Job design

About: Job design is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 9218 publications have been published within this topic receiving 426180 citations.

Factors Contributing to Job Satisfaction in Higher Education

Abstract: Introduction The extensive research that has been done on levels of job satisfaction may have distinctive applications to academic faculty. This is especially true when the separation between satisfaction and dissatisfaction is viewed in relation to the intrinsic and extrinsic characteristics of academic employment. In his well known motivational model, Herzberg (1987) makes some basic distinctions between intrinsic and extrinsic factors. The differentiations are founded on needs related to prime human characteristics, the ability to achieve and through that achievement to experience psychological growth. The dual factors arise from alternate needs that spring from basic animal nature, a drive to avoid pain from the environment and all the learned drives that are built on those basic needs. For example, an extrinsic factor, the drive to earn a good salary, is built upon the basic need of hunger. However, intrinsic factors such as responsibility and the satisfaction with work itself arise from the human ability to personally advance and grow. In the educational setting, intrinsic factors involve a direct link between faculty and their day to day routine, the actual performance of the job itself. "Intrinsic to the job are: the work itself, responsibility, and growth or achievement (Herzberg, 1987)." Herzberg's extrinsic or dissatisfaction-avoidance factors include organizational policy, status, pay, benefits, and overall work conditions. These factors comprise the background of one's work, the environment setting. Extrinsic factors less immediately affect the day to day job but are always in the background. As discovered by Rosenfeld and Zdep (1971), not all aspects of a job environment can be classified exclusively as intrinsic or extrinsic. They asked six industrial psychology professors to classify criterion items as being clearly intrinsic or extrinsic. Although there was agreement by all psychologist, on several items as being clearly intrinsic or extrinsic, many items were also classified as "neutral". Reflecting this finding, a new category of variables called "neutral" variables may be defined which reflect both the content and context of the job. In the setting of higher education, an example of a "neutral" variable would be the ability to influence institutional policy, since such influence would relate not only to intrinsic job aspects such as the type of student admitted to the institution, but also to extrinsic job aspects such as the number of classes taught by each instructor. Traditionally, a single scale has been used to measure both job satisfaction and job dissatisfaction. Usually, the high end of the scale measures complete satisfaction while the low end assesses complete dissatisfaction. A value in between suggests a level of less than complete satisfaction or dissatisfaction. This type of measure is a reflection of the prevailing view that job satisfaction and dissatisfaction are determined by the same group of factors. There is a vast literature in identifying these underlying factors. Some suggest that intrinsic rewards such as professional interest, job responsibility, psychological recognition, career advancement, skill utilization and development, enjoyment of work, and autonomy in decisionmaking are important determinants of both job satisfaction and dissatisfaction (Hanson, Martin, and Tuch, 1987; Kalleberg, 1977; Mortimer, 1979; Seybolt, 1976). Other researchers suggest that extrinsic rewards and factors such as monetary income, fringe benefits, job security, administrative policy, company reputation, job supervision, working conditions, and relationships with peers and management play a critical role in determining job satisfaction (Gruenburg, 1980; Seybolt, 1976). There is also evidence that both intrinsic and extrinsic factors are heavily influenced by the socio-demographic background of the worker (Glenn and Weaver, 1982; Gruenberg, 1980; Kalleberg, 1977; Kalleberg and Loscocco, 1983; Martin and Hanson, 1985; Martin and Shehan, 1989). …

Measures of Job Satisfaction

Abstract: Most taxonomies of "good jobs" and "bad jobs" are centred around pay and hours of work. This paper uses uses information on 7 000 workers in OECD countries (emanating from the 1989 wave of the International Social Survey Programme) to complement traditional measures of job quality with workersupplied information regarding a wide variety of characteristics of the current job. The responses to twenty different questions are collapsed into six summary variables measuring workers’ evaluations of: Pay; Hours of work; Future Prospects (promotion and job security); How hard or difficult the job is; Job content: interest, prestige and independence; and Interpersonal relationships (with co-workers and with management).An advantage of asking workers about these job attributes is that many of them, such as interpersonal relationships, job interest and job difficulty, are not measurable in the way that income and hours are. Another is that items may not have a linear relationship ...

Moving beyond job search quantity: Towards a conceptualization and self-regulatory framework of job search quality

Abstract: Job seeking is an important aspect throughout people’s careers. Extant theory and research has focused on one particular dimension of job search, that is, intensity/effort (i.e., job search quantity), posing that intensity/effort importantly affects employment success. The present conceptual paper extends job search theory by arguing for the importance of job search quality in explaining job search and employment success. We conceptualize job search quality as consisting of process quality and product/behavior quality, and propose that high-quality job search products/behaviors are more likely with a high-quality job search process. A four-phased cyclical self-regulatory model is presented, specifying the components of job search process quality. We build theory regarding the interrelations betweenqualitycomponents,theantecedentsandoutcomesofjobsearchquality,andthemoderators of theserelations. Thistheory offersnew and more detailedexplanations for previous findings,directions for future research, and practical guidelines regarding (re)employment success and services.

A social exchange theory framework for understanding the job characteristics–job outcomes relationship: the mediating role of psychological contract fulfillment

Abstract: This study integrated the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) model and concept of psychological contract fulfillment into a social exchange theory process framework to improve our understanding how and when job characteristics interact to influence job outcomes. Using survey data (n = 334), we found evidence to support our hypothesized relationships between job characteristics (job demands and job resources) and job outcomes (job satisfaction and organizational commitment); and the mediating role of psychological contract fulfillment (transactional and relational), such that when job resources (job control and support) were high, the negative effects of high job demands on psychological contract fulfillment were attenuated. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.