The Effect of Supervisor Self-disclosure on Subordinates’ Perception of Supervisor: A Gender Study
The quality of the relationship between supervisors and their subordinates affects the efficiency of organizationsand maintaining a good relationship between supervisors and subordinates requires specific communication strategies to be put in place. One of these strategies is supervisor self-disclosure of personal information. However, it is not yet clear whether and under which condition this improves the superior-subordinate relationship or the interaction outcomes for the subordinate (e.g., perception of the supervisor). We set out to test how subordinates perceive the self-disclosure of their supervisors and how this affects their perception of the supervisors. Our results suggest neither supervisor sex nor subordinate sex affects how frequently (breadth), how intimate (depth), how much concerning a negative aspect of the person (valence), how honest, or how appropriate the supervisor’s self-disclosure is perceived by their subordinates. While for a male supervisor, all aspects of self-disclosure were perceived more positively, for female supervisors, the picture was quite different. How much female supervisors disclosed was related to them being seen in a negative way whereas the amount of self-disclosure of male supervisors was related to them being seen in a positive way.