The analyse of relationship between organizational silence and cultural values: A survey of public institutions

The aim of this study is to ascertain whether cultural values have impact on organizational silence and employee silence behaviour. This study is structured by addressing both individualy and organizational dimensions unlike other studies. Also subjects like why employees are silent and what types of issues employees are likely to be silent about, which motives of employee silence and the variation of employee silence behaviour according to the demografic variables like gender, education and tenure are examined in the study. Hypothesis and research questions developed in this context tested with the data obtained from the workers of public institutions in İzmir. The required data was obtained by surveys. In order to measure the statement's exploratory power of variables, factor analysis was used firstly. Later, corelation and regression analysis had been applied to test the relationships between variables and factors exist or not. Anova and t-tests had been used to determine whether differentiation by demographic. In this research, Organizational Silence Scale was used in order to evaluate why employees remain silent in organization. Organizational silence scale was developed by the researcher (Çakıcı, 2007) grounding on Morrison ve Milliken (2000); Morrison, Milliken ve Hewlin (2003) studies. Another scale which was develop by Çakıcı was used for determining which areas the workers are silence about. Employee Silence Scale which was proposed by Van Dyne, Ang ve Botero (2003). Finally in the evaluation of culturel value, which developed by Dorfman ve Howell Scale (1998) was used. As the result of research, it has been found that cultural values have a direct effect on organizational silence and employee silence was found. It has also been found that attitudes and behaviours of the manager and the organized stricter are the two most important factors that lead to the silence of the employees. Also employees refrain from making suggestions to improve business and remain silent because of pro-social drivers. According to research findings, these results are expected for the research sample. This attitude of remaining silent and its spreading within the organization is based on cultural feature. In the study, it has been determined that employee silence behaviour doesn't vary according to age and total work experience but varies according to other demographic variables. Keywords: Organizational Silence, Employee Silence, Culture, Cultural Values