Counterproductive Work Behavior
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political, economical, and cultural contexts between Canada and China, the identified similarities
provide important insights for management. It is possible that certain behaviors such as stealing
from organizations, mistreating co-workers, and absence from work are considered as being
counterproductive uniformly across cultural boundaries. Should managers strive to reduce CWB,
they would likely receive support from most employees because the detriments of CWB appear
to be commonly recognized in the workplace.
The results of the study suggest that Canadian and Chinese managers assign differential
weights to task performance and CWB when rating the overall performance of employees. That
is, raters' cultural backgrounds might influence the emphasis they place onto task, OCB, or CWB
components in evaluating other's performance. In other words, an employee might receive
different messages about the extent to which task behaviors are rewarded or CWBs are penalized
on the job because of different preferences held by different managers. This raises important
questions about the potential inconsistencies that may surface when employees are rated. Our
results suggest that the different preferences held by managers are at least partially shaped by
their culture. It is important to note that managers are unlikely to be aware of their own
preferences, because one's cultural values and its impacts on behavior are not frequently
discussed. Therefore, organizations should anticipate and address the potential for evaluation
inconsistency. One possible strategy is to facilitate open discussions among managers concerning
the potential causes for systematic rating biases inherent in performance evaluation. Another
possible strategy is to place more emphasis on objective measures in performance ratings and
thus reduce the reliance on subjective evaluations. This potential implication is important not
only for multinational corporations, but also for organizations of all sizes, because the labor
forces in many countries are becoming more and more culturally diverse.