Abstract
We propose that middle managers’ perceived organizational support enhances their performance through the sequential mediation of their behavioral integrity and follower organizational citizenship behaviors. We test our model with data collected from middle managers, their direct subordinates, and their direct superiors at 18 hotel properties in China. The current study’s findings contribute to the existing literature on perceived organizational support and behavioral integrity. They also add a practical self-interest argument for middle managers’ efforts to maintain their word-action alignment by demonstrating that middle manager behavioral integrity positively affects middle managers’ own task performance ratings, both directly and via its positive effect on subordinates’ organizational citizenship behaviors.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
The composite reliability values of the three-parameter direct subordinate OCBO behaviors and three-parameter direct subordinate OCBI behaviors variables (0.77 and 0.86, respectively) were higher than the 0.70 threshold, the AVE values (0.54 and 0.68, respectively) were also higher than the 0.50 threshold, and all six SRW values were greater than the 0.50 threshold with SRW values varying between 0.61 and 0.92.
Note that in contrast with the above “possible rival explanation” and consistent with the current study’s assertions, the results of auxiliary analyses showed that middle manager reported perceived organizational support had a direct, positive effect on direct subordinate-rated middle manager behavioral integrity, while middle manager-rated direct subordinate organizational citizenship behaviors were not related to subordinate-rated middle manager behavioral integrity.
While social desirability is certainly likely to inflate respondents’ ratings of the middle manager’s integrity, it is difficult to conceive how it would inflate the association between those ratings and the middle managers’ ratings of the follower’s citizenship behaviors or between those and the superior’s ratings of the middle manager’s task performance. Were these variables measured by a single respondent in a survey, social desirability could indeed be a factor. The fact that we use different informants for the different variables in the model substantially mitigates the possibility that a single intrapsychic phenomenon, such as social desirability, will uniformly inflate the variables within each case so as to yield a spurious association.
References
Bergeron, D. M., Shipp, A., Rosen, B., & Furst, S. A. (2013). Organizational citizenship behavior and career outcomes: The cost of being a good citizen. Journal of Management, 39, 958–984.
Chung, J. Y., & Petrick, J. F. (2013). Price fairness of airline ancillary fees: An attributional approach. Journal of Travel Research, 52, 168–181.
Dineen, B. R., Lewicki, R. L., & Tomlinson, E. C. (2006). Supervisory guidance and behavioral integrity: Relationships with employee citizenship and deviant behavior. Journal of Applied Psychology, 91, 622–635.
Eisenberger, R. (2016). Perceived organizational support. University of Houston. http://classweb.uh.edu/eisenberger/perceivedorganizational-support/
Eisenberger, R., Huntington, R., Hutchison, S., & Sowa, D. (1986). Perceived organizational support. Journal of Applied Psychology, 71, 500–507.
Eisenberger, R., Shoss, M. K., Karagonlar, G., Gonzalez-Morales, M. G., Wickham, R., & Buffardi, L. C. (2014). The supervisor POS—LMX—subordinate POS chain: Moderation by reciprocation wariness and supervisor’s organizational embodiment. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 35, 635–656.
Farh, J. L., & Cheng, B. S. (2000). A cultural analysis of paternalistic leadership in Chinese organizations. In J. Li, A. Tsui, & E. Weldon (Eds.), Management and organizations in the Chinese context. London, UK: Macmillan.
Floyd, S. W., & Wooldridge, B. (1994). Dinosaurs or dynamos? Recognizing middle management’s strategic role. Academy of Management Executive, 8, 47–58.
Fritz, J. M. H. (2002). How do I dislike thee: Let me count the ways. Management Communication Quarterly, 15, 410–438.
Fritz, J. M. H., O’Neil, N. B., Popp, A. M., Williams, C. D., & Arnett, R. C. (2013). The influence of supervisory behavioral integrity on intent to comply with organizational ethical standards and organizational commitment. Journal of Business Ethics, 114, 251–263.
Gouldner, A. W. (1960). The norm of reciprocity: A preliminary statement. American Sociological Review, 25, 161–178.
Kannan-Narasimhan, R., & Lawrence, B. S. (2012). Behavioral integrity: How leader referents and trust matter to workplace outcome. Journal of Business Ethics, 111, 165–178.
Leroy, H., Anseel, F., Gardner, W., & Sels, L. (2015). Authentic leadership, authentic followership, basic need satisfaction, and work role performance: A cross-level study. Journal of Management, 41, 1677–1697.
Leroy, H., Palanski, M. E., & Simons, T. (2012). Authentic leadership and behavioral integrity as drivers of follower commitment and performance. Journal of Business Ethics, 107, 255–264.
Little, T. D., Cunningham, W. A., Shahar, G., & Widaman, K. F. (2002). To parcel or not to parcel: Exploring the question, weighing the merits. Structural Equation Modeling, 9, 151–173.
McDonald, R. P., & Ho, M.-H. R. (2002). Principles and practice in reporting statistical equation analyses. Psychological Methods, 7, 64–82.
Organ, D. W. (1988). Organizational citizenship behavior: The good soldier syndrome. Lexington, MA: Lexington Books.
Organ, D. W. (1997). Organizational citizenship behavior: It’s construct clean-up time. Human Performance, 10, 85–98.
Podsakoff, P. M., MacKenzie, S. B., Lee, J.-Y., & Podsakoff, N. P. (2003). Common method biases in behavioral research: A critical review of the literature and recommended remedies. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88, 879–903.
Podsakoff, P. M., MacKenzie, S. B., Paine, J. B., & Bachrach, D. G. (2000). Organizational citizenship behaviors: A critical review of the theoretical and empirical literature and suggestions for future research. Journal of Management, 26, 513–563.
Podsakoff, P. M., MacKenzie, S. B., & Podsakoff, N. P. (2012). Sources of method bias in social science research and recommendations on how to control it. Annual Review of Psychology, 63, 539–569.
Preacher, K. J., & Hayes, A. F. (2008). Asymptotic and resampling strategies for assessing and comparing indirect effects in multiple mediator models. Behavior Research Methods, 40, 879–891.
Rhoades, L., & Eisenberger, R. (2002). Perceived organizational support: A review of the literature. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87, 698–714.
Riggle, R. J., Edmondson, D. R., & Hansen, J. D. (2009). A meta-analysis of the relationship between perceived organizational support and job outcomes: 20 years of research. Journal of Business Research, 62, 1027–1030.
Rubin, R. S., Dierdorff, E. C., & Bachrach, D. G. (2013). Boundaries of citizenship behavior: Curvilinearity and context in the citizenship and task performance relationship. Personnel Psychology, 66, 377–406.
Schaffer, B., & Riordan, C. (2003). A review of cross-cultural methodologies for organizations research: A best-practices approach. Organizational Research Methods, 6, 169–215.
Shanock, L. R., & Eisenberger, R. (2006). When supervisors feel supported: Relationships with subordinates’ perceived supervisor support, perceived organizational support, and performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 91, 689–695.
Shi, W., Markoczy, L., & Dess, G. G. (2009). The role of middle management in the strategy process: Group affiliation, structural holes, and tertius lungens. Journal of Management, 35, 1453–1480.
Simons, T. (1999). Behavioral integrity as a critical ingredient for transformational leadership. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 12, 89–104.
Simons, T. (2002). Behavioral integrity: The perceived alignment between managers’ words and deeds as a research focus. Organization Science, 13, 18–35.
Simons, T. (2008). The integrity dividend: Leading by the power of your word. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Simons, T., Friedman, R., Liu, L. A., & McLean Parks, J. (2007). Racial differences in sensitivity to behavioral integrity: Attitudinal consequences, in-group effects, and “trickle down” among black and non-black employees. Journal of Applied Psychology, 92, 650–665.
Simons, T., Leroy, H., Collewaert, V., & Masschelein, S. (2014). How leader alignment of words and deeds affects followers: A meta-analysis of behavioral integrity research. Journal of Business Ethics,. doi:10.1007/s10551-014-2332-3.
Simons, T., Tomlinson, E., & Leroy, H. (2011). Research on behavioral integrity: A promising construct for positive organizational scholarship. In K. S. Cameron & G. M. Spreitzer (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of positive organizational scholarship (pp. 325–339). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
Takeuchi, R., Yun, S., & Tesluk, P. E. (2002). An examination of crossover and spillover effects of spousal and expatriate cross-cultural adjustment on expatriate outcomes. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87, 655–666.
Van de Vijver, F. J. R., Breugelmans, S. M., & Schalk-Soekar, S. R. G. (2008). Multiculturalism: Construct validity and stability. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 32, 93–104.
Williams, L. J., & Anderson, S. E. (1991). Job satisfaction and organizational commitment as predictors of organizational citizenship and in-role behaviors. Journal of Management, 17, 601–617.
Wood, D. J. (1991). Corporate social performance revisited. Academy of Management Review, 18(4), 691–718.
Wooldridge, B., Schmid, T., & Floyd, S. W. (2008). The middle management perspective on strategy process: Contributions, synthesis, and future research. Journal of Management, 34, 1190–1221.
Zagenczyk, T. J., Scott, K. D., Gibney, R., Murrell, A. J., & Thatcher, J. B. (2010). Social influence and perceived organizational support: A social networks analysis. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 111, 127–138.
Zohar, D. (2010). Thirty years of safety climate research: Reflections and future directions. Accident Analysis and Prevention, 42, 1517–1522.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Appendix
Appendix
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Way, S.A., Simons, T., Leroy, H. et al. What is in it for Me? Middle Manager Behavioral Integrity and Performance. J Bus Ethics 150, 765–777 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-016-3204-9
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-016-3204-9