10-15-2024
Unfortunately, the workplace is a rich setting for misconduct — employees might slack off, lie, cheat, steal, or worse. These behaviors cost organizations in major ways. Misconduct hampers performance and employee morale while increasing stress, liability costs and reputational issues for organizations. Given this, addressing misconduct is a critical and complicated aspect of many managers’ jobs.
Indeed, employees expect leaders to address misconduct and hold individuals accountable. Still, when addressing misconduct, not all leaders are punitive. Instead, some leaders may choose to be lenient. Importantly, choosing to be lenient does not just impact the leader and the wrongdoer. Other employees pay keen attention to how their leaders address wrongdoing. With this in mind, when do employees see leniency as unfair and harmful to the work environment, and when, if at all, might employees respond more favorably?
In our article, “Considering Personal Needs in Misdeeds: The Role of Compassion in Shaping Observer Reactions to Leader Leniency,” published in the Journal of Applied Psychology, my coauthors from University of North Carolina Kenan-Flagler, University of Tulsa, and Georgetown University and I set out to understand the impact of leader leniency to employees who observe the misconduct.
Leaders might think the simplest or the most empathetic thing to do is let things slide, particularly if it is a minor slight. But there’s a “social cost” to leniency for onlooking employees, so it should be exercised with caution. Notably, one such exception arises when the misconduct is a result of personal distress. In those instances, leaders may emphasize moral reasons for offenders, such as their personal and authentic needs, which speaks to humanitarianism and evokes compassion. We found that compassion can lessen the unfairness of leniency and observers’ retributive responses. Without moral consideration, though, observing employees may feel contempt that fuels the unfairness of leniency as well as their disdain.
Our study offers valuable insights into leadership behavior and organizational justice, and is particularly relevant as workplaces continue to emphasize ethical standards, leadership and employee accountability, and employee cooperation and engagement.
Given the study’s findings, we advise that leniency should come with a warning label for leaders: “Use carefully and when compassion is warranted.”
Kate Zipay is an Assistant Professor of Management in the Organizational Behavior/Human Resource area at Purdue’s Mitch Daniels School of Business. Her research examines the influence of life outside of work on employee emotions, attitudes, and contemporary issues of justice on employee outcomes.
