Do You Dare to Speak Up at Work? A Study on Organizational Conditions Enabling or Discouraging Employee Voice

Employee voice is part of internal communication, and this study extends current knowledge concerning the organizational conditions conducive to employee voice, namely: participation in decision making, consultation, information sharing, sensemaking and interactive communication, voice systems, formal policies regulating employees' freedom of speech, solicitation of informal voice, implementation of corrective actions and feedback to employees voicing concerns. This study specifically examines the organizational and environmental characteristics that shape these organizational conditions that promote employee voice. A SEM analysis shows: the positive influence of the organizational and environmental characteristics of business strategy, organizational model, labor market conditions and company size. In addition, the mediating role of managers' implicit beliefs that employees are self-interested, that management knows best and that dissent is undesirable was clearly emphasized.