Antecedents and consequences of trust in manager subordinate relationships

Résumé

The aim of this dissertation is to advance our knowledge on trust in manager-subordinate relationships. Specifically, we center our research on three tòpics where current research needed further analysis: the study of managerial trustworthy behaviors and perceived mutuality as antecedents of subordinates' trust in management; dimensional ity of managerial trustworthy behavior; and mediating role of trust between managerial trustworthy behaviors and organizational citizenship behaviors. For that purpose, we performed three different studies that I present here as three independent essays. in the first essay of this dissertation we study two antecedents of subordinates' trust in managers: subordinates' perceptions of managerial trustworthy behavior, and subordinates' perceptions of managers' trust in them. As hypothesized, both subordinates' perceptions of managerial trustworthy behavior, and subordiantes' perceptions of managers' trust in them have a significant relationship with subordinates' trust in their managers in our study. Further, we analyze mutual ity in trusting relationships. we found that there are significant differentes between subordinates trust in management and their perceptions about managers' trust in them. in the second essay we assess multidimensional ity of managerial trustworthy behavior through the development and validation of a measurement instrument. Based on interviews with managers and literture review, we identified six trustworthy behaviors: behavioral consistency, behavioral integrity, open communicatión, sharing and delegation of control, demonstration of concert, and loyalty.Then, we derived items for the scale, followed by content vaíidity assessment, exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, and criterion-related vaíidity. An 18 item instrument forms the final versión of the questionnaire In the third essay, we empirically test the relationship between managerial trustworthy behavior, trust, and organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs). We distinguish between two different types of trust: subordinates' trust in managers and managers' trust in subordinates.we study the mediating role of these two types of trust between managerial trustworthy behaviors an subordiantes' OCBs. Using subordinateratings, we measure six managerial behaviors that can produce trust: behavioral consistency, behavioral integrity, communicatión, delegation, demonstration of concern, and loyalty. Using manager-ratings, we measure three types of OCBs: OCB directed toward other individuals (OCBI), OCB directed toward the organization (OCBO), and OCB directed toward the task (OCBT). our results show a significant mediation of subordiantes' trust in management in the realtionship between managerial trustworthy behavior and OCBs, and a significant mediation of managers' trust in subordinates' in the relationship between OCBs and managerial behaviors. After introducing the three essays, we present some conclusions regarding the three essays. Then, we propose some avenues for further research that overeóme the main limitations of this dissertation.Finally, we discuss the implications of our findings for those managers who are concerned with the development of trust in their work exchanges with their subordinates.