Antecedents and outcomes of unethical pro-organizational behaviors in Pakistan’s retail sector
Employees in a highly competitive corporate setting may engage in unethical behavior such as lying, providing inaccurate information to stakeholders, or concealing information from customers to benefit the organization. Such actions are known as unethical pro-organizational behaviors (UPB). These...
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2022
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/105571/1/SPE%202022%2010%20UPM%20IR.pdf |
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| Summary: | Employees in a highly competitive corporate setting may engage in unethical
behavior such as lying, providing inaccurate information to stakeholders, or
concealing information from customers to benefit the organization. Such actions
are known as unethical pro-organizational behaviors (UPB). These actions have
resulted in penalties, product withdrawals, and company bankruptcies. Despite
these negative effects, the reasons employees engage in such behavior and the
outcomes remain under-explored. Thus, the objective of this study was to
examine the antecedents and outcomes of UPB.
This study adopted a quantitative research paradigm in which the data was
collected in two waves from 450 employees working in the marketing or sales
departments of the retail sector in Pakistan. The sample of this study was chosen
based on quota sampling in which quota was allocated for the most populated
cities of Punjab, Pakistan. Data were analyzed using the Partial Least Square
Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM). The findings revealed the prominent
influence of peer’s ethicality which was found to have a negative influence on
UPB.
Other antecedents such as relative leader-member exchange, job
embeddedness, and moral disengagement were also reported to be positively
related to UPB. Moreover, the significant mediating result of guilt indicated that
UPB induced guilt which then led to turnover intention and decreased job
satisfaction. However, the positive relationship between moral disengagement
and UPB was strengthened when the leader’s bottom-line mentality was low but
weakened when leader’s bottom-line mentality was high. The result also
demonstrated that UPB induced more guilt when the employees were more
morally aware. The limitation of this study is based on studying the phenomenon of UPB in the
context of retail stores in Punjab province in Pakistan and the use of quota
sampling due to the unavailability of the sampling frame. Despite the limitations,
the findings extend the understanding of the reasons and outcomes of UPB and
offer theoretical and practical implications. |
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