It should perhaps not come as a great surprise that the timely payment of employees might play a part in their general engagement levels, but nonetheless, research into the notion of timeliness is relatively under-explored in the workplace, especially in relation to fairness, which has been much better examined.
Research from Arizona State University attempts to redress the balance, and their study found that timeliness mattered in all manner of work-related contexts, whether in terms of getting a raise, a promotion or a desired assignment.
The researchers quizzed a number of employees who had not only volunteered to participate, but also secured approval from their manager to do so. They were especially keen to understand whether timeliness played a big part in motivating employees to go above and beyond their core duties.
Success at work
The research revolved around three emotions and attitudes that are crucial for success at work: trust, anxiety and anger. Trust is a vital behavior for workplace citizenship, as employees tend to trust supervisors who are not only capable but behave with integrity. The researchers believed that both of these are exhibited when bosses act in a timely manner.
By contrast, anxiety and anger can cause people to withdraw. If things don’t go well we can feel angry and try and retaliate, which often manifests itself by withholding behaviors that our boss explicitly wants. The data revealed that timeliness played a big part in all three, and interestingly more so than even justice.
“It makes intuitive sense,” the authors say. “You don’t know what’s going on behind the scenes when a decision is being made. Was it unbiased? You don’t know. Whereas, timeliness is transparent. If it’s quick, you know it’s quick.”
Timeliness therefore provides a pretty transparent reminder about whether the supervisor can be trusted or not, although even with timeliness, there appeared to be a sweetspot to aim for. If things were done ‘too’ quickly, then that was not ideal either.
“What if you ask your supervisor for a raise and they come back 15 minutes later and say ‘Nope.’ Then you think, ‘Did you actually put any thought into this?’ That makes you question whether they care about you,” the authors explain.
As such, it’s an issue that is often quite subjective, which is something the team hope to explore in future research to try and find a more objective basis to help managers behave in the most effective way. It’s rarely possible to give people exactly what they want, but doing so with respect and fairness is usually a good thing to strive for.
