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Untangling Employee Loyalty: A Psychological Contract Perspective

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  • Hart, David W.
  • Thompson, Jeffery A.

Abstract

Although business ethicists have theorized frequently about the virtues and vices of employee loyalty, the concept of loyalty remains loosely defined. In this article, we argue that viewing loyalty as a cognitive phenomenon—an attitude that resides in the mind of the individual—helps to clarify definitional inconsistencies, provides a finer-grained analysis of the concept, and sheds additional light on the ethical implications of loyalty in organizations. Specifically, we adopt the psychological contract perspective to analyze loyalty's cognitive dimensions, and treat loyalty as an individual-level construction of perceived reciprocal obligations. Based upon this perspective, we present a three-tiered framework of loyalty that provides a psychologically informed definition of the concept, specifies the variety of obligation types that loyalty can imply, and anticipates the potential for asymmetrical loyalty configurations between employers and employees. We use the framework to articulate moral issues associated with both symmetrical and asymmetrical loyalty configurations and discuss the implications of the framework for theory and practice.

Suggested Citation

  • Hart, David W. & Thompson, Jeffery A., 2007. "Untangling Employee Loyalty: A Psychological Contract Perspective," Business Ethics Quarterly, Cambridge University Press, vol. 17(2), pages 297-323, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:buetqu:v:17:y:2007:i:02:p:297-323_00
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Ganic Emir & Babic-Hodovic Vesna & Arslanagic-Kalajdzic Maja, 2018. "We are Happy Here and We Will Stay, What about You? The Cross-Level Impact of Employee Loyalty and Performance on Student Loyalty," South East European Journal of Economics and Business, Sciendo, vol. 13(2), pages 7-18, December.
    2. Sarah Sanders Smith & Ray Peters & Cam Caldwell, 2016. "Creating a Culture of Engagement -- Insights for Application," Business and Management Research, Business and Management Research, Sciedu Press, vol. 5(2), pages 70-80, June.
    3. Mohammadsadegh Omidvar & Maria Palazzo, 2023. "The Influence of Corporate Social Responsibility Aspects on Business Model Innovation, Competitive Advantage, and Company Performance: A Study on Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises in Iran," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(22), pages 1-19, November.
    4. Viergutz, Tim & Schulze-Ehlers, Birgit, 2018. "The use of hybrid scientometric clustering for systematic literature reviews in business and economics," DARE Discussion Papers 1804, Georg-August University of Göttingen, Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Development (DARE).
    5. Cam Caldwell & Larry Floyd & Ryan Atkins & Russell Holzgrefe, 2012. "Ethical Duties of Organizational Citizens: Obligations Owed by Highly Committed Employees," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 110(3), pages 285-299, October.
    6. Hailing Liu & Ping Hu & Kewei Shi & Yudan Zhang, 2023. "Does Psychological Contract Violation Change the Original Intention of Eco-Tourists to Participate in Scenic Value Co-Creation?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(6), pages 1-21, March.
    7. Nicolas Raineri & Pascal Paillé, 2016. "Linking Corporate Policy and Supervisory Support with Environmental Citizenship Behaviors: The Role of Employee Environmental Beliefs and Commitment," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 137(1), pages 129-148, August.
    8. Aksoy, Lerzan & Keiningham, Timothy L. & Buoye, Alexander & Larivière, Bart & Williams, Luke & Wilson, Ian, 2015. "Does loyalty span domains? Examining the relationship between consumer loyalty, other loyalties and happiness," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 68(12), pages 2464-2476.
    9. Masakure, Oliver, 2016. "The effect of employee loyalty on wages," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 274-298.
    10. Peter Verhezen, 2010. "Giving Voice in a Culture of Silence. From a Culture of Compliance to a Culture of Integrity," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 96(2), pages 187-206, October.
    11. Nidal Fawwaz Al Qudah & Yang Yang & Muhammad Adeel Anjum, 2018. "Transformational Training Programs and Quality Orientation of Employees: Does Employees’ Loyalty Matter?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(2), pages 1-13, February.
    12. Deng, Hong & Coyle‐Shapiro, Jacqueline & Zhu, Yanting & Wu, Chia‐huei, 2022. "Serving the cause when my organization does not: a self‐affirmation model of employees’ compensatory responses to ideological contract breach," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 117313, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    13. Juan Elegido, 2013. "Does It Make Sense to Be a Loyal Employee?," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 116(3), pages 495-511, September.
    14. Naqib Ullah Khan & Peng Zhongyi & Heesup Han & Antonio Ariza-Montes, 2023. "Linking public leadership and public project success: the mediating role of team building," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 10(1), pages 1-10, December.
    15. Cam Caldwell, 2011. "Duties Owed to Organizational Citizens – Ethical Insights for Today’s Leader," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 102(3), pages 343-356, September.

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