This study examined how organizational control is related to employees’ organizational trust. We specifically focus on how different forms of control (process, outcome, and normative) relate to employees’ trust in their employing organizations and examine whether such trust in turn relates positively to employee job performance (task performance and organizational citizenship behavior). In addition, and in response to the recommendations of past research, we examined these relationships in a high control and compliance-based cultural context. Using data from 105 employee–supervisor dyads from professional services firms in Singapore, we find support for our hypothesized model. The implications of the results for theory and practice, and directions for future research, are discussed.

Purpose: – Interpersonal trust is often considered as the “glue” that binds supervisors together with their subordinates, and creates a positive organisational climate. The purpose of this paper is to investigate factors affecting subordinates’ trust to their supervisor, and the consequences of such a trusting relationship.Design/methodology/approach: – The authors conducted a qualitative meta-analysis of the trust literature between 1995 and 2011, to identify 73 articles and review 37 theoretical propositions, 139 significant model parameters and 58 further empirical findings.Findings: – Four distinct clusters of trust antecedents are found: supervisor attributes; subordinate attributes; interpersonal processes and organisational characteristics. Similarly, the authors identify three categories of trust consequences: subordinates’ work behaviour; subordinates’ attitude towards the supervisor; and organisational level effects.Research limitations/implications: – The authors find a bias towards studying supervisor attributes and interpersonal processes, yet a dearth of attention on subordinate attributes and organisational characteristics. Similarly, the conceptual attention on trust between supervisors and subordinates has been limited, with empirical work reporting predominantly significant findings. Social exchange has dominated as the theoretical perspective, and cross-section as the main research approach. In order to advance this important field more heterogeneity is needed, utilising a range of different theoretical schools and employing different methodologies.Originality/value: – This seems to be the first qualitative meta-analysis explicitly directed to understanding trust between supervisors and subordinates. The authors contribute to the field of trust by revealing current gaps in the literature and highlighting potential areas of future research.

Purpose: – Vulnerability is a concept that lies at the core of the most prevalent academic trust definitions. Accordingly, a vast amount of scholars refers to vulnerability when studying trust. Surprisingly, there is almost no conceptual nor empirical work explicitly directed at understanding vulnerability itself. The purpose of this paper is to summarize and critique the existing base of knowledge of vulnerability with a particular focus on the leader-follower relationship and to open avenues for future research.Design/methodology/approach: – In the process of a very systematic literature search, the authors identified 49 studies that refer to vulnerability when studying trust at the interpersonal level. The authors coded the literature into conceptualizations, antecedents and consequences of vulnerability – with a particular focus on the leader-follower relationship.Findings: – The authors introduce a theoretical framework which allows the authors to structure the rather fuzzy discussed concept of vulnerability. The development of such a theoretical framework allows the authors to distinguish between trusting beliefs and actual trusting behaviour so that it is possible to separate the constructs of willingness-to-be-vulnerable and actual vulnerability.Research limitations/implications: – With the help of the developed framework, the authors point to the need for more work on vulnerability in order to take the study of trust to the next level. In this respect, the authors formulate several propositions that should be tested in future research.Practical implications: – Practitioners are made aware of the need to risk willingness to be vulnerable as a base for trusting behaviour. There is no way around being willing to be vulnerable.Originality/value: – This literature review provides a holistic understanding of the concept of vulnerability. The intention is to show the different understandings and interpretations of this term within the literature and identify which antecedents and consequences are related to the concept of vulnerability.

“Worthless,” “money burning,” or “black holes” is how media and professionals describe compliance practices today. Practitioners are unenthusiastic about control systems, codes of conducts, and systems for compliance management that are increasing in volume but not in effectiveness. In order to help practitioners clarify what actually makes employees comply with their compliance program, this study examines intrinsic and extrinsic motivators of 119 employees from procurement and sales. We contribute to the existing motivation literature, testing the self-determination theory in low and high hierarchical levels. Our findings show that intrinsic motivators are more strongly and positively related to compliance intention on higher hierarchical levels than the lower ones. However, employees from higher hierarchies show overall less compliance intention than employees from lower hierarchies. © 2015 The Authors. Human Resource Management published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Purpose: – Trust in financial institutions has been eroded through the collapse of mortgage-related securities, with confidence further denuded through well publicized cases of rogue traders and rate fixing cases, such as with the Lehman brothers, the Libor rate-fixing scandals, and the hypo real estate breakdown. In response to these events, governments have introduced a range of distinct policy initiatives designed to restore trust in this sector. Thus, the question arises: are these regulations and control mechanisms sufficient in isolation, or are there other elements that this sector needs to pay attention to in efforts to build and sustain customers’ trust? The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach: – There is a compelling agenda for both financial organizations and academics to understand better organizational trust in this context especially the role and impact of regulatory mechanisms in its development and repair. The paper therefore examines the special facets of the financial services sector in comparison to other sectors, such as manufacturing, to consider whether trust is fundamentally different in this context than others, and thus address how far there are special challenges concerning trust and the banking industry. The paper analyses, by using a meta-analytical design, 93 studies ( N =38,631), of which 20 empirically investigate organizational trust in the financial sector with a combined N of 11,224 respondents. Findings: – The paper shows that the banking sector is heavily affected by two distinct forces: first, customers’ perception of an organization's level of compliance and conformity with laws and regulations is a necessity for banks’ sociopolitical legitimization, and second it is also related to how non-compliance is dealt with. Importantly, this meta-analysis indicates that regulation is just one of a suite of devices that organizations need to deploy in their efforts to restore trust. The paper identified two further elements of significance: customers require direct evidence, derived either from their own or others’ satisfaction with the goods or services provided, and customers do take note of the external endorsement of the firm, especially in Asia, where customers place huge emphasis on the firm's reputation. Research limitations/implications: – First, meta-analysis is inherently reliant on the earlier studies and therefore retains their weaknesses. Some of the relationships included self-report variables collected at the same point in time and therefore may be inflated by common method bias. Second, due to the focus and because of the limited number of studies in this sector, and a paucity of attention on some key topics, such as perceptions of regulation, second-order sampling error may also be a limitation. Third, some relationships were not investigated frequently enough in studies to enable us to include them in the review, such as cooperation, opportunistic behaviour or quality. Finally, despite calls for trust scholars to include propensity to trust measures within their studies, many of these studies do not include this measure and therefore it is more difficult to identify and control individual difference factors. Practical implications: – The results show the merit of multi-strand trust development strategies. There is a striking paucity of financial institutions, which have examined how far their trust deficit may be related to their internal culture, and whether recent corporate corruption could be the product of bonuses and the internal short-term individualized reward systems. The analysis reveals that although external regulations and controls are an effective and powerful devise for organizational trust, over the last two periods of significant crisis, their impact appears to be warning; Yet reassuring customers of their expectations of the other party's future behaviour is central to trust. Alternative remedies need to be considered, such as the establishment of a more effective regulator, or board of governors who oversee and assure compliance. Monitoring and surveillance offer a further external means of reducing the possibility of future misbehaviours. However, as the analysis indicates, other strands are required to build trust, including greater attention by firms on customers’ direct experiences, which in turn would enhance the third part endorsement of their competence and goodwill intentions of organizations. Social implications: – Significantly, the results indicate the potentially partial erosion of credence factors, and thus confidence, in this sector over the last 20 years, during what has been a period of repeated exposure to trust breaches. The paper shows that single strand solutions, such as improvements to customer communication, are no longer sufficient, nor, more importantly, do they have the same impact. Instead, the paper shows the necessity to utilize more effectively and target attention towards three distinct antecedents: external regulations and their enforcement; third party and expert endorsements, and therefore external reputations; and customer satisfaction in terms of the effective delivery of customer expectations. Originality/value: – Organizational trust has been shown as critical in positively affecting and repairing broken relationships through uncertainty reduction and confidence enhancement. In the past, different meta-analyses of trust have been undertaken, but this, to the authors knowledge, is the first meta-analytic study measuring trust on an organizational level in the context of the financial services sector and its regulatory environment. This meta-analysis indicates that regulation is just one of a suite of devices that organizations need to deploy in their efforts to restore trust. The paper identified two further elements: customers require direct evidence, and do take note of the external endorsement of the firm.