TY  - JOUR
AB  - Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyse the mechanism of how Machiavellian corporate culture (MCC) affects employees’ counterproductive work behaviours.Design/methodology/approach Through a three-phase grounded study on the data of a single case amounting to over 170,000 words, this qualitative study explores why employees exhibit counterproductive work behaviours.Findings The results indicated that the implications of the MCC of family businesses in China include the following three dimensions: low trust, control orientation, and status orientation. In this corporate cultural context, employees exhibit counterproductive work behaviours because they perceive low organisational justice, psychological contract violation, and low trust. Among them, psychological contract violation serves as a triggering mechanism due to the organisational context and trust is crucial to employee counterproductive work behaviour.Research limitations/implications In this study, the results are derived merely from the observation of and generalisation about one case; more therefore, empirical studies are required.Practical implications Numerous family business owners in China exhibit a high level of Machiavellian personality traits, and this personality tends to determine the implications of corporate culture. In order to establish a diverse culture, a heterogeneous top manager team must be developed and a new organisational culture must be established from top down.Originality/value This study extends the research scopes of employee personality and behaviours as well as leaders’ personality traits and employee emotions, and proposes a theoretical framework of leaders’ personality-culture-employee behaviours as a contribution to studies on organisational behaviour, theories of corporate social responsibility, and development of corporate culture.
VL  - 55
IS  - 3
SN  - 0025-1747
DO  - 10.1108/MD-10-2016-0696
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1108/MD-10-2016-0696
AU  - Zheng Wenzhi
AU  - Wu Yen-Chun Jim
AU  - Chen XiaoChen
AU  - Lin Shu-Jou
PY  - 2017
Y1  - 2017/01/01
TI  - Why do employees have counterproductive work behavior? The role of founder’s Machiavellianism and the corporate culture in China
T2  - Management Decision
PB  - Emerald Publishing Limited
SP  - 563
EP  - 578
Y2  - 2024/04/25
ER  -