Impact of Cynicism Behaviour on Employee Engagement

An Employee is the pillar of strength in an organization, his contribution towards work is vital. Several problems are faced by an employee while working in the organization; it can be in the form of his work life balance, interpersonal relationship with his superiors or colleagues, health issues, job satisfaction, and job commitment. The word ‘Cynicism’ denotes the belief that people always act selfishly. Employee Cynicism refers to an attitude that arises due to frustration, hopelessness etc. Now-a-days,Employers are willing to recruit an employee who is engaged in the organization for the long period. Engaging an employee with the organization is a difficult task. Employee Engagement insists to make an employee aligning with the company vision, mission, and goals. The researcher wants to study the impact of Cynicism behaviour on Employee Engagement at the workplace.

Managing voluntary collective turnover: the impact of a cynical workplace climate

PurposeVoluntary collective turnover can be costly for workplaces. The authors investigate the effectiveness of high-performance work system (HPWS) intensity as a tool to manage voluntary collective turnover. Further, the authors investigate a cynical workplace climate (CWC) as a boundary condition on the HPWS intensity–voluntary collective turnover relationship.Design/methodology/approachThe unit of analysis is the workplace, with human resource (HR) managers providing data on HPWS practices in Time 1 (T1) and voluntary collective turnover two years later. Aggregated employee data were used to assess the cynical workplace climate. Hierarchical regression analysis was used to test the hypotheses.FindingsThis study’s results demonstrate a negative relationship between HPWS intensity and voluntary collective turnover when there is a low cynical workplace climate. The authors find that in a high cynical workplace climate, HPWS intensity is ineffective at managing voluntary collective turnover.Research limitations/implicationsThis study’s results show that HPWS intensity needs to be well received by the workforce to be effective in reducing voluntary collective turnover.Practical implicationsTo increase the chances of HPWS intensity reducing voluntary collective turnover, workplaces need to assess the level of employee cynicism in their workplace climates. When the climate is assessed as low in cynicism, the workplace can then consider implementing an HPWS.Originality/valueThe authors explain why the HPWS intensity–voluntary collective turnover relationship varies across workplaces. As HR practices are subject to interpretation, workplaces need to look beyond the practices in their HPWS and focus on employee receptivity to HR practices.

The association between interpersonal conflict, turnover intention and knowledge hiding: The mediating role of employee cynicism and moderating role of emotional intelligence

Academia is prone to incivility and interpersonal conflict like any other workplace environment, although incivility in academia is manifested in behaviors such as undermining colleagues’ professional standing, intelligence and authority; reprobating other’s accomplishments; and hiding knowledge from other faculty members. The autonomy, independence, academic freedom, and tenure in academia lead to a working environment (culture) with different “rules of engagement”, governed by the faculty members themselves. This study examines the impact of employee cynicism on faculty’s interpersonal conflict as a source of stress, which leads to undesirable organizational behaviors, namely higher turnover intention and knowledge hiding behavior; furthermore, the role of faculty’s emotional intelligence as a moderator on the relationship between interpersonal conflict among faculty members and turnover intention has been investigated as a second objective of this study. The study uses a quantitative method of research and analysis, by collecting data from 200 faculty members in private higher education institutions. The study’s hypotheses were tested by Smart PLS3 (SEM) to conclude that: 1) interpersonal conflict directly influences turnover intention and knowledge hiding behavior; 2) employee cynicism has no mediating effect in the relationship between interpersonal conflict, and turnover intention or knowledge hiding behavior; 3) Faculty’s emotional intelligence moderates the relationship between interpersonal conflict and turnover intention.

Employee Cynicism and Organizational Change

Organizational performance and its sustainability significantly depend on aligning business procedures with the fast-changing environment. Because of its significance, the study is based on the Social Exchange Theory. It has developed a new model that has five latent variables (i.e., organizational change, organizational commitment, trust, employee cynicism, and tendency to gossip and a total of fifteen direct and indirect relationships. The study has focused on SMEs in New York. The sample size for the survey was 390 calculated at a 95% percent confidence level and a 5% margin of error. The scales used in the study were adapted from earlier studies. The author has collected the data personally by visiting selected SMEs and used SmartPLS for data analysis. The results suggest that employee cynicism has a negative association with organizational change, the tendency to gossip, and trust. The organizational change also has a negative relationship with organizational commitment and trust. The tendency to gossip and trust have a negative association with organizational commitment. The results support all five single mediating relationships and two multi-mediating relationships. Based on the results, the study has concluded that the element of trust between employees and management is the most crucial aspect in SMEs of the surveyed units. Employees who have confidence and trust in management policies and procedures tend to support change management processes and have a high commitment level towards the organization.Keywords: Organizational change, commitment, trust, employee cynicism, the tendency to gossip.

Afrocentric Attitudinal Reciprocity and Social Expectations of Employees: The Role of Employee-Centred CSR in Africa

In view of the limited consideration for Afrocentric perspectives in organisational ethics literature, we examine Employee-Centred Corporate Social Responsibility (EC-CSR) from the perspective of Afrocentric employees’ social expectations. We posit that Afrocentric employees’ social expectations and the organisational practices for addressing these expectations differ from conventional conceptualisation. By focusing specifically upon the psychological attributes evolving from the fulfilment of employees’ social expectations, we argue that Afrocentric socio-cultural factors could influence perceived organisational support and perceived employee cynicism. We further draw upon social exchange theory to explore rational reciprocity (i.e. attitude and behaviour) evolving from the fulfilment and breach of employees’ social expectations at work. Contrary to the rational norm of reciprocity, we identify a reciprocity norm within which the breach of employees’ social expectations could in fact engender positive reciprocity rooted in esan reciprocity ideology—an ideology that emerged from the ethical tradition of the Yoruba people from Nigeria, West Africa. Overall, our paper elucidates the implications of Afrocentric peculiarities for employees’ social exchange within the African workplace, thus extending the present understanding in this regard.

Examining the role of employee engagement in the relationship between organisational cynicism and employee performance

PurposeOrganisational cynicism (OC) is a growing trend in contemporary organisations. However, its impact on employee performance (EP) remains understudied. The purpose of this paper is to address this gap by investigating its effect on EP. The study also investigates the moderating effect of employee engagement (EE) on the relationship between OC and EP.Design/methodology/approachPrimary data are collected through questionnaire from employees (N=200) of various health organisations in Pakistan by employing a convenient sampling technique. Hierarchical multiple regression is employed by using SPSS.FindingsThe findings of correlation and regression analyses reveal that OC has significant negative relationship with EP. Hence, the patient care is compromised in sampled organisations due to poorer performance of employees. Moreover, findings also reveal that EE has a moderating effect on relationship between OC and EP. Therefore, hospital management needs to increase EE to reduce the cynicism and improve performance. In addition, organisations and managers need to consider their role and actions creating the conditions that lead to cynicism among employees and should take trustworthy steps to increase employee retention and engagement and, ultimately, their performance. Moreover, the findings of the study indicate that the majority of respondents are not happy with their organisations. They also feel that the organisation is not fulfilling its promises and betraying them in several ways. This breach of contract becomes the reason for OC among employees and badly affects their performance. Most of respondents give importance to their career development and the findings reveal that organisations are not focussing on career development of their employees.Research limitations/implicationsThe study has some limitations and implications. The organisational culture can mitigate the negative effect of OC and enhance performance by promoting EE. It is recommended that employee cynicism can be reduced by providing a supportive environment, EE and fairness. Nevertheless, the findings of this study still help supervisors to inhibit this harmful effect by reducing the level of psychological contract violation and organisational politics that will reduce the level of cynicism among employees and improve their performance.Practical implicationsIt is found that OC has a major impact on the behaviour and attitude of employees, supervisors and representatives on the one hand and, ultimately, the organisation, on the other hand. These effects have specific susceptibilities due to the vicinity of the employees. It is recommended that employee cynicism can be reduced by providing a supportive environment.Social implicationsThe study also helps psychologists to understand employees’ attitudes and improve personnel selection to ensure they recruit the right people. Leaders need to communicate honestly, effectively and frequently to address cynicism in order to ensure ample staffing and resource levels that result in good patient care and positive work attitudes at hospitals.Originality/valueAccording to the researchers’ best knowledge, only few studies tried to investigate the relationship between organisational cynicism and EP by employing the moderating effect of EE. Therefore, it will be a good contribution in existing literature to understand consequences of cynicisms.