Organizational Cynicism

Q-1) Why organizational cynicism prevails in most of the organization?

Cynicism Is On the Rise
Research over indicates that cynicism is on the rise which affects society as well as
business. As one research depicts that Cynicism not only affects society at large, but
also is widespread among organizations in the United States (Dean, Brandes, &
Dharwadkar, 1998; Kanter & Mirvis, 1989), Europe, and Asia (Kouzes & Posner,
1993).
Research reports that cynicism in organisation hurts the competitiveness and ability to
accommodate today's needed organizational change. Paul J. Rosen (Hendrick, 1993, p.
E1:2), President of the American Institute of Stress, indicates that recent, dizzying
changes in technology and the economy are causing unprecedented burnout, cynicism,
sickness and absenteeism.
About Cynicism
Cynicism is an attitude characterized by hopelessness, frustration and disillusionment.
It is also related to contempt, disgust, and distrust (Andersson, 1996; Andersson &
Bateman, 1997). The central belief associated with cynicism is that principles of
honesty, fairness, and sincerity are sacrificed to further the individual's self-interest.
This underlying self-centered purpose is believed to lead to actions based on hidden
agendas and deception (Abraham, 2000). This strong negative attitude permeates
Americas corporations and is currently blamed for a multitude of unfavourable
organizational outcomes. Thus, cynicism is recognized as a growing problem in the
workplace that calls for immediate and detailed attention. Cynicism is described as a
mind-set characterized by hopelessness, disappointment, and disillusionment, and is
also associated with scorn, disgust, and suspicion (Andersson, 1996). This strong
negative attitude has infiltrated Americas corporations, and is believed to be
responsible for a host of unfavourable organizational consequences. Thus, cynicism is
acknowledged as a increasing problem in the workplace that merits immediate and
detailed research attention.
Organizational psychologist and consultant, Philip H. Mirvis, and Professor Donald L.
Kanter (1989, p. 377) found, in their national survey of 649 workers, that one bold
theme prevailed: "self-interest and opportunism mark today's wised-up employee."
They classified 43% of these workers as being cynical (p. 379), and 40% of the
managers and supervisors as being cynical, as well (p. 381). In a later study (Mirvis
and Kanter, 1991), they concluded that more workers were cynical, rising from 43%
to 48% (p. 50).
Cynicism has been described in a number of ways. Much of the past research has
defined cynicism as a personality trait (Smith, Pope, Sanders, Allred, & OKeefe,
1988), or has identified industry-level environmental causes of cynicism (i.e.,
workforce reduction and cutbacks, firm performance) (Andersson & Bateman, 1997).
Other studies have examined antecedents or causes that are under the direct control of
individual organizations (Andersson, 1996; Reichers et al., 1997). Further, it has been
theorized that organizational cynicism includes both a stable personal component as
well as situational components (Abraham, 2000; Dean et al., 1998).

Ingredients of Cynicism
Mirvis and Kanter (1991) explain there are three key ingredients to cynicism, 1)
unrealistically high expectations of oneself and others, 2) the experience of
disappointment in oneself and others (and the resulting feelings of frustration and
defeat), and 3) disillusionment, and being deceived by others.
Mirvis and Kanter (1989) describe four aspects of company life that most often
disillusion people, including perceptions that the 1) pay system is rigged, 2)
management can't be trusted, 3) company doesn't care and 4) the organization's time is
at a premium. Effective responses to these concerns, respectively, include widely
communicating the rationale and structure of the pay system, making hard truths
testable and verifiable, bringing community into the workplace, and giving
organization members more control over their time.
Cynics don't trust management, find the pay system to be fair, think they have fair
chance for advancement, don't believe management listens to them or value their jobs
(Mirvis and Kanter, 1989). Cynical managers "are skilled in controlling information
and exercising power through operatives" (Mirvis and Kanter, 1989, p. 381) In their
mind, they 'made it the hard way,' and anyone who has not is weak, naive, inept, or
just plain stupid" (Mirvis and Kanter, 1989, p. 381).Mirvis and Kanter (1989) go on to
convey that cynics appear aloof and unfeeling, and treat people as if they were
machines. Cynics are open and vocal about how the game is played; they see through
company politics and thrive on inside dope. They yield cynicism like a sword.

Q.2. Assess the impact of cynicism on organizational performance.
Cynicism impacts management which becomes more driven by personal relationships
in giving rewards rather than actual performance. This can be attributed to the fact that
cynical knowledge is denial of the goodness or sincerity of altruism in organizational
actions, decisions, or procedures, seeing that the management always do not believe in
what they say. This is actually a result of organizational hypocrisy which further
results in less organizational commitment, threat to authority relationships and
organizational legitimacy (Goldner, Ritti and Ference, 1977).
Due to cynicism people are ready to lie if they can gain something out of it. Most of
the time, they show that they care for one another, though actually they do not. It can
be attributed to the observation that cynicism is a personality trait, which reflects the
general belief that selfishness and fakery is at the core of human nature.
Unrealistically high expectations, disappointment, and disillusionment play a vital role
in this and it further creates distrust and contempt of management. It lowers trust in
co-workers. Employees perceived injustice and inequity everywhere and feel that
management is not taking them seriously (Kanter and Mirvis, 1989; 1991).
Cynicism creates a negative, distrustful attitude toward authority and institutions
(Kanter & Mirvis, 1989). It can be evoked in a person even by showing him a movie
in which management is being unfair with employees (Bateman, Sakano and Fujita,
1992).
Cynicism impacts the organization and it is reflected in the work ethics. Work ethics
strongly predict cynicism, not the personality characteristic. It usually results in
depersonalization and estrangement. People have low regard for authority and
experience low self-esteem Guastello, Rieke, Guastello and Billings, 1992).
Cynicism creates pessimism about the success of future organizational changes, and
people believe that change agents are incompetent, lazy, or both. It is actually derived
from the history of failed change attempts. This has negative effect on job satisfaction
and organizational commitment. However, it has a very weak relationship with
negative affectivity (Wanous, Reichers and Austin, 1994).
Cynicism causes frustration and disillusionment and negative feelings toward and
distrust of a person, group, ideology, social convention or institution. It usually results
from Workplace characteristics which includes but is not limited to high executive
compensation, layoffs, limited voice expression, role ambiguity and role conflict. As a
result, people feel detached from all the malpractices like misuse of power and
manipulation by management. They undermine leaders and institutions and the
practices they support (Andersson, 1996).
The above scenario also discourages people to perform OCB and they do not comply
with unethical requests from management (Andersson and Bateman, 1997).
People lose faith in the leaders of change, characterizing them as lazy and
incompetent, and pessimism about the likelihood of the success of future change
efforts. It can analysed by the incompetence of those who are responsible for
improvement of the system. Their lack of knowledge of what they are doing is a clear
indicator. It emerges from continuously witnessing failures while bringing about
changes and lack of knowledge. They also lose the reliability. As a result, people lose
commitment, satisfaction, and motivation and strongly disbelieve what top
management says (Reichers, Wanous and Austin, 1997).
Organizational cynicism modifies the attitude of the employees and they start
believing that the organization lacks integrity. They display disparaging attitude and
critical behaviour (Dean, Brandes and Dharwadkar, 1998).
Cynicism creates large perceptions of contradictory forces, where people believe that
there is increased outsourcing but middle managers do not contribute any discernible
value. It causes a shift in paradigm of employment relations, and encourages short-
term rather than long-term attachment between organizations and employees
(Feldman, 2000).
It has been noticed that weak support for negative affectivity and stronger support for
amount of previous change, less participation in decision making and ineffectiveness
of supervisors results in relationships with decreased organizational commitment and
grievance filing. It has an overall negative effect on instrumentality of pay for-
performance systems (Wanous, Reichers & Austin, 2000).
As cynicism impacts the moral decision making, involving strong levels of distrust
and hostile impugning and vilification of another person's motives, people only
believe in the negative aspects of anything and hardly consider that the positive
aspects can actually be valid and true. This increases with the decrease in trust and
increases with the increase in role conflict. Ultimately, it results in the decrease in
organizational commitment (Turner and Valentine, 2001).
As a result of cynicism, people do not find connected to the organization and feel that
organization is not efficient in dealing with stress in the workplace. Usually due to
lack of choice, lack of trust, sense of unequal status and power, and lack of genuine
institutional support creates a sense of being devalued. This has worse consequences
where organization cannot fully realize its latent social capital. It hampers the
development of isolated subcultures who perceive themselves as devalued groups and
gradually they become immune to organizational goals (O'Brien et al., 2004).
Cynicism induces disbelief of another's stated or implied motives for a decision or
action. People are highly suspicious and sceptical about motives of management in the
organization. It is caused due to inefficient managerial communication, overall
management incompetence and management incompetence to implement change. It
results in intention to resist change (Stanley, Meyer and Topolnytsky, 2005).
A cynic makes negative comments and with exhibiting low sentiments about
positives, specifically the denial of the positive impact of the firm's values statements
on actual decision-making. People so not believe in the company's real intention to
live up to values statements. Leadership acts in a manner inconsistent with the values
proclaimed, i.e. it is an organizational hypocrisy. This causes employees to have
significantly less commitment towards the organization and its goals (Urbany, 2005).

Q3) How does an organisation deal with the problems?
Cynicism grows or ebbs depending on the atmosphere that it feeds on. There is a need
for less bureaucracy and more management, more and more organisations are realising
this. There is a common platform in most companies where employees can voice their
grievances thus reducing possible cynicism. Many corporate excellence programs are
designed for the specific purpose of management interacting more with employees.
The ways in which an organisation deals with problems related to cynics are varied
and a few are explained further.
People oriented work culture:
A people oriented work culture carries a message such that the company gets de-
bureaucratized and makes people centric to the companys success. Cynics are
focused on signs and symbols and feel that those in authority are out for themselves
only. If the work culture is people oriented then bosses are put in touch with workers
de-bureaucratizing the company and so people feel central to the success of the
enterprise. One of the companies which follow this is Accenture, one of its key core
values in respect for the individual, fostering a trusting, open and inclusive
environment.
Better Management of the Basics:
The basics are pay, benefits, reviews, promotions and so on. Human resource systems
must be truly fair to people and responsive to their needs. Moreover, management
must provide information about these systems, ensure that they are competently and
fairly administered and assess their impact through periodic reviews with the people
whose lives they affect. One approach can be to make pay systems open where all the
rates, grades are made public so employees can be assured that the system is fair. The
management needs to convince cynics by substance. Employees at SumAll, a
Manhattan data-analytics company, can click on a shared drive to peruse investor
agreements, company financials, performance appraisals, hiring decisions and
employee pay, along with each worker's equity and bonuses. As per the management
this way employees work better as they are freed of doubts regarding the same.


Participative Management:
This is perhaps the most important factor in dealing with cynicism. Employees must
feel that their opinions have been heard and that they are given respectful
consideration (Reichers, Wanou and Austin, 1997). Participative management can be
helpful in the design of compensation and career development systems, and in shop
floor and office decision-making. This brings people inside the mechanics of running
a business and makes them responsible for their own careers. It also counters cynics'
claims that decisions in a company are always rigged and manipulated. Employees
should be involved in business decision-making processes wherever it is appropriate
to give them a sense of ownership and pride in the company. Employees must be
given some degree of power over the way they perform their job and make decisions
related to their positions. These empowered employees are more likely to have a
positive outlook about their employer and are more invested in the outcome of their
performance. Their feedbacks should be taken and implemented, they can thus know
that their ideas are listened to and valued. If employees are encouraged to invest
themselves in all stages of business planning they will see themselves as integral parts
of the company. Participative management that incorporates supervisory
communications can improve employee job satisfaction (Soonhee Kim, 2002).
Enhancing Credibility:
Cynicism cannot be moderated or changed by timely information unless that
information is believed. A message is more likely to be made believable by using
credible spokespersons. Cynics can be more easily persuaded if they see the
spokesperson as knowledgeable about the subject matter, possessed of high power and
status in the organization and trustworthy. The manager should base his techniques of
communication on the kind of audience and most importantly should present the
message seriously and sincerely. He should use a positive logical approach as it
emphasizes benefits compared to a negative approach that emphasizes dire
consequences. In case of organisations a manager should try and appeal to the logical
side of the employee and not the emotional side. There should be congruence between
behaviour and words of the organisations spokespersons. Besides spokespersons, a
number of other channels of conveying information should be used to ensure that
everyone has a chance to receive the information. CEOs should encourage employees
to have realistic yet optimistic expectations. To regain credibility after failure
managers must accept responsibility and accept that they made mistakes. Those who
dont accept responsibility are likely to be viewed as dishonest (Reichers, Wanou and
Austin, 1997). Accepting mistakes and quickly rectifying them will help the
management gain credibility otherwise employees may find it difficult to let go of
cynicism. This approach works well even in face of repeated failures (Kouzes and
Posner, 2006).
The above methods of tackling cynicism however would fall short if employees are
not given the opportunities of airing their issues and receive validation that those
issues would be redressed. For this reason two way communication is critical
(Reichers, Wanou and Austin,1997).This way managers get to learn about employee
concerns and employees learn about management constraints, and the two can work
together to achieve a solution to the issues leading to enhanced productivity in the
organisation.

Conclusion:

There have been many researches over the years to access the impact of cynicism in
the organizations. Various findings propose that cynicism in the organization is indeed
stimulated by the employees apprehensions. Many studies explained cynicism a
mechanism that diminished trust and caused individuals to develop a generalized
dislike and suspicion toward executives and big business (Kanter & Mirvis, 1989).
Organizational cynicism has been identified as an impediment to organizational
development (Wanous et al., 2000), and a major cause of negative employee outcomes
(Abraham 2000; Andersson & Bateman, 1997). Significant changes in the workplace
may not yield fruitful results, if employees are characterized by negative cynicism.
Most of these studies confer cynicism as an attitude. But its various positive
outcomes have not been taken into consideration and little research has been done in
this area to analyse as to what extent positive cynicism may impact outcomes in the
organization. Cynicism may help employee to effectively confront the rapidly
changing complex work environment. In some cases, cynicism may help employee
adjustment to the environment, and serve as an influence on future behaviour.
Due to the rise of cynicism in the business environment and its severe repercussions,
organizations are realizing the importance of handling cynicism at workplace. It
depends on the organizations ability to identify the causes of cynicism relevant to
their structure and to tackle it. Further research is required to comment of the detailed
effect of cynicism in the organizational context.







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