A 'trickle-down' model of organizational justice: Relating employee and customer perceptions of and reactions to organizational fairness

Practitioners and researchers alike have suggested that the way an organization treats its employees impacts the way employees treat customers. However, there has been little empirical research examining the specific links between employees' perceptions of organizational treatment and customers' perceptions of employee treatment and their subsequent reactions. Moreover, the type of treatment likely to trigger such an effect has not been empirically identified.; This study develops and tests a trickle-down model of organizational justice, proposing that employees' perceptions of fairness are the trigger to the above employee-customer relationship. More specifically, it is hypothesized that employees' perceptions of fairness affect their attitudes toward and perceptions about the organization (organizational commitment, job satisfaction, and perceived organizational support), subsequently influencing their behaviors toward customers (effort and prosocial behaviors). In turn, customers interpret these employee behaviors as signals that the employee is treating them fairly, leading to positive reactions to both the employee and the organization as a whole.; In order to test the model, data were collected from 187 instructors (employees) and their students (customers) at the University of Maryland, College Park. Instructors reported on their perceptions of organizational fairness and their attitudes and feelings about the university. Students reported on the instructor's student-directed behaviors, as well as their attitudes and future behavioral intentions toward both the instructor and the university.; Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the fit of the trickle-down model to the data. The results revealed support for several key hypotheses: employees' perceptions of organizational fairness were significantly related to their organizational commitment, which in turn was significantly related to students' reports of the instructor's effort and prosocial behaviors. Students' reports of instructor behaviors were positively related to both their perceptions of the instructor's fairness as well as their attitudinal reactions to the instructor, although there was no significant relationship to their subsequent reactions to the university.; Overall, the results suggest that an organization's fair treatment of its employees has important consequences, not only for employees, but also for the organization through customers' attitudes and future intentions toward key service employees.