Does organizational formalization facilitate voice and helping organizational citizenship behaviors? It depends on (national) uncertainty norms

Fischer, Ronald and Ferreira, María Cristina and Van Meurs, Nathalie and Gok, Kubilay and Jiang, Dingyu and Fontaine, Johnny R.J. and Harb, Charles and Cieciuch, Jan and Achoui, Mustapha and Mendoza, Ma Socorro D. and Hassan, Arif and Achmadi, Donna A. and Mogaji, Andrew A. and Abubakar, Amina A. (2019) Does organizational formalization facilitate voice and helping organizational citizenship behaviors? It depends on (national) uncertainty norms. Journal of International Business Studies, 50 (1). pp. 125-134. ISSN 0047-2506 E-ISSN 1478-6990

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Abstract

Prosocial work behaviors in a globalized environment do not operate in a cultural vacuum. We assess to what extent voice and helping organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) vary across cultures, depending on employees’ perceived level of organizational formalization and national uncertainty. We predict that in contexts of uncertainty, cognitive resources are engaged in coping with this uncertainty. Organizational formalization can provide structure that frees up cognitive resources to engage in OCB. In contrast, in contexts of low uncertainty, organizational formalization is not necessary for providing structure and may increase constraints on discretionary behavior. A three-level hierarchical linear modeling analysis of data from 7,537 employees in 267 organizations across 17 countries provides broad support for our hypothesis: perceived organizational formalization is weakly related to OCB, but where uncertainty is high; formalization facilitates voice significantly, helping OCB to a lesser extent. Our findings contribute to clarifying the dynamics between perceptions of norms at organizational and national levels for understanding when employees may engage in helping and voice behaviors. The key implication is that managers can foster OCB through organizational formalization interventions in uncertain environments that are cognitively demanding.

Item Type:	Article (Journal)
Additional Information:	2898/60926
Uncontrolled Keywords:	culture, formalization, multilevel analysis, organizational citizenship behavior, uncertainty
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor > HD28 Management. Industrial Management H Social Sciences > HF Commerce > HF5001 Business. Business Administration H Social Sciences > HF Commerce > HF5001 Business. Business Administration > HF5549 Personnel management
Kulliyyahs/Centres/Divisions/Institutes (Can select more than one option. Press CONTROL button):	Kulliyyah of Economics and Management Sciences > Department of Business Administration
Depositing User:	Prof. Arif Hassan
Date Deposited:	03 Jan 2018 16:57
Last Modified:	24 Jan 2020 12:01
URI:	http://irep.iium.edu.my/id/eprint/60926

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