The 'Darth' side of technology use: Cyberdeviant workplace behaviors

Organizations and employees increasingly rely on information technologies (IT) for work-related activities. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, close to 100 million American workers use a computer at work daily. More than half of all capital investments in the United States today is in IT. However, the increased proliferation of IT in the workplace has also created numerous opportunities for employees to misuse technologies. It has been reported that organizations lose more than ;Essay 1 developed a typology of cyberdeviant workplace behaviors---defined as the intentional use of information technologies in the workplace that is contrary to the explicit and implicit norms of the organization, and in doing so threatens the well being of the organization and/or its members ---using multi-dimensional scaling. In a 3-phase study comprising multiple participants, a series of qualitative and quantitative techniques were utilized. In phase 1, a field study comprising nine qualitative focus group sessions with 134 full-time employees in a fortune 500 company was conducted to derive the range of cyberdeviant activities that employees engage in the workplace. In phase 2, 240 full-time employees across five organizations provided ratings of similarity/differences among the various cyberdeviant activities to create a 3-dimensional configuration. In phase 3, 46 full-time M.B.A students provided the associated bipolar descriptors for the 3-dimensional configuration. Results suggested that cyberdeviance varies along three dimensions: minor versus serious cyberdeviance; cyberdeviant behaviors that are harmful to individuals versus organization; and cyberdeviant behaviors that require low versus high technological skill to perform. This study has important implications for theory, practice, and public policy.;In Essay 2, a specific instance of cyberdeviance called cyberslacking--- intentional use of IT for non-work related personal activities in the workplace during work hours that are minor, that require less technological skill to perform, and primarily affect the organization---was examined. Specifically, a model of the determinants and job performance consequences of cyberslacking was developed and tested. Drawing upon structuration and workplace deviance theories, technology perceptions---re-adaptability, computer concurrency, and limited work use; justice perceptions---procedural, distributive, and interactional; job perceptions---job meaninglessness and perceived slack time; and deterrent perception--- perceived risk of detection are hypothesized as determinants of cyberslacking and job performance ratings as the consequence of cyberslacking. A longitudinal field study in a Fortune 500 company was conducted to test the model. Email, instant messaging, and Internet were the technologies examined in the study. The results suggested that all technology perceptions, interactional justice, all job perceptions, and deterrent perception were significant drivers of cyberslacking and that cyberslacking was negatively related to supervisor ratings of job performance. Further, computer self-efficacy significantly moderated the relationship between re-adaptability and cyberslacking, and computer concurrency significantly moderated the relationship between cyberslacking and job performance. This study has significant research and managerial implications.