Test of a Justice-Based Model of Subordinates' Resistance to Downward Influence Attempts

Abstract

The authors developed and tested a model that depicts interactional justice as a mediator of the effects of managers' influence tactics on subordinates' resistance. Data collected from supervised workers provided evidence of mediated moderation: The use of hard influence tactics was associated with lower resistance when they were used with soft influence tactics. This effect was mediated by the experience of interactional justice. Although the use of rational influence tactics was unrelated to subordinates' resistance, it was associated with greater interactional justice when they were not used with soft influence tactics. Resistance was also related to the content of the influence attempt: Resistance was lower when targets perceived the request to be interesting, important, and unarnbiguous. Implications and directions for future research are briefly discussed.