The relationship between productive and counterproductive work behaviour across four European countries

Abstract

Research suggesting a similar but different relationship between Organisational CitizenshipBehaviour (OCB) and Counterproductive Work Behaviour (CWB) is dominated by North American samples. Little evidence exists on whether these findings are replicated in other countries. To assess if a similar pattern emerged, we used the Social Axioms model (Bond et al, 2004) as a cultural framework and surveyed employees in the UK (105), The Netherlands (203), Turkey (185) and Greece (70) on the relationship between OCB and CWB, and the relationship between these behaviours and personality, justice and commitment. Analysis supported a multidimensional structure to OCB and CWB and indicated a non-bipolar relationship between these behaviours. Culturally, somewhat different to OCB research in general, we find support for a convergence perspective across countries. Conceptually, linguistically and structurally the scale assessing OCB/CWB was shown to be equivalent across countries and a non bi-polar pattern of relationships was consistent across countries. Overall, findings imply a universal nature to the relationship between OCB and CWB across societal cultural groups. Experiences of both productive and counterproductive behaviours may differ across countries as a result of different norms, beliefs and values within the countries. Researchers need to ensure that cultural considerations become inherent within the development of OCB and CWB research and to clarify if meaningful differences emerge across cultures. Therefore, given the scarcity of intercultural research on both OCB and CWB, the current study adopts a cross-cultural approach to examine the relationship between OCB and CWB across four European countries. The Merging of OCB and CWB ResearchAlthough the research on OCB and CWB has increased dramatically in the past 20 years, it is has tended to follow distinct paths, with researchers proposing different definitions and concepts to capture behaviours that are positive or negative to the organization. This is evidenced by the plethora of concepts and conceptual models proposed to capture OCB (e.g. Coleman &The relationship between productive 4

Leadership, absenteeism acceptance, and ethical climate as predictors of teachers’ absence and citizenship behaviors

“…Furthermore, these findings may be supported by previous studies indicating that contradictory behaviors may be expected in the same person at the very same time and that a positive perception of SEC leads to greater acceptance of teacher absence, and as a result, to higher OCB (e.g. Coyne et al, 2013;Sackett et al, 2006;Vardi and Weitz, 2004); therefore, our findings may be explained by the fact that an ethical climate in school is characterized by collegial relationships and support.…”

The Mediating Role of Psychological Capital between Motivational Orientations and Their Organizational Consequences

“…The opposite aspect—although Coyne et al [ 15 ] caution against referring to two bipolar dimensions—is counterproductive performance or counterproductive work behaviors (CWBs). Although this factor has not been as extensively studied, it is easy to recognize in any business environment, in aspects such as absenteeism and presenteeism.…”

Job stressors and voluntary work behaviours: mediating effect of emotion and moderating roles of personality and emotional intelligence

“…The 50‐item version of the Voluntary Workplace Behaviour Scale (VWB) (see Coyne et al ., ) was used to measure OCB and CWB. The scale assessed a five‐factor model, namely interpersonal courtesy ( e.g.…”