Treat Us Fairly and We Won’t Complain: Multilevel Effects of Procedural Justice on Complaining Behavior in Team Meetings

Eva-Maria Schulte,Nale Lehmann-Willenbrock,Simone Kauffeld

doi:10.4236/psych.2015.614176

Abstract

One reason for ineffective meetings is complaining behavior. Complaining statements emphasize negative aspects which cannot be changed and often portraying the team as a victim. Whereas several studies have highlighted the detrimental consequences of complaining, less is known about the antecedents of this counterproductive behavior during team interactions. This study addresses this research gap by providing starting points for managing complaining behavior in meetings. Through the lens of social exchange theory, we argue how individual justice perceptions and team-level justice climate create a social context for more or less complaining during meetings. Furthermore, we explore how team members’ satisfaction with their supervisor mediates the relationship between procedural justice and complaining. 305 employees nested in 54 teams completed a survey concerning their justice perceptions and supervisor satisfaction. Moreover, we videotaped regular meetings of these teams and used an independent observer approach to code actual occurrences of complaining behavior. Multilevel results show that team-level procedural justice climate—but not individual justice perceptions—inhibits complaining behavior in meetings. Team-level supervisor satisfaction mediated the relationship between procedural justice climate and complaining. We discuss research implications for understanding and preventing specific counterproductive work behaviors in the team context and practical implications for managing effective meetings.

Highlights

Meetings are regular practice in contemporary organizations (e.g., Cohen, Rogelberg, Allen, & Luong, 2011)
This study focused on complaining as a specific form of counterproductive work behavior (CWB) and examined how procedural justice perceptions can contribute to complaining behavior in meetings
From a social exchange perspective, we argued that employees who experience procedural fairness would be less inclined to show complaining behavior

Summary

Introduction

Meetings are regular practice in contemporary organizations (e.g., Cohen, Rogelberg, Allen, & Luong, 2011). We argue that employees’ level of satisfaction with their supervisor constitutes the explanatory process underlying the link between perceived procedural (in-) justice and complaining behavior in meetings. The reason why justice perceptions are linked to individual complaining behavior may be that employees who experience procedural injustice attribute this to their supervisor and are less satisfied with their supervisor (cf Colquitt, 2001; Simons & Roberson, 2003). Building on social exchange theory, previous research on CWB generally and counterproductive meeting behaviors we take a multilevel perspective to examine individual procedural justice and procedural justice climate as important antecedents of complaining behavior in team meetings. On a related note, refraining from complaining has been described as a form of loyalty toward the organization (Lievens, Chasteen, Day, & Christiansen, 2006)

Results

Discussion

Conclusion