Abstract:

Heightening the quality of employee voice has been recognized as an important way to improve organizational effectiveness. However, previous studies have mainly focused on how to promote employees’ voice participation and quantity of voice, while ignoring the most essential issue - voice quality. To solve this problem, the present study aims to systematically research voice quality, including the connotation, measurement and antecedents of employee voice quality. The first study defines the connotation of employee voice quality based on grounded theory, and develops a scale of employee voice quality. The second study, drawing on implicit voice theory, explores the theoretical mechanisms linking leader and employee critical thinking to employee voice quality on both team and individual levels. This paper makes theoretical contributions by developing an employee voice quality framework and expanding the application of critical thinking and implicit voice theory.

Key words: voice quality, measurement tool, critical thinking, implicit voice theory, impact mechanism