Abstract
In this research, we examine the effects that customer perceptions of employee deception have on the customers’ attitudes toward an organization. Based on interview, archival, and observational data within the international airline industry, we develop a model to explain the complex effects of perceived dishonesty on observer’s attitudes and intentions toward the airline. The data revealed three types of perceived deceit (about beliefs, intentions, and emotions) and three additional factors that influence customer intentions and attitudes: the players involved, the beneficiaries of the deceit, and the harm done by the perceived lie. We develop a model with specific propositions to guide organizations with respect to apparently deceitful behavior of their employees. Implications and directions for future research are provided, focusing on the question of whether organizations should consistently encourage honesty or train their employees to be effective liars.
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The authors would like to thank the Zicklin Center for Business Ethics Research for financial support and two anonymous reviewers from this journal for their helpful comments on earlier versions of this work.
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Karen A. Jehn is a Professor of Social and Organizational Psychology at Leiden University in the Netherlands. Her research focuses on intragroup conflict, group composition and performance, and lying in organizations. Professor Jehn has authored numerous scholarly publications in these areas, including articles in the Academy of Management Journal, Administrative Science Quarterly, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, International Journal of Conflict Management, Research in Organization Behavior, Journal of Business Ethics, Business Ethics Quarterly, and Group Decision and Negotiation. She has served on the editorial boards of Administrative Science Quarterly, Academy of Management Review, the Journal of Organizational Behavior, and the International Journal of Conflict Management where she was an Associate Editor. She was also an Associate Director of the Solomon Asch Center for the Study of Ethnopoloitical Conflict, the Research Director of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation's Diversity Research Network, and the Chair of the Conflict Management Division of the Academy of Management. Her most recent research interest is asymmetries of perception in workgroups - why do members view the same experience differently and how does this influence group outcomes ?
Elizabeth D. Scott received her PhD from Wharton and is currently an Associate Professor of Business Administration at Eastern Connecticut State Universitty. Her research interests include individual and organizational moral values, ethics in human resources management, and organizational justice. The Journal of Business Ethics has previously published several of her articles regarding dishonesty in organizations. Her work has also been published in the Business Ethics Quarterly, Business and Society, the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, and the Industrial Relations Research Association's annual volume.
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Jehn, K.A., Scott, E.D. Perceptions of Deception: Making Sense of Responses to Employee Deceit. J Bus Ethics 80, 327–347 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-007-9423-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-007-9423-3