Promotive and prohibitive ethical voice: Coworker emotions and support for the voice.

Abstract

Despite the importance of ethical voice for advancing ethics in organizations, we know little about how coworkers respond to ethical voice in their work units. Drawing on the fundamental approach/avoidance behavioral system and the promotive and prohibitive distinction in the voice literature, we distinguish between promotive and prohibitive ethical voice and propose that they engender different emotionselevation (an approach-oriented moral emotion) and feelings of threat (an avoidance-oriented emotion), respectively, in coworkers. We propose that these emotions differentially influence coworker subsequent responses to the ethical voice behavior. In a time-lagged critical incident survey and two experimental studies, we consistently found support for our hypothesis that promotive ethical voice elicits moral elevation in coworkers with subsequent coworker verbal support for the ethical voice (an approach-oriented response). However, results for prohibitive ethical voice were more complex because prohibitive ethical voice leads to mixed emotions in coworkers. It sometimes leads to feelings of threat, with indirect negative effects via threat on coworker support. But surprisingly, it also leads to coworker elevation and hence can have positive indirect effects via elevation on coworker support. We will discuss the research and practical implications of these findings.

Enhancing employees' duty orientation and moral potency: Dual mechanisms linking ethical psychological climate to ethically focused proactive behaviors

“…Conceptually related to but distinct from ethical taking charge, ethical voice is focused on verbally suggesting ideas for improving the ethical situation and challenging the status quo (Chen & Treviño, 2022; Rees et al, 2013). Ethical voice can thus be described as an employee's expression of concerns about violations of ethical standards (Morrison, 2011).…”

“…As extant research has shown, both employees and organizations greatly benefit when employees express ethical voice, through improved leadership behaviors (e.g., Babalola et al, 2022) and ethical performance (Huang & Paterson, 2017). Thus, finding ways to encourage more ethical voice within organizations continues to be an issue of significant theoretical and practical importance (Babalola et al, 2022; Chen & Treviño, 2022). In short, both ethical voice and ethical taking charge serve as two related but distinct forms of ethically focused proactive behavior that effectively capture employees' desire to make a positive difference in their organizations (Babalola et al, 2022; Kim et al, 2015; Kim & Liu, 2017; Weiss & Morrison, 2019).…”

“…Individuals engaging in such behaviors may risk not being promoted (Burris, 2012; Marinova et al, 2015) or being labeled “troublemakers” (Xu et al, 2022). Expressing ethical voice may even make observers feel threatened, partly because they are unwilling to take the risk of speaking up themselves (Chen & Treviño, 2022). Given these many impediments to employees acting proactively, those who choose to engage in ethically focused proactive behaviors likely do so out of a desire to fulfill their duty to further the organization's goals through ethical means, since duty orientation provides the necessary motivation to engage in behaviors that seek to change and improve the organization in ethical ways (e.g., Eva et al, 2020; Moss et al, 2020; Zheng et al, 2022).…”

“…This omission is both notable and surprising, given the proactivity literature suggests employees may be driven to act in ways that support the organization, even when doing so comes with personal risk to their career and/or reputation (Morrison, 2011). In considering this possibility, we suggest such proactive acts are embedded within two ethically focused employee proactive behaviors— speaking up about ethical issues and taking charge in ethical ways (Chen & Treviño, 2022; Morrison & Phelps, 1999). Whereas ethical voice refers to employee “expression that challenges, and seeks to change, the current behaviors, procedures, and policies that are not normatively appropriate” (Huang & Paterson, 2017), ethical taking charge focuses on the constructive efforts individuals make to effect functional change with respect to the ethical execution of work.…”

Is Thinking the Big Picture a Leader's Favorite in Psychologically Safe Conditions During Covid-19?

“…Employees' acquiescence voice definition emphasizes expressing support for work-related practices and out of a sense of inability to make a difference (Maynes & Podsakoff, 2014). However, when employees make many suggestions, inevitably, some suggestions will not be regarded as useful, value-added, or practical by others (Chen & Trevino, 2022;Ng et al, 2022;Xu et al, 2019).…”