Newcomers as unwitting victims? Examining department leaders' denial of information support and team leaders' resentment during organizational socialization
研究团队领导在部门领导拒绝提供信息支持后产生的怨恨情绪，如何影响他们对新员工的支持程度，基于相对剥夺理论。
Summary Newcomers depend on organizational insiders to successfully adjust to their organization, with their direct team leaders playing an important role in facilitating their assimilation during organizational socialization. However, in certain circumstances, team leaders may refrain from supporting newcomers, based on their experiences from before newcomers joined the organization. The purpose of this study is to examine team leaders' preexisting perception of deprivation and resentment toward their department leaders as factors that may influence the extent to which they provide support to newcomers. Drawing on relative deprivation theory, we propose that the denial of task‐related information to team leaders by their department leaders before newcomers join the organization triggers resentment in team leaders. We further propose that team leaders' preexisting resentment toward their department leaders influences their level of support to newcomers. We tested our hypotheses through data collected from team leaders before newcomers joined their organization and matched data collected from team leaders and newcomers after the latter joined the company. The results indicate that team leaders' preexisting experience of resentment toward their department leaders influences the support they provide to newcomers, an uninvolved target.