The Microfoundations of Error Reporting: A Mixed Methods Approach
Final Report Abstract
Errors made by employees can cause severe harm not only to organizational performance, but also to the public good – most notably to employee well-being and customer safety. Their consequences, however, are most far-reaching in so called high-reliability contexts such as aviation, mining, and healthcare. Given the considerable importance of error reporting for organizational learning and the long tradition of research on errors and error management, it is striking to note how limited extant theory and evidence on error reporting still are. Although fundamental research gaps were identified a decade ago, many continue to exist today. The funded research project combines field studies and experiments to uncover salient factors associated with the individual propensity to report an error observed in the workplace. Moving the organizational reporting culture center stage it finds that an error-friendly culture enhances error reporting, whereby an obvious opportunity to learn from errors seems to be crucial. Moreover, it revealed that negative emotions mediate the relationship between culture and error reporting and that a learning opportunity moderates this indirect effect in the sense that a blame culture enhances negative emotions, which reduces error-reporting behavior. Last but not least, a learning opportunity seems to compensate for negative emotions and leads to higher reporting propensity despite people’s negative emotions.
Publications
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(2019). Connecting Motivation Theory and Error Reporting: The Effects of Culture, Learning, and Emotions. In Academy of Management Proceedings. Vol. 2019, No. 1, p. 17662. Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510: Academy of Management
Hartwich, N.; Antons, D.; Harbring, C
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(2021). Investigating the relationships among error culture, error reporting, and performance: A panel study. Academy of Management Proceedings. Vol. 2021, No. 1, p. 14515. Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510: Academy of Management
Hartwich, N.; Antons, D
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(2021). What difference a day makes: An examination of dynamic antecedents of voice. Academy of Management Proceedings. Vol. 2021, No. 1, p. 15493. Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510: Academy of Management
Hartwich, N.; Antons, D.
