Organizational justice and workplace mediation: a six‐factor model

Abstract

PurposeThis study examines the structure and dimensionality of organizational justice in a workplace mediation setting. It has three purposes: to determine whether the procedural and interpersonal justice factors in the four‐factor model of organizational justice can be split, thereby providing support for a six‐factor model; to identify how the split factors relate to other factors in the model; and to uncover any differences in employee and supervisor perceptions of organizational justice in workplace mediation.Design/methodology/approachConfirmatory factor analysis is used to explore the fit of four different models of organizational justice. The paper examines cross factor correlations to assess the strength and relationships among factors and to look for differences between employees and supervisors.FindingsIt is found that a six‐factor model of organizational justice provides the best fit for the data and that factor relationships differ little for employees and supervisors.Research limitations/implicationsThis is a field test of REDRESS®, the USPS employment mediation program which uses transformative mediation. The study has important theoretical and research implications for organizational justice and workplace mediation.Practical implicationsThe study has practical implications for organizational conflict management and dispute system design.Originality/valueOrganizational justice has not been adequately explored within the context of workplace mediation. The study is unique in that it concurrently examines multiple factors of organizational justice, using a large, longitudinal dataset from an internationally recognized workplace mediation program.