Management commitment to the ecological environment and employees: Implications for employee attitudes and citizenship behaviors

Abstract

In this article, we examine the implications of perceived management commitment to the ecological environment for employee attitudes and behaviors. Following deontic justice theory, which suggests that individuals are capable of feeling and expressing moral outrage when others are treated poorly, even if such treatment has no direct implications for themselves, we expected that employee attitudes and behaviors would be related to perceived organizational treatment of the environment. At the same time, we expected that these reactions would be moderated by how employees themselves were treated by the organization, in the form of perceived organizational support. In a study of employees and supervisors in a textile firm in Turkey, the results indicate that perceived organizational support moderated the effects of management commitment to the environment on organizational justice, organizational commitment and organizational citizenship behaviors targeting the environment.

Keywords

ecological environment and sustainability organizational citizenship behaviors organizational justice perceived organizational support

Movements to lighten human-initiated environmental damage and promote sustainable development are gaining visibility. For example, a United Nations-backed study revealed that in 2008 the top 3000 public companies in the world were responsible for US$2.15 trillion worth of damage to the environment (Trucost, 2010). Thus, organizations are increasingly faced with institutional pressures to limit their negative impact on the ecological environment. A 2010 survey by PricewaterhouseCoopers (2010) found that 92 percent of companies listed in Standard & Poor’s indices reported greenhouse emissions on their websites, and over 80 percent discussed plans to reduce their emissions, indicating that this information is increasingly shared with stakeholders, despite the absence of legal requirements to do so and substantial costs of such voluntary disclosures.

At the same time, many question corporate environmental initiatives on the grounds that they increase costs and that responsible managers should adopt green management approaches only if they complement their core business (e.g. Siegel, 2009). Thus, establishing the business case for ‘going green’ is important for sustainability theory and practice. In fact, strategic management and marketing researchers have already identified potential benefits, such as the ability to access new markets and increased efficiency (Maignan et al., 1999). Management scholars adopting a more micro lens are relative newcomers to this dialogue, and the search for the implications of management commitment to environmental programs on employee attitudes and behaviors has only recently begun (Aguinis and Glavas, 2012). Several studies have included items about organizational commitment to the ecological environment as part of broader measures of corporate social responsibility (CSR), and showed that commitment to CSR relates to higher organizational commitment (Maignan et al., 1999) and employee effort (Sully de Luque et al., 2008).

Despite this burgeoning literature suggesting that CSR may relate to positive attitudes and behaviors, there are gaps in knowledge. To date, empirical studies have measured CSR by aggregating activities focusing on internal (employees) and external stakeholders (environment and community: e.g. Mueller et al., 2012; Rupp et al., 2013). Hence, these measures may be tapping into the well-established finding that organizational concern for employees results in better attitudes and behaviors (e.g. Rhoades and Eisenberger, 2002). When management commitment to the environment and to employees is separated, only modest effects have been observed for the environment. For example, Turban and Greening (1997) showed in a laboratory study that applicants were attracted to organizations with a positive CSR reputation, but environmental reputation had no effect on organizational attractiveness. In other words, owing to potential measurement contamination, the link between management commitment to the ecological environment and attitudes and behaviors remains inconclusive. Thus, key questions in the CSR literature are: Is there a relationship between management commitment to the ecological environment and employee outcomes? When organizations engage in environmentally sensitive actions, do they also experience internal benefits in the form of employee attitudes and actions?

Following the deontic model of justice (e.g. Cropanzano et al., 2003), we propose that employees will react positively to management’s commitment to the environment. According to this view, individuals care about how third parties are treated, even when such treatment has no direct effects on themselves. In recent years, CSR scholars have begun explaining employee reactions by likening CSR to justice events targeting outsiders (e.g. Rupp, 2011). Moreover, consistent with Rupp et al. (2013), we predicted that how employees themselves are treated also matters. We hypothesize that employee perceptions of management commitment to the environment will interact with their perception of management commitment to employees – measured as perceived organizational support (POS) (Eisenberger et al., 1986) – with respect to attitudes toward the organization (organizational justice, organizational commitment) and behaviors (citizenship behaviors targeting the organization and the environment).

Thus, our study was designed to make three contributions. First, studies have explored employee reactions to corporate commitment to CSR (for a review, see Aguinis and Glavas, 2012) without distinguishing between its beneficiaries. We propose that management’s commitment to the environment and to employees should be measured separately, given that their beneficiaries are at different levels inside and outside the organization. We make a contribution by exploring the possibility that an organization’s commitment to external stakeholders will be interpreted within the context of its commitment to employees.

Our second aim is to expand the nomological network of management’s commitment to the environment. For this purpose, we develop a scale measuring management commitment to the ecological environment, and examine how it interacts with POS in relation to organizational justice and commitment. Further, we explore how management commitment to the environment is related to organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs). To date, scholars have shown that CSR commitment predicted self-rated (e.g. Rupp et al., 2013) but not supervisor-rated OCBs (Jones, 2010). In the present article, we adopt a finer-grained approach by distinguishing between OCBs targeting the organization (OCBO) and OCBs targeting the environment (OCBE). Ones and Dilchert noted that ‘our field can define, describe, and measure individual pro-environmental behaviors so that they can be predicted, explained, and changed. We have a rare opportunity for the criterion domain of employee green behaviors’ (Ones and Dilchert, 2012: 457). By developing a scale to measure OCBE, we are introducing a citizenship behavior that is a meaningful outcome of management’s commitment to the environment.

Finally, we make a contribution to the POS literature by investigating how POS relates to employee attitudes and behaviors through a mechanism that goes beyond social exchange or resource-based explanations. Past research has shown that POS is associated with positive attitudes and behaviors (Rhoades and Eisenberger, 2002) and alleviates the effects of stressors (Erdogan et al., 2004; Wang et al., 2013). These studies tended to examine POS either as social exchange motivating employees to behave in organizationally desired ways, or as a resource that minimizes the effects of stressors. In our model, we propose that POS constitutes the lens through which employees interpret the organizational experiences of others.

Management commitment to the environment and outcomes

Management commitment to the environment from a deontic justice perspective

Scholars investigating the consequences of employee reactions to perceived CSR tend to adopt a deontic justice perspective (e.g. Rupp et al., 2006, 2013). Deontic justice simply means that individuals value justice for its own sake, and not only as a means to an end. They are sensitive to how others are treated and can feel moral unease and outrage when others are mistreated even in the absence of personal impact on themselves (Cropanzano et al., 2003). Studies have shown that when employees perceive others to be targets of discrimination (Goldman et al., 2008), or when coworkers (Spencer and Rupp, 2009) or supervisors abuse customers (Greenbaum et al., 2013), they become less attached to the organization, feel less happy and experience more negative emotions, irrespective of how they themselves are treated.

Extending this theory to CSR, Aguilera et al. (2007) contends that how employees react to perceived CSR activities is akin to observing how third parties are treated, and therefore perceived CSR will be a driver of employee sense of fairness as well as attitudes and behaviors. Based on this view, we expect employees to have attitudinal and behavioral reactions to the degree to which management displays commitment to the ecological environment.

Perceived organizational support as the treatment of the self

Even though the justice literature recognizes that employees pay attention to, and show concern for, the treatment of third parties, scholars also recognize that reactions to how third parties are treated do not reduce the importance of how employees themselves are treated. Instead, reactions to how third parties are treated and how the focal person is treated tend to have interactive effects. For example, van den Bos and Lind (2001), in a series of two experiments, showed that when a focal individual was treated with due process, namely by receiving opportunities for voice and being subject to a correct procedure, they became more sensitive to how hypothetical others in the same experiment were treated. Replicating these results, de Cremer et al. (2005) showed that treatment of the self and others interacted such that reactions to outsiders’ treatment were more strongly related to outcomes when individuals were treated positively themselves. Finally, Spencer and Rupp (2009) showed that customer mistreatment of coworkers was more positively related to emotional labor experienced by employees treated well by customers. Altogether, these results suggest that, although employees will react to how management treats the ecological environment (a third party), the strength of these reactions will depend on how management treats employees themselves.

In the employer–employee relationships literature, the degree to which the organization is committed to employees is captured by POS (Wayne et al., 2002). POS refers to the degree to which employees perceive that the organization values, cares for, and is committed to them (Eisenberger et al., 1986). POS develops as a function of positive treatment by the organization, including recognition (Wayne et al., 2002), quality of the relationship with managers (Rhoades and Eisenberger, 2002), and employee supportive practices (Gavino et al., 2012). Therefore, POS is a suitable variable to capture the organization’s treatment of the focal person. To the degree to which third-party treatment interacts with self-treatment, we expect management commitment to the ecological environment to interact with POS.

Attitudinal outcomes: Organizational justice and commitment

Adopting a deontic justice view, we expect that how the organization treats a third party (the ecological environment) helps shape employee perceptions of justice. Therefore, organizational justice is an outcome of interest. Further, we regard organizational commitment, operationalized as affective commitment, as a salient correlate of management commitment to the environment. Commitment literature distinguishes between affective (emotional attachment), continuance (commitment owing to lack of alternatives) and normative commitment (commitment owing to felt obligation: Allen and Meyer, 1990). Out of these, affective commitment is the most relevant to our model. CSR literature regards affective commitment as a salient and proximal outcome of CSR (e.g. Chun et al., 2013; Turker, 2009). Further, the deontic justice literature suggests that how third parties are treated elicits an emotional reaction in employees rather than a cognitive or calculative one (Skarlicki and Kulik, 2004). For example, when coworkers are mistreated, employees experience heightened levels of emotional labor (Spencer and Rupp, 2009), and when they perceive that one person intends to harm the other, they experience negative emotions such as anger (Umphress et al., 2013). As a result, affective commitment should be a salient outcome of management commitment to the ecological environment.

Given that individuals are more sensitive to poor treatment of third parties when they receive positive treatment themselves, we predict that management commitment to the environment (how the organization treats a third party) will interact with POS (how the organization treats the employee), to determine an employee’s reactions about the organization. We reason that perceived management commitment to the environment (MCE) and commitment to employees will not perfectly overlap. For example, Royle (2005) cautions that organizations that adopt CSR may still mistreat their employees, even violating labor laws or safety concerns. Özen and Küskü (2009), writing about the Turkish business climate, showed that organizations that go beyond existing environmental regulations tended to be oriented toward export markets, suggesting that visible forms of CSR such as environmental initiatives may provide market advantages not always linked to internal CSR initiatives such as treating employees well.

Thus, we expect that management’s commitment to the environment is positively related to organizational justice, and the relationship will be more positive when POS is high. Given that treatment of others becomes more salient for those treated well themselves, higher management commitment to the environment should engender a sense that the organization is fair only for high-POS employees.

Hypothesis 1: POS will moderate the relationship between perceived management commitment to the environment (MCE) and organizational justice such that the relationship is more positive when POS is high.

Similarly, management’s commitment to the environment has the potential to be positively related to affective commitment to the degree to which employees have high POS. Deontic need fulfillment has been shown to be related to organizational commitment (Goldman et al., 2008), suggesting that one way in which employees react to deontic concerns is reducing their attachment. When POS is high, management commitment to the environment (MCE) is likely to engender positive feelings by creating the perception that one’s organization is caring, has a good reputation, and is a good citizen. For employees who have low POS, management commitment to the environment is likely to have less positive effects.

Hypothesis 2: POS will moderate the relationship between MCE and organizational commitment such that the relationship is more positive when POS is high.

Behavioral outcomes: Organizational citizenship behaviors targeting the organization and the environment

In addition to attitudinal reactions such as assessments of organizational fairness and commitment to the organization, we expect that MCE will have behavioral implications in the form of citizenship behaviors. Citizenship behaviors are discretionary actions on the part of employees. They may have different targets, and the most commonly studied of them are OCBOs and those benefiting one’s coworkers (OCBI: Williams and Anderson, 1991). Recently, sustainability scholars proposed that discretionary actions aimed at environmental improvement, or OCBEs, should be studied as a type of content-specific OCB (Daily et al., 2009). Even employees at the lowest levels of the hierarchy may display behaviors such as supporting environmental initiatives or identifying ways to conserve resources.

To date, CSR perceptions have been studied with respect to self-rated OCBOs (e.g. Rupp et al., 2013). Some controversial findings also exist: Lin et al. (2010) showed that perceived CSR activities in the form of giving to charities and community events were negatively related to the self-rated altruism and courtesy dimensions of OCBs. Greenbaum et al. (2013) showed that employee reactions to deontic concerns require a finely tuned approach. Employees may react to mistreatment of third parties in ways ranging from punishing the source, rewarding the victim, or passive resistance such as withdrawal.

We assert that perceived organizational commitment to the environment has implications for behaviors targeting the organization and environment. We expect that organizational commitment to the ecological environment has the potential to both increase OCBOs and OCBEs. When employees perceive that the organization is favorably disposed toward the ecological environment, this is likely to result in favorable reactions to the organization because the organization is viewed as treating a third party in a fair manner. Furthermore, when management is viewed as being committed to the environment, employees are likely to follow the lead of the organization and display OCBEs. Yet, we expect that deontic concerns operate more strongly when employees themselves are treated in a supportive manner by the organization. Therefore, we predict:

Hypothesis 3: POS will moderate the relationship between MCE and OCBO such that the relationship is more positive when POS is high.

Hypothesis 4: POS will moderate the relationship between MCE and OCBE such that the relationship is more positive when POS is high.

Method

Employees and managers working in a textile manufacturer in Istanbul, Turkey were surveyed. The organization expresses sensitivity to the environment as one of their values on their corporate website, and possesses certifications signaling concrete efforts to reduce environmental impact, including an ISO 14001 certificate. All 244 employees and 27 managers were invited to complete a survey. With the cooperation of the Human Resources (HR) department, employees were invited to a meeting room to complete the surveys. The HR team ensured that employees were scheduled to attend a data collection without disrupting their work, which resulted in collection of data in small groups over the next four months to accommodate production schedules. Managers completed the surveys in their offices and submitted in privacy envelopes. A total of 194 employees and 25 managers participated, representing a response rate of 79 percent and 93 percent, respectively. After the employee and manager responses were matched and surveys with missing data were dropped, sample size available to test our hypotheses was 170 for Hypotheses 1 and 2, and 142 for Hypotheses 3 and 4. Results from t-tests showed that cases used in hypothesis testing and cases that had to be dropped because of missing, or lack of matching, data did not significantly differ for any of the study variables.

Employees came from all departments including finishing, process control, unprocessed fabric warehouse and the chemical laboratory. Respondents were on average 33.05 (standard deviation [SD] = 6.84) years old and had 9.50 years (SD = 5.70) of experience in manufacturing. Of the respondents, 96.3 percent were male, typical of blue collar factory jobs in Turkey, and 12.09 percent of the respondents had elementary school education, 13.05 percent at the middle school level, 64.1 percent at the high school level and 9.4 percent were college graduates. Managers were, on average, 37 years old (SD = 6.56) and had 15.58 years (SD = 6.62) of experience in manufacturing. Of the managers, 88 percent were male and 60 percent held at least a college degree.

Measures

All scales were translated into Turkish following Brislin’s (1970) back-translation procedures, and used responses ranging between 1 = strongly disagree and 7 = strongly agree.

Perceived management commitment to the environment

Because we were unable to locate a scale measuring this variable, we developed a new scale. We followed Hinkin’s (1998) scale development procedures and utilized two additional samples. This information is presented in the Appendix. The six items we retained were: ‘My organization values the environment’, ‘My organization cares about the environment’, ‘My organization is committed to preserving and protecting the environment’, ‘My organization is aware of the need to protect the environment’, ‘My organization demonstrates concern for ecological matters’ and ‘My organization considers the full impact of its action on the environment’ (α = .92).

Perceived organizational support

POS was measured using the eight-item short form of Survey for Perceived Organizational Support by Eisenberger et al. (1986). A sample item is ‘The organization values my contribution to its well-being’ (α = .88).

Organizational justice

Justice perceptions were measured using three items developed by Ambrose and Schminke (2009). A sample item is ‘Usually, the way things work in this organization are fair’ (α = .90).

Organizational commitment

Allen and Meyer’s (1990) eight-item affective commitment scale was used. A sample item is ‘I feel like “part of the family” at my organization’ (α = .92).

Organizational citizenship behaviors targeting the organization

Managers rated OCBO of each employee reporting to them using the seven-item scale by Williams and Anderson (1991). A sample item is, ‘This employee’s attendance at work is above the norm’ (α = .68).

Organizational citizenship behaviors targeting the environment

Because we were unable to locate a scale measuring OCBE, we developed a new scale. Scale development information is presented in the Appendix. Supervisors rated employees reporting to them using the following items: This employee … ‘helps to identify ways that lessen the organization’s environmental impact,’ ‘helps solve environmental problems faced by the organization,’ ‘helps come up with creative suggestions that have the potential to improve the organization’s environmental performance,’ ‘Assists in creating procedures and policies that protect the environment’ and ‘provides ideas about potential new products or services that solve environmental problems’ (α = .92).

Control variables

Because employee ability to perform OCBEs is expected to vary with education and experience, we controlled for education (1 = elementary school, 2 = middle school, 3 = high school, 4 = college graduate) and organizational tenure, operationalized as years worked in the organization. We did not control for age and work experience as these were highly correlated with tenure (.73 and .68, respectively).

We also included two control variables for their possible relevance for OCBE, but because these variables emerged as significant correlates of other dependent variables as well, we retained them in all analyses. First, personal pro-environmental values of employees was a potential correlate of OCBEs. Employee perceptions of MCE should at least partially be a function of their own values (Sharfman et al., 2000), and therefore the relationship between MCE and OCBE may partially reflect a relationship between the employee’s own values and OCBE. To control for this potential confound, we measured employee environmental values with a three-item ecocentric value orientation scale (Soyez et al., 2009), with the sample item: ‘It makes me sad to see natural environments destroyed.’

Further, OCBs are discretionary actions, and therefore employees’ ability to display OCBs will be contingent on how much discretion they have over their work. As a result, we expected autonomy to be relevant to the display of OCBs. Further, POS and autonomy tend to be correlated (Rhoades and Eisenberger, 2002). Therefore, to ensure that we examined the effects of POS and not simply the level of autonomy inherent in the jobs, we controlled for autonomy. We measured autonomy with the three-item self-determination scale by Spreitzer (1995) – sample item: ‘I have significant autonomy in determining how I do my job’ (α = .85).

Results

Means, standard deviations and correlations among variables are presented in Table 1. As presented, MCE was highly correlated with POS (r = .67, p < .01) and organizational commitment (r = .68, p < .01). Moreover, POS was highly correlated with organizational commitment (r = .69, p < .01). As a result, we subjected all self-reported variables to a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). We specified each item to fall under a single factor. Although the model fit statistics were less than ideal (χ² = 764.32, d.f. = 269, p < .01, comparative fit index [CFI] = .86, root mean square error of approximation [RMSEA] = .10), the comparison of the hypothesized model to alternative models where MCE fell under the same factor as POS, organizational justice and organizational commitment yielded worse fit (Δχ² (1) = 20.92, p < .01; 24.45, p < .01, and 28.95, p < .01, respectively). In addition, an alternative model where the correlation of POS with organizational commitment was set to 1 yielded poorer fit (Δχ² (1) = 4.30, p < .05), suggesting that respondents distinguished between study variables.

Table 1.

Means, standard deviations and correlations among variables.

Variable	M	SD	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
1. MCE	5.92	.86	(.92)
2. POS	5.61	.92	.67**	(.88)
3. Organizational justice	5.11	1.29	.39**	.59**	(.90)
4. Organizational commitment	5.37	1.10	.68**	.69**	.59**	(.92)
5. OCBO	5.44	.80	.14	.02	−.06	−.00	(.68)
6. OCBE	4.20	1.35	.04	−.08	−.19*	−.04	.12	(.92)
7. Education	2.70	.83	−.06	.00	−.13	−.13	.10	.25**
8. Organizational tenure	7.68	5.29	−.00	−.13	−.10	.02	−.12	.02	−.40**
9. Pro-environmental values	6.38	.83	.32**	.19*	.11	.23**	−.01	.19*	.14	.13	(.67)
10. Autonomy	5.26	1.23	.22**	.29**	.28**	.34**	.01	−.11	−.11	.14	.10	(.85)

n = 142. MCE is perceived management commitment to the environment; POS is perceived organizational support; OCBO is organizational citizenship behaviors targeting the organization; OCBE is organizational citizenship behaviors targeting the environment. Education is coded as 1 = elementary school degree, 2 = middle school degree, 3 = high school degree and 4 = college degree. Reliabilities are reported on the diagonal. * p < .05, ** p < .01.

Because employees were nested within groups, we tested our hypotheses using a random coefficient regression model (RCM) in MPlus 7. When individuals working for the same manager are studied, individual observations will have shared variance, violating OLS assumptions of uncorrelated error terms. RCM accounts for the clustering of data within work units and therefore is a suitable method to test such models (Bliese and Hanges, 2004). Preliminary analyses have suggested that our data showed significant group effects owing to clustering (intraclass correlation coefficient [ICC](1) scores were .03, .07, .38, and .69 for organizational justice, organizational commitment, OCBO and OCBE, respectively).

We used grand mean centering in all analyses. For each dependent variable, we ran three models. In Model 1, we entered the control variables. In Model 2, we entered the main effects of management commitment to the environment and POS. In Model 3, we entered the interaction term. We examined the significance of coefficients and change in R². The results in Table 2 provide support for Hypotheses 1 and 2. Specifically, the interaction term of POS with MCE was significant for both organizational justice and organizational commitment. Simple slope analyses showed that management commitment to the environment was positively related to organizational justice for employees with high POS (γ = .44, t = 2.61, p < .01), but not for those with low POS (γ = −.16, t = −1.20, p > .05), providing support for Hypothesis 1. Further, MCE was positively related to organizational commitment for high-POS (γ = .56, t = 6.42, p < .01) and low-POS employees (γ = .36, t = 4.88, p < .01), but the slopes were significantly different from each other and the relationship was more positive for high-POS employees, supporting Hypothesis 2. The plots of the interactions at high and low levels of the moderator (one standard deviation above and below the mean) are presented in Figures 1 and 2.

Table 2.

Random coefficient modeling analyses testing Hypotheses 1 and 2.

Variable	Organizational justice						Organizational commitment
	Model 1		Model 2		Model 3		Model 1		Model 2		Model 3
	Estimate	t	Estimate	t	Estimate	t	Estimate	t	Estimate	t	Estimate	t
Intercept	5.08	59.18**	5.08	66.61**	4.93	65.19**	5.36	74.53**	5.37	94.32**	5.32	76.61**
Education	−.30	−2.59**	−.26	−2.54*	−.23	−2.06*	−.20	−1.89	−.11	−1.91	−.10	−1.77
Organizational tenure	−.07	−2.33*	−.04	−2.01*	−.05	−2.33*	−.03	−1.68	−.01	−.59	−.01	−.74
Ecological value orientation	.21	1.40	.09	.68	.06	.41	.31	3.36**	.08	1.23	.07	1.04
Autonomy	.29	4.09**	.12	2.07*	.07	1.17	.28	4.29**	.10	1.88	.08	1.53
MCE			−.07	−.43	.14	1.01			.39	5.35**	.46	7.12**
POS			.77	5.98**	.79	6.98**			.53	10.24**	.54	11.21**
MCE x POS					.32	4.96**					.11	2.08*
R ²	.15		.38		.44		.17		.56		.57

n = 170. MCE is perceived management commitment to the environment; POS is perceived organizational support. R² is global effect size (square of the correlation between observed and modeled values for dependent variables). *p < .05, **p < .01.

Figure 1.

Interaction of perceived management commitment to the environment (MCE) and perceived organizational support (POS) on organizational justice

Figure 2.

Interaction of perceived management commitment to the environment (MCE) and perceived organizational support (POS) on organizational commitment.

The results in Table 3 did not provide support for Hypothesis 3, which predicted an interaction between POS and MCE with respect to OCBO. For OCBE, the interaction was significant, but in the opposite direction of what we expected. Simple slope analyses suggested that the slopes did not significantly differ from zero (γ = −.22, t = −1.12, p > .05 for high-POS employees and γ = .03, t = .28, p >.05 for low-POS employees), yet the slopes were significantly different from each other as indicated by the significant interaction. The plot of the interaction in Figure 3 suggested that the highest level of OCBE occurred when employees perceived that management was not committed to the environment, and had high POS. Thus, the results did not support Hypotheses 4.

Table 3.

Random coefficient modeling analyses testing Hypotheses 3 and 4.

Variable	OCBO						OCBE
	Model 1		Model 2		Model 3		Model 1		Model 2		Model 3
	Estimate	t	Estimate	t	Estimate	t	Estimate	t	Estimate	t	Estimate	t
Intercept	5.58	39.43**	5.59	40.02**	5.59	39.98**	4.32	16.05**	4.32	15.97**	4.39	16.56**
Education	−.00	−.03	.01	.15	.01	.14	.26	1.62	.26	1.73	.25	1.69
Organizational tenure	.01	.40	.00	.30	.00	.31	.03	2.95**	.03	3.11**	.03	3.09**
Ecological value orientation	−.06	−1.06	−.10	−1.40	−.10	−1.38	.06	.72	.05	.54	.08	.78
Autonomy	.01	.19	.03	.54	.03	.61	−.06	−1.08	−.06	−1.11	−.04	−.71
MCE			.23	3.93**	.23	3.65**			−.01	−.04	−.09	−.67
POS			−.19	−2.84**	−.19	−2.87**			.02	.31	.01	.13
MCE x POS					−.01	−.29					−.13	−2.12*
R ²	.00		.02		.03		.10		.10		.13

n = 142; OCBO is organizational citizenship behaviors targeting the organization; OCBE is organizational citizenship behaviors targeting the environment; MCE is perceived management commitment to the environment; POS is perceived organizational support. Education is coded as 1 = elementary school degree, 2 = middle school degree, 3 = high school degree, 4 = college degree. R² is global effect size (square of the correlation between observed and modeled values for dependent variables). *p < .05, **p < .01.

Figure 3.

Interaction of perceived management commitment to the environment (MCE) and perceived organizational support (POS) on organizational citizenship behaviors targeting the environment (OCBE)

Discussion

We set out to examine the relationship between commitment by management to preserving and protecting the environment, employee attitudes and behaviors. Past studies examining this question tended to focus on applicant reactions to ‘green’ management practices (e.g. Turban and Greening, 1997), or examined green management as part of overall CSR efforts including initiatives targeting employees. Hence, we set out to answer the following question: How do employees of an organization react to management commitment to an external constituency when such commitment has no direct benefits to employees? Based on deontic justice theory, we predicted that employees would interpret management commitment to ecological environment within the context of how management treats employees. Thus, we expected that employees would perceive the organization as more fair, would express greater commitment, and would engage in pro-organizational and pro-environmental behaviors when the organization displayed high commitment to both its internal and external stakeholders.

Our results were supportive of this expectation for attitudinal outcomes. Management commitment to the environment was associated with perceptions of organizational justice only when POS was high. This is consistent with Rupp et al.’s (2006) contention that how the organization treats the environment would be viewed with a deontic justice lens. At the same time, our findings suggest that, in the absence of supportive treatment of the self, employees do not react to an organization’s externally fair actions as strongly. Similarly, whereas management commitment to the environment was positively related to organizational commitment, the connection was stronger when employees perceived high POS. These results suggest that employee attitudes are reactant to how management is perceived to treat the ecological environment. Yet, these reactions are also a function of self-treatment.

When supervisor-rated outcomes were examined, the results followed a different pattern. First, the interaction term did not have any effects on OCBO. Instead, management commitment to the environment had a positive main effect on OCBO, controlling for POS. Holding POS constant, employees engaged in more frequent citizenship behaviors benefiting the organization when the organization was perceived as being committed to the ecological environment, suggesting that management commitment to the ecological environment has direct benefits to organizations in the form of high levels of OCBO.

Our results with respect to OCBE were unexpected but intriguing. Management commitment to the environment was negatively related to OCBE when POS was high. As Greenbaum et al. (2013) suggested, employee reactions to third-party treatment may take the form of punishing the culprit or compensating the victim. It seems that when employees are treated well (high POS condition) they become more attuned to how the organization treats the environment. In the high POS condition, OCBE increased as management was less committed to the environment, suggesting that employees may be trying to compensate the victim of poor treatment (ecological environment) by treating the environment better. In other words, OCBO and OCBE may have differential relations to deontic concerns, given that the former rewards the organization for positive treatment of a third party, whereas the latter compensates the victim.

Theoretical and practical implications

In this study we set out to make three contributions. Our first objective was to distinguish between different forms of CSR based on its beneficiaries. We differentiated between management’s commitment to the environment and employees. We found that respondents were able to perceive them separately. Moreover, the distinction enabled us to observe the interactive effects of management’s commitment to internal and external stakeholders, and to demonstrate that the CSR activities of management targeting external and internal stakeholders cannot be studied in isolation from each other. In particular, employees were more attuned to management commitment to the environment when they were recipients of higher levels of POS, underscoring the need for research to not only differentiate between different forms of CSR activities but also to recognize the very complex interactive effects they can have on employee perceptions.

A second goal was to contribute to the nomological network of management’s commitment to the environment. In particular, this study fills a gap concerning employee green behaviors (Ones and Dilchert, 2012) – a theoretically important outcome of management commitment to the environment. The scale we developed helps distinguish these green behaviors towards the organization (OCBE) from the well-established theoretical construct of OCBO. The two new validated scales make an important contribution to the literature that seeks to understand the effects of CSR activities on employee behavior.

Finally, we contribute to the POS literature by examining POS from a deontic justice perspective. We found that when employees perceived low POS, there was a weaker relationship between management commitment to the environment and attitudes. Instead, POS may shape employee reactivity to organizational treatment toward an external stakeholder, with high-POS members rewarding the organization more strongly when the organization is committed to the environment. Further, high-POS members were more likely to react to low management commitment to the environment with high OCBE, compensating for the victim’s inconsiderate treatment. This suggests that the mechanisms through which POS affects attitudes may encompass more than reciprocity (Rhoades and Eisenberger, 2002).

Our results have important implications for organizations seeking to become more environmentally friendly. Recent literature has increasingly called for a greater role for human resource management in the successful implementation of pro-environment strategies in firms (e.g. Jackson et al., 2012). For the HR partners of corporate leaders, the results suggest that employee perception of management’s external and internal CSR actions may affect employee engagement in the enactment of the strategy in complex ways. Although HR can enact policies intended to encourage pro-environmental attitudes and behaviors, it cannot assume that voluntary behaviors that bolster the effects of induced behaviors will necessarily result. Instead, employees may display fewer pro-environmental behaviors when management commitment to the environment is high because of the sense that environment ‘needs’ it less. This could slow the journey towards becoming environmentally friendly and require additional efforts to counteract.

Potential limitations and future research directions

One potential limitation is the measurement of management commitment to the environment, POS and attitudes from the employee’s perspective. We utilized supervisor responses when assessing OCBs, but in order to minimize common method variance (CMV), it would have been preferable to assess employee-reported data at short intervals. Despite the inflation of relationships, employees were able to differentiate between self-reported variables, as evidenced by our CFAs. Further, Monte Carlo studies have shown that correlated errors among independent and dependent variables cannot result in artificial interactions, nor attenuate true interactions (Evans, 1985; Siemsen et al., 2010). In other words, interaction effects cannot be inflated or artificially created as a result of CMV. Yet, measuring behavioral outcomes would increase our understanding of the nomological network of this variable.

Our focus on a developing country context is a strength, given the importance of developing countries in the world’s manufacturing. Environmental sustainability efforts rely on the cooperation of all nations, and understanding how employees in developing countries react to management commitment to the environment is important for the successful adoption of sustainable management practices. At the same time, these results would benefit from replication. Some results, such as low-POS members demonstrating higher OCBs in reaction to management commitment to the environment, may be because employees had low education and performed manufacturing jobs in a context where job opportunities are limited. Instead of quitting their jobs or withholding OCBs, these employees may have chosen to display higher levels of the types of OCBs they know the organization cares about. It is important to examine the role of national context in the observed results by replication in other contexts.

One other potential limitation is the collection of data from employees over a period of four months to accommodate periods of peak production. Employees may have discussed the study among themselves and as a result some responses may have been less spontaneous than others. Furthermore, for some employees there would have been a time lag between employee surveys and manager ratings. We feel that this latter point is of limited concern, owing to the high levels of stability of performance, particularly in jobs with low complexity (Sturman et al., 2005), with test–retest reliabilities over .80 with a lag time of six months. Still, it would have been preferable to complete the data collection in a single point in time.

In conclusion, employees react to and interpret management commitment to the environment within the context of their own treatment by the organization. Although CSR efforts have the potential to result in more positive employee attitudinal and behavioral reactions toward the organization, researchers should pay explicit attention to the focus of such CSR. Although providing benefits to external stakeholders has the potential to result in stronger attachment and dedication of employees to the organization, how organizations treat their employees is the key contingency determining employee reactions.

Footnotes

Appendix

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Fulda Erdoğan, Handan İnanç and Ahmet Temiroğlu for facilitating the data collection, Bjarke Kronborg and Layla Mansfield for their help with data entry, and Nik Rupp for his copyediting. Finally, we are thankful to Lale Yaldiz and Onur Emre for their help with scale development.

Funding

This research was funded by a Portland State University School of Business Loacker Sustainability Fellows grant.

Berrin Erdogan is Express Employment Professionals Professor of Management at Portland State University and Visiting Professor at College of Administrative Sciences and Economics at Koç University, Istanbul, Turkey. She conducts research on the topics of interpersonal relationships in the workplace, organizational justice and manager–employee relationships, as they relate to employee well-being, effectiveness and retention. Her work appeared in outlets such as Academy of Management Journal, Journal of Applied Psychology, Journal of Management and Personnel Psychology, among others. Dr Erdogan is a former associate editor for European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, and a current associate editor for Personnel Psychology. She serves on the editorial boards of Group & Organization Management, Journal of Applied Psychology and Journal of Management, and served on the editorial board of Journal of Organizational Behavior. She is a fellow of Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology. [Email: berrine@pdx.edu]

Talya N Bauer is the Cameron Professor of Management at Portland State University, USA. She conducts research about relationships at work in the areas of new hire onboarding, recruitment, selection, overqualification, mentoring and leadership, which have resulted in publication in the journals Academy of Management Journal, Journal of Applied Psychology, Journal of Management and Personnel Psychology. She has been a Visiting Scholar in France, Spain and at Google. She has served in elected positions such as the HRM Executive Committee of the Academy of Management and Member-at-Large for SIOP. She is the former Editor of Journal of Management and serves on the editorial boards for Personnel Psychology and Journal of Management and as an Associate Editor for Journal of Applied Psychology. Her work has been discussed in The New York Times, BusinessWeek, The Wall Street Journal, Harvard Business Review, USA Today, Washington Post and National Public Radio (NPR)’s All Things Considered. [Email: cetb@pdx.edu]

Sully Taylor is Professor of International Management at Portland State University, USA and a Visiting Professor at IE Business School, Madrid, Spain. Her academic writing and research is on issues important to managing global organizations effectively, including global mindset, global leadership, global corporate cultures and global staffing, as well as sustainable HRM. Her publications have appeared in journals such as Academy of Management Review, Journal of International Business Studies, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Human Resource Management, Sloan Management Review, Academy of Management Education and Learning and The International Journal of Human Resource Management. She has served on various editorial boards including European Journal of International Management, and was a guest editor (with Carolyn Egri and Joyce Osland) of a special issue on sustainable HRM for Human Resource Management. [Email: sullyt@sba.pdx.edu]

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