The organizational citizenship behavior of IS personnel: Does organizational justice matter?

In developing a successful IS development project today, good IS personnel are crucial. However, just achieving and maintaining their skills is not sufficient; they must contribute to the project in a meaningful fashion, including their supportive activity: organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). However, IS personnel have different motivational factors, informal behavior patterns, and exhibit OCBs different from those in other fields. In addition, projects present a different face than operations in an organization and alter the context of OCBs. This combination leads to a unique setting where the perceptions of equity by IS employees in project teams are unlikely to follow patterns established for functional operations. To determine if perceived equity can lead to desirable attitudes and behavior in this novel setting, we surveyed IS team members of development projects. Data from 298 respondents in 47 project teams indicated that equity, as measured by perceptions of justice, add to job commitment, which serves as a mediator between the justices and OCBs. Project leaders of teams with IS personnel must therefore work to improve the perception of equity in the distribution of rewards and treatment.