Employee Theft in “Who Stole the Money, and When?”

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Summary

Purpose

The purpose of the given research is to extend the existing knowledge on employee theft and single out the most important determinants of this phenomenon.

Design/methodology/approach

The article summarizes the results of qualitative research conducted with the help of an experiment that allowed researchers to observe participants’ behavior in an unusual situation. The study involved 270 employees working in American financial services companies; 142 of them were working in companies that offered programs for ethical education, whereas 128 were employed by companies where ethical education was not given. The majority of the participants were women with more than one year of work experience in their respective companies.

Findings

Findings partially supported the conclusions of Murphy (1993) and Trevino and Nelson (1995). After experimenting, the author concluded that those participants whose moral development level had been classified as conventional were more likely to steal extra money. Moreover, the results indicated that there was a strong link between the presence of ethics programs in participant schedules and their average levels of moral development. In the end, the researcher concluded that there was only one combination of factors that accurately described employees who did not steal the money: the most honest participants were working in the companies promoting ethical values and had a conventional level of moral development.

Research limitations/implications

Possible limitations include the fact that only small sums of money were used in the study, making it hard to regard as real theft. Furthermore, it was impossible to find out whether the participants themselves would classify such behavior as theft. As for its implications, the results of the research may be helpful for many employers.

Practical and social implications

Despite the possible limitations of the research, its results highlight the importance of promoting ethical principles among employees in different organizations and increasing the level of their moral development. Therefore, the findings should be taken into consideration by managers who would like to make their employees more conscious of ethical concerns.

Originality/value

The problem of employee theft has been studied since the middle of the twentieth century, but it had become important even earlier than that. The most important reasons for employee theft have been revealed by Murphy (1993). Nevertheless, Greenberg’s research is the first to study employee theft in connection to moral development. The article may be valuable for those who aim to develop a solution to curtail employee theft.

Critique

Critique (positive)

As made clear by the discussed article, the author is interested in the topic, which is why his work is substantial and deserves the attention of the academic community. Moreover, the topic chosen by the author presents an important problem for the majority of business managers today, making its results practically significant. Furthermore, the author is successful at extending the existing knowledge regarding the level of moral development and its influence on people’s decision-making.

Critique (negative)

Despite the positive things connected to the research, there are a few weaknesses that may decrease the significance of the results. To begin with, stealing a few dollars cannot be ranked together with large-scale theft, as the latter presents a greater problem. Furthermore, considering the reported experimental conditions, it was not possible to define whether the participants themselves regarded their acts as theft.

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