Employee voice as a route to wellbeing

For many years, evidence has been growing to indicate that subjective well-being is linked to higher worker productivity. However, it has only been more recently that an absence of voice, known as silence, has been linked to a reduction in well-being and productivity. Therefore, this chapter presents an up-to-date review of theoretical perspectives drawn from organizational behavior (OB), employment relations (ER), and human resource management (HRM) literature to highlight the motivations and outcomes that underpin voice about wellbeing. Analyzed across three levels, the societal level (macro), the organizational or departmental level (meso), and the individual level (micro), it can be seen that the traditional focus of organizations has been on collective well-being rather than individual well-being. Yet, if we are to truly encourage worker voice about well-being, we suggest that there must be a greater focus on how individuals, managers, and HR departments can create an organization capable of responding to voice about individual well-being. Serving not only to deepen our understanding of voice about well-being, this chapter also highlights significant gaps in the literature and suggests important avenues for further research. Importantly, we highlight one key question which deserves more attention: Whose responsibility is voice about well-being?