Employee Ethics Scale: Development And Validation Of A Situational Judgment Tool For Organisations

Orientation: Unethical employee behaviour is a concern for organisations. To sustain the workforce and not lose them in the hands of competitors, human resource managers must adopt newer strategies and methods for selecting employees, bringing into focus employees' ethical behaviour. This process is facilitated by making use of standardised measures of employee ethical intention. Research purpose: The present study aimed to develop and standardise a selection tool for organisation, to assess employee ethical intention, this being the Employee Ethics (EE) Scale. Motivation for the study: The development of the EE scale, a Situational Judgement Test (SJT), is an attempt to overcome some of the limitations associated with self-reported measures of ethical intention accompanied by a Likert-type response scale, such as social desirability bias. It further allows for a judgment of candidates' responses to ethical dilemmas resembling real-life problem situations. Research approach, design and method: The EE scale was developed through a process of stakeholder consultation and the involvement of subject matter experts. An extensive literature review and a brainstorming session were conducted to develop bespoke SJT scenarios, their corresponding judgements and scoring keys. The factor structure of EE scale was examined through exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). The psychometric properties of the scale were established. Main findings: EFA and CFA identified and confirmed a one-factor structure for the EE scale which is comprised of eight scenarios (items). The scale showed an adequate internal consistency (Cronbach's α = 0.66). Results of ANOVA showed that the EE scale could discriminate between the intentions of non-ethical people and ethical persons, thus exhibiting criterion validity. Practical or managerial implications: The scale can be used by psychologists, consultants, HR managers and other decision makers in selection process to determine employee ethical intention in organisations.