Development and Validation of the Organizational Dissent Scale

Abstract

The general trend toward more democratic forms of organizing highlights the necessity to consider how employees engage their organizations in participative environments. Assessing employee dissent represents one means of understanding the dialogue between employee and employer. The purpose of this study was to develop a measure for operationalizing how employees verbally express their contradictory opinions and disagreements about organizational phenomena. The Organizational Dissent Scale (ODS) was developed and tested in a series of studies designed to generate evidence of validity and reliability for the measure. Results indicate that the scale measures how employees express dissent along three dimensions: articulated, antagonistic (latent), and displaced. Results also indicate that initial evidence of validity and reliability exists for the scale.