Search results

The high-pressure nature of the construction industry, along with the COVID-19 pandemic, triggered abusive supervision (i.e. workplace bullying and incivility behaviour) that has diminished workers' well-being. However, despite the growing prevalence in practice and increasing concern in academia, abusive supervision remains largely unexplored by construction management scholars. This study aims to fill the gap in the current literature by analysing the effects of abusive supervision on construction workers' well-being, the mediating role of guanxi closeness and the moderating role of trust in the manager.

A questionnaire survey was completed by 258 Chinese construction workers. The data underwent mediation and moderation analyses using PROCESS macro 3.5 for SPSS.

The results revealed that managers' abusive supervision reduced construction workers' well-being at work and in life. Guanxi closeness between manager and workers mediated the relationship between managers' abusive supervision and construction workers' well-being. Additionally, trust in managers moderated the mediating effect of guanxi closeness. This study further revealed that the emotional connection between construction managers and workers, such as expressive guanxi closeness and affective-based trust, is important in handling the impact of abusive supervision on the workers.

The findings of this study provide support for recent calls to address negative manager behaviours such as abusive supervision in construction management. They aid the development of a more comprehensive internal mechanism that considers the influence of guanxi closeness on the outcomes of abusive supervision by managers at construction sites. Additionally, interventions that develop trust in managers may be particularly effective in alleviating the tension of abusive supervision. More attention should be paid to managers' emotional connections in daily construction project management.

Rather than concentrate on positive leadership, this study shifts the focus to negative leadership in construction project management by identifying abusive supervision as a negative primary antecedent of workers' well-being. While prior research has highlighted how negative manager behaviours affect workers' well-being from the conservation of resources theory (COR) perspective, this study is the first, to the authors’ knowledge, to adopt a social exchange theory perspective by introducing guanxi closeness as a mediator. It contributes to a greater understanding of how trust in the manager alleviates the negative effect of the person's abusive supervision on construction workers.

This research focuses on exploring a psychological mechanism between abusive supervision and job engagement via job insecurity and job alternative to understand how frontline construction workers' perceived abusive supervision impacts on their work engagement.

This study draws on the conservation of resources theory (COR) to postulate that workers' job insecurity acts as a mediation between abusive supervision and work engagement, and the perception of job alternative moderates the impact of abusive supervision on job insecurity. This study empirically tests survey data from 357 frontline construction workers and adopts partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to test the proposed model.

This paper proved the dark-side of abusive supervision, dual character of job insecurity and moderating role of job alternative. The game-changing mediation effects of job insecurity were examined, which suggested that work engagement would be higher when abusive supervision stimulates stronger job insecurity. Furthermore, the result indicated that the relationship between abusive supervision and job insecurity should be weaker when job alternative is high.

This research suggests construction project managers (CPMs) must take steps such as enhancing supervisors' emotional management skills to control frequency of abuse and thus lessen compromising engagement. Moreover, overall understanding frontline workers' job insecurity is meaningful for better construction performance management.

This research contributes to the disputed leadership style (abusive supervision) and positive psychology knowledge (work engagement) in construction projects by unveiling the psychosocial mechanism (game-changing effects of job insecurity) of construction frontline workers positive engaged feeling. This study highlights the function of personal and job resources in process of resource conservation.

This study aims to explore the mechanism of abusive supervision differentiation on employee work-family conflict, and examine the chain mediating role of work-related rumination and organizational citizenship behavior/deviant workplace behavior, as well as the moderating role of work-family boundary segmentation preference.

The authors designed two studies: Study 1 was a scenario experiment with 120 Master of Business Administration students. To further explore this finding, the authors conducted a multiwave survey in Study 2 with 345 employees from various organizations.

The results of Study 1 showed that abusive supervision differentiation had a positive effect on work-related rumination, and work-related rumination mediated the relationship between differentiated abusive supervision and organizational citizenship behavior/deviant workplace behavior. The results of Study 2 not only confirmed the conclusions of Study 1 but also revealed that organizational citizenship behavior/deviant workplace behavior significantly affected work-family conflict. Abusive supervision differentiation had a positive effect on work-family conflict through work-related rumination and organizational citizenship behavior/deviant workplace behavior. In addition, work-family boundary segmentation preference negatively moderated the relationship between organizational citizenship behavior and work-family conflict.

First, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first paper to test the spillover effect of abusive supervision differentiation on the family domain through a chain mediation model. It extends the research on abusive supervision differentiation from the work domain to the family domain. Second, previous research has highlighted role conflict or role insufficiency as significant factors contributing to work-family conflict. However, this study suggests that abusive supervision differentiation from workplace managers can also trigger work-family conflict, providing a new perspective in the study of precursors to work-family conflict.

Work–family conflict (WFC) is rife among construction professionals, leading to a significant negative impact on their work engagement. Building on an extant body of research, this study provides nuanced insights into the link between WFC, work–life balance (WLB) and work engagement and identifies the boundary conditions of these relationships.

Data were collected from 257 dyads of construction professionals and their immediate supervisors from a sample of five construction firms based in India using an online survey.

The results found that WLB mediates the relationship between WFC and work engagement, and the relationship is controlled by professionals' gender and perceptions of psychological contract breach (PCB). An important finding is that PCB accentuates the negative influence of WFC on work engagement via WLB. The study also reveals that the negative impact of WFC on WLB is stronger for women.

The findings are relevant for construction firms since they are primarily dominated by men and continue to struggle to attract more women professionals. The study insights provide avenues to expand existing research on the relationship between WFC and work engagement and offer managerial implications for improving construction professionals' work engagement in the high-pressure context of the construction industry.

The study significantly advances the underdeveloped literature on work–family interface, especially in the unique work settings of the construction industry, by establishing WFC as a predictor and revealing how engagement at work is affected. It highlights the importance of boundary conditions such as gender and PCB. It is one of the first to assess the relationship between WFC, WLB, PCB and work engagement among construction professionals in India.

Drawing on conservation of resources theory, this study aims to develop a resource-based model depicting a decreased level of psychological resourcefulness – relational energy, as a novel explanatory mechanism that accounts for the harm of abusive supervision, and we further investigate the role of leader humor as a boundary condition.

We applied multilevel path analysis to test our hypotheses with three-time-point survey data collected from 226 supervisor-employee dyads in a telecommunication company in China across six months.

Our results show that abusive supervision is negatively related to employee relational energy, leading to a subsequent decline in employee job performance. The predictions of the depleting effects get alleviated by leader humor.

This study foregrounds the importance of employee relationship management in the workplace and reveals that some abusive supervisors may manage to sustain employee performance and relational energy by using humor in their interactions, which necessitates immediate intervention.

These findings offer novel insights into the deleterious impact of abusive supervision by demonstrating the critical role of relational energy in dyadic interactions. We also reveal the potential dark side of leader humor in the context of abuse in the workplace.

Drawing on the conservation of resources theory, the present study aims to design and explore the influence of abusive supervision and coworker incivility on turnover intention among frontline employees (FLEs). Besides the mediating effects of work stress between abusive supervision and turnover intention, coworker incivility and turnover intention also be explored.

Data from 311 FLEs are collected by a self-administered structured questionnaire and analyzed by confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation model.

The empirical results established that abusive supervision and coworker incivility significantly predicts work stress and work stress significantly predicts turnover intention. Abusive supervision significantly predicts a positive relationship with turnover intention, whereas coworker incivility with turnover intention is vis-à-vis. Besides, abusive supervision and coworker incivility significantly predict turnover intention via work stress. The study further illustrated the control variables, e.g. education, experience, and proactive personality of FLEs.

The study finds abusive supervision and coworker incivility as stressors in the emerging economy for FLEs. However, coworker incivility on turnover intention cannot predict as expected because the roles of the supervisor and coworker are different in this context.

The continuous support of supervisors and coworkers can reduce the stress and consequences of reducing the intention of turnover of FLEs. The concerns can enhance their support by using respect and credit for work, maintaining privacy, providing proper feedback, being sensible to the performance, and entitlement to any achievement. They also suggest ensuring a work environment of privacy, fair treatment, importance to suggestions, and ascertaining punishment for any colleague's mistreatment.

The frontliners always contribute a large pie of output for any organization. Supervisors and coworkers impact the day-to-day life of FLEs.

As a study on FLEs in the context of evolving economy, the investigation fulfills the inconsistencies of the previous result with the mediating role of work stress with a strong theoretical base.

This paper examines the moderated-moderation model of reciprocity belief and fear of negative evaluation between supervisors' abusive reactions and subordinates' distress.

The authors obtained 412 valid responses from Egyptian hotel employees and analyzed them using PROCESS model 3.

The three-way interaction findings proved that when employees have high reciprocity beliefs and low fear of negative evaluations, the abusive supervision-psychological distress relationship is dampened.

Organizations have the opportunity to implement human resource development (HRD) strategies focused on cultivating reduced apprehension toward negative evaluation and fostering a robust sense of positive reciprocity. To achieve this, HRD and HRM initiatives can encompass elements such as bolstering organizational and coworker support, promoting cultural assimilation and redefining work practices.

This paper adopts a comprehensive approach that recognizes the intricate interrelationships within the workplace by identifying subtle dynamics of abusive supervision and its impacts. It also explores the complex nature of such relationships rather than taking a purely causal perspective.

The present research aims to empirically test the “Barriers to abusive supervision model” to find how employee-related (core self-evaluations) and situational factors (perceived job dependency) make an employee trapped in the spiral of supervisory abuse. In addition, the work–family spillover lens is used to explain how employees' retaliation is targeted at their families in response to abuse from their bosses.

The current study has employed a three-wave longitudinal moderated mediation design and analysed data from 265 employees working in the hospitality industry of Pakistan.

The results of this study have shown that low core-self evaluations put employees in a spiral of supervisory abuse and they instil aggression towards their families. This association is further strengthened when employees are dependent on their job.

This study is one of the first to use the “Barriers to Abusive supervision” model to answer who and in which conditions tend to trap in the spiral of abuse and integrate the work-to-family interface model for elaborating the outcomes to the family domain.

Bullying knowledge hiding has been recently identified as a manifestation of knowledge hiding behavior. As a relatively new concept, it is still underexplored. Previous research has focused on the antecedents of bullying hiding. However, there is a lack of research on the negative consequences that bullying hiding may have on employees. This study aims to uncover the effects of supervisor bullying hiding on employees knowledge behavior. The study also aims to examine the moderating effect of power values and the mediating effect of job stress.

Data were gathered in two waves from 444 employees with higher education in Poland. Data collection was conducted in July and August 2022. A general linear model mediation analysis with jamovi Advanced Mediation Models software was used to examine the hypotheses.

The results indicate that bullying knowledge hiding by supervisors triggers subordinates’ job stress and aggression in the form of bullying knowledge hiding toward co-workers. Contrary to expectations, job stress does not mediate the relationship between supervisor bullying hiding and subordinate bullying hiding toward co-workers. Power-dominance values, contrary to power-resources values, moderate the above relationship.

As bullying hiding has significant potential to spread among organizational members, managers seeking to reduce it should check the personal values of job applicants and employees.

Based on the behavioral contagion and frustration–aggression–displacement theories, to the best of the author’s knowledge, this study is the first to investigate the relationships between supervisor bullying hiding, job stress, power values and subordinate bullying hiding toward co-workers.

This article aims to examine the role of boundaryless career orientation in influencing Internet professionals' strategies toward workplace problems in China's Internet companies, which feature prominent problems including excessive overwork. It addresses one question: how do Chinese Internet professionals make grievance strategies?

This article draws on qualitative data based on semi-structured, in-depth interviews with 134 employees from 6 representative Chinese Internet companies. The data were collected during 2018-2021 and analyzed with a grounded theory approach.

This article highlights the role of boundaryless career orientation in explaining Chinese Internet professionals' strategies toward workplace grievances. The author develops a comprehensive model to illustrate how boundaryless career orientation influences four grievance strategies namely, strategic compliance, exit, dissent expression and resistance that correspond to four different motives to advance the professionals' boundaryless career: learning, transferring, relieving and resolving. Internet professionals choose different grievance strategies based on how each option can benefit their boundaryless career goals.

This article is one of the first to bring in boundaryless career orientation as a key factor in explaining Chinese Internet professionals' grievance strategies. It provides a fuller picture than previous studies by showing wide varieties of professionals' grievance behaviors. The finding of high-level boundaryless career orientation among Internet professionals offers insights on how companies can improve employment relations by improving career management practices.