When customers become scapegoats: how negative gossip about organizational change can cause negative emotions and displaced aggression

Purpose Based on affective events theory, this research attempted to investigate how negative gossip about organizational change drives employees to experience negative emotions and direct their aggression toward customers. Design/methodology/approach We conducted a scenario-based experiment (Study 1) and a multiwave field survey (Study 2) to test our hypotheses. Findings The results show that (1) negative emotions mediate the relationship between change-related negative gossip and displaced aggression toward customers; (2) perceived organizational constraints strengthen the relationship between change-related negative gossip and negative emotions; (3) future work self-salience weakens the relationship between change-related negative gossip and negative emotions; and (4) change-related negative gossip has a strengthened (weakened) indirect effect on displaced aggression via negative emotions when employees have high perceived organizational constraints (future work self-salience). Originality/value The study expands research on organizational change and displaced aggression and provides practical implications for managing organizational change.