Impact of workplace bullying on work engagement among early career employees

Abstract

This study aims to measure the impact of workplace bullying on work engagement in terms of employee silence and knowledge sharing. It also helps to explain how psychological contract breach moderates the bullying-silence relationship. For this study, data is collected from 384 early-career employees having experience up to three years from seven banks of Lahore, Pakistan. Findings of this study reveals that workplace bullying has a positive relationship with employee silence and negative relationship with work engagement. Results of all moderation and mediated variables are significantly related to each other. However, the results explain that a psychological contract breach slightly moderates the bullying-silence relationship. Survey-based questionnaire, cross-sectional research design, and convenience-based sampling technique are some of the limitations of this study. This is the first study that tried to investigate the bullying-engagement relationship among early-career employees in the banking sector of Lahore, Pakistan. This study may help practitioners and policymakers to develop anti-bullying laws that can support the management in overcoming the negative workplace environment. This study aims to promote an equal opportunity for all employees where they can raise their voices about misconduct. This is the first study that investigated the victimization of bullying behavior among early-career employees in a Pakistani cultural context.