The world never stops changing: the population is growing, customer trends are changing, technology is being used more, and the economy is developing. Businesses that fail to embrace this reality will eventually fall out of touch and be unable to compete in current conditions. But what about the employees in those businesses? How can a firm’s employees drive and maintain change?
Organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) is a field of study that defines all work-related actions employees do outside their formal job description. These actions characterize employees who will take initiative and go the extra mile just from personal motivation. The driving force for that motivation can, however, come from a variety of sources. University of Arkansas Associate Professor Adam Stoverink and Ph.D. Candidate Cody Bradley focus on the impact of state affect, the collective term used to describe underlying emotions, moods, and feelings, on change-oriented organizational citizenship behavior (OCB-CH).
More importantly, they, along with co-authors Dan S. Chiaburu, In-Sue Oh, Hyesoo (Hailey) Park, and Brenda A. Barros-Rivera, examine the predictive power of positive and negative affect versus previously established predictors of OCB-CH including job satisfaction and the Five-Factor Model (FFM) personality traits. FFM is a popular model used for analyzing human personality and behavior in five traits: conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism, openness, and extraversion. For comparative purposes, two related forms of citizenship behaviors are included: those directed at other individuals (OCB-I) and those directed at the organization (OCB-O).
While other researchers have primarily focused on positive affect and OCB-CH with the exclusion of negative affect, in “Happy to help, happy to change? A meta-analysis of major predictors of affiliative and change-oriented organizational citizenship behavior,” the authors look at joint affects (positive and negative). Proactive behaviors and actions from employees implement change in products, services, or work processes. Given our current fast-paced environment, the workplace should be the first to recognize how to help and how to change.
Positive & Negative Affect
Affect is an important predictor of how employees initiate and maintain change and refocus actions toward change-directed tasks in the workplace. Positive affect is beneficial for a range of work-related attitudes, including job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and turnover intentions, while negative affect can have a detrimental impact on a similar range of attitudes.
According to the “broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions,” employees’ scope of attention and cognitions broadens when they are in a positive state affect. Positive emotions such as cheerfulness, energy, joy, and enthusiasm are more likely to cause someone to be creative, playful, curious, and experimental. Positive emotions will enrich an individual’s physical, intellectual, social, and psychological resources, allowing them to take risks and seek out new information. More importantly, other theories are consistent with this view and connect positive affect with ‘approach’ rather than ‘avoidance’ attitudes and behaviors. ‘Approach’ and ‘broadening’ both relate to promote action and risk-taking.
There are myriad benefits in having employees high in positive affect. First, they will see themselves with enhanced levels of agency, confidence, self-efficacy, and resilience. Second, they will see the workplace with more meaning and as a place where achievement is possible, therefore creating upward goals for themselves. Third, positive affect is correlated with higher levels of social engagement and seeing those around you as more approachable and open to the changes they propose.
Employees with high positive affect create an advantage because they recognize opportunities and utilize resources, navigate change, and demonstrate persistence and resilience through the process. All these characteristics are found by the study to positively impact and drive OCB-CH.
Taking the same theoretical framework conversely, negative emotions such as frustration, stress, anxiety, humiliation, and resentment cause a decrease in scope of attention and quality of cognition in employees. Such a reduction in focus can hinder task performance and employee engagement.
The qualities needed to drive and maintain change can be depleted with high levels of negative affect. Employees with negative affect gravitate toward “tried-and-true” conventional methods rather than riskier routes of change. Their overall focus is prevention rather than promotion. While the researchers did not find a statistically significant relationship between negative affect and OCB-CH, their findings indicate the need for future research to understand how and why negative affect can enhance OCB-CH and when it acts as a deterrent.
Relationship of All Predictors and Outcomes: Affect, Job Satisfaction, and FFM Traits
Knowing more about OCB-CH research can help organizations that are focused on propelling change rather than maintaining their status quo. That said, while job satisfaction and personality traits can help predict OCB in general, they cannot help predict OCB-CH. There are certain “hot” (action-related) and “cold” (knowledge-related) properties of affective states and processes that allow this to happen. Employees with “hot” properties, such as joy and discontent, are linked to having the “go” system. They are more motivated and specialized in responding to situations versus reflecting on them and are thus more likely to take action to change the situation.
In comparison, job satisfaction relies on social exchange theory and reciprocation (directed at individuals or the organization). Since the employees’ choices are made by a cost-benefit analysis rather than emotion, job satisfaction is a poor predictor of OCB-CH. Just because employees are satisfied doesn’t mean they’ll be agents for creating change. OCB-CH is based on employees acting to create change; therefore, the researchers conclude affect is a stronger predictor than an employees’ attitude (job satisfaction).
Even FFM, the popular model used for analyzing human personality and behavior that is also the most accurate predictor of work behaviors and outcomes than other personality models, does not work perfectly for OCB-CH. The extent to which someone is open to experience can predispose them to embrace or reject change due to their mental schemas and attitudes. Further, the FFM traits related to OCB-CH (e.g. openness, conscientiousness) lack the “hot” properties that propel people toward action and change.
Therefore, the personality model is a strong predictor for citizenship behavior in general but not the strongest for OCB-CH. On the one hand, the results suggest state affect to be the main predictor of OCB-CH in employees. On the other hand, this study found FFM to be the main predictor for the affiliative citizenship behaviors (OCB-I, directed at individuals and OCB-O, directed at organizations). Job satisfaction, however, was found to be the weakest predictor amongst all.
The bottom line is that change is inevitable. Firms and businesses that wish to keep up must be able to respond to various changes and perhaps initiate them at times. Overall, affect was the strongest predictor of OCB-CH therefore focusing on that and the state of employees’ emotions is an important consideration. Managers who want high levels of OCB-CH will be at an advantage if they either assess employees' trait affect prior to hiring or look for ways to increase positive state affect continuously in the workplace
