BWL VIII: Vortrag zum Thema "Why do people commit to authority rules"

Der Vortrag beschäftigt sich mit dem Thema "Why do people commit to authority rules? The roles of collective/personal outcome favorability and procedural justice". Interessierte sind herzlich eingeladen.

• Abstract: Individual commitment to rules is crucial to organizational success but proves difficult to achieve. Prior research has primarily considered authority rules from self-interest perspective and focused on personal outcome favorability and procedural justice as two major antecedents of individual reactions to authority rules and polices. However, many authority decisions affect both personal and collective interests, and individuals may be willing to endorse rules and policies that benefit the collective interests even at the expense of their personal interests. We draw from interdependence theory of social dilemma (Van Lange & Rusbult, 2011) to provide a new perspective on why individuals commit to authority rules. In three independent survey studies within a hospital (Study 1), a government policy (Study 2), and a hotel customer service context (Study 3), we found that collective outcome favorability was positively related to authority rule commitment and procedural justice accentuated this positive linkage. This interactive relationship of collective outcome favorability and procedural justice with rule commitment was particularly salient under condition of low rather than high personal outcome favorability. All in all, the findings demonstrate that individuals’ commitment to authority rules and policies is shaped by their dilemmatic considerations of personal and collective outcome favorability. Importantly, we highlight the role of procedural justice as a “safety check” to gauge the risk of committing to the rule under the situation of misalignment between personal and collective interests, a conundrum facing many organizations and governments.