Speaking Up Competently: A Comparison of Perceived Competence in Upward Dissent Strategies (original) (raw)

Employees' Expressions of Upward Dissent as a Function of Current and Past Work Experiences

Communication Reports, 2006

This study considered the degree to which employees' current and past work experiences related to employees' expressions of upward dissent. A sample of full-time working adults completed a survey questionnaire that assessed workplace freedom of speech, current job tenure, employment history, and upward dissent. Findings indicated that perceptions of workplace freedom of speech and current job tenure related to upward dissent about other-focused issues, that employment history related to upward dissent about functional issues, and that perceptions of workplace freedom of speech and employment history related to upward dissent about protective issues.

Consider This: A Comparison of Factors Contributing to Employees' Expressions of Dissent

Communication Quarterly, 2008

In this study, full-time employees were surveyed to determine the degree to which different considerations factored into their decisions to express upward or lateral dissent. Employees rated considerations similarly when reportedly dissenting to either supervisors or coworkers, with organizational climate and organizational attachment considerations being comparatively stronger than concerns associated with being perceived as adversarial and experiencing retaliation. A comparison across types of dissent revealed that organizational climate, organizational attachment, and adversarial perception=retaliation were more important considerations when employees expressed upward versus lateral dissent. Additionally, results suggested no significant differences in the way management and non-management employees weighed considerations when expressing dissent.

How Superior-Subordinate Relationship Quality and Conflict Management Styles Influence an Employee's Use of Upward Dissent Tactics

Negotiation and Conflict Management Research, 2016

This study examined employees' use of upward dissent tactics to express disagreement with organizational policies or practices to their supervisors. Employees (N = 242) from three organizations completed a survey instrument in which they reported the types of upward dissent tactics and types of conflict management styles they used with their supervisors as well as their perceptions of the quality of those relationships. The integrating conflict management style was positively correlated with the prosocial dissent tactic and negatively correlated with the threatening resignation dissent tactic. The dominating conflict management style was positively correlated with threatening resignation, circumvention, and repetition dissent tactics. When looking at relationships between the use of upward dissent tactics, superior-subordinate relationship quality, and conflict management styles, we found that conflict management styles were a stronger predictor of the use of upward dissent tactics than superior-subordinate relationship quality. Implications for employee voice are discussed.

Examining the Relationship between Organizational Dissent and Aggressive Communication

Avtgis / ORGANIZATIONAL DISSENT The purpose of this study was to explore the degree to which individual differences, in general , and aggressive communication traits, in particular, influenced employees'dissent strategy selections. Employees completed self-report instruments describing their levels of verbal aggressiveness, argumentativeness, and how they chose to express dissent concerning organizational practices and policies. Results indicated that argumentativeness, verbal aggressiveness, and organizational position predicted articulated and latent dissent use. Results also indicated that individual differences did not predict the use of displaced dissent.

Full-and Part-Time Dissent: Examining the Effect of Employment Status on Dissent Expression

This study examined whether employment status affected the amount and type of dissent employees expressed to management. To address this full-time and part-time employees in separate data collections completed the Upward Dissent Scale. A comparison of participant scores indicated that full-time employees used comparatively more prosocial (direct-factual appeals and solution presentation) and repetition upward dissent tactics compared to part-time employees. Contrastingly, part-time employees relied more heavily on upward dissent expressions that involved circumventing their bosses and threatening to quit their jobs. The findings indicate that employment status has a notable effect on the expression of upward dissent— with full-and part-time employees relying on differing tactics.

Accuracy, Coherence, and Discrepancy in Self- and Other-Reports: Moving toward an Interactive Perspective of Organizational Dissent

Management Communication Quarterly, 2013

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was twofold and involved examining the viability of using the Organizational Dissent Scale as an other-report instrument, and developing additional perceptual data related to dissent expression. A sample of 291 people completed survey questionnaire measures of organizational dissent. Equal-sized groups (n = 97) completed either a self-report, a workplace colleague other-report, or an organizational outsider other-report. Results indicated the Organizational Dissent Scale performed reliably as an other-report, but it showed some tendency for social desirability. In addition, findings suggested that certain indicators of proximity to the dissenter reduced discrepancy between self- and other-reports for upward dissent, but not lateral dissent. By comparison, lateral dissent produced the most discrepant reports of dissent expression, while displaced dissent produced the most coherent reports.

"In Case You Didn't Hear Me the First Time": An Examination of Repetitious Upward Dissent

This study explores how employees express dissent to management about the same issue on multiple occasions across time (i.e., how they practice repetition). Employees completed a survey instrument reporting how often they used varying upward dissent tactics, how often and for how long they raised the same issue, and how they perceived their supervisors responded to their concerns. Results indicate that employees relied predominantly on competent upward dissent tactics but that they adopted less competent and more facethreatening tactics as repetition progressed. In addition, employees' perceptions of their supervisors' responses to repetition related to the overall duration of repetition but not to the frequency with which employees raised issues or the amount of time that elapsed between dissent episodes.

Someone’s Going to Hear about This: Examining the Association between Dissent-Triggering Events and Employees’ Dissent Expression

Management Communication Quarterly, 2002

The purpose of this study was to examine how the nature of dissenttriggering events influenced to whom employees chose to express dissent. This was accomplished by asking respondents to report the frequency with which they expressed upward dissent to managers and supervisors, lateral dissent to coworkers, and displaced dissent to people external to their organizations (i.e., family and nonwork friends) in response to different dissent-triggering events. Structural equation models were employed. Results revealed that employees were more likely to express dissent to supervisors and coworkers about issues related to their coworkers and about organizational functions such as decision making and organizational change than they were to express dissent about ethical practices and preventing harm to employees. Employees did not appear to differentiate the amount of dissent they expressed to people outside of their organizations as a function of dissent-triggering events.