Trust in the face of conflict: The role of managerial trustworthy behavior and organizational context

The authors explored the role of attributions in shaping employees' trust in their managers in the context of negative events. The authors examined how 2 forms of managerial trustworthy behavior (open communication and demonstrating concern for employees) and organizational policies relate to attributions, trust in the manager, and organizational citizenship behavior. Participants were 115 credit union employees who responded to a critical incident regarding a disagreement with their managers. As hypothesized, trustworthy behavior was negatively related to attributions of personal responsibility for negative encounters, and this relationship was stronger when human resource policies were perceived as unfair. Managerial trustworthy behavior was also positively related to trust in the manager and organizational citizenship behavior. Personal attributions partially mediated the relationship between trustworthy behavior and trust.