Are you perceived as a Cinderella at work? Is your office filled with disciples of the Protestant work ethic? If so, you could be making your co-workers envious, an article by Notre Dame management professor Robert P. Vecchio suggests. And here's a response you might want to consider: Bring back some baguettes for your colleagues at the home office the next time you make one of those grueling business trips to Paris.
In "It's Not Easy Being Green: Jealousy and Envy in the Workplace," published last year in the annual Research in Personnel and Human Resources Management series, Vecchio explores the roots of workplace resentment as well as some favored responses, including the compulsion some business travelers feel to bring back a token gift from a perceived plum trip. They hope the goodie will soothe the resentment of colleagues chained to their desks.
According to a study Vecchio cites, 77 percent of employees surveyed had witnessed jealousy around the office within the past month, and more than half admitted to being directly involved. However, Vecchio, ND's Franklin D. Schurz Professor of Management, says almost no research has been done to explain jealousy and envy specifically in organizational settings.
The ND professor thus set out to verify whether more general findings about resentment hold true at work. For instance, jealousy among children has been found to be greater in families with intensely affectionate mothers. But in a survey of 111 first-level supervisors, Vecchio found that inconsiderate supervisors fueled more jealousy and envy among subordinates than did bosses perceived as nurturing. Vecchio also found that employees who appeared to have a strong Protestant work ethic were more apt to react emotionally to office situations, making them more prone to envy and jealousy.
Males expressed more workplace envy and less jealousy than females. The researcher attributes this to men being more attuned to threats to competitive standing, while women are more attuned to threats to social relations. In Vecchio's analysis, jealousy is more about holding on to what one possesses, particularly prized relationships, while envy pertains to what a person would like to have but doesn't.
Jealousy and envy seem to arise less frequently in large offices than small. Vecchio suggests two possible explanations: People tend to feel less possessive in larger groups, or employees may shrug off such inequities as a colleague with less seniority earning more than they are as being a consequence of working in a big, inefficient organization.
On the other hand, employees who find themselves the object of envy and jealousy may be victims of what's known as the Cinderella complex. Like the virtuous, uncomplaining Cinderella, Vecchio says, "merely doing one's job well can arouse a sense of inferiority in others that leads to resentment and hostility."
