Illegitimate Absence of Tasks: A New Concept of Offense to The Self

Work identity is intimately tied to tasks, roles, and goals. Illegitimate tasks are an identity-relevant stressor that emanates from the stress-asoffense-to-self theory. Such tasks leave employees feeling like, "I should not have to do this!" because they violate normative prescriptions about what tasks can and cannot be expected to be completed in a given role or position. Illegitimate tasks contaminate norms associated with a given role or position; however, we argue that illegitimacy may also manifest in the absence of tasks one expects to undertake but which are not assigned. In this chapter, we introduce a new concept of illegitimacy, which we term the illegitimate absence of tasks (IAT); Specifically, we outline reasons for tasks being illegitimately unassigned and how these reasons dovetail into two forms or facets of IAT: unassigned tasks, that is, tasks which are not assigned to anyone within the team, workgroup, or organization; and tasks assigned to others, which represent tasks that do exist within the work setting, but are assigned to other people. We discuss apparent underpinnings in SOS theory, anticipated manifestations of work stress from 126IAT, and further boundary considerations. We then detail the differences between the IAT and other related stress concepts. Finally, we propose a survey measure for IAT and overview several research considerations both in terms of establishing the concept and questions that could be addressed given the current literature on illegitimate tasks and on work stress and occupational health more broadly.