Discuss In Which Ways A Negative Culture In The Workplace Can Affect Employee
A negative culture in the workplace can entail a variety of situations such as bullying, defined as repeated harmful, abusive conduct (WBI 2017), a poor working environment, or a general lack of working motivation. Regulations set out by the government create legal requirements and responsibilities the employers must follow regarding the condition of working environments; wages, holiday pay and hours of work are all examples of strictly monitored variables with legal minimums (McKeever 2015).
If any of these factors fall below an employee’s expected standards, they can cause severe stress among the workforce. A survey conducted by the Workplace Bullying Institute in 2017 also determined that 60. 3 million US employees have at some point identified as being a victim of workplace bullying, almost half of the entire US workforce (Statista 2017). This is a good indication that the problem is very prominent in US workplaces, with similar results expected in many other countries. The effects of this can be very varied and include, but are not restricted to, reduced motivation when at work as well as increased absenteeism and a poor quality of work produced. This can be particularly detrimental to a business if it is in the service sector, where employees become representatives of the business and can have a direct impact on the client’s perception of the service offered and the business’ reputation.
Employee engagement can be a key indicator of any issues occurring within a workforce but can also be an indicator of how successful a team of employees or taskforce will become, in terms of ability to complete generic tasks in a team, such as designing a new product. A 2002 study by Harter, J. K. , Schmidt, F. L. , & Keyes, C. L. measured this exact variable, concluding that employee engagement (as a percentile) was directly proportional to the ‘success’ of the employee unit both within a business, and when liaising with client groups between companies. The research team discovered that an increase from 75% employee engagement to 95% caused only a 10% increase in measured success rate however a 4% increase from 95% to 99% caused a 6% increase in success rate completing internal tasks, and a 7% increase in success when liaising between businesses.
Overall, a positive employee culture (I. e. one in which employees are well engaged and focused on the tasks at hand) resulted in a high ability to complete tasks in groups. Time was not measured as a factor in the tests however it can be assumed that a ‘high ability to complete tasks’ implies that large group projects can be completed considerably faster in instances where engagement within the group is high. (Gallup 2017). It is fortunately very rare that large-scale inefficiencies occur as a result of a ‘negative culture’ however from time to time, scandalous cultures in large corporations are uncovered and reported on; during the 2008 global financial crash, UK banks were accused of fixing the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) without permission of their superiors, including the Bank of England (Snyder 2015). The result of this wrongdoing over extended periods of time were felt in most households in the world, with Naomi Snyder commenting “If your organization promotes ethical decision-making but the employees are all robbing the bank, then clearly there is something wrong with your culture. ”
