Michel Tremblay, Olivier Doucet and Marie-Claude Gaudet Win a Best Paper Award at the 2009 ASAC Conference

August 20, 2009

Michel Tremblay, HEC Omer DeSerres Chair in Retailing, Assistant Professor Olivier Doucet and doctoral student Marie-Claude Gaudet won the Best Paper Award in the Human Resources Division for their paper presented at the Association des sciences administratives du Canada (ASAC) Conference, held in Niagara Falls in June. The paper was entitled Leadership transformationnel, épuisement émotionnel, comportements de citoyenneté et absentéisme : le rôle médiateur de la perception de justice.

In their paper, the co-authors examined the effects of transformational leadership on employees’ extra-role performance (meaning anything outside an employee’s normal role and tasks), emotional exhaustion and absenteeism. They did so by studying the influence of employees’ perceptions of distributive justice, i.e. whether they feel that management is treating each of them fairly, of procedural justice, i.e. whether they feel that the same procedures apply to everyone, and interactional justice, i.e. whether they feel that managers interact with all staff members without making distinctions.

Their findings: managers can improve their subordinates’ extra-role performance

Their analyses of structural equations on data from three different sources – the total sample was 294 people – showed that managers can improve their subordinates’ extra-role performance and reduce the likelihood of emotional exhaustion by improving employees’ perception that they are being treated fairly.

The study also showed that a high level of emotional exhaustion among employees may lead to higher absenteeism and reduced extra-role performance. Lastly, the research showed that higher extra-role performance does not necessarily lead to emotional exhaustion among employees.