| dc.description.abstract | This research examined the role of ethical organizational culture in preventing
sickness absence and turnover in organizations, and also validated the Corporate
Ethical Virtues (CEV) model used to study ethical organizational culture. More
specifically, the research had four aims: 1) to test the factorial validity and group
invariance of the 58-item CEV scale, 2) to examine the associations between ethical
organizational culture and sickness absence at the individual and work unit levels,
3) to study the role of ethical organizational culture as an antecedent of managerial
turnover, and 4) to examine the reasons managers gave for their turnover, and the
associations between ethical culture and these reasons. Three different datasets
were used. The first dataset (aim 1) consisted of four samples that together
contained 3,098 Finnish participants from two organizations. The first organization
operated in the private sector (consulting and engineering), and the second, a large
city organization, operated in the public sector. The second dataset (aim 2)
consisted of all members of the aforementioned public sector organization, which
included four service areas comprising 246 smaller units (n = 2192). The third four-
year three-wave dataset (aims 3 and 4) comprised 902 Finnish managers from
different organizations at the study baseline in 2009. The results showed, first of all,
that the factorial validity of the 58-item CEV scale was good and that it remained
statistically similar, i.e. invariant, across samples. Second, a strong ethical culture
was found to associate with less individual-level sickness absence. At the work unit
level the same tendency was not found, implying that sickness absence is more of
an individual than a shared outcome at the work unit level. Third, the results
indicated that the more present were the virtues of congruency of supervisors and
senior management, discussability, and sanctionability, the more likely managers
were to stay in their organization. Moreover, in those organizations where the
ethical culture was seen as weaker, managers gave reasons for turnover related, for
example, to dissatisfaction with the job or organization, value misfit, and decreased
well-being. To conclude, the findings of the present research highlighted the
essential role of the ethical values embedded in an organization’s culture and
business practices in both reducing sickness absence and keeping valuable
managers in the organization. | |
