Twenty-two percent of people in their 20s feel jealous at work, according to a study from the University of California, San Diego. For those in their 40s, the figure rises to 43 per cent; After the age of 50, 36 percent were jealous. So why are people jealous? Face envy, how should deal with? A recent study by Jingzhou Pan and his team at Tianjin University sheds light on workplace jealousy and its effects.
Envy: that spot of hidden mystery in duty field "red"
In real life, many people are jealous of others: when a classmate is admitted to the ideal school, a colleague gets a promotion or a salary increase, or even a stranger wins the lottery, it can lead to a lot of envy. That complex emotion is jealousy, the painful feeling that comes from seeing another person as better than oneself.
Why do I get pinkeye? Jealousy stems from social comparison, in which individuals evaluate themselves by using others as a yardstick for comparison. Comparisons are so pervasive in the workplace that we compare ourselves to others in terms of performance, earnings, relationships, etc. Among them, establishing a good relationship with the leader and becoming an insider is one of the important sources of jealousy.
Leader-member Exchange (LMX) theory holds that leaders will build better relationships with certain members of the team. Those who are on good terms with the leader become "insiders" of the leader, while those who are on bad terms with the leader become "outsiders". To become the leader of the "insider" will bring some special benefits to employees, such as preferential treatment, pay, promotion, so it is bound to cause the "outsider" comparison, in comparison caused by psychological gap and imbalance will lead to jealousy.
Is pinkeye all bad? On the surface, jealousy is a negative, hostile emotion, but it seems inevitable. So how do we deal with it? Based on the above questions, this study conducted three rounds of surveys among 814 respondents and conducted scenario simulation experiments. The results showed that employees with poor leadership relationships could be benign envy and malicious envy. Benign jealousy is an assimilative emotion in which the envious feel deserving of the superior qualities, achievements or possessions of the envied and hope to become similar to the envied by improving themselves. Malicious envy is a kind of contrast emotion, which is characterized by belittling superior contrast object, hoping others to fail in something or lose the target of being envied, or even be hurt. So what are the behavioral consequences of both jealousy-seeing others develop better relationships with their leaders?
Benign jealousy (Figure 1) : Learning Behaviors and Advice Seeking Research shows that benign jealousy triggers learning behaviors and advice seeking. That's because benign jealousers are encouraged when they see their colleagues developing better relationships with their leaders and believe they have a chance to do the same. In order to get such an opportunity, the jealous person will try to build a better relationship with the leader by learning how to interact with the leader from excellent colleagues or seeking their advice.
Malicious jealousy: Inhibiting Behavior In contrast, malicious jealousy can lead to social inhibiting behavior (social undermining). Social disinhibition refers to the behavior that deliberately and persistently prevents others from forming and maintaining healthy relationships and from succeeding at work and having a good reputation. Malicious envy person thinks oneself cannot be like be envied person to produce good relation with the leader, therefore, in order to let those colleague who have good relation with the leader lose superior position, they will choose to denigrate to its, suppress, pull step on, thereby alleviate oneself painful emotion and psychological imbalance.
How to do by people "envy"?
No matter be benign envy is malevolent envy, regard as be envied it seems that the person is innocent. So how can we reduce the negative effects of being envied when we have a better relationship with our leader than others? The study also provides an answer.
Emotional social information theory holds that the emotion of a specific target can convey important social information to the emotional observer, and then affect the observer's reaction. Based on this theory, the study found that whether a jealous person engendered benign or malicious jealousy depended on the genuine or arrogant pride of the person being envied (Figure 2).
Genuine pride is when a person attributes his or her achievements to "internal, unstable, controllable" causes. For example, I succeeded because I worked hard. When employees who have a good relationship with the leader show modest and sincere behavior, those employees who have a bad relationship with the leader will feel that their good relationship with the leader is achieved through their own efforts, and others can also do so. As a result, they believe they, too, have a chance to build better relationships with their leaders, sparking benign jealousy.
Arrogance is the reason individuals attribute success to "internal, stable, and beyond their control." For example, I succeed because I am a genius. When employees who have a good relationship with their leader act too cocky, they often convey the message that their relationship with their leader is unique and cannot be replicated. This can lead employees who have poor relationships with their leaders to believe that they can't build a better relationship with their leaders like they can, and at the same time, to think that these colleagues don't deserve such a good relationship with their leaders, leading to malicious jealousy.
Therefore, when we have a better relationship with leaders than others, it is best not to be too "Versailles", so as not to provoke others "envy", more their own unnecessary disaster.
How to resolve "workplace pinkeye"?
According to the research, jealousy in the workplace can be a double-edged sword that can spur progress or lead to destructive behavior, depending on how you use it. This study has some implications for potential envy, envy and managers.
Oneself got "pink eye disease" how to do? If you're feeling anxious and hot, it's an internal reminder that you need to work hard, not that you're failing. A person must have confidence, believe that they can do, others can do what they can do, this is an opportunity for growth. On the basis of positive attitude, we should learn more about the strengths of excellent people, improve our own methods and skills, and catch up after the first standard. To compare oneself outstanding person, should choose benign envy, change envy to be motive force, observe study more, seek the way such as the suggestion of outstanding colleague, positive ego changes to obtain progress. Avoid seeing other people's success as a threat to yourself.
How not to let teammates "envy"? If you are better than others, you must first learn to manage your emotions well. Consider the feelings of others, pay attention to their own words and deeds, show natural, peaceful, less pretentious, even deliberately lower posture. Don't put yourself at a disadvantage by showing off your strengths. In some cases, do not talk about success in front of frustrated people, do not show affection next to a single dog, carrying a heavy treasure do not show off, this is not only a kind of cultivation, but also to avoid trouble.
Also, show genuine pride, show others that your success is a result of hard work, make them feel that they can achieve it themselves, and actively offer effective help and advice to colleagues. In addition, it is advisable to speak with the results of your work, convince your teammates, and learn to give up and show that your achievements are the result of joint efforts.
How does organization manage skillfully use "pink eye disease"?
First, to guide benign jealousy. In organizational management, competition between departments or employees is also a kind of incentive, and this incentive is more durable than performance appraisal and material rewards. Managers can encourage mediocre employees to make upward comparisons and guide them to narrow the gap with excellent colleagues and make progress by rewarding excellent employees and setting examples to make other employees jealous. For example, more transparent procedures could be put in place to let employees know why excellent colleagues perform better, provide them with adequate resources and support, and encourage them to better themselves.
Second, avoid the harm of "pinkeye". The most negative effect jealousy can have on an organization is to push things in the wrong direction. As a leader, reduce negative emotions such as malicious jealousy among employees. In resource allocation, transparency and justice should be achieved to avoid malicious "red eyes" of employees. For example, in salary adjustment and promotion, employees with similar ability and performance should be treated carefully, otherwise it is easy to cause departmental discord, performance decline, and even staff turnover. The introduction of multi-channel promotion mode in the system design, more horse racing and less match horses in the evaluation, strengthening the positive guidance and improvement of the temporary laggard, paying attention to the positive atmosphere within the organization, timely detection and treatment of malicious behavior of pulling on others, all these can effectively prevent the breeding of "pink eye disease".
Third, provide training in mood assessment. Effective emotional training can help employees to effectively adjust their experience of jealousy when they are compared upward, prompting them to pay attention to benign aspects, giving play to the incentive function of jealousy, and alleviating the pain brought by jealousy. At the same time, more attention should be paid to the personality and values of employees during the induction evaluation, so that the team can move in the right direction.
In short, we should correctly understand the workplace "pinkeye", see the double layer of jealousy, jealousy into positive energy, to find a better way to avoid destructive results, promote positive results. Don't let the workplace that point "red", covered the head of the blue.
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