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National News

Employee Theft Causes Major Heartache in Offices

May 01, 2012 posted by Steve Brownstein

Employee misconduct or theft is not always a cut and dry issue, especially in many cases when the employee did not feel like they had done anything wrong.

According to the National Retail Federation, 43 percent of the total losses in the retail industry in 2010 resulted from employee theft, and a 2007 study by the Institute for Corporate Productivity found that at least a quarter of all respondents said that theft of company office supplies, products, and electronic equipment has risen as a result of the recession.

These incidents represent different levels of a problem, says California State University's David Whitney, who studies industrial-organizational psychology.

"When we're at work, there's a belief of things that we're going to provide the organization and what the organization will provide to us," he says.

"Part of that is the written contract, what we do for them and what they'll do in exchange.
There's a psychological contract that goes along with that as well."

"Whitney goes on to explain that both employees and employers acknowledge that it is pretty much "the norm" if a worker might take a few more pens than they truly need.

Such incidents are seen as "an expected cost of business."

Where Whitney often sees problems arise is often when an employer crosses an invisible line, violating unwritten employee expectations about how the company or manager should behave.

For example, if an employee has not received a raise in three years, they may feel considerably less guilty about taking items of larger value, or acting out in other ways.

He encourages employers to prevent this kind of behavior by treating workers fairly and ethically, not giving them the occasion to feel slighted.

This fairness does not just mean that companies must give in to employee demands.

Instead, experts suggest setting out clear standards of behavior and consequences for employees, including some "minor" behaviors such as taking excessive breaks or viewing inappropriate content on work computers.