Work Ethics’ Impact on Counterproductive Work Behaviour in Institutes of Higher Education

Counterproductive work behaviour (CWB) projected would negatively impact both individuals and organizations in some ways. The ideas of CWB harm the performance of the institution which develops stress-related issues, low morale and lost work time. To estimate the likelihood of reducing counterproductive work behaviour (CWB) among employees, this concept paper aims to examine work ethics and CWB with a prediction that strong work ethics are seen to make people less inclined to participate in CWB. The main objective of this study is to investigate how work ethic components are affecting CWB. A theoretical structure was created using theoretical models to identify the elements of work ethics that are expected to reduce CWB such as ethics code, regulations, independence, hard work and work goals. The research will be conducted in selected institutes of higher education which discover both academic and non-academic. A questionnaire will be used as the data gathering tool in this quantitative study and the analysis uses IBM Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). The expected findings after the hypotheses have been tested are the components of work ethics able to reduce CWB among employees as predicted. Future research should involve additional variables and be conducted in different areas of sectors to allow the extending level of analysis specifically in understanding human behaviour.