Strengthening Supervisor Bonds but Impairing Coworker Relations? The Divergent Effects of Voice Endorsement

Abstract

Research on voice endorsement has predominantly focused on factors that predict whether supervisors will react favorably to subordinate suggestions. Beyond considering its antecedents, however, it is equally pertinent to understand how such positive social feedback affects voicers and their relations with others. Drawing from appraisal theories of emotion and the dual-faceted, functional conceptualization of pride, we develop and test a model in which supervisor voice endorsement elicits divergent effect patterns—one underscoring relationship maintenance, and the other relationship impairment. To test our hypotheses, we collected multi-wave data from 414 voicing subordinates and their 112 supervisors employed in a high-tech company. Regarding the relationship maintenance pathway, our results demonstrate that voice endorsement positively relates to future supportive voice toward supervisors, and this effect is mediated by voicers’ felt authentic pride. Meanwhile, for the relationship impairment pathway, endorsement also positively relates to voicer hubristic pride and, in turn, greater interpersonal conflict with coworkers, but only among voicers higher in narcissism. Our results demonstrate that endorsement is a potent tool affecting voicers’ emotions and work behavior, while also highlighting how endorsement reactions may differ in important ways depending on voicers’ dispositions.