Social exchanges within organizations and work outcomes: The importance of local and global relationships

Social exchange research has focused primarily on employee relationships with supervisors and with the organization to explain employee in-role and extra-role behaviors. This article extends the understanding of social exchange by exploring two additional exchanges (employee relationships with top management and with employees in other work areas) and examine all four social exchanges' effects on work behaviors. It also extends notions of employee performance to include employee involvement in organizational improvement efforts. Data collected in a field study of 129 supervisor-subordinate dyads suggest that local (interpersonal exchanges with supervisors and colleagues in other work areas) and global (exchanges with top management and the organization) foci have different effects on work performance and that local social exchanges have a greater influence on work outcomes than global social exchanges.