Paper Type

ERF

Abstract

In large organizations, top management has traditionally been the custodian of decision-making affecting employees and the organization. However, contemporary organizations increasingly recognize the importance of engaging employee views, ideas and suggestions, collectively referred to as voice. The post-COVID era has renewed scholarly attention on employee voice for two reasons. First, while many transitioned to remote work, lower-level operations employees could not work from home. Second, employees who did transition lost face-to-face channels for expressing voice, relying instead on technology-mediated platforms. Drawing on power in organizations, leader-member exchange, and employee voice literature, we examine how employees' sense of power and leader-member exchange influence their voice on social media and how such voice shapes organizational responses. We propose a survey of 300 to 500 U.S. employees through a third-party panel. This study extends voice research by examining how power dynamics and leader relationships shape social media voice and its consequences.

Paper Number

1632

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Aug 15th, 12:00 AM

Digital Voice: The Role of Leader-Member Exchange and Employee Sense of Power

In large organizations, top management has traditionally been the custodian of decision-making affecting employees and the organization. However, contemporary organizations increasingly recognize the importance of engaging employee views, ideas and suggestions, collectively referred to as voice. The post-COVID era has renewed scholarly attention on employee voice for two reasons. First, while many transitioned to remote work, lower-level operations employees could not work from home. Second, employees who did transition lost face-to-face channels for expressing voice, relying instead on technology-mediated platforms. Drawing on power in organizations, leader-member exchange, and employee voice literature, we examine how employees' sense of power and leader-member exchange influence their voice on social media and how such voice shapes organizational responses. We propose a survey of 300 to 500 U.S. employees through a third-party panel. This study extends voice research by examining how power dynamics and leader relationships shape social media voice and its consequences.