Behavioral Manifestations of Boss's Insecurities and their Impact on Employee's Psychological Contract: A case study of Banks in Islamabad and Rawalpindi

Abstract

Leadership is a function of three broad variables: leader’s characteristics, the impact on the followers and the characteristics of the situation involving the leader and the followers. Leader’s effectiveness depends on his/her ability to relate to these variables in developing his/her leadership style. With in this constantly shifting relationship of leader, followers and situation, a leader or boss need to be emotionally mature i.e. be both flexible and socially sensitive.

Although there have been numerous international studies on insecure and ineffective leadership highlighting what constitute as unproductive behaviours in bosses/managers and their impact on employee’s psychological contract yet such comprehensive studies in the Pakistani corporate context have been missing. This paper aims at identifying; what percentage of Pakistani bosses, in our sample, from within the service sector, are emotionally insecure, what are the behavioural manifestations of bosses insecurities, what percentage of bosses display these insecure behaviours at work and to what degree, the impact of such boss behaviours on employee’s psychological contract. For this purpose a questionnaire was designed and mailed to 100 employees in various banks. Their responses show that in employees’ perception, based on the behaviours they face at work place: • 76.6% employees work with defensive bosses • 76.2% bosses act secretive and vague at workplace • 74% bosses are self-absorbed and self-centred • 70.5% employees faces micromanagement by their bosses • 68% employees have faced bullying by their bosses • 67.4% bosses uses fear to control workplace • 65% bosses act paranoid • 64.2 % bosses are self-promoting • 50.6% employees have bosses who use verbal abuse at workplace As a result only 33% employees said they are totally committed to their organizations while 67% employees showed little or no loyalty towards their bosses and organization. Almost 74% employees feel de-motivated by their bosses’ behaviour whereas over 68% employees said their behaviour and attitude have become negative while working for their current bosses. All this leads to a very low employees’ sense of ownership, as only 29% employees showed a strong sense of ownership towards their job and organization. Almost 78% employees said that because of their bosses they think about quitting their jobs even if they don’t really do it. The paper shows how behavioural manifestations of insecurities in bosses are hurting their employees and ultimately the organizations.