Power of Negative Emotions at workplace: Envy, Subjective...

Power of Negative Emotions at workplace: Envy, Subjective career

success, Thriving at work with moderating role of Self-control

(An emerging trend of positive psychology)

Saba Ahmed* and Sajid Bashir

†

Abstract

Our study examined the impact of envy on subjective career

success and thriving at work with moderating role of self-control

in private sectors. The aim of the study was to explore the

positive effects of negative emotions at workplace by

takingpersonality trait asintensity factor.For this purpose data

was collected from 220 employees of fast moving consumer

goods (FMCG), Telecommunications and Banks of various cities

of Pakistan. The convenience and non-random sampling

technique was used. Results showed that envy has an impact on

subjective careers success and thriving at work, while self-

control negativelymoderates the relationship between envy and

subjective career success along with envy and thriving at work.

The implication of findings for private sector’s management and

direction for future research was provided.

Keywords: Envy, Self-control, Subjective career success and Thriving at

work

Introduction

In today’s competitive world where expectations are high and resources

are low, emotional outburst seems like norm rather than exception(Fisher

& Ashkanasy,2000; Ashkanasy& Daus,2002;Bono et al,2007;Ashkanasy

et al ,2002;Gopinath,2011).The benefits of learning emotions go beyond

knowledge transfer and grab greater attention towards the growth of self-

awareness and meaningful skill development at workplace (Evans &

Warren,2015). Nevertheless, emotions have a profound effect on how

employees carry out their roles at the

workplace(Nica&Molnar,2014).Researchers have been continuously

showing how decisions and actions of employees are related with

emotions at all levels of human behaviors (Vacharkulksemsuk et al,

2011).

* Saba Ahmed, Ph.D Scholar Capital University of Science and Information Technology.

Email: [email protected] † Dr. Sajid Bashir, HOD, Capital Universtiy of Science and Information Technology

_______Education and Information Management (EIM 2017)_____

Journal of Managerial Sciences 428 Volume XI Number 03

There is a need of balanced approach at work that takes into

consideration both the positive and the negative emotions (Luthans&

Youssef,2007).Workplace events are perceived differently by different

people which leads toward contrasting discrete emotions

(Totterdell&Niven, 2014). Additionally, both types of emotions have

different functions, antecedents and consequences that are important

driving forces (Barclay & Kiefer, 2014).According to Fredrickson (2016)

positive emotions are about feeling good and help to improve coping to

produce well-being. In contrast, due to staff layoff, budget cuts, low

resources and high competition, negative emotions have always

remained part of organizations(Simon,2014).

Envy is most joyless of all deadly sins (Tomlin,2014)and is

characterized as negative emotion. It is an aversive negative emotion

(Fan,2016;Charash,2016;Smith,2016).Vecchio (2000) defined envy as a

way of our thoughts ,emotions, feelings and behavior. Furthermore, envy

is more easily institutionalized than joy and harmful emotions for

others.(Belk,2011).Despite the previous work on envy with detrimental

outcomes, it is important to consider certain benefits of negative

emotions. These can have functional outcomes and healthy functioning

in the form of avoidance the harm and danger(Gilbert et al ,2014).

According to recent work of Lange and Cruise (2015) envy can

lead to hostile behavior or can be helpful to strive for self-improvement.

It is Envy is social functional emotion syndrome(Lang,2016) which is

frustrating but can also motivates other for self –improvement and lead

towards better performance(Van et al,2011).According to (Tai et al

,2012)envy can activates challenge oriented action tendencies hence,

there is a need to inquire positive outcomes of envy at workplace.

Additionally, Charash&Mueller(2007) also proposed to work on

productive reactions to envy. Ricci and Scafarto (2015) suggested to

foster envy for healthy competition and encouraged future research to

empirically explore the positive level and impact of envy at workplace.

As, the concept of “thriving” received attention in the most

recent area f positive psychology (Feenay& Collins,2015). Thriving at

work considered learning and vitality jointly with their positive impacts

on organizational outcomes (Paterson et al,2014). Moreover, when

people are thriving in organizations, they feel development in their work

(Carmeli& Spretizer,2009).Thriving serves as internal gauge used by the

individuals to assess their well-being at work (Spreitzer&

Porath,2014).They suggested to link motivation and thriving in order to

build integrative model for human growth.



Moreover, addressing these aspects is needed further to contribute an

increase sense of thriving at work(Liu & Klug,2013). Thriving is also

associated with reduced job stress, it should be studied and promoted at

workplace to reduce stress related emotions (Porath et al ,2012). Thriving

fuels positive feelings and energy and leads toward meaningful activities

at work. Hence, there is a need for further studies with

employeesemotions (Niessen et al, 2012).

Basinska(2017) proposed that there is a need for future inquiry to

generalize the impact of emotions on thriving at work and its ultimate

results in subjective wellbeing of individual and career success of

employees.Ultanir&Irkoruku (2017) presented that the studies on

efficiency of emotions, achievement motivation and thriving at work are

quite few and suggested researchers to conduct empirical studies to

figure out the effectiveness of emotions and their association with

learning and achievement motivation.

Career success has been defined as hierarchal progression in an

occupation(Judge et al.,1999;Seibert & Kraimer,2001). According to

Stumpf and Tymon (2012) objective career success defines progress in

the term of rewards and promotions while subjective career success is

one’s own perception about his/her career development. Most of the

studies(Ng et al.,2005;Day & Allen,2004;Abele &

Spurk,2009;Colakoglo,2011) have been conducted on career success

with focused on external rewards, promotions and

achievements(objective success) but ignored the internal

perspective(subjective career success).

Russel (2008) suggested researchers to explore role of different

work practices to create more positive workplaces and lead to healthy

employee outcomes. According to Otto et al (2017) internal feelings are

beyond job position, promotions, and salary, and suggested future

focused on the inclusion of both path and quality of motivation to

comprehensively explore their effect on intrinsic success. Furthermore,

(Koh,2016)contended that it will be fruitful to study the effect of intrinsic

values within person to explore the importance of subjective career

success of employees. Furthermore,Jiang(2017) give us an future insights

into the complex interplay of psychological emotion and career relevant

aspects in various occupational roles.

Moreover, personality traits are not fixed but are situational

specific which also have positive impact on cognitions. Self-control is

central function of self and deliberate part of self-regulation, leads

toward success and human development (Moffitt et al., 2011). On the

hand, Haggers et al (2010) also revealed significant impact of self-



control on negative effects, while future investigation is needed for

testing mechanism of self-control. Another work by Fox and Calkins

(2003) suggested that it will be fruitful to study in future the integrative

approach of self-control. Watson and Milfont (2017) further suggest

studying impact of self-control on future consequences in long term time

frame to assess the more generalizable results.

Problem Statement

Regardless of all above facts, literature does not comprehensively

explain the link of envy with its functional outcomes, empirical study on

functional effects of envy is still at nascent stages and. As, the emergence

of positive psychology also give new avenues towards the study of

functional outcome of emotions at workplaces

(Seligman,2005).Moreover, positive psychology believed that people

wanted to live fulfilling life and try to nurture best in them

(Seligman,2014). Hence, we extend the work of (Lange &Crusius, 2015;

Lange 2016; Morgan et al,2016; Evan & Warrens,2015; Tandoc et al

,2015) by focusing on positive outcomes of envy and explore the thriving

at work and achievement motivation as functional consequences of

negative emotion envy at workplace.

Literature Review

Theconcept of envy was given by (Smith et al., 1999) they developed

scale for the measurement of dispositional envy named as scale for

dispositional envy DES, and associate envy with the combined feelings

of inferiority, unhappiness, frustration and injustice. It is predisposed in

every individual and emerges out as a reaction to something. It is one of

the widespread bad emotions and more easily institutionalized than joy

(Schoeck,1969) because of its unpleasant and reprehensible nature. He

acknowledged the dark side of envy and also mentioned that envy motive

can lead towards destructive as well as constructive consequences

depending upon circumstances.

According to Russel and Fehr(1994),envy is subcategory of

anger and a negative emotion characterized by the feeling of shame ,

failure , self-dissatisfaction and craving for what other had and you lack

(Haslam and Bornstein ,1996) furthermore they differentiated envy and

jealousy and concluded that these two emotions are synonymous but

have little distinction depending upon situation as jealousy is

characterized by feelings of betrayal, dis- trust, rejection, threat and

loneliness. The main distinction between envy and jealousy is “lack” and

“loss” as Envy involves the lack of some possession, skill and quality



while jealousy implies assumed loss or threat of loss already possessed

by jealous party (Miceli& Castelfranchi,2007).

As envy is charactized by its hostile nature, people are taught that it is

wrong to show even if you are faced with injustice and unfairness thus

people finds way to relabeled or reframe envy and hostile

feeling(smith,2004).The main purpose of envious person is to reduce the

gap between himself and envied person by equalizing the position of self

and envied person. It can be done by two ways either by depriving others

from what they have or by trying to getting what other

have(Lange,2016).The mechanism which involved in second way is

achievement motivation, which makes individuals to get desired goals.

As, Mccllland gave achievement motivation theory which states

that all motives are learned to associated them with positive and negative

feelings with certain things happens to them.Achievement

motivation can be defined as the need for success or the attainment of

excellence. Individuals will satisfy their needs through different means,

and are driven to succeed for varying reasons both internal and external

(Mcclland,1961).Belk (2011) developed the concept of benign envy and

analyze the forces which can be helpful to replace malicious envy with

benign envy. Besides he concluded that benign envy has less destructive

outcomes but it is competitive as it makes other envious and make them

to work hard and achieve what they admire and respect.

Khan et al (2013) worked on episodic envy and

counterproductive work events with interaction of event specific

procedural and distributive justice. Moreover perception of justice also

has an effect on role ambiguity which ultimately leads to envy. Recent

research regarding two forms of envy investigated similarities and

differences malicious and benign envy and revealed that both are caused

by equal level of frustration (Crusius& Lange, 2014) but they differ with

respect to their affective, cognitive, and motivational aspects. These

prerequisites are also found in research on the amplification of social

comparisons in general. Furthermore, It develops into malicious envy if

the envier appraises the other’s advantage as undeserved and evaluates

control over personal outcomes as low (Corcoran, Crusius,

&Mussweiler, 2011).

Stearns (1999) documents how during the early 20th century, the

moral condemnation of envy in the West gave way to embracing envy as

a healthy motivator of consumption and a strong competitive work ethic.

Rawls (1971) recognizes benign envy as well as the related constructs of

emulative envy and excusable envy. His emulative envy, in which the



envier is motivated to achieve what the other has achieved, is closest to

the current use of benign envy. Thus, envy can have distinct motivational

consequences. Benign envy increases the motivation to invest more

effort to improve one’s own position. In contrast, malicious envy

increases the motivation to harm an envied person’s success(Crusius&

Lange, 2014; Van de Ven, Zeelenberg, &Pieters, 2009).

Jordan and Chalder (2013) investigate the outcome of malicious

envy and focus on cognitive, emotional as well behavioral components

from the point of envier. They settled that envy is not simple emotion but

it is a sequence of emotions that are influenced by fairness, self-worth

and lacking of desired object. Moreover they believed that envy

motivates hostile thoughts and action which can lead toward avoidance

or withdrawal. Research has also reported the following constructs to be

related to workplace bullying: high negative affect, low self-esteem, high

role conflict, high role ambiguity, and high job insecurity. In terms of

work role situations, overt signs of frustration that are rooted in

employees’ feelings of role conflict, role ambiguity, or job insecurity

could be interpreted by others as being provoked (Samnani& Singh,

2015).Employees who have high levels of role conflict and role

ambiguity tend to experience greater confusion and espouse lower

confidence in their actions (Agervold and Mikkelsen 2004).

Johar (2011) worked on envy and role of perceived injustice in

its augmentation by the help of two experiments. He came to conclude

that perceived injustice does paly main role in envious hostility and he

further associate envy with darker side of human nature and derogation

of superior individuals .Consequently perceived injustice can be

antecedent of role ambiguity and make employees confused regarding

their role at job which ultimately points negative feelings of envy.

Moreover, experience of envy intensifies when attribution of others

success and personal failure are internal rather than external, and these

internal attributions are directly related with perceived threat self-esteem

(Mikulincer et al., 1989). Consequently, envious individual are more

inclined to self-esteem threat when the cause is internal attribution (i.e

ability) rather than external attributes like( injustice).

Reactionto envy can be classified as emotional, behavioral, and

cognitive which reduces the relevance of the comparison by changing the

perception of the other.(Jordana&Chalder, 2013; Charash ,2009).The

more closely and intensively envier compares himself with others the

more he will thrown back in himself in self-pity (Schoeck,1969). When

people feel fairly or advantageously treated they are more likely to be

motivated; when they feel unfairly treated they are highly inclined to



feelings of disaffection and demotivation. The way that people measure

this sense of fairness is at the heart of Equity Theory (Adam,1963).As

equity and the sense of fairness which commonly underpins motivation,

is dependent on the comparison a person makes between his or her

reward/investment ratio with the ratio enjoyed (or suffered) by others

considered to be in a similar situation.

Workplace can be source Of various emotions including joy,

envy , pain , boredom, fulfillment or mixed of

all(Wrzesniewski,2003).He consider the ways in which people views

their work as meaningful and satisfying. He concluded with the remarks

that job attitudes and work relationship should be forged to recast in

variety of ways by finding and celebrating deeper meaning in work.

Thriving a work is process of human growth and can be characterized as

psychological experience of growth in positive capacity i.e constructive

way (Spreitzer& Grant,2004).Moreover, thriving at work helps to

understanding one’s strengths and becomes critical for eventual career

success. Career success is based on knowledge anad value that make

human capital which includes both objective career success and

subjective career success(Radjenovic,2017).Salary level and promotions

served as dependent measures of objective career success while job

satisfaction, organizational sponsorship and stable individual differences

are acknowledged with exploration of various predictors of complex

phenomena career success both objective and subjective.

Russo et al.(2014) study the determinants and implications of

career success, explores the impact and relevance of individual attitudes

of trust and organizational citizenship behavior on objective and

subjective career success, and their relevance to physical and mental

health with moderating role of a career system on the relationships

between work attitudes and career success. They further diverted the

attention towards how other work attitudes as well as further

organizational characteristics might contribute to the understanding of

the career success in both private and public sectors. Likewise, impact of

additional work attitudes as well as the impact of other organizational

differences, such as size or industry, on the degree to which employees'

positive attitudes at work predict positive career outcomes needed to

examine in future.

Jackson et al.(2007) explore the concept of resilience as a

strategy for thriving at workplace diversity. They linked resilience with

thriving by arguing that resilience is ability to positively adjust to

hardship through building positive professional relationships;

maintaining positivity; developing emotional insight; achieving life



balance. Moreover, they recommended the incorporation of resilience

building strategies for professional support and better work environment

which ultimately linked with subjective career success. Henenkam(2017)

examined thriving with personality traits and found that neuroticism,

extraversion and consciousness were related to thriving, while

openness and agreeableness were not. Moreover, the link between

thriving and self-perceived employability is positively related to

subjective success in their career.

Self-control refers to the ability to alter one’s response for future

consequences (Baumeister& Exline,2000).Hence, it is key to success and

personal well-being with reduction in social problems. Self-control is

form of cognitive behavioral intervention as given by Bandura and

Kanfar. They use the term self-control synonymously with

conscientiousness, a large class of personality traits that includes

responsibility, industriousness, and orderliness. According to Mezo

(2005) self-control is ability of an individual to exert control on

probability of targeted behavior in future by effective monitoring and

evaluation of stimuli associated with that behavior.

According to the strength model(Baumeister,2007) self-control

is a finite resource that determines capacity for effortful control over

dominant responses and leads to impaired self-control task performance,

known as ego depletion. Employees are increasingly facing

concentration requirements (qualitative work load) and high work

pressure (quantitative work load) combined with demands on self-control

(impulse control, resisting distractions, and overcoming inner

resistances).Diestel and Schmidt (2009) focuses on self-control processes

through which high work load increases job strain, thus having a

debilitating effect on the employee. They proposed that demands on self-

control moderates the adverse impact of high work load on indicators of

job strain with different stressor of role ambiguity and causes

psychological anxiety.

Moreover, Babar et al (2009) conducted study on time

perspective and academic achievement with moderating role of self-

control and came to conclude that there is empirical support for the

importance of self-control as a mechanism that influences the link

between dispositions and behavioral outcomes. Chi et al(2016) examined

impact of leader’s customer interaction and his behavior with

subordinates and peers with moderating role self-control. They

acknowledged the moderating effect of leader’s trait self-control such

that leaders with high trait self-control will be less affected by the

depleting effects of emotions than their peers. They also considered the



antecedents of abusive leadership and their behavior with subordinates as

emerging area for research.

Kiewitzet al (2012) examined the role of self-control as

moderator between supervisor undermining behavior and subordinates

perception of abusive supervision .They also confirmed that the role of

self-control in mitigating the impact of supervisors' previous experiences

of family undermining on subordinate perceptions of abusive supervision

exists, furthermore behavior of supervisor leads towards psychological

stress and leads towards emotional consequences. Besides, a very recent

study conducted in Pakistan by Ishaq and Shamsher (2016) examines

revenge attitude as a moderator of the relations between the breach of the

psychological contract and work place deviant behaviors. They

contributes that an employee having low self-control more frequently

execute deviant behaviors on the breach of the psychological contract

than employee with high self-control.

Envy’s stigma of being a vicious sin is going to change as the

current evidences support conceptualization of envy as a social-

functional emotional syndrome, which points adaptive benefits of most

joyless of all sin (Lange,2016).Moreover, envy not only foster by unjust

situations but systematically determined by dispositional and situational

moderators like personal control. Similarly, it has also been found that

revenge attitude strengthens the relationship of psychological contract

breach and work place deviant behaviors. Likewise, self-control

positively moderates the relationship between intention and action, and

that it counters the rise of action-related fear, doubt, which can leads to

negativity like envy (Gelderen et al., 2015).This study further signal the

importance of studying moderators of the intention–action relationship.

Theoretical Framework

On the basis of above literature, following conceptual model was

developed for this current study.

Envy

Thriving at work

Self -

Control

Subjective

career success



Fig 1: Envy, Self-control, thriving at work and subjective career success

Methodology

Instrumentation

The nature of items included in the questionnaire were self-reported,

measured using a 5 point likert-scale where 1 (strongly disagree) to 5

(strongly agree). Envy was measured by Vecchio(2000) 5-Item scale.

Moreover, subjective career success was measured by using Shockley et

al (2016) 24 items scale. Self-Control was measured by using Tangnay et

al (2004) 10 item scales. Thriving at work will be measured by Porath et

al (2012) 10-Item scale.

Population and Sample

In developing country like Pakistan the organizations are characterized

by strong competition and eagerness to move ahead (Andrew &

Hedley,2016).Due to various challenges and tough business

environment, the sector of FMCG (Fast- Moving Consumers’ Good),

Banks, Telecommunication, Health and Education witnessed huge

competition for making tremendous growth in their revenues. Moreover,

the competition in these industries demands to be more innovative to

deal with fast changing environment to meet the rapidly changing

demands of the customers and clients (Taghizadeh, 2015). Therefore, the

contemporary study will grasp the focus of attention on the employees of

these sectors of Pakistan, consequently.

Therefore, data on variables of interest shall be collected from

FMCG (Fast- Moving Consumers’ Good) and Bankswith equal or almost

equal strength of male and females employees. Printed as well as online

questionnaires were used on case to case basis. The target sample was

280 and above. Few were discarded due to incomplete information and

sample of remaining 220 respondents was used for data analysis. All

questionnaires will be self-reported and unit of analysis will be

employees

Sample Characteristics

Data were collected from employees of Fast moving consumers

goods(FMCG), Telecommunication and Banks through convenience

sampling. Among these 47% were males and 52% were females, 53%

were around the age of 25 to 30 while 30% were about 31 to 36 ,

moreover 37% were having experience of 1 to 3 years and 21% were

having 4 to 7 and 28% were among 7 to 10.

Results and Discussion



Reliability analysis, correlation analysis and linear regression was run

through SPSS to analyze the internal consistency of items, direction of

relationships among variables and linear regression for testing of

hypotheses. Results are shown in below tables.

Reliability Analysis

Table 1

Reliability Statistics

Variables Cronbach Alpha(a)

1 Subjective career

success .946

2 Envy .855

3 Self-Control .752

4 Thriving at work .895

Table no.1 shows reliability analysis for all variables. According to Uma

Sekaran (2003), the closer the reliability coefficient that is Cronbach’s

Alpha is to 1.0, the better is the reliability. To test the scales reliability, a

pilot study was conducted. For this purpose data was collected from 50

respondents. The reliability test of our constructs happened to be in the

acceptable to good and very good ranges. The results of reliability show

that all variables are acceptable.

Correlation Analysis Table 2

Mea

n

Std.

Deviation

1 2 3 4

envy_mean 3.98 .86 (.855)

sc_mean 4.01 .55 .755**(.752)

tw_mean 4.16 .51 .274** .468** (.895)

scs_mean 4.12 .49 .316 .508** .939** (.946)

**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).

Table 2 shows descriptive statistics and correlation matrix of the

variables. The mean and standard deviation of envy is 3.98 and .86,

thriving at work is 4.16 and.51, for self-control is 4.01 and .55 and for

subjective career success it is 4.12 and .49 respectively. Reliability

results also shows good to very good values envy has .855, self-control

has .752, thriving at work has .895 while subjective career success



has.946. The bivariate correlation matrix shows that all variables were

envy found positively and significantly correlated with each other.

Regression Analysis Hierarchical regression analyses were performed to formally test the

hypotheses. The results of regression analysis are presented below in

table 3.

Table 3

Predictors

Thriving at work Subjective career success

B R2 ΔR2 B R2 ΔR2

Direct Effect Step 1

Control Variable

Step 2

Envy

.019

.174*** .103

.084***

.022

.196*** .135 .112***

First hypothesis of our study predicted that envy is directly related to

subjective career success which is supported based on results presented

in table 3 (β=.19, p<.05).Moreover, the second hypothesis stated that

envy is directly related to thriving at work which was also supported

based on results presented in table 3 (β=.17, p<.05). Hence, hypothesis 2

was also accepted.

Moderated Regression Analysis

Table 4

Predictors

Subjective career

success

Thriving at work

B R2

ΔR2 B R2 ΔR2

Moderator Analyses

Self-control

Step 1

Control Variable

Step 2 Envy

Self-control

Step 3

.022

.196*** .135

.572*** .310

.175***

-.133 .336 .027**

.019

.174*** .103 .084*** .569*** .267 .164***

-.148** .298 .031**



Interaction

Term

For analyzing moderator, we regress self-control on subjective career

success, in first step, we enter control variables(R2=.022), in second step

we entered envy (B=.196***,p<.05)and self-control (B=.527***,p<.05),

finally entered interaction term of self-control. The results showed that

there is significant and negative relationship between self-control and

envy (R2=.027,p<.05) and (B=-.133, p<.05) , thus showing that third

hypothesis i.e self-control moderates between envy and subjective career

successwas accepted.

On the other, we regress self-control on thriving at work, in first step, we

enter control variables(R2=.019), in second step we entered envy

(B=.174***,p<.05) and self-control (B=.569**,p<.05), finally entered

interaction term of self-control. The results showed that there is

significant and negative relationship between self-control and envy

(R2=.031,p<.05) and (B=-.148, p<.05) , thus showing that fourth

hypothesis i.e self-control moderates between envy and thriving at work

was accepted.

Moderation Graph

Fig 2: Self-Control dampens the positive relationship between Envy and

Subject Career Success.

As shown in figure 2, moderation graph of envy and subjective career

success depicted that as intensity of moderator i.e self-control increases



the positive relationship between envy and subjective career success

becomes weak and vice versa.

Fig 3: Self-Control dampens the positive relationship between

Envy and Thriving at work

As shown in figure 3, moderation graph of envy and thriving at work

depicted the same as intensity of moderator i.e self-control increases the

positive relationship between envy and thriving at work becomes weak

and vice versa.

Discussion

The purpose of this paper was to examined the impact of negative

emotion envy i on subjective career success and thriving at work with

moderating role of self-control. The results show that almost all

hypotheses were accepted. First and second hypotheses proposed that

envy will be positively and significantly related with subjective career

success and thriving at work. The results showed the direct relationship

of envy with subjective career success was highly significant and

positive.

The main reason of hypothesis acceptance is the prevalence of

emotions at workplace and awareness of employees regarding showing

negative emotion at workplace. Hence employees tend to subsides their

negative emotions and try to work hard for subjective career success and

thrive at work. In developing countries the objective success is more



important for employees but when leader is non-cooperative then

employees become indulge in negative emotions like envy. The final

result of such negative emotions will be harmful for both specifically

employee and employer. As a result employees avoided presentation of

negative emotion to save their jobs and try to by moving ahead and hard

working for self-satisfaction at work.

Moreover, third and fourth hypotheses stated that self-control

personality trait moderates the relationship between envy and subjective

career success along with envy and thriving at work. Contrary to

expectation, self–control was significantly but negatively moderates the

relationship between bothenvy and subjective career success along with

envy and thriving at work. As, it showed the higher the intensity of self-

control weaken will be the direct relationships and vice versa. The reason

behind this is the high prevalence of job demands competition and

eagerness to move ahead as soon as possible. This factor makes some

individuals to indulge in negative emotions and they tried to defeat other

or to achieve goals to minimize their internal stress and anxiety.

Moreover collectivist culture (Hofstede,1983) becomes the reason, which

makes indulge d employees in negative emotions and as a result these

employees cope with these emotions positively to retain their jobs.As,

due to high rate of unemployment, poverty and completion in market,

people of developing countries avoid to leave jobs and instead tried to

buffer negative emotions for their betterment.

Limitation and Future Direction

Although the findings of our paper complement the extant literature and

is more generalizable, still this study has few limitations.

· First is the issue of sample size as it was not representative of all

population.

· Survey based questionnaire were conducted but even after great

effort only 220 were collected. There are many top organizations

in Pakistan but few were targeted.

· Moreover, cross sectional study make it difficult to understand

mediation process properly as in longitudinal and time lag

studies.

· Likewise, many other important facets of negative emotions,

personality traits and career success were not covered in this

paper.

Recommendations and Implications



The current study provides manager of various organization a theoretical

framework and empirical evidence of why and how important is the role

of emotions in organizations. This study suggested that leaders should

focus on their behavior and treat every employee equally on the basis of

performance. This balance of treatment will eradicate the negative

emotion of envy among employees and promotes the effective

functioning of employers. Moreover, leaders should educate and train the

employees of organization the negative consequences of envy for both

the employee and employer. These employees must be provided with

equal treatment, organizational and leader support to make them

internally satisfied and accomplishing subjective career success.

Conclusion

This study provides an empirical evidence of positive consequence of

negative emotionenvy and its ultimate effect on the productivity and

functioning of organization. As negative emotions of employees at

workplace can be harmful in the form of revenge and deviant work

behavior, these can leads toward employees personal mental health

problem and stress. Hence, there is a need for proper policy and

management of emotions at workplace and scholars are needed to

explore more evidences regarding role ofemployee’s emotion and their

success at workplace.

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