| In an effort to track employee activities, organizations are increasingly relying on electronic performance monitoring and control systems. Critics argue that such systems can be unfair and invasive to employees. Nevertheless, there has been little systematic research examining the role of justice or privacy in understanding the impact of electronic monitoring. Adopting a justice-privacy framework, I present a model of individual reactions to information gathering and control systems and test its plausibility by conducting a laboratory study investigating whether procedural variation in electronic performance monitoring impacts justice and privacy perceptions.;The proposed model suggests that privacy processes play a mediational role in understanding procedural justice. The model distinguishes between privacy-sensitive (PSPs) and privacy-insensitive procedures (PIPs). I suggest that PSPs impact procedural justice in part, through their impact on privacy processes, whereas PIPs impact procedural justice irrespective of privacy processes. Whereas the organizational justice literature suggests that procedures matter because of instrumental or relational concerns, consideration of privacy processes may reveal a third underlying mechanism, focusing on personal identity maintenance, which may explain why procedures in general, and procedural justice in particular, matter to individuals.;To test this model, students were randomly assigned to one of eight experimental conditions representing a 2 (relevance) x 2 (voice) x 2 (consistency) between-subjects factorial design. The setting simulated a "telework" environment whereby students performed computer-based activities using telecommunications technologies in what they perceived to be a real organization.;The findings support a model of information gathering and control systems focusing on justice and privacy, though fit indices failed to support the model as originally proposed. As predicted, both relevance and voice impacted perceived invasion of privacy and procedural justice. Perceived invasion of privacy completely mediated the effects of relevance on procedural justice, and partially mediated the effects of voice as predicted. Consistency, although it did not relate to privacy as predicted, also did not relate to procedural justice. Procedural justice was positively related to task satisfaction and performance. The findings are encouraging for stimulating new directions in electronic monitoring, organizational justice and organizational privacy research. |
