Vardi and Wiener (1996: 153) prefer the term “organizational misbehavior” to “workplace/organizational deviant behaviour”. They define organizational misbehavior as “any intentional action by members of organizations that defies and violates (a) shared organizational norms and expectations and/or (b) core societal values, mores and standards of proper conduct” O’Neill and Hastings (2011) accept undesired behaviours directed toward the organization as organizational deviance. “Organizational deviance occurs when counter-productive behaviors are directed toward the organization (e.g. theft, absenteeism)” (O’Neill and Hastings, 2011: 268). Deviant behaviours are understood to decline the level of productivity in any organization which produces goods or services. It may not only cause the loss of workforce but also the loss of finance which means loss of profit. Therefore it becomes a vital problem which should be tackled with seriously.

As mentioned above, there is not a common definition of organizational deviance in the related literature. Robinson and Greenberg (1998: 4) state that “there is no currently common definition or terminology regarding workplace deviance that is generally agreed upon” and add “numerous scholars have sought to define this construct, operationalize it and identify its boundaries.” 

Although the researchers study in the same field, they prefer to use different terms in order to define undesired behaviours in the workplace. Robinson and Bennett (1995) prefer the term “workplace deviance” and refer to the voluntary actions violating organizational processes. Vaughan (1999) uses the term “organizational deviance” and examines the deviance depending on whether the organizations would reach their aims and expectations. Vardi and Wiener (1996) use the term “organizational misbehavior” and accept that the deviance not only violates organizational norms and expectations but also violates social structure and communication within it.

Although different features of organizational deviance are emphasized by different researchers, it refers to voluntary actions which violate healthy organizational processes. Organizational deviance can be seen in all of the organizations and institutions which produce goods and services. 

As mentioned in the explanations and definitions of organizational deviance above that these behaviours can be accepted as undesired attempts to prevent the targets.  Because, the actions which refer to deviant behaviour are “sexual harassment, vandalism, rumor spreading, corporate sabotage, not following manager’s instructions, intentionally slowing down the work cycle, arriving late, committing  petty  theft”  (Appelbaum  et  al., 2007: 587). Different factors can cause undesired actions within the organizations. According to Appelbaum et al. (2005: 48-50), the causes of unethical and deviant behaviours are “presence of counter norms and the effect/danger ratio, operational environment, group behaviours, organizational commitment, organizational frustration and change”. Ferris et al. (2012) examine the relation between interpersonal injustice and workplace deviance and they suggest that interpersonal injustice is one of the causes of workplace deviance in any organization. Because of these reasons the adminis-trators should take essential measures to overcome deviant behaviours. They may use group dynamics to attract the attentions for the solutions of the problems. And also, when they decide to do something, they should behave fairly among employees in order to avoid injustice.

Researchers relate organizational deviant behaviours to the concept of organizational justice. In the literature, organizational justice is defined as “a personal evaluation about the ethical and moral standing of managerial conduct” (Cropanzano et al., 2007: 35). Henle (2001: 13) explains organizational justice as “employees' perceptions of fairness in the”workplace.” In addition, McCardle (2007: 9) states that “the justice framework of deviant behavior argues that individuals’ perceptions and experience of organizational justice significantly relate to deviant behaviors, and that the effects of justice on deviant behavior can be influenced by a variety of organizational, contextual, and personal characteristics”  McCardle (2007) concludes that when the employees encounter economic, social and emotional injustice, they perform deviant behaviours within the organization. Therefore, justice should be a key figure in the struggle against deviant behaviours. Murray (2006: 40) also points out that employees have deviant behaviours as a result of encountering unfair treatment.  And he also mentions that organizational justice may have both positive and negative effects.

Robinson and Greenberg (1998: 4) suggest five characteristics for workplace deviance; perpetrators, having certain intentions, select targets, toward whom they act and consequences. Peterson (2002: 57), who studies the relation between organizational deviance and organizational climate, states that “deviant workplace behavior can be partially predicted from the ethical climate of an organization”.

Robinson and Benett (1995: 565) developed “typology of deviant workplace behavior” in order to explain organi-zational deviant behaviours. Lawrence and Robinson (2007: 385) examine the factors of organizational deviance in two dimensions which are severity and target; “Severity refers to the extent to which the deviant act violates important organizational norms and thus is perceived as more potentially harmful to the  organization or its members. Relatively minor forms of deviance include such behaviors as social loafing and unjustified absenteeism, whereas more severe forms might involve physical aggression or theft. The target dimension reflects whether the deviance is directed at the organization or organizational members. Organizational-directed deviance might include, for example, vandalism, theft, or sabotage”. Robinson and Bennett (1995: 565) have developed “typology of deviant workplace behavior” in order to explain organizational deviant behaviours. This typology is presented in Figure 1. 

 

 

As it is seen in Figure 1, organizational deviant behaviours are studied in two dimensions, organizational and interpersonal. The organizational behaviours which aim at organization are divided into two groups; production and property deviance. The undesired interpersonal behaviours are studied under these two categories;  political and personal deviance. We can conclude that the first type of the deviant behaviours is directed to physical conditions or equipment which have a fundamental importance in the production process. The second type of the deviant behaviours is about the relations among employess. These behaviours may attempt to spoil the positive relations and atmosphere within the organizations.

Organizational deviance is examined within two subtitles; negative and positive deviance. Robinson and Bennett (1995), Bennett and Robinson (2000), Peterson (2002), Appelbaum et al. (2005); Lawrence and Robinson (2007), Ferris et al. (2012) have studied negative effects of organizational deviance. According to these researchers the behaviours in Figure 1 are negative organizational deviance and these behaviours are seriously harmful to both the organization and its employees. The common effect of these behaviours is to prevent the organizational goals and expectations which may cause the loss of power and finance and profit. In this case, the employees may lose their jobs.

Some researchers suggest that organizational deviance has positive effects. Spreitzer and Sonenshein (2004) point out that deviance traditionally refers to negative behaviours and this term is used in order to mean negative effects of workers but they also explain that workers are doing extra things which have positive effects on the organizations. Spreitzer and Sonenshein  (2004: 828) express that “although the study of such negative behaviours is an important scholarly endeavor, research on deviance is an unnecessarily narrow area of study”. Positive organizational deviant behaviours are voluntary, purposeful, departed from unit/organization and honorable (Spreitzer and Sonenshein, 2004: 842). Appelbaum et al. (2007: 589) point out that positive deviance may be classified as “pro-social type of behavior” such as organizational citizenship behaviors. As it is known, these types of behaviours develop positive climate within the organizations since the workers act voluntarily without the limits of procedures. Therefore organizations   try   to   reduce   negative   behaviours  by supporting the ones that promote the organization. “Organizations are obviously better off when helpful behavior is optimized and harmful behavior minimized” (Lee and Allen, 2002: 132).

Crom and Bertels (1999: 164) have studied positive deviant behaviours and they determine the basic logic of this type of behaviours:

1. Under equal conditions and within the same culture, some members of the community do a lot better than others.

2. Identifying these people and the principles they apply provides the background to distill the principles of success within this culture.

3. In different communities there might be different success models. Focusing on a single model is not different.

4. Using these individuals and their own cases to educate the remaining community members is much more successful than using external experts.

5. Leveraging the experience of the participants’ application of this training can fuel next round of training and helps develop community members into change leaders. However, it is key to replicate the process of discovering successful behaviors, not simply best practices.

The information presented above reminds us of the concept of organizational citizenship behavior. “Organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) refers to organizationally beneficial behaviors and gestures that can neither be enforced on the basis of formal role obligations nor elicited by a contractual guarantee of recompence” (Somech and Ron, 2007: 40).  As it is seen, both positive deviant behaviours and organizational citizenship behaviours refer to workers’ volantary behaviours which are not required formally on the behalf of their organizations. However, Spreitzer and Sonenshein  (2004: 836) make a distinction between positive deviant behaviours and organizational citizenship behaviours; “first, whereas OCBs reflect behaviors that could not be enforced by the organizations in terms of formal role expectations or job requirements, positive deviance involves a departure from the norms of referent group. Second, although OCBs are intended to improve organizational functioning, positive deviance may or not improve organizational functioning. Third, although OCBs are minor in magnitude, mundanea and common, positive deviance represents a more substantial departure from norms.”

 

Aim of study

Organizations which want to reach their aims effectively at the target time should control and manage organizational   deviance.   Determining   the  reasons  of organizational deviance behaviours are not only important in producing goods and services but also they are important in the process of supervision which is used to understand the realization level of organizational goals. This is because, the aims of the supervision are to determine the realization level of organizational goals, to take necessary precautions in order to get a better result and to improve process (Ayd?n, 2007: 11). The process of supervision takes place in schools in order to determine realization of educational goals and the most important aim is to improve teaching and learning process. Ayd?n (2007: 37), who calls supervision at schools as instructional supervision, defines instructional supervision “as to contribute teachers’ professional development by determining the problems and solving them in a positive attitude.”

There is no doubt that supervisors are at the center of supervision process at all types of schools.  According to Taymaz (1982: 3-4) the basic roles of supervisors are leadership, management, counseling, educator, search-ing and investigation. The success of supervision depends on these roles. Therefore, when the behaviours required by these roles are not performed, supervisional deviance can occur. Determining supervisional deviant behaviours and decreasing negative effects of these behaviours would improve supervision process. It would be helpful to develop instructional and educational goals at schools.

Because of these reasons mentioned above, the aim of this study is to define supervisional deviant behaviours in supervision process according to the primary school teachers. 

 

 

In this study, primary school teachers’ opinions were sought in order to determine supervisional deviant behaviours. Therefore, descriptive analysis which is one of the qualitative research methods and provide opportunities to understand all of the dimensions of  social events and facts (Y?ld?r?m and ?im?ek, 2013) is used in this study. It is known that descriptive analysis presents important clues to understand the reasons of social events and facts. This study aimed at presenting a descriptive and realistic picture of the problem.

 

The participants

In this study, extreme end sampling, which is one of the qualitative research methods, is used. Extreme end sampling can provide a richer data than normal situtations and can help to understand research problem in detail (Glesne,2012; Y?ld?r?m and ?im?ek, 2013). When the participants were chosen, the frequency of supervision represented extreme end. Because of this, the primary schools in Buca Distrcit, Izmir Province, were grouped according to their socio economic development. One primary school in upper socio economic group and another in lower group were chosen and ten teachers were interviewed from each school.

 

Data collecting tools

A semi-structured interview form was used in order to collect the data in this study. A conceptual framework about supervisional deviance was gathered from the literature of organizational deviance to prepare the interview form. The items which were supposed to be in the interviewform were listed and a sample form indicating three questions were prepared depending on the expert view.

 

Interview form

The interview form included three questions about supervisors’ negative individual behaviours, their negative opinions and behaviours about National Education Organization and their unethical behaviours. These questions were;

1. Do the supervisors have negative individual behaviours such as subjective decisions, lack of trust, doing something without any plan during the supervision process? If your answer is “Yes”, what types of behaviours do they perform?

2. What types of negative opinions and behaviours do the supervisors have about National Education Organization, the schools in which they work for supervision, the teachers they supervise (such as gossiping about schools and teachers or not obeying the principles of supervision)?

3. What types of unethical behaviours do supervisors have (such as threatening, accepting a bribe, harrassement or mobbing)?

When the questions in the interview form can be understood by the interviewees clearly and completely, the interview is more effective (Y?ld?r?m and ?im?ek, 2013). That is why, an expert opinion was asked in order to correct the grammatical mistakes in the outline of the interview form. Then a piloting interview was organized in order to test whether the interviewees could understand the question items clearly. The teachers’ views were analysed by using descriptive analysis.

The participants were interviewed in a separate room away in order to establish a proper communication. The interviews took place between 20th-24th April 2014. The interviewees did not let us do audio recording. Therefore, we took notes during the interviews. The notes were typed in Microsoft Office Word and then they were examined in Maxqda 10.1, which is a descriptive data analysis parogramme.

 

Data analysis

According to the results of Humble (2012)’s research, depending on the journals of Family and Family Psychology, qualitative data analysis software is used in 23.2% of qualitative studies (Lewins and Silver, 2007).  The programmes Nvivo, Atlas.ti ve Maxqda, which are defined as three leaders in the field are used in these kinds of analyses. Qualitative data anlaysis programmes help reseachers to organize the data. Therefore, these programmes accelarate to form systematic information process (Johnson, 2014). In this study, Maxqda 10.1 data analysis programme was used for searching, marking, making connections and organizing the data.

The steps which are defined by Allen (2015) were followed during the qualitative anlaysis and presenting of the results. At the beginning of the analysis all the data were examined in detail and the first codes emerged. For example, as the first step, the following are teacher views; “they are patronazing” (f=11), “they are not constructive” (f=11) and “they ignore suggestions” (f=1) were coded as a category. Because of these codes, we concluded that some deviant behaviours resulted from supervisors’ negative individual behaviours. Therefore, the theme “supervisors’ individual deviant behaviours” emerged. The techniques of “open coding” and “focus coding” which are explained by Goldberg and Kuvalanka (2012) are used during the coding process. The best views which explained the categories and themes were presented in italics and quotation marks in order to give the reader a sense of being there and to present a powerful proof (Pratt, 2009).

 

Validity and reliability

The criteria which are defined by Burns (1989) were applied in order to support the reliability. This criteria is “descriptive vividness”, “methodological congruence”, “an alytic preciseness”, “theoretical connectedness”, “heuristic rele vance”. The reliability refers to the principle that the research has similar outcomes when it is repeated in similar settings. That is why the characteristics of the research group, determining the group, and the steps of data analysis are clearly presented. The researchers analyzed the data twice on the computer in order to provide the researcher with realibility. The themes and categories which were determined by the researchers were examined by another researcher and the reseachers had an agreement on them.

In order to ensure the validity, the criteria which were determined by Miles and Huberman (1994) were taken into consideration. The research questions depended on a detailed theoretical background and an expert’s view was sought in order to provide validity. And then, the piloting proved that the questions were proper for the aims of the study.

After interviewing primary school teachers, the themes and categories related to supervisional deviance were determined and their frequencies are presented in Table 1.

As it is seen in Table 1 supervisioanl deviant behaviours are grouped under 3 themes according to their frequency values.

 

Supervisors’ ?ndividual deviant behaviours

According to the results of data analysis, supervisors’ individual deviant behaviours are observed in primary schools at the highest frequency level (f=112).  Whereas these types of deviant behaviours are not related to supervisors’ duties, they are explained by supervisors’ personalities. Therefore, these actions are called individual deviant behaviours within the framework of this study.

The frequency distribution of supervisors’ individual deviant behaviours is presented in Figure 2. As it is seen in Figure 2, the teachers, both from the lower group school and upper group school, state that; supervisors have arbitrary decisions (upper group f=9; lower group f=10) and they are not constructive (upper group f=6; lower group  f=5).  This  finding  indicates  that the participants agree on these specific deviant behaviours. 

 

 

The teachers working in upper group school express that supervisors are aimless (f=13) and they are under the influence of school directors (f=11). The teachers coming from lower group school do not mention this deviant behaviour much since their fundamental concern is to work in a disadvantaged school.

All of the teachers (f=17) working in the lower group school agree that supervisors’ work does not concern the problems of disadvantaged schools. None of the teachers from the upper group mentioned this issue.

The teacher views which support these findings are presented below:

 “The supervisors give a score for our teaching performance.” Two years ago, a supervisor gave me 95. The same supervisor graded me with 85 the next year. So, is this fair? The same teacher, the same supervisor and the same class, what is the difference? Why does he behave differently? There is no scientific explanation. These are arbitrary decisions” (Lower group school, arbitrary decision C3).

“They are not constructive and they have a rude manner (Upper group, not to be constructive V7).

 “When they come to the classroom, they may ask some questions which are not included in the schedule or they may want to get information on the teaching subjects (Upper group, being aimless V1)

“They are under the influence of school directors. Supervisors and directors have close friendships. So their decisions are not fair” (Upper group, directors’ effects)

“Supervisors do not care about differences among schools. They believe every school has the same teaching facilities. As every school is the same, every teacher is the same. They try to shape us. Supervisors should understand that disadvantaged schools have a lot of problems. Our students are coming from lower economic income level. So, their only concern is to help their family budgets. They work after school. And most of them use drugs. How can a teacher organize teaching activities with these students? But supervisors ignore these conditions. They compare our school to a school which is located in a good environment” (Lower group, ignoring disadvantaged schools, C2).

 

Deviant behaviours stemmed from supervisors’ ?nabilities

The sub-categories do not occur under the title of deviant behaviours resulted from supervisors’ inabilities in data analysis. So, a graph can not be presented in this theme. The frequency value is 17 in this theme. The deviant behaviours in this theme are about supervisors’ educa-tion, professional abilities and working styles. Although they have a duty of supervising the teachers, they may not follow the recent improvements in their fields. In addition, they may not have a democratic attitude towards teachers. The sample deviant behaviours about supervisors’ qualifications are presented below:

“First of all, how are supervisors appointed? We should consider it. I have been working for 37 years as a primary school teacher. So, I have seen many supersivors so far. My close friends have been appointed as a supervisor, too. In the past, a teacher who wanted to be a supervisor, attended four years university education again. They knew this job very well. They were qualified in teaching and supervising. They really helped the teachers a lot. However, this system is not carried out now. Experienced teachers are having so called exams. These kinds of supervisors are a real problem. They do not like teaching or are not successful in this job. They can not teach. So the students and their parents do not like these types of teachers. And then they want to be supervisors. Since they are not qualified teachers, they can not be qualified supervisors” (Upper group, V4),

“Supervisors do not know how student centered education can be organized. They are not aware of methods of student centered education. And then they want teachers to use these types of methods. And also they do not have any idea in order to use IT in the classrooms. When we use IT in our classes, they are against it since IT is not included in the schedule. They are not qualified enough in today’s technological world” (Lower group C3).

 

Supervisors’ unethical deviant behaviours 

As a result of the data analysis, supervisors who are working with primary school teachers behave unethically. The frequency value is 53 in this theme.

The frequency distribution of supervisors’ unethical deviant behaviours is presented in Figure 3.

As it is understood from Figure 3, primary school teachers agree on that supervisors behave politically (f=16). The teachers from upper group school complain about this deviant behaviour more than teachers from lower group school (upper group f=11; lower group school f=5).

Other finding that can be obtained from the graph that supervisors are not objective and the teachers perceive their decisions are subjective. Almost all the teachers who are working in the upper and lower group school have common ideas about this deviant behaviour (upper group f=8; lower group f=6). 

 

 

Another unethical behaviour is to threaten (f=9). However, teachers from upper group school emphasize threatening behaviour more than teachers from lower group schools (upper group f=6; lower group f=3). 

Demoralizing is another supervisional deviant behaviour for primary school teachers. Only the teachers coming from lower group school mention this type of behaviour (f=7).

The teachers’ views which support these findings are presented below:

“In my opinion they are political people because supervisors are appointed by the ruling party. So, they are helpful for the teachers who support the same political party. These teachers always get the highest scores in the process of supervision.” (Upper group, V1)

“Supervisors are not objective. They decide considering their political preferences. That is too bad for education. They use the process of supervision as a penalty for the teachers who do not suppoprt the ruling party” (Lower group, C5)

“Supervisors threaten teachers. When the teacher does not accept supervisor’s decisions, the supervisor threatens to start investigation process about the teacher.”  (Lower group, C3)

“Supervisors always complain about us. They never approve our teaching methods. So, they demoralize us. (Lower group, C8)

Therefore, both the system as a whole and the teachers can not benefit from the supervision process. Generally, educational supervision and supervisors are essential to improve standards of education and teaching techniques. Supervisors are supposed to solve teaching problems and contribute to teachers’ development (Ayd?n, 2007: 21). However, according to primary school teachers’ views, supervisors can not meet these needs. So supervisional deviant behaviours emerge. The reasons of supervisional deviant behaviours for primary school teachers are supervisors’ individual behaviours, unethical behaviours and professional inabilities. There-fore, supervisional deviant behaviours are necessary to be observed. The reasons for them should be explored for relevant solutions.

Educational supervision is such a broad field that it is impossible to handle all the problems within the framework of this limited study. Supervisional deviant behaviours are mostly individual deviant behaviours (f=112). These negative behaviours listed as not working according to the aims, paying attention to documents a lot, having arbitrary decisions, behaving under the influence of directors and not behaving constructively. Teachers do not know how the supervisors evaluate their professional performance and development. Because, as it is mentioned  above supervisors’ decisions depend on different variables which are not related to educational targets. Supervisors’ individual deviant behaviours affect teachers’ opinions and they develop negative attitude to supervision and supervisors. So that, they do not try to find ways to benefit from  supervisors’  experiences  or  to consult them for a career development.

When we evaluate supervisors’ behaviours as organizational deviance, we conclude that supervisors perform political deviance most of the time. Political deviance is the behaviours which are defined “as engagement in social interaction that puts other individuals at a personal or political disadvantage” (Robinson and Bennett, 1995: 566).  According to this definition, the behaviours such as behaving politically, being subjective, demoralizing, favouritism and arbitrary decisions can be accepted as political deviance. On the other hand, the supervisors’ behaviours such as being aimless and paying attention to the documents may be included in production deviance that is defined as “behaviors which violate the formally proscribed norms delineating the minimal quality and quantity of work to be accomplished” (Hollinger and Clark, 1982: 333). When the supervisors have lack of aim, they do not know how to help and guide the teachers.  Therefore, educational quality can not be improved. Injustice and inequity which are among the reasons of organizational deviance cause deviance in the process of supervision according to the primary school teachers’ views. Most of the teachers point out that supervisors are not fair and objective (f=14). Ferris et al. (2012) suggest that interpersonal injustice causes employees to engage in deviant behaviours. The effects of injustice are observed in the supervision process, too. Supervisors’ unfair behaviours cause lack of motivation and dissatisfaction among teachers.

Supervisors’ attitudes and behaviours are vitally important in the educational supervision. Just because of this, appointment of supervisors and their supervising training (pre-service and in-service training) should be carried out carefully. Their training programmes should include modern education approaches and methods. They should also learn information technologies, which is one of the essential pre-requisites for development. The best teachers should be appointed to supervising and they should be trained according to the needs of modern education which mainly requires the ability of critical thinking and creativity in the information age.

In today’s educational settings, the overall system needs the supervisors who are creative, objective and talented in teaching. Because of these qualifications we need a mental renovation in the supervision process besides effective supervisor training. The supervisors should change their point of views and working styles. Since the teachers need guidance based supervision instead of controlling based one.

As it is seen in this study that organizational deviance and supervisional deviance have similar reasons and sources. This research is a beginning point for further studies about supervisional deviant behaviours. Studying all of the aspects of supervisional deviance is beyond this research. Supervisional deviance should be studied more in different teaching and learning settings at all educational levels. When the reasons of supevisioanl deviance are clearly determined, the methods can be improved in order to solve the problems of supervisional deviance. 

The author has not declared any conflict of interests.