Abstract Guanxi circle is a special social network structure in Chinese workplace, rooted from the special type of Chinese social categorization which is named ‘pattern of differences’. Based on indigenous psychology, this study has explored the mechanism of Chinese guanxi circles’ influence on organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) at individual level. As informal organizations, guanxi circles provide the role system and the norms based on interpersonal relationship, which is different from formal organization and rules. The empirical data was sampled from a hi-tech company which is funded by Taiwanese and located in Suzhou. In the survey, 18 departments had a response rate above 80%. After excluding invalid and incomplete answers, we eventually obtained 390 valid responses. The results show that different roles of circles have positive impact on OCB after controlling the effects of demographic variables and job satisfaction. OCB can facilitate the effective operation of organization and also help employees to balance his or her roles between the guanxi circle and the formal organization.
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