Chapter

Trust, Justice and Ethics

Slide 7-1 Copyright 2011 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.

McGraw-Hill/Irwin

Copyright 2011 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.

Learning Goals
What is trust, and how does it relate to justice and ethics? In what three sources can trust be rooted? What dimensions can be used to describe the trustworthiness of an authority? What dimensions can be used to describe the fairness of an authoritys decision making?

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Learning Goals, Contd

What is the four-component model of ethical decision making? How does trust affect job performance and organizational commitment? What steps can organizations take to become more trustworthy?
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Trust, Justice, and Ethics

Reputation reflects the prominence of its brand in the minds of the public and the perceived quality of its goods and services. Trust is defined as the willingness to be vulnerable to a trustee based on positive expectations about the authoritys actions and intentions. Justice reflects the perceived fairness of an authoritys decision making. Ethics reflects the degree to which the behaviors of an authority are in accordance with generally accepted moral norms.
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Worlds Most Admired Companies

Table 7-1

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Discussion Questions
Why are some authorities more trusted than others? Would you be willing to let that person have significant influence over your professional or educational future?

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Trust
Disposition-based trust means that your personality traits include a general propensity to trust others. Cognition-based trust means that trust is rooted in a rational assessment of the authoritys trustworthiness. Affect-based trust means that it depends on feelings toward the authority that go beyond any rational assessment.
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Disposition-Based Trust
Has less to do with the authority and more to do with the trustor.
Some trustors are high in trust propensity a general expectation that the words, promises, and statements of individuals and groups can be relied upon.
Shaped from both genetics and environment

Trust propensity levels are actually relatively high in the United States, especially in relation to countries in Europe and South America.
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Trust Propensities by Nation

Figure 7-2

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Cognition-Based Trust
Our trust begins to be based on cognitions weve developed about the authority, as opposed to our own personality or disposition.
Trustworthiness is defined as the characteristics or attributes of a trustee that inspire trust. Driven by the authoritys track record.
Ability, benevolence, and integrity
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The Track Record

Ability is defined as the skills, competencies, and areas of expertise that enable an authority to be successful in some specific area. Benevolence is defined as the belief that the authority wants to do good for the trustor, apart from any selfish or profitcentered motives.
Mentor-protg Doctor, lawyer

Integrity is defined as the perception that the authority adheres to a set of values and principles that the trustor finds acceptable. OB on Screen
Walk the talk Slumdog Millionaire
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Affect-Based Trust
Often more emotional than rational. We trust because we have feelings for the person in question; we really like them and have a fondness for them. Affect-based trust sometimes acts as a supplement to the types of trust discussed previously. An emotional bond develops, and our feelings for the trustee further increase our willingness to accept vulnerability.
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Types of Trust Over Time

Figure 7-3

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Factors that Influence Trust Levels

Figure 7-1

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Justice
Distributive justice reflects the perceived fairness of decision-making outcomes.
Employees gauge distributive justice by asking whether decision outcomes, such as pay, rewards, evaluations, promotions, and work assignments, are allocated using proper norms.

Procedural justice reflects the perceived fairness of decision-making processes.

Fostered when authorities adhere to rules of fair process.

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Procedural Justice Rules

Voice concerns giving employees a chance to express their opinions and views during the course of decision making. Correctability provides employees with a chance to request an appeal when a procedure seems to have worked ineffectively.
Improves employees reactions to decisions.

Consistency, bias suppression, representativeness, and accuracy rules help ensure that procedures are neutral and objective, as opposed to biased and discriminatory.
Interview questions, compensation practices
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Some of the 50 Best Companies for Minorities

Table 7-3

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Procedural Justice
Does procedural justice really matterdont people just care about the outcomes that they receive? Distributive justice and procedural justice combine to influence employee reactions.
When outcomes are bad, procedural justice becomes enormously important. Procedural justice tends to be a stronger driver of reactions to authorities than distributive justice.
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Combined Effects of Distributive and Procedural Justice

Figure 7-4

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Justice, Contd
Interpersonal justice reflects the perceived fairness of the treatment received by employees from authorities.
Interpersonal justice is fostered when authorities adhere to two particular rules. Respect rule pertains to whether authorities treat employees in a dignified and sincere manner. Propriety rule reflects whether authorities refrain from making improper or offensive remarks.

When taken to the extremes, interpersonally unjust actions create abusive supervision, defined as the sustained display of hostile verbal and nonverbal behaviors, excluding physical contact.
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Justice, Contd
Informational justice reflects the perceived fairness of the communications provided to employees from authorities.
Informational justice is fostered when authorities adhere to two particular rules.
The justification rule mandates that authorities explain decision-making procedures and outcomes in a comprehensive and reasonable manner. The truthfulness rule requires that those communications be honest and candid.
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The Effects of Justice on Theft During a Pay Cut

Figure 7-5

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The Four Dimensions of Justice

Table 7-2

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Ethics
Research on ethics seeks to explain why people behave in a manner consistent with generally accepted norms of morality, and why they sometimes violate those norms.
Two primary threads
Prescriptive Descriptive

Whistle-blowing occurs when employees expose illegal or immoral actions by their employer.
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The Four-Component Model of Ethical Decision Making

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INSERT ONCE REVISED

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The Four Component Model of Ethical Decision Making

Moral awareness occurs when an authority recognizes that a moral issue exists in a situation or that an ethical code or principle is relevant to the circumstance.
Moral intensity captures the degree to which the issue has ethical urgency. Moral attentiveness captures the degree to which people chronically perceive and consider issues of morality during their experiences.
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The Dimensions of Moral Intensity

Table 7-4

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The Four Component Model of Ethical Decision Making, Contd

Moral judgment reflects the process people use to determine whether a particular course of action is ethical or unethical.
Cognitive moral development theory argues that as people age and mature, they move through several stages of moral developmenteach more mature and sophisticated than the prior one.

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Ethical Dilemma Used to Assess Moral Development

Table 7-5

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The Four Component Model of Ethical Decision Making, Contd

Moral judgment, contd
People begin their moral development at the preconventional stage.
At this stage, right versus wrong is viewed in terms of the consequences of various actions for the individual.

As people mature, their moral judgment reaches the conventional stage.

1

At this stage, right versus wrong is referenced to the expectations of ones family and ones society.
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The Four Component Model of Ethical Decision Making, Contd

Moral judgment, contd
The most sophisticated moral thinkers reach the principled (or postconventional) stage.
At this stage, right versus wrong is referenced to a set of defined, established moral principles.

Philosophers have identified a number of moral principles that serve as prescriptive guides for making moral judgments.
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Moral Principles Used in the Principled Stage

Table 7-6

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The Four Component Model of Ethical Decision Making, Contd

Moral intent reflects an authoritys degree of commitment to the moral course of action.
The distinction between awareness or judgment on the one hand and intent on the other is important, because many unethical people know and understand that what theyre doing is wrongthey just choose to do it anyway. One driver of moral intent is moral identity the degree to which a person self-identifies as a moral person.
Moral identity moderates the effects of moral judgment on ethical behavior.

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Why Are Some Authorities More Trusted Than Others?

Figure 7-7

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How Important Is Trust?

Trust relates to performance because it increases an employees ability to focus. Trust also influences citizenship behavior and counterproductive behavior because it allows employees to develop social exchange relationships instead of economic exchange relationships with their employers.
Economic exchange relationships that are based on narrowly defined, quid pro quo obligations that are specified in advance and have an explicit repayment schedule. Social exchange relationships are based on vaguely defined obligations that are open-ended and long-term in their repayment schedule.
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Effects of Trust on Performance and Commitment

Figure 7-8

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Application: Social Responsibility

Corporate social responsibility is a perspective that acknowledges that the responsibility of a business encompasses the economic, legal, ethical, and citizenship expectations of society.
A companys obligations do not end with profit maximization. Organizations have an obligation to do what is right, just, and fair and to avoid harm.
Nike
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Takeaways
Trust is the willingness to be vulnerable to an authority based on positive expectations about the authoritys actions and intentions. Justice reflects the perceived fairness of an authoritys decision making and can be used to explain why employees judge some authorities as more trustworthy than others. Ethics reflects the degree to which the behaviors of an authority are in accordance with generally accepted moral norms and can be used to explain why authorities choose to act in a trustworthy manner. Trust can be disposition-based, meaning that ones personality includes a general propensity to trust others. Trust can also be cognition-based, meaning that its rooted in a rational assessment of the authoritys trustworthiness. Finally, trust can be affect-based, meaning that its rooted in feelings toward the authority that go beyond any rational assessment of trustworthiness.

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Takeaways, Contd
Trustworthiness is judged along three dimensions. Ability reflects the skills, competencies, and areas of expertise that an authority possesses. Benevolence is the degree to which an authority wants to do good for the trustor, apart from any selfish or profit-centered motives. Integrity is the degree to which an authority adheres to a set of values and principles that the trustor finds acceptable. The fairness of an authoritys decision making can be judged along four dimensions. Distributive justice reflects the perceived fairness of decisionmaking outcomes. Procedural justice reflects the perceived fairness of decision-making processes. Interpersonal justice reflects the perceived fairness of the treatment received by employees from authorities. Informational justice reflects the perceived fairness of the communications provided to employees from authorities.
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Takeaways, Contd
The four-component model of ethical decision making argues that ethical behavior depends on three concepts. Moral awareness reflects whether an authority recognizes that a moral issue exists in a situation. Moral judgment reflects whether the authority can accurately identify the right course of action. Moral intent reflects an authoritys degree of commitment to the moral course of action. Trust has a moderate positive relationship with job performance and a strong positive relationship with organizational commitment. Organizations can become more trustworthy by emphasizing corporate social responsibility, a perspective that acknowledges that the responsibilities of a business encompass the economic, legal, ethical, and citizenship expectations of society.

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