Defensive decision making: Operationalization and the relevance of psychological safety and job insecurity from a conservation of resources perspective

Defensive decision making occurs when the decision‐maker does not choose the option that is in the best interest of an organization or client but instead chooses a less effective but lower risk alternative that protects him or her in case something goes wrong. Such decisions are widespread across occupations and sectors and cause substantive damage to organizations. In a first step, we developed a scale to measure defensive decision making and...