Deviance (Organizational Behaviour)

Introduction In the past 10 years, more and more research has come to the forefront regarding organizational deviance. It is widely accepted that employee deviance has been increasing in recent years and the topic has become much more publicly discussed, especially in light of recent scandals such as Enron and WorldCom (Appelbaum et al., 2005, p. 43), and, most recently, with the mortgage crisis in the US economy. In addition, employee deviance has a large effect on the economy with some researchers estimating the financial cost of employee theft to be $50 billion in the US economy (Coffin, 2003) (Henle, 2005, p. 247). Furthermore, employees in today’s technologically advanced society are able to express deviance in new and modern ways such as “Cyberloafing” or workplace Internet deviance which some studies report can take up to 40% of an employee’s day (Zoghbi-Manrique de Lara, 2006, p. 581). These new forms of deviance affect an organization’s bottom line as it tries to control employee deviance through “preventative measures along the lines of tightening vigilance and strengthening supervision of their employees” in an ever-changing society (Zoghbi-Manrique de Lara, 2006, p. 581). The purpose of this paper is to provide a discussion of the current literature in organizational deviance with a focus on the primary causes of deviant behavior as a result of stress in the modern workplace. To accomplish this task, this article will provide a working definition of organizational deviant behavior including an overview of the causes of employee deviant behavior, as well as a framework for studying this phenomenon. Second, it will highlight the causes of increased workplace deviance in modern organizations through an in depth look at stress and its more recent causes; competition, empowerment, downsizing, technological change and work/home conflict as key influential causes of deviance progress in modern organizations. To conclude, there will be a short

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