THE LITIGATION MENTALITY IN ORGANIZATIONS - A TEST OF ALTERNATIVE PSYCHOLOGICAL EXPLANATIONS

A ''litigation mentality'' increasingly pervades today's workplace, as an ever wider variety of managerial decisions are the target of emplo yee-initiated lawsuits. In this paper we identify different psychologi cal factors that could explain why employees consider suing their empl oyers. One group of factors suggests that employee consideration of li tigation is motivated primarily by self-interest, as employers perceiv e they have more to gain than lose by going to court. A second group o f factors suggests that employees' decision to go to court is influenc ed largely by the perceived fairness of their dealings with the organi zation. In a survey of 141 currently employed workers, we found that t he perceived fairness of organizational rules and procedures was the p rimary factor influencing whether employees consider a litigious respo nse. In particular, employees were concerned about how the rules and p rocedures were implemented and the quality of interpersonal treatment received from managers. Job satisfaction also had an impact on employe es considering litigation. We argue that while our findings support or ganizational efforts to create more formalized policies and procedures that emphasize due process or procedural justice, such efforts, in an d of themselves, may undermine the intended goal of ensuring fairness and reducing employee litigation. The solution to this dilemma is not in the creation of formal procedures per se, but in the moral and inte rpersonal conduct of those implementing the procedures. We conclude by identifying directions for future research on employee litigation.