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Does it help to help and to be helped? Impacts of informal help on effort and wages

Does it help to help and to be helped? Impacts of informal help on effort and wages The purpose of this paper is to analyse the role of informal help at the workplace and identify its determinants and outcomes. With an agency model, a multidisciplinary framework is proposed to understand how the “managerial” logic that shapes formal communication combines with the social logic underlying informal help in the context of organisational changes.Design/methodology/approachWith a sample of 12,475 employees of the French private sector, switching models estimate the determinants and impacts of informal help on wages and effort.FindingsThe results of this paper show that informal help networks reproduce discriminatory stereotypes, and they are driven by the firm’s instability, organisational design of workstation and social mechanisms. When employees help other workers, they intensify their effort. It pays to be helped, as recipients of help receive a wage premium. Results also suggest the existence of free-riding behaviours in informal help when workers do not reciprocate helpOriginality/valueThis approach of work organisation focuses on the analysis of productive interdependencies and social interactions at the workplace. The link between the formal organisation and the informal social structure is analysed with the concept of informal help. It also highlights the social dimension of performance. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Journal of Accounting & Organizational Change Emerald Publishing

Does it help to help and to be helped? Impacts of informal help on effort and wages

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References (27)

Publisher
Emerald Publishing
Copyright
© Emerald Publishing Limited
ISSN
1832-5912
DOI
10.1108/jaoc-03-2018-0031
Publisher site
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Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the role of informal help at the workplace and identify its determinants and outcomes. With an agency model, a multidisciplinary framework is proposed to understand how the “managerial” logic that shapes formal communication combines with the social logic underlying informal help in the context of organisational changes.Design/methodology/approachWith a sample of 12,475 employees of the French private sector, switching models estimate the determinants and impacts of informal help on wages and effort.FindingsThe results of this paper show that informal help networks reproduce discriminatory stereotypes, and they are driven by the firm’s instability, organisational design of workstation and social mechanisms. When employees help other workers, they intensify their effort. It pays to be helped, as recipients of help receive a wage premium. Results also suggest the existence of free-riding behaviours in informal help when workers do not reciprocate helpOriginality/valueThis approach of work organisation focuses on the analysis of productive interdependencies and social interactions at the workplace. The link between the formal organisation and the informal social structure is analysed with the concept of informal help. It also highlights the social dimension of performance.

Journal

Journal of Accounting & Organizational Change – Emerald Publishing

Published: Jun 5, 2019

Keywords: Communication; Social capital; Organizational change; Effort; Help; Wage

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