Perceived Exploitative Relationships in Organizations: An Examination of Its Antecedents and Impact on Employee Job Performance

This thesis explores how leaders' exploitative behavior influences employee perception of their organizations and impact on employee performance. It reviews past studies on exploitative leadership, clarifies the concept, and suggests future research directions. The empirical findings show that when leaders exploit their employees, employees see the whole organization as exploitative, especially if they feel the leader represents the organization. It then examines how these perceptions affect job performance, showing that feeling exploited by the organization lowers both task and extra performance efforts at work due to reduced obligation. However, it also increases self-interest, improving task performance but harming extra efforts.