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Gossiping about outsiders: How time-related work stress among collectivistic employees hinders job performance

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 July 2019

Dirk De Clercq Open the ORCID record for Dirk De Clercq [Opens in a new window] ,
Inam Ul Haq Open the ORCID record for Inam Ul Haq [Opens in a new window]  and
Muhammad Umer Azeem Open the ORCID record for Muhammad Umer Azeem [Opens in a new window]
Dirk De Clercq*
Affiliation:
Goodman School of Business, Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario L2S 3A1, Canada
Inam Ul Haq
Affiliation:
Lahore Business School, The University of Lahore, Lahore, Pakistan
Muhammad Umer Azeem
Affiliation:
School of Business and Economics, University of Management and Technology, Lahore, Pakistan
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

This study investigates the connection between employees’ experience of time-related work stress and their job performance, with a particular focus on the mediating role of their propensity to engage in negative gossip and the moderating role of their collectivistic orientation. The results based on multisource, three-wave data from employees, their peers, and supervisors in Pakistani organizations show that an important reason that time-related work stress might diminish job performance is that employees expend significant energy discussing their negative evaluations of other organizational members with peers, possibly as a way to protect their self-esteem resources. This mediating role of gossip is also invigorated by employees’ collectivistic orientation. For organizations, this study identifies a key mechanism – informal conversations with peers about the flaws of others in the organization – by which time-related stress prevents employees from allocating sufficient energy to completing their job tasks, and it reveals that this process is more likely among collectivistic employees.

Keywords

time-related work stressgossipcollectivistic orientationjob performanceconservation of resources theory
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Management & Organization , Volume 29 , Issue 2 , March 2023 , pp. 191 - 206
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press and Australian and New Zealand Academy of Management 2019

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