Individual Perceived Corruption Diminishes the Work Effectiveness and Organizational Performance: Public Organizations in Laos

Laos is still categorized by United Nations as one of the least developed countries in the world and it is also perceived by international community as a highly corrupt state in the world based on the report of Corruption Perception Index in 2017. The main purpose of this empirical research is to investigate the influence of individual perceived corruption on job motivation, commitment, satisfaction and organizational performance among public organizations and state-run enterprises in Laos. Additionally, it will also examine the mediating effect of perceived corruption on the relationship between job commitment, satisfaction and motivation and organizational performance. To make an empirical research on this article, public officers who have been working at public organizations and state-run enterprises at both central and local governments in Laos were selected as target samples. 5-point Likert questionnaire form was developed and tested before distributing to target samples through email and social media channels in Laos. 281 questionnaire forms were returned. 5 questionnaire forms were sorted out and 276 cases were used in this research. The collected data were analyzed by both IBM AMOS v23.0 and SPSS v23.0. Additionally, Sobel (1982) and Baron and Kenny (1986) tests were also conducted for figure out the mediating effect of perceived corruption. The findings showed that individual perceived corruption statistically has a negative impact organizational performance among public organizations in Laos. In addition, job commitment and satisfaction played a crucial role in diminish individual perceived corruption among Lao public officers. Interestingly, the finding of this research indicated that job motivation insignificantly relates to individual perceived corruption and this was contradictory with original assumption on the relationship between job motivation and perceive corruption. Another significant finding in this research was that perceived corruption can partially mediate the positive relationship between job commitment and satisfaction and organizational performance. Managerial implications will be next introduced. Finally, the research limitations and suggestions for the future research are indicated and explained respectively.