Professional transition and organizational change: The role of employees' justice perceptions

In today’s dynamic world, businesses have to implement organizational changes in order to survive and stay competitive. Change implementation has thus become more and more common within businesses (e.g. merging, downsizing, etc.), resulting sometimes in job layoff decisions. Employees have therefore to face periods of transition in their professional careers. Because organizational change and professional transition may have economic and socio-emotional consequences for employees, individuals are very sensitive to the fairness of such managerial decisions. Within this framework, we can wonder how employees’ justice perceptions can help the implementation and acceptance of these decisions, and generate favorable reactions on their part. The aim of the present dissertation is therefore to examine justice issues in the specific contexts of professional transition (i.e. through outplacement assistance) and organizational change, and investigate the contributions of employees’ justice perceptions in such situations.