14229: Flattering to Deceive: Understanding Disparity Between Employee Wellbeing Obligations and Practices (session 25849)

Research has demonstrated the importance of well-being policies and practices for positive employee outcomes. While this research recognises the importance of employee perceptions of well-being practices it does not consider how employees might weigh these perceptions against normative expectations about employers’ obligations, and importantly any disparity between well-being obligations and well-being practices. In short, what employers are seen to do in relation to employee well-being versus what employees perceive they should do. Drawing on psychological contract and social exchange perspectives, we argue that a disparity between employees’ perceptions of the organisation’s practices and obligations regarding organisational well-being is consequential in several ways. We defined the organisation’s attempts to meet employee perceptions of obligations in regard to well-being practices as the perceived commitment to organisational well-being (POW). Results from four empirical quantitative studies support our hypotheses: disparity between obligations and perceived practices is associated with employees’ well-being, above and beyond the perception of well-being practices alone and comparable variables (i.e., psychological safety climate and perceived organisational support) (Study 1 and 2); disparity is also associated with poorer job quality measured through effort-reward imbalance, and this in turn is associated with poorer well-being (Study 3 and 4).

view paper (if available)