Unfortunately, the balance between commitment and critical distance is hard to achieve. My own research, carried out with Lars-Eric Petersen from the University of Halle, has found that organisational commitment tends to be associated with a willingness to defer to organisational authorities, even when they demand unethical conduct.
There are plenty of examples of commitment resulting in blind compliance. Barbara Lee Toffler noted the illegal conduct of Arthur Andersen employees during the Enron scandal: “Their behaviour - their overarching commitment to the firm and what it stood for - and the firm's efforts to shape that behaviour were, to me and to many others, cult-like. It would never occur to employees to question any practice, despite the cosmic changes taking place both inside and outside the firm.”
Understanding commitment
To understand commitment and ‘yesmanship’, we must first try to understand the meaning of commitment. Some people are committed because the company means a lot to them – so much so that it almost becomes an extension of their own self. Perhaps unsurprisingly, we found that employees who demonstrate this so-called ‘affective commitment’ were more likely to comply with unethical requests.
The problem here is that committed employees can also be very good corporate citizens. The challenge lies in managing their commitment so that it becomes tempered with a degree of mindfulness. Mindfulness is the ability to critically evaluate the impact of one’s actions on oneself and others, including stakeholders outside of one’s company.
To a certain extent, this can be achieved through training that makes employees aware of their ‘ethical emotions.’ Most of us have visceral reactions when we do something we know is wrong. When these feelings arise, mindful employees will question why they have them and not simply ignore them. Thus, these ethical emotions become strong signals that prevents individuals from saying yes to everything.
Managing commitment
The second way of managing commitment is through organisational design and culture. Organisations are hierarchical structures and those who are in positions of authority can very easily abuse the loyalty of their employees. Hence, organisations need some form of warning system to protect against power abuse. For example, top-down channels of communication are typically well defined, but what about bottom-up channels of communication through which employees can express their concerns about senior management?
More effective still is institutionalising ethical decision making. For example, universities have ethics committees that have the power (in fact, the duty) to forbid the conduct of studies that do not meet ethical guidelines. This is far more potent than a code of conduct, because such codes are useless if they can’t be enforced. Therefore, institutionalisation – giving real power of oversight to ethics committees – is a sure-fire way of negating the impact of 'yes' men and ensuring that overcommitment does not spill over into unethical behaviour.
So let’s not forget that employee commitment is a real asset. But like any asset, it needs to be managed. Mindful commitment and institutionalised ethical decision-making help companies to benefit from the loyalty of their employees.
Joerg Dietz is a professor at the Department of Organisational Behaviour at HEC Lausanne, the business school of the University of Lausanne.
