An assessment of the relationships among organizational trust, organizational politics, and organizational justice, and their effects on merit pay outcomes in the Malaysian public sector

This study developed a conceptual model to examine the relationships among organizational trust, organizational politics, and organizational justice, and their effects on merit pay outcomes in a non-Western environment. The independent variables were organizational politics and organizational justice. Organizational trust was the intervening variable. The outcomes variables were NRS attitudes and organizational commitment. The model hypothesized that organizational trust, organizational politics, and organizational justice were important factors affecting merit pay outcomes. It also hypothesized that organizational trust mediates the relationship between organizational politics and merit pay outcomes as well as the relationship between organizational justice and merit pay outcomes. In addition to testing these hypotheses, this study also examined the relationships between individual factors (demographic and job-related) and merit pay outcomes. To obtain data for this study, a self-administered questionnaire comprising measures of organizational trust, organizational politics, organizational justice, attitudes toward NRS, and organizational commitment were distributed to 738 employees in six public sector organizations in Malaysia. The survey questionnaire also included several demographic and job-related questions. A total of 491 usable questionnaires were returned, giving an overall response rate of 67%. Results of the study provide partial support that organizational trust, organizational politics, and organizational justice affect merit pay outcomes. Although organizational politics and organizational justice were important factors affecting NRS attitudes, organizational trust was not. However, organizational trust, organizational politics, and organizational justice were important factors affecting organizational commitment. The findings also indicate that organizational politics and organizational justice have a negative relationship and both were important factors affecting organizational trust. Several individual factors were also found to influence merit pay outcomes. Based on the research findings, several recommendations for future research and practice were proposed.