Organizational justice and employee in-role performance nexus: a dual theory perspective

Abstract The organizational sustainability heavily depends upon employee performance. The aim of the study is to examine the relationship of organizational justice and in-role employee performance. Moreover, the organizational embeddedness and employee advocacy are used as mediator and moderator, respectively. A sample of 402 medical doctors was selected from different hospitals using snow-ball sampling technique. Their responses were gathered through a closed-ended questionnaire. The data collected were analyzed using partial-least square method. The study shows that organizational justice in the organization increases the employees performance. Organizational embeddedness mediates their relation, whereas advocating the needs of the employees moderates their relation. We have contributed to the existing theoretical model proposed in earlier literature by comprehensively analyzing the organizational justice impact on the in-role performance, i.e. by including the interactional justice impact as well. Furthermore, we also propose to include the role of employees’ advocacy in enhancing the in-role performance of the employees. The hospital managers can enhance employees’ in-role performance by treating them fairly; apply same rules without any bias, while developing open communication with them. These measures can be further improved by providing support. The cross-sectional nature of the study may restrict the generalizability of results.


Introduction
Managing employees in-role performance still remains a concern for practitioners, policymakers, and researchers (Gregory et al., 2010;Jackson, 2014;Van Wingerden et al., 2017). The organizational competitiveness depends the employee's performance who perform as per the set parameters. Conversely, the absence of adequate role performance results in higher turnover with the negative consequences both for individuals and organizations (Yap et al., 2009). Nesheim et al. (2017) define in-role performance as "a work related behavior that is considered to be the part of the formal job requirement". Therefore, employees' in-role performance is a necessary behavior that directly affects the organizations' technical core, thereby enhancing organizational performance. Organizational justice is ethical and fair conduct of people within the organization (Adeel et al., 2018). Fairness in dealing with the employees increases their in-role performance Cho et al. (2012). Treating the employees fairly in the organization provides the resource to the employees that leads toward the organizational embeddedness and hence increased performance. Employees' advocacy is the act of working for the interests of the employees as well as to show the transparent policy of the organization (Yeh, 2014). Employees' advocacy includes considering the employees complaints, protecting the employee against unfair treatment and harassment and to address the complaints and worries of employees in a rightful manner (Kim, 2009), hence further enhancing the in-role performance.
There are various explanations available in literature as how the justice would affect in-role performance. We draw on the principles of social exchange theory (SET) and conservation of resources (COR) theory (Ghosh et al., 2017). According to SET, in any social exchange, both parties do their cost benefit analysis and exchange in a way that benefits both. This exchange can involve both tangible as well as intangibles. We posit that in an organization, employer and employee act as two parties involved in a social exchange. For example, employer while demanding good performance from employees needs to give employees what they need. We argue that employees while demanding many things from employer, also needs justice at the foremost, i.e. they need to be treated equally and fairly. If they are treated as such, they would develop trust and in exchange would get involve in their work. The more they are involved in the organization, higher they would be embedded. This effect is further enhanced by the employees' advocacy, 1 as employers listen to their complaints and acts in a justified manner. Thus as a whole, organizational justice from employer's side is reciprocated by employees by getting embedded in the organization, and therefore would give better performance.
According to COR theory, it can be argued that an organization wants to conserve the existing resources. One such resource is organizational justice. As employer provides this resource to the employees, which builds trust between them and resultantly employees get embedded in the organization. This effect is further enhanced by the employees advocacy, as employees feel more loyal to the organization. Therefore, it can be argued that both these factors would improve employees' in-role performance (Ghosh et al., 2017). From both these perspectives, we can argue that both explanations are the different sides of the same coin. For example, we can consider the social exchange between the employer and employee similar to the resources exchange, i.e. employer while providing other resources, also starts giving organizational justice and care for their employees as additional resources to the employees and employees on the other hand reciprocate by getting embedded in the organization and provide better performance, hence further increasing the resources of the organization.
Various studies found employees with higher level of distributive justice face less dissatisfaction (Brotheridge & Lee, 2003;Kim et al., 2009;McFarlin & Sweeney, 1992;Schappe, 1998). Similarly, Lee et al. (2010) argued distributive justice to be important factor in embedding employees as it suppresses the employees' turn over intentions. Negative outcomes arise when the employees find that they are not being treated equally as their co-workers (Burton et al., 2010). Greenberg (2004) argued that employees having higher perception of procedural, distributive and interactional justice are more embedded in their jobs. This performance can be further improved through employees' advocacy.
This study is built on the framework developed by Ghosh et al. (2017) and as suggested by the study further enhances the existing literature mainly by incorporating the effect of employees' advocacy in explaining the relationship among organizational justice, job embeddedness and inrole performance. Albeit, the study proposed by Gosh et al., (2017) highlighted the impact of organizational justice to increase the in-role performance of the employees. However, study considered the relationship to be poorly explained and thus warranted further examination. We propose the relationship can be better explained if that relationship is moderated by employees' advocacy. It is because when the organizations work for the interest of the employees, it strengthen the trust of the employees. The positive perception towards the organization increases in response the overall performance most specifically the in-role performance.

Organizational justice and in-role performance
The distributive, procedural and interactional justice makes the overall organizational justice (Haines et al., 2018). Gilliland and Paddock (2005) defined distributive justice as the fair distribution of outcomes consistent with the principles of equality and equity. Procedural justice refers to the fairness in the procedures (Siers, 2007). Whereas, interactional justice is defined as the quality of interactions between individuals within organizations (Stamenkovic et al., 2018).
Organizational justice is based on the social exchange theory (Ghosh et al., 2017). Social exchange focuses on the fair treatment of the employees that induces the positive attitude towards the work performance (Haines et al., 2018). Similarly Zhang et al. (2014) stressed when employees perceives the fair treatment, they respond more promptly by contributing toward the organizational and performance goals. Various studies (Colquitt et al., 2012;Nadiri & Tanova, 2010;Sahin, 2007) argued justice to be associated with the satisfaction, commitment and proactive behavior towards in-role as well as the extra role performance. Furthermore Fischer and Smith (2006) predicted justice to be fundamental element that induces the self-reported behavior of the employees, consequently increasing the overall performance. When the employees receive the justice from the organization, they shows more level of trust (Chen et al., 2015) increased cooperation (Chathoth et al., 2007; Hubbell & Chory-Assad, 2005) and organizational citizenship behavior (Adeel et al., 2018). Obviously working with more level of trust and cooperation will make the employees more motivated towards the workplace therefore their in-role performance increases. Likewise low level of the organizational justice evidently affect counterproductive behavior of the employees, disengagement, retaliation (Cohen-Charash & Spector, 2001;Colquitt et al., 2001) and negative behavior. Thus the study hypothesize that: H1: Organizational justice positively affects the employees' in-role performance.

Organizational embeddedness
Organizational embeddedness is defined as, the extent to which the employees are deemed to be embedded and merged within the organization. (Ghosh et al., 2017). Mitchell et al. (2001) first coined the concept of job embeddedness. The construct of job embeddedness consists of two dimensions i.e. organizational and community embeddedness, respectively (Ghosh et al., 2017). Each of these dimension is further related to three respective dimensions i-e (fit, link and sacrifice). In this regard (Mitchell et al., 2001) describes link to be "the connection between the person institutions and the people". These connections can be formal and informal in nature. If the quantity of the links are greater and important then the employee will be more embedded. Fits refers to the "employees' comfort and compatibility within an organization" (M. E. Brown & Treviño, 2006). Finally sacrifice deals with the social, financial and psychological losses which one may bear while exiting. This may include pay, benefits, status etc. Shahriari (2011) states unbiased and equal application of rules, opportunity to correct errors of judgment and involvement in decision making as the source of procedural justice. In this regard Greenberg (2004) stressed employees' voice in decision making and active involvement in the organizational policies and the procedures make them more embedded in the organizational environment. Furthermore previous literature (Aryee, Budhwar & Chen, 2002;Aryee et al., 2004;Brotheridge & Lee, 2003;Colquitt et al., 2001;O. M. Karatepe & Tekinkus, 2006;McFarlin & Sweeney, 1992;Niehoff & Moorman, 1993) argued presence of fair procedures along with treating the employees with fairness and dignity that leads towards affective commitment with least intentions of turnover, hence making them more engaged in the organization. Thus employees having high perception of distributive, interactional and procedural justice repays the organizations with more embeddedness in the organization. Therefore the following hypotheses are proposed:

H4: Interactional justice has a positive effect on organizational embeddedness.
Conservation of the resources theory also holds the grounds that work force pursue not only in protecting the prevailing current resources but also strive for gaining the additional resources (Harris et al., 2011). Being embedded in the organization the employees experience the resource abundance in the form of higher link, fit and sacrifice. This resource abundance backed by the justice leads towards the higher in-role performance. Many studies like (Ghosh et al., 2017;Kiazad et al., 2015) argued that organizational embeddedness affects in-role performance. Moreover dealing the employees with justice provides the ground resources for the employees' that strengthens the employees' embeddedness, thus finally leading towards the increased in-role performance. Therefore the study hypothesizes that:

Employees advocacy
Advocating is defined as the organizational willingness to act for the best interest of its employees (Yeh, 2014). It is also defined in terms of the employees' perception of the degree to which an organisation normally values the contribution of its employees and the degree of care towards its employees' well-being (Kim, 2009). Employees' advocacy is the further investment in the resources aimed at increasing the employees' productivity.
In the presence of employees' advocacy organization creates win-win situation both for organization and employees by inducing positive feeling (Akgunduz & Sanli, 2017). These efforts of creating the support from the organization is a measure to make the employees embedded in the organizational environment. Moreover (Otaye & Wong, 2014) argued that the job satisfaction of those employees increase who believes their rights, needs and interest are acknowledged. Henceforth they work with more commitment and are less inclined towards quitting the job which ultimately increases organizational embeddedness. Supported employees puts more efforts in their task completion and pursue their efforts for longer time period even when they face impediments (Yeh, 2014) which directly effects the productivity.
Thus this study posit the hypothesis:

Theories in action
The social exchange theory (SET) is a sociological and psychological theory that encompasses the social behavior in the interaction of organization and employees and is used for cost-benefit analysis to create a win-win situation (Ekeh, 1974). Conservation of resources theory (COR) describes the motivation that drives humans to both maintain their current resources and to pursue new resources (Hobfoll & Shirom, 2000).
Organizational justice based on social exchange theory sets the grounds for the existing resources which are when full filled employees conserve the resources to gain the additional resources. Pursuit of having additional resources is based on conservation of resources theory. Resource abundance in the form of higher fit, link and sacrifices fosters more embeddedness. These accumulation of the additional resource induces the behavior of advocacy. Hence, it will lead towards motivating the employees' behavior which in return increase the in-role performance of the employees. The proposed framework is shown in Figure 1.

Sampling and data collection
The data was gathered from the doctors working in the health sector of Pakistan. The main reason behind choosing the doctors as the unit of analysis is because health sector of Pakistan is going through a transition period, as the government is trying to include private sector in the management of public hospitals. There is uncertainty prevailing among doctors about their jobs. The data were collected by distributing the research questionnaire. Snowball sampling was used. Four hundred and two questionnaire were statistically analyzed. The sample included 222 male and 181 females as the participants of the research.

Instruments used
Organizational justice was measured by using the fifteen item scale of justice validated by Colquitt et al. (2012). A five point Likert scale was used to analyze the respondents' level of agreement. Organizational embeddedness was measured by using the seven items scale adapted from Akgunduz and Sanli (2017). This scale was originally developed by Crossley et al. (2007). Employee's advocacy is adapted from Akgunduz and Sanli (2017). This scale was originally developed by Yeh (2014). In-role performance was adapted from Janssen and Van Yperen (2004).

Common method bias
To control the common method bias we used different methods. Firstly the anonymity of the respondents was ensured by not asking them about their names and identification numbers augmented with maintaining the confidentiality of their responses. The respondent's consent was obtained before conducting the survey thus reduced social desirability bias was ensured. Secondly, we placed dependent and independent variables in such a manner in the questionnaire that no one can identify the nature of the variable could not provide any ques to the respondents. This helped in not providing a common context that helped in avoiding the potential bias (Podsakoff et al., 2003). Thirdly, the Harman's single factor test was used in the un-rotated solutions that explained only 24.5% of the variance that is acceptable according to the experts, because it is less than 50%. Therefore the risk of common method bias was minimized.

Results
The study used PLS-SEM. In the first stage the assessment of the measurement model is done whereas the second stage involves the assessment of the structural model (Fornell et al., 1981). Table 1 reports the detailed description of the measurement model. Factor loading for each item are presented. Besides, cronbach alpha values are also presented. In order to gauge convergent validity, the authors evaluated the Average Variance Extracted (AVE) statistics of each dimension, see, Table 1.

Measurement model
Discriminant validity is established if the square root of constructs'/dimensions' AVEs are greater than the inter-correlations of other constructs/dimensions. In this study, the results of the analysis show that the square root of AVE were greater than the correlation between each pair of dimensions as shown in Table 2, thus providing evidence for discriminant validity. Table 2 reports that all the diagonal elements are greater than the off diagonal elements in respective rows and column, see, Table 2.
Overall, the results of the measurement model are satisfactory and suggest it is appropriate to proceed further for the evaluation of the structural model.

Structural model
Structural model is also known as the inner model which describes the relationship among the latent variables (Hair et al., 2012). Furthermore the structural model depicts the relationship between the exogenous and the endogenous variables. In the present study the structural model is analyzed by the coefficient of determination (R square) and path coefficient. The value of R-square must lies between 0 to1. The value of R-Square for the current study is 0.340. Table 3 represents the standardized parameters. Bootstrapping simulation is done to confirm the t-values and the significance of the hypothesis. All the hypotheses from H1 to H6 were accepted, see, Table 3.

Discussion & conclusion
This study contributes to the literature by unfolding the mechanism for improving the in-role performance of the employees. First, the current study checked the impact of organizational justice on the in-role performance of the employees. The result was found to be consistent with previous studies (Cohen-Charash & Spector, 2001;Colquitt et al., 2001;Haines et al., 2018;Zhang et al., 2014). These studies argued organizational justice as the fundamental element to induce the positive attitude towards the work performance. Employees' responds more effectively, promptly and proactively when they perceive they are being treated fairly. In addition, the study also showed that the employees express more trust, satisfaction and organizational citizenship behavior when they experience distributive, procedural and the interactional justice. Hence, it lead towards increasing the in-role performance of the employees.
Trust increases when the employees are being rewarded justifiably on the basis of their performance and the real efforts put in. Therefore to make the employees more embedded there is a strong need to provide the distributive justice to the employees. In this regard past studies (Brotheridge & Lee, 2003;Kim et al., 2009) stressed that employees receiving distributive justice experience lower level of burnout and are more productive.
Procedural justice is ensured if relevant procedures are followed consistently. We found procedural justice to be significantly influencing the in-role performance. It can be argued that employees' feel treated impartially, when organizational procedures are consistently followed. In addition, procedural justice make employees more embedded, as they feel their organization is following the already set procedures without any personal bias. Niehoff and Moorman (1993) argued in presence of fair treatment of employees, based on procedures would lead towards affective commitment with less turnover intentions, hence embedding them in the organization.
This study also specified that the interactional justice is equally important as the distributive and procedural justice. The employees' who experience higher interactional justice and are dealt with dignity and respect develop a sense of loyalty with the organization and feel the organizations' goals as their own. Moreover, the interactional justice develops a feeling of transparency due to open communication. This open communication adds to the confidence of people, by sharing their thoughts and seeking solutions to the problems, while working effectively that creates a sense of embeddedness. Past studies (Aryee et al., 2004;Brotheridge & Lee, 2003) also argued that besides the procedures, the personal treatment also helps, to make the employees embedded. Therefore all those employees who receive treatment on equality basis with open communication, are more engaged and would be less inclined to show turnover intentions and are more productive (Aryee et al., 2002;Cohen-Charash & Spector, 2001;Wei, 2015). Thirdly, this study confirmed that organizational embeddedness mediates the relationship between the organizational justice and the in-role performance of the employees. The employees feel being more embedded in the organization when they perceive themselves to be the best fit in the organization. Adding to the fairness they receive when they develop a sense of being a part of the organization they tend to be more satisfied and perform better. Therefore in this regard the organizational justice acts as the forerunner supported by the sense of embeddedness by making the employees engaged and be better performers. The previous studies (Ghosh et al., 2017;Kiazad et al., 2015) stressed that the sense of being embedded in the organization prove to be a resource in the form of the stronger link, sacrifice and the fit in the organization. Hence this justice, as a resource, results in increased in-role performance of the employees. In this regard O.M. Karatepe and Shahriari (2014) argued that the employees are found to be more productive as being part of their workplace (embeddedness) when they have favorable perception of distributive, interactional and the procedural justice.
Fourth this study confirmed that the employees' advocacy moderates the relationship between organizational embeddedness and in-role performance. Those organizations which advocate the needs of the embedded employees tend to get better performance with respect to tasks assigned. Such organizations generally have set standards and procedures to address the employee issues. Moreover, the organizational efforts to make the employees more satisfied are also important as a part of employee advocacy, i.e. provision of open and accurate information and application of fair policies across the board. Enabling the employees to share the information about their experience is the most effective approach to advocate the interests of the employees, thus breaking the circle of silence, that further help employees to get engaged in their work with more confidence. Previous studies (Men, 2014;Yeh, 2014) also found employees advocacy as an act of creating the win-win situation which help induce the positive work attitudes. In addition Otaye and Wong (2014) argued that the enhanced job satisfaction due to embeddedness and advocacy increase the in-role performance of employees.
This study makes important theoretical contributions by unfolding the mechanisms which can enhance doctor's embeddedness and increase their in-role performance. The results of this study support the argument developed by the social exchange theory i.e. when the employees get fair response from their organization they tend to be better performers. Fairness in procedures, distribution of resources and relationships maintained result in enhancing higher commitment of job and people try to develop organizational identity. They tend to view their organization positively, in a long term, even if they are currently dissatisfied form the organization (due to low pay or may be imbalance in workloads assigned). Lack of distributional justice may result in snatching the resources and people may incline towards adopting work deviant behaviors. Moreover, as conceived by conservation of resources theory, an organization not only strives to conserve its existing resources, but also tries to enhance them. Organizations by providing justice to the employees enhances one of their resources, this resources is further increased by employees, as they reciprocate by getting embedded in the organization through improved links, fit and sacrifice. While at the same time organization also conserve its resources by making the employees embedded in the organization, thus lowering turnover intentions and getting improved performance.

Implications
This study specifically addresses the current lack of research on the doctor's in-role performance as an outcome of organizational embeddedness and unveiled the unexplored role of employees' advocacy in between. There is deficiency of studies about in-role performance especially in health sector, which can validate the relationship of justice, embeddedness, advocacy and in-role performance. This research stands beneficial in terms of its practical contributions and will help the health sector to improve this untapped area. performance of doctors. In order to retain the good performers the organization must provide the best possible justice in terms of distribution of resources, procedures adopted and relationships. Employees are generally found more committed and engaged where their existing needs are full filled (through organizational justice and employee advocacy). In addition the employees conserve more resources and try to put in more efforts when their basic needs are addressed adequately. As a result the employees consider themselves to be more valued and get further engaged in their work. So, advocating the needs of the employees and working for their best interest is a step towards pooling to the organizational resources that lead to increase in-role performance.
The hospital managers can use justice as a resource that makes them act in a rightful manner, hence performing better. When the employees develop a sense of embeddedness, that is, they feel themselves as parts of the organization that values their opinions, and suggestions make them feel more supported and in return they put in additional efforts to achieve the organizational goals. A sense of support (advocacy) developed by the hospital managers, adds to the strength of being embedded that motivate them to show better performance. Good performance is especially important to overcome the uncertainty prevailing in the transition phase in hospitals. Besides, it may also help in shaping public health policy towards hospitals.

Limitation and directions for future research
Like any other research studies, this study also has a few limitations. First, the underlying study is cross-sectional, that may restrict the findings to the only respondents who took part in the study. So it is recommended to conduct the longitudinal study to examine the relationship in the depth and over time.
Second, this research was focused on analyzing the in-role performance of the health sector of the employees. Other sectors like Informational Technology industry, Telecom industry, tourism industry, pharmaceutical industry, manufacturing and other industries can be considered for examining the same framework.
Third, the current research only included the doctors as the unit of analysis. In future studies the responses of other staff like nurses, hospital technicians and paramedics and others specifically related to the health sector for in-depth analysis.