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This study uses an eye-tracking device to examine the effects of dissenting opinion on information search style and decision quality, using insights from dual-process theory. When evaluating strategic outcomes, managers not exposed to a dissenting opinion employ directed information search using System 1 (heuristic, automatic cognitive processing), leading to low-quality decisions. Providing a dissenting opinion causes managers to use System 2 (sequential information search characterized by deliberate, slow, and effortful cognitive processing), leading to higher-quality decisions. This study provides useful insights into the cognitive processes underlying managers' judgments, and the factors that influence their decisions. We conclude by discussing the critical role of dissent in business practices, and explain how dissent affects people's System 2 cognitive processes.

This study aims to examine the extent to which organizational dissent predicts perception of workplace bullying. As previous studies have reported inconsistent and sometimes contradictory results regarding the interaction between the reporting of bullying and demographic variables, these variables are examined in the New Zealand context. Organizational communication research provides considerable insight into the ways individuals make sense of and resist workplace bullying through juxtaposition with the concepts of dissent and intragroup conflict.

A nationally representative sample of managers in New Zealand (n = 239) was conducted. Surveys included demographic questions and the following measures: Organizational Dissent Scale and Negative Acts Questionnaire Revised Scale.

Key results and indications for further research are highlighted by the third model in this study. First, workers who reported they engaged in either articulated dissent or latent dissent were more likely to perceive workplace bullying. Second, workers who are more likely to express contrary opinions in the workplace are more likely to recognize, acknowledge and tolerate less positive interactions in the workplace such as bullying.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to analyze dissent and bullying in the New Zealand context. Second, this research raises the question of whether there is a conflation of work-related bullying behaviors and bad leadership styles that may not be targeted (e.g. authoritative leadership and micromanaging). Finally, communication research provides a distinctive contribution by exploring the narrative form of worker responses to perceived bullying. In this manuscript, the authors examine potential predictors on the perception of workplace bullying in the context of New Zealand, particularly focus on the relationship between dissent and the perception of workplace bullying.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how government employees perceive and react to limits on their right to express public dissent about their employer. Within the context of Canada's federal workplaces, this two‐part project sought first to analyse and clarify the nature of complex government rules on dissent, and then to explore federal employees' understanding of those rules, and the balance between the duty of loyalty owed to their employer, and their protected rights as citizens to criticize their government. The goal was to contribute to further research and improve professional practice within the federal public service in addressing employee dissent.

This research is qualitative and exploratory. Documentary and literature analysis was conducted to review Canada's laws, policies and guidelines. These were critically analysed for consistency with each other, and with their stated objectives. Employee views and perceptions were collected through a focus group of communications employees, and three in‐depth interviews. Interviews and focus group results were analysed by inference to explore employee perceptions of their duties and rights, and the authority on which their perceptions are based.

Results indicate that respondents base decisions about employee dissent on unconsciously internalized organizational values. Formal policy, training, or legal consequences had less influence on dissent than organizational culture, employee experience, and perceived career and relationship risks. Respondents valued their right to dissent, but were willing to yield it to honour a voluntary moral contract to support a higher cause (public service). The implications are that traditional theories that view employee dissent as largely self‐interested may be less relevant when employees perceive the organization's goals to be value‐driven, and that employee dissent can be minimized by promoting a value‐based organizational culture.

This paper's findings suggest that organizations might better manage reputation and minimize external employee dissent by focussing on communications that foster a value‐driven organizational culture, rather than by implementing formal limits or policies to control dissent.

This paper offers policy analysis that fulfills an identified gap in knowledge in terms of general day‐to‐day practise when it comes to advising Canada's federal employees regarding their rights and responsibilities, and offers some challenges to traditional theories that suggest employee choices regarding dissent are primarily based on individual self‐interest or self‐actualization.

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationships between face concerns, articulated (upward) dissent and organizational assimilation. In this study, articulated dissent was conceptualized as a type of dissent.

A questionnaire was distributed to 370 working adults in the USA via Qualtrics. The questionnaire measured five face concerns, namely, self, other and mutual-face, articulated dissent and organizational assimilation. Before hypothesis testing, each measure was subjected to a confirmatory factor analysis to ensure that the hypothesized factor structure held. Pearson correlation and ordinary least squares estimation were used to test the hypotheses.

Conceptualizing dissent as a type of conflict, the findings of the current study are as follows: self-face and assimilation are positively correlated, other-face and assimilation are positively correlated, mutual-face and assimilation are positively correlated, assimilation and articulated dissent are positively correlated and organizational assimilation mediated the relationship between mutual-face and articulated dissent.

Theoretically, the self-presentation process (face) is more critical as a person becomes part of an organization; it is through assimilating into an organization that members become familiar with the norms of an organization and more comfortable dissenting to their superiors (articulated dissent); and the more the authors integrate with the work colleagues the more the authors engage in mutual face-saving.

The results of this study demonstrate that self-presentation is critical as a person becomes part of an organization, particularly when it comes to managing conflict.

This is the first study to link facework with organizational dissent. The results add to the understanding of how face affects whether we choose to express this kind of conflict behavior.

This study sets out to understand the extent to which public relations practitioners use dissent tactics in the face of organizational unethical decisions, and to examine how organizational environment facilitates such dissent.

A web‐based survey was conducted with the assistance of the research team of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA). A systematic random sample of 6,126 practitioners was drawn from the 2008 PRSA membership directory.

The results reaffirmed that “assertive confrontation” was the most frequently adopted tactic to resist an unethical organizational decision. Practitioners were more likely to confront management in an organization where top leaders do not support or exhibit ethical behavior. When an organization does not have an ethics code, practitioners were more likely to agitate others to oppose the unethical decision. Selective use of information and sabotage tactics were adopted when an organization does not value open communication.

The study was limited to practitioners in the USA, and the response rate was very low (4.02 percent).

As one of the grounding studies in public relations dissent, this research contributes to better understanding how public relations practitioners make an effort to promote organizational ethics by resisting unethical organizational decisions. The study also sheds light on the characteristics and nature of dissent in public relations, an important but little explored area in the field.

The purpose of this study is to investigate how compensation committee structure or characteristic impacts say on pay (SOP) voting dissent and the impact of SOP dissent on chief executive officer (CEO) turnover.

The authors use corporate governance and SOP data to test the relationships amongst variables. Additional analysis is performed using one-to-one propensity-score matched samples.

The authors find that firm-years with at least a female member present on the compensation committee are associated with lower SOP dissent. The authors find mixed results of the impact of SOP dissent on CEO turnover.

This paper suggests that diversity on the compensation committee, particularly the presence of at least a female member on the committee, serves as an important determinant of SOP voting outcome in the USA. The paper provides policymakers and practitioners with insights into factors influencing SOP voting outcomes and implications of SOP dissent for firms.

The findings of this paper contribute to the corporate governance literature by enhancing the understanding of the role of the compensation committee as it relates to SOP dissent and effect of SOP dissent on CEO turnover.

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, this study aims to explore how working remotely might impact the superior–subordinate relationship. Specifically, this study examines how immediacy explains articulated dissent, considers how an individual’s attitudes toward online communication predicts immediacy and articulated dissent and compares these relationships in England, Australia and the USA.

Three nations were examined: Australia, England and the USA (n = 1,776). Surveys included demographic questions and the following measures: organizational dissent scale, perceived immediacy measure, computer-mediated immediate behaviors measure and measure of online communication attitude.

The results reveal supervisors’ computer-mediated immediate behaviors and perceived immediacy both positively predict dissent. Some aspects of online communication attitudes positively predict computer-mediated immediate behaviors and perceived immediacy. In addition, attitudes toward online communication positively predict dissent. National culture influences some of these relationships; in each case the effects were substantively larger for the USA when compared to the other nations.

This study is the first to cross-culturally analyze dissent and immediacy. In addition, this study considers the extent to which the COVID-19 pandemic influences the superior–subordinate relationship.

Although decision makers and their superiors are obliged to be open to bad news, dissent, warnings, and problem signs, employees are often afraid to speak up. The purpose of this paper is to present a framework for the study of organizational dissent strategy used during the decision‐making phase of organizational change.

After identifying the components of the frame work, it is illustrated by examining two distinct and challenging dissent experiences. Propositions are set forth for further research.

It is argued that level of trust and sense of urgency will impel employees to voice opposition using four dissent strategies: organizational silence, organizational rumbling, organizational communication, and/or organizational blasting.

The paper is of value by showing that decision makers should be better equipped to identify and manage dissent strategies before they cause harm within their organizations.

The purpose of this paper is to chart the process of culture change within Durham National Savings, both before and after the public‐private partnership (PPP) of the organisation, and to examine dissent – in its many forms – as a dimension of employee resistance.

In‐depth semi‐structured interviews were conducted with trade union representatives and shop‐floor employees. Senior management declined all offers to participate in the research.

Despite managerial attempts to generate a homogenous culture, the organisation consisted of an array of subcultures. Yet dissent became more pointed and political after the PPP of the organisation. In combination with trade union resistance, workplace dissent challenges and destabilises managerial efforts at usurping organisational cultures.

The theoretical contribution of the paper is important as it moves beyond traditional forms of resistance to examine opaque and emergent forms of dissent at the subterranean level. The changing nature of such actions and attitudes are examined in the context of managerial attempts to transform the culture of the organisation. Whilst there are overlaps around the notions of misbehaviour, dissent and resistance, a fresh and extended definition of workplace dissent is offered.

This systematic literature review analyses the determinants and consequences of executive compensation-related shareholder activism and say-on-pay (SOP) votes. The review covers 71 empirical articles published between January 1995 and September 2017. The studies are reviewed within an empirical research framework that separates the reasons for shareholder activism and SOP voting dissent as input factor on the one hand and the consequences of shareholder pressure as output factor on the other. This procedure identifies the five most important groups of factors in the literature: the level and structure of executive compensation, firm characteristics, corporate governance mechanisms, shareholder structure and stakeholders. Of these, executive compensation and firm characteristics are the most frequently examined. Further examination reveals that the key assumptions of neoclassical principal agent theory for both managers and shareholders are not always consistent with recent empirical evidence. First, behavioral aspects (such as the perception of fairness) influence compensation activism and SOP votes. Second, non-financial interests significantly moderate shareholder activism. Insofar, we recommend integrating behavioral and non-financial aspects into the existing research. The implications are analyzed, and new directions for further research are discussed by proposing 19 different research questions.