Standing by your Organization: The Impact of Organizational Identification and Abusive Supervision on Followers' Perceived Cohesion and Tendency to Gossip

Abusive supervision has been shown to have significant negative consequences for employees' well-being, attitudes, and behavior. However, despite the devastating impact, it might well be that employees not always react negatively towards a leader's abusive behavior. In the present study we show that employees' organizational identification and abusive supervision interact for employees' perceived cohesion with their work group and their tendency to gossip about their leader. Employees confronted with a highly abusive supervisor had a stronger perceived cohesion and engaged in less gossiping behavior when they identified more strongly with their organization. Our findings illustrate that organizational identification functions as a buffer for those confronted with an abusive supervisor.

Publication year:2013

BOF-keylabel:yes

IOF-keylabel:yes

BOF-publication weight:10

CSS-citation score:3

Authors:International

Authors from:Higher Education

Accessibility:Closed