The Role of Quality of Work Life as a Predictor of Counterproductive Work Behavior

Abstract

Counterproductive work behavior (CWB) is work behavior that violates the rules/norms (written or unwritten) that could potentially harm an organization or members of an organization. This study aimed to explain CWB based on the condition of the quality of work life (QWL). CWB can be negative behavior towards co-workers/supervisors/subordinates in the workplace (CWB-I) and can be either negative behavior towards tasks/rules/organizational system (CWB-O). Participants in this study were the members of National Police. The number of participants was 305 people. Based on the analysis, the better the quality of relationships with supervisors (supervisory), the implementation of work culture (constitutionalism), the quality of relationships with co-workers (co-worker), and the quality of tasks/ responsibilities (promotion), the lower the CWB-I. Meanwhile, the lower levels of CWB-O were predicted by the promotion of quality of relationships with supervisors (supervisory). The study raised a further question concerning why the higher quality of/balance between work and private life (work life balance) led into the higher levels of CWB-I.Keywords: counterproductive work behavior, interpersonal behavior, organizational system, quality of work life, supervisoryCounterproductive work behavior (CWB) adalah perilaku kerja yang melanggar aturan/norma (baik tertulis maupun tidak tertulis) yang berpotensi merugikan organisasi atau anggota organisasi. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menjelaskan CWB berdasarkan kondisi quality of work life (QWL). CWB dapat berupa perilaku negatif terhadap rekan/atasan/bawahan di tempat kerja (CWB-I) dan dapat berupa perilaku negatif terhadap tugas/aturan/sistem organisasi (CWB-O). Partisipan pada penelitian ini (N = 305) adalah anggota Kepolisian. Berdasarkan hasil analisis, semakin baik kualitas hubungan dengan atasan (supervisory), penerapan budaya kerja (constitutionalism), peningkatan kualitas hubungan dengan rekan kerja (coworker), dan peningkatan kualitas tugas/jawab (promotion), maka semakin rendah CWB-I. Adapun rendahnya CWB-O, dapat diprediksi melalui kondisi peningkatan kualitas hubungan dengan atasan (supervisory). Penelitian ini menimbulkan pertanyaan lebih lanjut, mengapa semakin tinggi kualitas/keseimbangan antara pekerjaan dan kehidupan pribadi (work life balance), justru semakin tinggi CWB-I.

Overview of Counterproductive Work Behavior in Millennial Generation Employees (Study on Employees at PT. X)

“…Another limitation of this research is that there are certain types of CWB-I and CWB-O at PT. X which was not investigated on the measuring instrument [24], thus it is possible that counterproductive work behavior is not fully measured in this study.…”

“…The measuring instrument used to measure counterproductive work behavior in this study is the interpersonal and organizational deviance scales which have been adapted to Bahasa Indonesia [24]. This measuring instrument consists of two dimensions, the CWB-I with a total of 20 statements and CWB-O with a total of 28 statements.…”

“…Another counterproductive work behavior study involved police officers consisting of baby boomers, X, and millennials born in the year between 1959 and 1999 [24]. From the two previous studies, it can be said that each study is not specific to millennial generation employees.…”

Relation of Work-life Balance to Counterproductive Work Behavior and Turnover Intention among Malaysian Employees

“…This may be due to CWB being used as a tool to express negative emotions and unfairness when employees cannot achieve WLB (Beauregard, 2014). Meanwhile, although employees with WLB will not display destructive behavior on company property, the quality of the relationship between supervisors and colleagues suffer if the employee's attitude is more favorable toward family (Suyasa, 2017). As discussed in the components approach, WLB is not spending an equal amount of time on both work and nonwork matters; thus, the favoritism may lead to another issue.…”