Although many scholars and practitioners have shown that work from home (WFH) leads to positive organizational outcomes, the COVID-19 outbreak’s consequences suggest important downsides associated with an increased extent of WFH. Utilizing theories of social identity and need to belong, this study aims to investigate the potential dark sides of an increased extent of WFH. In a moderated mediation model, we test how an increased extent of WFH affects feelings of isolation and further influences the employees’ organizational identification. Our study is based on data from an online survey of 382 employees in Germany. Results suggest that a higher extent of WFH during the COVID-19 lockdown leads to more social isolation and less organizational identification. Besides, our results show that task interdependence significantly moderates the correlation between an increased extent of WFH and social isolation. In such manner, our study contributes to the literature on potential counterproductive organizational effects caused by an increased necessity of WFH. Organizations must develop countermeasures to better integrate employees who WFH more intensely into organizational routines to decrease their feelings of social isolation and increase their organizational identification.

In performance appraisal processes, corporations face the problem that the subjective ratings of employee performance tend to be largely biased toward being too favorable and too homogeneous. Drawing on prospect theory, we conceptualize below-average employee ratings as perceived losses and suggest that the proportion of such ratings increases under a recommended rating distribution because of a higher rating dispersion. The perceived losses may decrease employees’ organizational commitment, job satisfaction, and cooperation while increasing their turnover intentions. Using a large-scale, dual-source proprietary panel dataset from the German Federal Employment Agency, we show that a recommended distribution rating system is negatively related to organizational commitment, while job satisfaction, turnover intentions, and cooperation are unaffected when considering the whole sample. Post-hoc analyses reveal that the adverse effects appear in employees without managerial responsibility, while employees with managerial responsibility remain unaffected by the recommended distribution rating system.

No abstract

No abstract