Can’t shake office “Cold Violence” outside workplace: an investigation of how and when workplace ostracism affect employee work-to-family conflict

Workplace ostracism is a recognized work stressor with negative impacts on the victim’s work-related outcomes. However, its implications beyond the workplace have received limited attention, and the potential effect of workplace ostracism as a team climate remains understudied. Drawing on the work-home resources model, we aim to investigate whether the workplace ostracism employees face within their teams affects their individual perceptions of work-to-family conflict (WFC). We conducted a three-wave field survey among 48 teams (N = 431 employees) from various industries. We found that team-level workplace ostracism is positively related to employees’ WFC, and employees’ emotional exhaustion mediates the above relationship. Psychological resilience not only attenuates the negative influence of team-level workplace ostracism on emotional exhaustion, but also emotional exhaustion’s harmful impact on WFC. Moreover, a high level of psychological detachment buffers emotional exhaustion’ harmful impact on WFC, but fails to attenuate the negative influence of team-level workplace ostracism on individuals’ WFC. This study contributes to workplace ostracism literature by exploring workplace ostracism in team settings and its effect on team members’ outcomes beyond the workplace.