Abstract:

The aim of this research is to evaluate organizational silence behavior from the perspective of foreign employees who work at the international companies in Poland. It is also aimed to find out "what issues employees remain silent about, the reasons for remaining silent, and how remaining silent affects employees" by considering the employee-manager relationships and to compare the findings based on the distinction between representations of eastern and western cultures. Ten foreign employees from ten different countries who work at international companies in Warsaw were selected based on maximum variation sampling. Depth interviews were conducted between November and December 2019 with these employees and content analysis method was used to analyze their responses. The themes that stand out from the participants’ responses were summarized through tables and discussed in light of the relevant literature. The situations related to managers’ attitudes, behaviors, perceptions, decisions, daily moods, and mentality are the most common issues for employees to remain silent about. While employees’ culture and personality, and being afraid of managers' reactions are the main reasons for remaining silent, the silence causes some negative effects on employees’ mood, efficiency, motivation, behaviors, and self-esteem. Organizational culture, managerial attitudes, employees’ culture and personality have an effect on organizational silence. Hence, well-structured organizational structures and cultures will direct managers to develop positive behaviors, and eliminate the negative effects of managerial attitudes and behaviors on the employees. Additionally, managers working for international companies with employees from different countries should take into account the cultures, religions and personalities of the employees not to cause silence during organizational communication.

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