Defensive Silence Is Not Golden in Workplace Bullying: Building Hotel Employee Resilience From a Transactional Theory Perspective

Abstract

The transactional theory suggests that over time, employees who experience workplace bullying will gradually become more resilient. Employees gain inner peace and spiritual strength from adverse situations, thereby strengthening their resilience (e.g., mental toughness and mindfulness). Based on transactional theory, this study aims to examine how hotel frontline employees, who are more vulnerable to workplace bullying, engage in self-protective behaviors (i.e., defensive silence and defensive voice) and subsequently develop their mental toughness and mindfulness. Data were collected from 400 full-time hotel employees in Turkey. We found that workplace bullying pushed employees to defensive silence and voice. Defensive silence reduced employees' mental toughness. Furthermore, employees' mental toughness enhanced their mindfulness. An additional mediation analysis showed that defensive silence damaged employee mindfulness by weakening their mental toughness. Notably, this study provides a new insight that defensive silence is not always beneficial for hospitality employees in the context of workplace bullying.