C6 - I II Do Whatever I Want ... Who Are You To Prohibit Me A Tattle Tale of Workpalace Deviance
C6 - I II Do Whatever I Want ... Who Are You To Prohibit Me A Tattle Tale of Workpalace Deviance
C6 - I II Do Whatever I Want ... Who Are You To Prohibit Me A Tattle Tale of Workpalace Deviance
who are
you to prohibit me? A tattle tale
of workplace deviance
Jihad Mohammad, Farzana Quoquab, Norsyila Bt Rashid, Nur Azlina Bt Rashid,
Fazilah Bt Osman and Wan Muhammad Hamka Wan Shamsudin
DOI 10.1108/EEMCS-06-2016-0124 VOL. 8 NO. 1 2018, pp. 1-14, © Emerald Publishing Limited, ISSN 2045-0621 EMERALD EMERGING MARKETS CASE STUDIES PAGE 1
Natacha: the imposter
Natacha Rosli was a 31-year-old single woman who came from a lower-middle income
family. Her parents were in their 60s. She had two siblings who were studying at university
level. She was the sole earning member of her family. Therefore, she had to work very hard,
sometimes having to do extra work to make sufficient money for the family’s survival.
Natacha joined ESSB in January 2015. She was very attractive and people noticed this, with
Noman, the Assistant Director, being no exception. Natacha used to take advantage of this
situation. She was not only reported for slacking off but also used to spend time watching
Korean dramas during office hours. Apart from this, it appeared that she was having an
affair with Noman who was married with two children.
Previously, Natacha worked at the Community College in Bentong. Siti made an effort to
investigate to find out more about Natacha’s previous work performance in the community
college. As Siti expected, Natacha’s former director Wan Zakaria informed her that
Natacha’s performance was below average and that was why the company gave her a
warning letter.
Although Natacha’s other colleagues tried to advise her about her misconduct, she paid
little attention to their advice. Even once shouting at Adiba saying, “Who are you to poke
your nose in my personal matter?” Nothing changed in her behaviour. She always skipped
her work and sneaked out from the office.
Noman replied, “Just follow my instruction. I want her to join the inspection [. . .]”. Siti was
surprised because she knew that, Noman never liked the idea of bringing any newcomers
to accompany him for any inspection or visit to private institutions before. Instead, he used
to ask Siti and other senior officers to join the inspection. Siti shrugged her shoulders with
reluctance.
Not only Siti but other staff also noticed Noman’s biased behaviour towards Natacha. Even
though Noman received complaints about Natacha, he did not take any action against her.
Slowly, all staff started to talk about it, as it made them feel demoralized and demotivated.
One day, while Siti was going for lunch, she heard the conversation between Ruzanna and
Adib.
Siti showed consistently responsible behaviour throughout her career. She firmly believed
that a healthy working environment could lead to better work productivity and output. In the
past, when she worked with other institutions, due to her responsible behavioural pattern,
she gained higher authorities’ praise. She never felt afraid to speak out if she noticed any
misconduct be it her boss or subordinate. The director of the unit Dato’ Arafat also trusted
Siti’s responsible and trustworthy nature. If any issue aroused in this unit, he used to call Siti
and get her opinion in regard to the matter. The Director’s trust also made Siti obliged to
think about the issue pertaining to Natasha.
Siti did not want the top management to complain about her department, neither had she
wanted Dato’ Arafat to feel down about this unit. Noman’s position put Siti in a dilemma. She
was stuck in the middle of the situation between Assistant Director Noman Ali and Natacha
Rosli. Siti desperately wanted to find a solution to this unhealthy office environment and to
protect the image of her department.
“Hey Ruzanna, do you know what Natacha is busy for? She seems so cheerful and relaxed
without any special task to handle” Atika asked Ruzanna who was sitting next to her.
I feel like there is no harmony at this place anymore [. . .] very biased situation. Is there any end
of this story? Ruzanna vented her frustration.
They did not realize that Siti had come to the café to grab some drinks and was standing
at the counter to pay for her drink. Siti heard the conversation and left the place silently.
Noman went for an official tour to Singapore for three days. Siti decided to take this
opportunity to talk to Natacha. She wanted to discuss many things but finally stopped
herself by thinking that Noman could rebuke her once he was back from the office trip. She
casually informed Natacha that everybody was talking about her absence, sneaking out of
the office for long time and use of the office PC for her own business. She also mentioned
that it would affect the workplace environment and could affect other colleagues as well.
Natacha reluctantly mentioned that she would try to behave accordingly. However, Siti felt
that Natacha did not feel guilty at all which made her feel upset.
Recurring problem
Although Natacha gave her word to Siti that she would follow the official code of conduct,
no changes were seen in Natacha’s behaviour. Siti looked at the calendar on the desk. Only
two weeks left for her to complete the next employee performance appraisal which was due
at the end of the month.
Based on her nine years’ experience in working at ESSB, Siti realized that Natacha needed
to be given a warning letter by the Human Resource Department. Similar cases that she
encountered in the past had resulted in receiving lower scores in their key performance
indicators during performance reviews, which caused them to receive less or no salary
increments and bonus.
Siti thought about discussing the whole thing with Noman. But after few minutes, she
cancelled the plan by thinking about his rough attitude and position in the hierarchy.
Moreover, there was a rumour on the floor that Noman was having affair with Natacha. She
sensed it too. However, without having any solid evidence, it would not be possible for her
to report the issue to the top management. Siti started to feel light headed by thinking about
all these unsolved issues.
At the crossroad
As the head of the unit, Siti felt guilty as the unfair situation in the office was due to
Natacha’s deviant behaviour and Noman’s discriminatory support. She realized that if this
situation continued to grow, her unit would face serious problems. Already the work culture
was polluted, backbiting, gossip, demoralization became daily activities. Before Natacha
joined, the work environment was completely different. At least nobody felt that they were
unfairly treated, and there was no backbiting. Nobody cheated on their daily attendance.
Nobody showed negligence towards their routine activities. Furthermore, Noman did not
have any workplace romance before which had made the situation worse.
Siti leaned back in her chair. She was determined to make things right. As the Assistant
Director himself was involved in polluting the workplace environment, she had to do
something to solve the issue. She realized that she had to work smartly and to investigate
more before she could take any step in this regard. She decided to investigate Natacha’s
Keywords:
performance appraisal given by Noman to see whether it was equal to or exceeded the
Organizational performance,
scores given to other staff.
Business ethics,
Siti was thinking about her next steps. Should she report the unethical behaviour in the Organizational behaviour,
department to the Human Resource Department? However, she was in a dilemma about Corporate culture
Source of information
Interview with Mr Rahman Bin Mohd Din, the Director of Enforcement and Inspectorate
Division, EDU Solution Sdn Bhd (ESSB).
Figure E1
Figure E2
Director
Dato’ Arafat
Assistant Director
Mr Noman Ali
43 years old
Head of Supervision & 9 years working at ESSB
Monitoring Unit
Madam Siti Hajar
Absenteeism
According to Employment Act 1955, an employee shall be deemed to have broken, i.e.
breached his contract if he is absent from work for more than 2 consecutive working
days without permission or without reasonable excuse and without informing or
attempting to inform his employer.
Absence from work without permission is an act of misconduct. Action should be taken
every time an employee is absent from work without permission and without a
reasonable excuse.
When an employee is absent for one or two days without leave, an employer should
require the employee to explain the reason for his absence. If he is unable to provide
an acceptable reason for the absence, a warning letter should be issued. If the
employee repeats his behaviour of being absent without leave for a second time, a
second warning letter may be issued. Any further repetition of this behaviour should
lead to a serious penalty such as a suspension without pay, or a demotion or even a
dismissal.
Sneaking
Sneaking from work is considered a misconduct.
The Employment Act states that an employer may dismiss an employee “on the
grounds of misconduct which is inconsistent with the fulfilment of the express or implied
conditions of his service”. This means that any behaviour which conflicts with express
rules established by the employer or with implied conditions of service may be
considered misconduct. Misconduct may be defined as any action or behaviour which
conflicts with the interests of the employer.
Corresponding author
Jihad Mohammad can be contacted at: [email protected]