Organizational Behavior and Development

You have been working for Alpha Management for almost two years. You are in the office working on Sunday to prepare for an important meeting the next day. After putting some PowerPoint slides together, you decide to print a copy for review. You leave your office and make your way to the copy room, which serves as both a copy room and supply room. You can get common supplies (e.g., pens, paper, staples, etc.). Upon arriving to retrieve your copies, you notice your supervisor is in the copy/supply room. This seems a little unusual, especially since it’s a weekend and you thought you were the only one in the office. After some “˜professional small talk,’ you notice he has been putting a large quantity of office supplies in his laptop case. Before you can ask him what he’s doing, he quickly tells you that he has a home office where he does much of his weekend work. You have not heard of or seen a policy for taking office supplies home. He then tells you that if you need any extra supplies, you can just take them, since you are probably doing some work at home. You don’t take any supplies, but you thank him for the offer. As you leave the copy/supply room, you see him putting some of the supplies back on the shelves. On your drive home that afternoon, you think back to the situation, and it just makes you feel uncomfortable. You then start trying to convince yourself that it’s only pens and paper. Also, who knows, there may be some type of company policy that allows this. You then do some research within the company and find there is no policy for this. You go back to work on Monday, and the same supervisor comes to your office and asks how the rest of your weekend was; he has not done that before. What do you do? Do you report this activity through the chain of command? (He’s your direct supervisor.) Do you not report because it’s only small office supplies and, who knows, there may be some type of policy that allows this for home office use? Do you sit down with him and discuss the situation? Do you do nothing; it’s no real issue and it’s only pens and paper?