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Entitlement Versus Obligation: The Role of Attributed Motives in Subordinate Reactions to Leader Leniency

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Abstract

Although previous research has examined the effectiveness of various levels of punitive reactions to misconduct, researchers have given leader leniency relatively inadequate attention. Prior studies consistently suggest the beneficial effects of reacting less punitively toward misconduct. The current research challenges this notion by delineating a mixed effect of leader leniency on subordinate psychological and behavioral reactions. Building on social exchange theory (i.e., reciprocity norm and rank equilibration norm) and motive attribution literature, the authors argue that when subordinates hold high levels of instrumental motive attribution, leader leniency relates positively to subordinate psychological entitlement, which in turn leads to workplace deviance. In contrast, when subordinates develop high levels of value-expressive motive attribution, leader leniency is positively associated with their felt obligation toward leaders, which positively influences their subsequent organizational citizenship behavior. The results of a field study, a scenario experiment, and a recall experiment conducted to test these hypotheses confirm the double-edged effects of leader leniency. These findings have important implications for theory and practice.

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Data availability

The original data are not available to protect the anonymity of the participants of this study.

Notes

  1. We collected an open-ended survey on Prolific to ask 139 participants recall their most recent experience with receiving leniency from their leaders, and we finally retained 117 incidents. Among these incidents, the most common incidents were work mistake (i.e., 35.04%), and other incidents involved late for work, longer break, organizational rules violation, and interpersonal offense.

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Funding

This work was supported in part by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant numbers: 72202106, 72202040, 72102220, 72192843), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (Grant number: 63222080) and was supported by Ant Group and a grant from MOE Social Science Laboratory of Digital Economic Forecasts and Policy Simulation at UCAS.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Business School, Nankai University, Tianjin, China

    Zheng Zhu

  2. School of Management, Fudan University, Shanghai, China

    Xingwen Chen

  3. School of Economics and Management, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    Mengxi Yang

  4. MOE Social Science Laboratory of Digital Economic Forecasts and Policy Simulation at UCAS, Beijing, China

    Mengxi Yang

  5. School of Business, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai, China

    Wansi Chen

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  1. Zheng Zhu
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Appendix

Appendix

Part I: Leniency Manipulation

High Leniency Condition

Imagine that you are serving as a logistician at a large company. One day, you made a mistake regarding an order and the shipping label. You sent the wrong package to the wrong person. This caused issues as the matter had to be resolved and the customer was very unhappy. According to policy this should have been recorded and reprimanded, but your leader showed leniency and did NOT punish you for the error as per policy. Your leader contacted the customer and rectified the mistake, and asked for it not to happen again in the future.

Low Leniency Condition

Imagine that you are serving as a logistician at a large company. One day, you made a mistake regarding an order and the shipping label. You sent the wrong package to the wrong person. This caused issues as the matter had to be resolved and the customer was very unhappy. Your leader followed the policy to record your mistake and reprimand you. Your leader required you to contact the customer and rectify the mistake, and warned for it not to happen again in the future.

Part II: Attribution Manipulation

Instrumental Attribution

Research shows that when interacting with subordinates, supervisors sometimes display lenient behaviors toward subordinates’ misconducts, such as giving subordinates at work a lighter punishment for their misconduct than they could have; lessening or removing a negative consequence for misconduct; and being lenient in response to subordinates’ misconduct. There has been a long debate about why supervisors engage in these lenient behaviors toward subordinates. A new research study conducted in both the United States and China with thousands of participants from multiple organizations has provided support to the conclusion that supervisors’ lenient behavior is often a result of instrumental considerations. That is, engaging in lenient behaviors to subordinates is beneficial for protecting or maximizing leaders’ self-interests. For instance, being lenient toward high performers can help promote his/her commitment and work effort.

According to this study, when your leader shows leniency towards you, you should attribute this to instrumental factors (e.g., leaders’ self-interests).

Value-Expressive Attribution

Research shows that when interacting with subordinates, supervisors sometimes display lenient behaviors toward subordinates’ misconducts, such as giving subordinates at work a lighter punishment for their misconduct than they could have; lessening or removing a negative consequence for misconduct; and being lenient in response to subordinates’ misconduct. There has been a long debate about why supervisors engage in these lenient behaviors toward subordinates. A new research study conducted in both the United States and China with thousands of participants from multiple organizations has provided support to the conclusion that supervisors’ lenient behavior is often a result of leaders’ value expression. That is, engaging in leniency reflects that being lenient is the supervisor’s core belief and he/she is a lenient, virtuous and benevolent person.

According to this study, when your leader shows leniency towards you, you should attribute this to value-expressive factors (e.g., leaders’ values and virtue).

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Zhu, Z., Chen, X., Yang, M. et al. Entitlement Versus Obligation: The Role of Attributed Motives in Subordinate Reactions to Leader Leniency. J Bus Ethics (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-023-05544-4

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