Organizational commitment

Marketing

Crisis communication

Context (archaeology)

Feeling

2019-20 coronavirus outbreak

Biology

Social psychology

Public relations

Organizational communication

Virology

Tourism

Hospitality industry

Anger

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)

Outbreak

Business

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)

Paleontology

Psychology

Hospitality

Political science

Infectious disease (medical specialty)

Medicine

Disease

Pathology

International Journal of Hospitality Management

During a crisis, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, what managers communicate to their employees can greatly impact important organizational attitudes, such as organizational trust. There is, however, very little research focusing on the mechanisms explaining how managers' messages during a crisis can influence employees' organizational trust. To address this gap, the current study examined the role that emotions play in developing organizational trust using a 2 (following CDC norms vs. ignoring CDC norms) by 2 (employee focus vs. bottom-line focus) between-subjects factorial experiment, with COVID-19 as the context. The results showed that a manager's communication that followed the CDC social norms made employees feel grateful, whereas communication that ignored CDC social norms enhanced fear and anger toward the organization. The feelings of gratefulness and fear influenced organizational trust. These results provide important theoretical and practical implications for understanding organizational trust during a crisis.

Organizational trust in times of COVID-19: Hospitality employees’ affective responses to managers’ communication