages. The results in the Table 4.1 expose the dark side of both the organizations and employees working in them by depicting the percentage of employees actually reporting deviant workplace behaviours. Respondents were asked to indicate how often they have done each of the following things on their present job, on a five point scale (1=Never; 2= Once or twice; 3= Once or twice per month; 4= Once or twice per week; 5= Everyday). Table 4.1 represents the percentages of survey respondents reporting to have done each of the 45 deviant behaviours at workplaces. These numbers represent respondents who did not answer Never for each item. The most reported deviant workplace behaviours were daydreamed rather than did your work, and complained about insignificant things at work as reported by 60% of the sample each. This was respectively followed by came to work late without permission, and taken a longer break than you were allowed to take, as reported by 57% of the sample each. The mean percentage across all 45 items was 31% and median percentage was 27%. As can be seen, there is a considerable variation in the frequency with which these behaviours were being reported by the respondents. The percentage variation ranged from a low of 8% of the sample reporting for stolen something belonging to your employer to a high of 60% of the sample reporting for daydreamed rather than did your work, and complained about insignificant things at work. 73

2 Table 4.1: Percentage of Sample Reporting Deviant Workplace Behaviours SNo. Deviant Workplace Behaviour Statements Percentage 1 Purposely wasted your employer s materials/supplies 25 % 2 Daydreamed rather than did your work 60 % 3 Complained about insignificant things at work 60 % 4 Told people outside the job what a lousy place you work for 51 % 5 Purposely did your work incorrectly 24 % 6 Came to work late without permission 57 % 7 Stayed home from work and said you were sick when you weren t 56 % 8 Purposely damaged a piece of equipment or property 15 % 9 Purposely dirtied or littered your place of work 16 % 10 Stolen something belonging to your employer 8 % 11 Started or continued a damaging or harmful rumor at work 20 % 12 Been nasty or rude to a client or customer 33 % 13 Purposely worked slowly when things needed to get done 31 % 14 Refused to take on an assignment when asked 39 % 15 Purposely came late to an appointment or meeting 25 % 16 Failed to report a problem so it would get worse 23 % 17 Taken a longer break than you were allowed to take 57 % 18 Purposely failed to follow instructions 33 % 19 Left work earlier than you were allowed to 55 % 20 Insulted someone about their job performance 32 % 21 Made fun of someone s personal life 31 % 22 Took supplies or tools home without permission 27 % 23 Tried to look busy while doing nothing 51 % 24 Put in to be paid for more hours than you worked 34 % 25 Took money from your employer without permission 9 % 26 Ignored someone at work 49 % 27 Refused to help someone at work 30 % 28 Withheld needed information from someone at work 37 % 29 Purposely interfered with someone at work doing his/her job 23 % 30 Blamed someone at work for error you made 23 % 31 Started an argument with someone at work 49 % 32 Stole something belonging to someone at work 14 % 33 Verbally abused someone at work 14 % 34 Made an obscene gesture (the finger) to someone at work 27 % 35 Threatened someone at work with violence 16 % 36 Threatened someone at work, but not physically 16 % 37 Said something obscene to someone at work to make them feel bad 18 % 38 Hid something so someone at work couldn t find it 18 % 39 Did something to make someone at work look bad 16 % 40 Played a mean prank to embarrass someone at work 20 % 41 Destroyed property belonging to someone at work 11 % 42 Looked at someone at work s private mail/property without permission 27 % 43 Hit or pushed someone at work 15 % 44 Insulted or made fun of someone at work 29 % 45 Avoided returning a phone call to someone you should at work 54 % 74

3 Hence, from the results it can be concluded that deviant workplace behaviours are quite prevalent among employees in the corporate sector and that too at a good extent. Not a single statement got zero percentage reporting; as such each behaviour statement is prevalent in the workplaces of Indian corporate sector. Employees have reported to have done each of the mentioned deviant workplace behaviours once or twice or more often in their workplaces. The percentage variation of the deviant workplace behaviours ranged from least of 8% to highest of 60% among the sampled employees. 4.2 PROMINENT TYPOLOGY OF DEVIANT WORKPLACE BEHAVIOUR The second objective of the present study was to identify the prominent typology of deviant workplace behaviour. In other words, to identify among abuse, production deviance, sabotage, theft and withdrawal types of deviant workplace behaviour, which are the most prominent ones among the employees working in different organizations. The deviant workplace behaviour scale developed by Spector et al., (2006) was used to measure five types of deviant workplace behaviour along with deviant acts targeting individuals or organization among the male and female employees working in different organizations. Table 4.2 shows the breakdown of the deviant workplace behaviour construct into Spector et al., (2006) dimensions of workplace deviance as abuse, production deviance, sabotage, theft, withdrawal, which also incorporated the Robinson and Bennett's (1995) typology of organizational deviance (DWBO) or behaviour directed towards organization and interpersonal deviance (DWBP) or behaviour directed towards other co-workers. The deviant workplace behaviour mean scores with respect to its dimensions (abuse, production deviance, sabotage, theft, withdrawal, organizational deviance and interpersonal deviance) as reported by employees, are presented in the Table 4.2. The means of the dimensions of deviant workplace behaviour scores range between a lowest (Mean = 3.74) of sabotage to the highest (Mean = 22.31) of abuse. Results depicted abuse (Mean = 22.31) to be the most prominant deviant workplace behaviour followed by withdrawal (Mean = 7.43), than theft (Mean = 6.31), than production deviance (Mean = 4.36) and lastly sabotage (Mean = 3.74) (Figure 4.1). Thus, employees on an average are found moderately involved in deviant acts, which in response are harming other employees and the organization itself. 75

4 Means, standard deviations, observed score ranges and possible score ranges for the deviant workplace behaviour dimensions are presented in Table 4.2. Table 4.2: Descriptive Statistics for Deviant Workplace Behaviour and its Dimensions Deviant Workplace Behaviour Dimensions N Mean Scores Standard Deviation Observed Score Range Possible Score Range Abuse Production Deviance Sabotage Theft Withdrawal DWBO DWBP Overall DWB Note: DWBO=Organizational Deviance, DWBP=Interpersonal Deviance, Overall DWB=Total Deviant Workplace Behaviour. The results depict that abuse, which consists of harmful behaviours against the coworkers and inflict physical and psychological harm through threats, inappropriate comments, ignoring or undermining co-worker s ability to work efficiently, spreading harmful rumors at work, being nasty or rude to a client, insulting someone about their job performance, making fun of someone s personal life, ignoring someone, blaming others for own fault, staging arguments, verbally abusing someone and playing mean pranks to embarrass, is the most frequent deviant behaviour in the workplaces. Withdrawal behaviour frequency is next to abuse which consists of behaviours that involve intentionally working slow and less, remaining absent, arriving late to the workplace and taking more frequent breaks than were allowed to and leaving early from the workplace. On the other hand, theft relating to office or any colleague property, production deviance and sabotage are minimal reported behaviours in the workplaces. Where theft dimension comprises stealing something from your employer, taking office supplies home without permission, taking money from your employer without permission and stealing something belonging to your colleague, is found next less frequent behaviour to withdrawal. The production deviance examples include purposefully doing work incorrectly, slowly and failing to follow the instructions. While sabotage behaviour consisting of purposefully wasting office materials and supplies, physical destruction of 76

5 Mean Scores Mean Scores the property and dirtying around is the least frequent deviant workplace behaviour type in the corporate sector organizations. Mean Scores of the deviant workplace behaviour and its dimensions are shown in Figures 4.1 and Mean Scores 0 Abuse Production Deviance Sabotage Theft Withdrawal Deviant Workplace Behavior Dimensions Figure 4.1: Mean Scores of Deviant Workplace Behaviour Dimensions Mean Score DWBO DWBP Deviant Workplace Behavior Dimensions Figure 4.2: Mean Scores of Organizational Deviance (DWBO) and Interpersonal Deviance (DWBP) 77

6 The deviant workplace behaviours directed towards organization (DWBO) and towards people (DWBP) mean scores were and respectively, while the mean overall DWB score was It can be seen from the Figure 4.2, that deviant workplace behaviour directed towards organization (DWBO) is more prevalent as compared to the deviant workplace behaviour directed towards people (DWBP) in the workplaces. Deviant workplace behaviour directed towards organization means the target of the deviant behaviour is the organization and not the individuals. It means employees found to indulge more in those deviant workplace behaviours that aim to harm the organizations rather than harming the other employees or co-workers. Thus, employees reported behaviours that directly interfere with the work being performed in the organization and effect the performance of the company and its growth; for example, like reading a newspaper instead of working, wasting the resources, leaving early, taking excessive long breaks, calling in sick when you are well and so on. Also employee reported destroying or misusing an organization s property. They might indulge in sabotaging equipment, stealing from organization property, lying about the hours worked, misusing expense accounts and so on. Clearly, these acts bring direct costs for the organization in having to replace the stolen or damaged equipment and thereby hampering the productivity because work cannot be done until replacement equipment arrives. Hence, the first two objectives of the study, to identify the overall status and prominent type of deviant workplace behaviour among employees working in the different organizations were achieved through data analysis. Results reveal that deviant workplace behaviours are quite prevalent in the corporate sector among employees and that too up to a good extent. Abusive behaviour and withdrawal behaviour incidences are high as compared to sabotage, theft and production deviance. Again deviant workplace behaviour directed towards organization is more prevalent as compared to the deviant workplace behaviour directed towards other people working in the organizations. Thus, deviant behaviours like daydreaming, complaining, arriving late to work, frequent sick leaves, longer work breaks, leaving workplace early, looking busy while doing nothing, ignoring someone, starting arguments first, avoiding returning a phone call are found quite prevalent in the organizations thereby calling management for an immediate action. 78