SUCCESSFUL INDIVIDUALS WITH HIGH LEVELS OF JOB SATISFACTION - Essay Example

?SUCCESSFUL INDIVIDUALS WITH HIGH LEVELS OF JOB SATISFACTION Introduction Job satisfaction is a topic that has been discussed in several human resource and labour related literature. The reason for this and the importance of such studies have always been to draw the line between employee job satisfaction and organisational growth and development. A relatively trend in these studies and literature works however is that not much has been studied into finding factors that bring about job satisfaction, but the gutters have been jumped into discussing the impact of job satisfaction on growth and development. In this essay therefore, the existing gap is closed by critically outlining key factors that must be put in place within various types of organisations to ensure that there is job satisfaction (Yi and Gong, 2008). This is done from the perspective of four individuals, whose stories are used as a case study. Job Design and Job Satisfaction Job satisfaction is a very qualitative and subjective labour principle, as different people seek different opportunities and factors within their work structure to make them satisfied (Yoo, 2002). But as varying and different as job satisfaction may be to different people, one fact remains that job satisfaction comes from within the job that one does and this is where characteristics of the job comes to play. Depending on the characteristics of a given job, employees may be more comfortable working in the premise of that job. Yoo (2002) identified two of these characteristics as autonomy and variety, all of which are exhibited in the stories of the successful people presented. Yoo (2002) was however quick to add that there is always the need to ensure that the job characteristics that prevails is defined by the job design in place for workers. These job designs include are nature of job, employee engagement, and business success. Wofford and Liska (2003) has explained that one crucial characteristic of job is variety. By this, meaning is given to the need for the workplace to present the employee with non-static but differential task scope that ensures that employees always have something new to explore at the workplace. This means that the variety of job that a person does go a long way to determine and influence the level of job satisfaction that will be recorded. Clearly, each of these people works in top enviable organizations that have many different departments and units that offer variety and challenge to exploring new opportunities for every up and coming young executive. As stated by Clark, there are numerous people looking for the kind of job that he does. The same can be said for Kurtz and Bishop, whose jobs take them to various places of the world and makes them enjoy the luxury of travelling from one airplane to the other. Clearly, when the characteristic of the job of a person puts him or her in such a position where there is internal satisfaction as to the variety of work that is done, such person is likely to gain job satisfaction. What is more, there are very high levels of autonomy for each of these workers. The question of ‘when and how tasks are done’ have been said to be very instrumental in job design (Ramsey and Sohi, 1997). Generally, autonomy comes to play when employees are given sufficient room to operate and manipulate the movement and direction of their jobs (Netemeyer et al, 2007). Once this is done job satisfaction can be said to be guaranteed because it makes employees feel useful of themselves and evidentially become intrinsically motivated. Meanwhile, for all four individual read about, even though they are not the owners of the business they work for, they have very high levels of autonomy and are instrumental in the way and manner the businesses should move. A typical example of this is Clark who has the pleasure of promoting MTV all across the globe. Finally, as recommended by Yoo (2002), there is evidence from the story that the characteristics of job in place have been directly linked with job design. It would be noted that job design tries to answer the broader question of factors that affect work (Schlesinger and Zornitsky, 1991). In modern competitive global trading, the bargaining power of most companies remains the profits they make, which is a core determinant in the level of competition that they will be engaged in against other competitors. The quest for each of these individuals to see a business success or business growth that is rooted in amassment of profits is therefore a core source of job satisfaction that keeps them going. It is not for nothing that Tse maintains that she can easily count the days she did not want to go to work. Organisational Culture and Job Satisfaction The organizational culture of any organization or company is very instrumental and relevant in determining ways in which several organizational decisions and interactions are undertaken. For example, the organizational culture of a particular company can determine the nature of employee to employee communication, employee to employer communication, and employee to customer communication (Sujan, Weitz and Kumar, 1994). Largely so, organizational cultures are important in defining the character and temperature of an organization, and to differentiate it from other competitors. For most customers to be satisfied with a particular company, they must first be satisfied with the organizational culture that prevails in the organization (Pereay, Dellaert and De Ruyter, 2004). For Citigroup, the culture of being informal and casual in business operations has been identified as one major cultural dimension that has determined the company’s way of conducting business (Mano and Oliver, 2003). In often cases, the employee of a company is the epitome of the organization’s culture. What this implies is that organizations manifest their cultural dimension through their employees. Reading through the case of Bishop of Citigroup’s global energy team in New York, there is a clear manifestation of this fact. It has earlier been mentioned that autonomy as an important characteristic of job determines the degree to which employee satisfaction will be achieved. The relationship employee satisfaction and the cultural dimension of casual and informal attitude towards work are clearly exhibited in the way in which the satisfying element of autonomy is displayed by Bishop. For example, it is noticed that Bishop works outside of what may be referred to as the normal office times, having the need to be at a conference call at 6:00pm. This is clearly not an official way of doing office work but at Citigroup, workers have the autonomy to decide the best times they function effectively, as long as it does not conflict with what their customers want (Robinson and Morrison, 2005). Happily, there are studies to show that this cultural manifestation goes down very well with customers of the company, especially international customers who do business with the Citigroup global energy team in New York but have different time zone from New York (McKee, Simmers and Licata, 2006). On the question of how the organizational culture of Citigroup brings about job satisfaction to employees like Bishop, it would be noted that the kind of liberal, casual and informal culture practiced by the company makes it possible for the success element of autonomy and variety to be attained. That is to say that employees are best engaged within time frames that best suits them, for which they will have no complains of the need to attain to work. In most companies where autonomy and variety are lacking, some of the excuses that have been given are that there are no right times within the normal working season for employees to be made to take charge of job demands (Stone and Hollenbeck, 1989). Offering such people what may seem like informal working hours to explore themselves within the organization is certainly the best way of promoting employee engagement. Meanwhile, when employees are engaged, be it through formal means or informal means, they have a great sense of usefulness of themselves, making them highly satisfied at the jobs (Staw and Ross, 2005). Personality and Job Satisfaction Clearly, the jobs of these people, that demands from them 80 hours and above a week it certainly demanding, challenging and stressful. Unfortunately, the need to work these 80 hours or not does not depend on the workers, neither was it created by them. Rather, it is a part of their organizational climate, of which they must respond to (Brief and Motowidlo, 2006). In such cases where a person’s attitude does not determine or drive the direction of the work, but it is the work that drives the attitude of the worker, it is said that it is important to have a reinforcement that would make one fit (Iedema and Poppe, 2001). One of such reinforcements is personality. There cannot be much argument about the role that personality plays in responding to such tasking jobs. This is because personality ensures that a person develops an adaptable and touch skin towards the demand that the work brings. Without personality, it will just not be able to fit into a very demanding organization as the individuals in the case find themselves. Using the Big 5 Personality Traits as a typical example, there are various personality traits among the individuals that can be pointed to as being the driving force with which they have been able to cope with the stress of their job design. Openness to experience is one of such factor within the personality trait that most of these individuals have exhibited. With the level of demand and time that their works take from them, one would expect that Bishop, Tse, Kurtz, and Clark would make negative and derogatory remarks about their jobs. However, the openness to experience that these people posses, making them intellectually curious have enabled them to make comforting statement, regarding, their situations as not being the worse in the world (Homburg and Giering, 2001). Kurtz is for instance quick to take consolation from his girlfriend, whiles Clark appreciates how fortunate he is to be doing the kind of job he is doing as other people would gladly embrace his position if he gives it up. Indeed, the level of openness to experience make these people not open to abstractions but being present to ensure that work is done in a manner they most desire. The second personality trait that can be discussed in relation to the four individual, though not as something they possess, but something they dispossess is neuroticism. Generally, neuroticism is associated with the likelihood that a person will easily become emotional destabilised (Brown and Lam, 2008). For such people, they have difficulty handling stress and cannot work under much pressure. They also become upset, irritated and change mood easily (Hoyle and Panter, 1995). Clearly, with the demand of travelling across the globe, answering numerous emails and messages, and waking up to check on stocks, there is no way that a person with neuroticism can cope. It is there because of the absence of this personality trait in the way in which these people go about their duties that they have been able to surmount the pressures of their work and seen success for themselves. Outcomes of Job Satisfaction Once job satisfaction prevails, it is expected that several other areas and aspects of organisation controls and systems will be affected. One of these ways is in terms of performance. As it has been outlined earlier, a core factor that brings job satisfaction to these people is organisational success. In effect, once they feel satisfied in their jobs, they would want to continue to push harder to either better the existing levels of success or to maintain it (Livingstone, Roberts and Chonko, 1995). Meanwhile, in a competitive market such as the ones that these individuals find themselves in, the only guarantee on success that cannot be challenged is high levels of performance (Lengnick-Hall et al, 2000). Especially with a person like Clark realising and stating that there are people out there who would want to be in his place, he is clearly going to increase his performance so as to ensure that he earns the appreciation of his superiors. The same applies to the others who would not be ready loss out on their satisfying jobs and so will perform better to be loved by their superiors. Apart from performance, job satisfaction also is very influential on perceived organisational support. Here, perceived organisational support will be defined as the level to which the organisations that these individual belong to assist employees in achieving their personalised roles and goals within the organisation (Gremler and Gwinner, 2000). For this, the levels of expenditure outflows that the various organisations make in the daily routines of their employees are a justification that there is enough organisational support. As much as one may argue that the eventual benefactor of the expenditure of the company is the employer, it is also good to realise and appreciate the fact that there are also employee level successes that each employee wants to attain in order to be satisfied (Brady and Cronin, 2001). In some organisations and companies, there is conflict of interest between employers and employees on the achievement of employee level success, leading to withdrawn organisational support (Hartline and Ferrell, 1996). But clearly, this cannot be the case for the four people as they seem to have every support they need from their employers and managers, both intrinsically and extrinsically. In terms of intentions of the employees to leave, definite statement can be made to the effect that that is the last thing that would come to the mind of any of them. Studies by Groth (2005) actually show that job satisfaction increases employee retention by over 60%. The rational meaning that this finding could have on the four people is that they would really want to remain in their positions and continue to impact their services and experience to the organisation. Moreover, they would want to consolidate the levels of job satisfaction they currently enjoy since change of job does not necessarily guarantee success with job satisfaction. If the statement by Tse is anything to go by, she is not really to miss a day off work, let alone miss her entire position. Clark also is weary of the worth of opportunity he has been presented with, of which when he losses, others will graciously pick up and so he will certainly not loss it. Lessons Learned There are several implications that the case presented, as well as the discussions had so far had on professional human resource practice. For example, managers have a lot to learn with it comes to the value of personality, job design and organisational culture, and its effect on job satisfaction. Generally, it will be appreciated that job satisfaction brings about growth and development to any organisation (Dolen et al, 2002). However, for such levels of satisfaction to take place, it is important that all three values listed are fulfilled (Ganesan and Weitz, 1996). In terms of personality, the lesson that can be learned is that personality is something that is acquired or developed directly by the employee. To this end, the best moments of their works that, managers and other employers should look out for personality is at the time of recruiting and placing workers. There must be a rigorous system that understudies the kind of personality that candidates possess and compares these to the aims, visions, missions, and aspirations of the organisation. Where the personality of candidates cannot help in the realisation of organisational goals, they must not be made to fit in. Again, it will be learned that organisational culture and job design are both elements that can be built or designed based on the ideologies of managers and employers. To this end, it is always important that managers and employers create room for employee engagement, business success and conducive working atmosphere that can be comforting and welcoming to all manner of employees. As often as possible however, there must be assessment of employees to understand and appreciate the level to which they are making good use of opportunities presented to them. As much as these individuals accept the work they do and have not made any publicly known complains about the long hours within which they work, it is still very important that managers consider the consequence that this could have on the workers and other employees in lower ranked positions or jobs. First and foremost, it is important to discuss the question of mentorship for those in lower ranks. In most cases when those at the top take up almost all the task within the department, what happens is that those in lower rank are denied the necessary hand-on training and practice they need in decision making (Dubinsky and Levy, 2009). This is because their superiors overshadow them in work functionality and decision making. In such cases, in the unfortunate event of a turnover at the top, filling in the vacuum created also becomes a very big blow to those at the lower rank because of the absence of sufficient mentorship. Another situation is that all attention on job design, job satisfaction and motivation becomes spent on those at the top, leaving those in lower ranks higher dissatisfied (Bagozzi and Yi, 2008). The dissatisfaction comes in because the higher level of employee engagement given to those at the top blocks the chance of those in lower ranks from getting any (Babin and Boles, 2006). In such situations employee turnover at the lower ranks becomes more because those downwards always have an urge of moving on to other places where they can be met with new challenges and given sufficient room to display what they have also got to offer (Anderson and Gerbing, 1988). References Anderson, J.C. and Gerbing, D.W. 1988, “Structural equation modeling in practice: a review and recommended two-step approach”, Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 103 No. 3, pp. 411-23. Babin, B.J. and Boles, J.S. 2006, “The effects of perceived co-worker involvement and supervisory support on service provider role stress, performance and job satisfaction”, Journal of Retailing, Vol. 72 No. 1, pp. 57-75. Bagozzi, R.P. and Yi, Y. 2008, “On the evaluation of structural equation models”, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Vol. 16 No. 1, pp. 74-94. Dolen, W.V., Lemmink, J., Ruyter, K.D. and Jong, A.D. 2002, “Customer-sales employee encounters: dyadic perspective”, Journal of Retailing, Vol. 78, pp. 265-79. Dubinsky, A.J. and Levy, M. 2009, “Influence of organizational fairness on work outcomes of retail salespeople”, Journal of Retailing, Vol. 65, April, pp. 221-52. Ganesan, S. and Weitz, B.A. 1996, “The impact of staffing policies on retail buyer job attitude and behaviors”, Journal of Retailing, Vol. 72 No. 1, pp. 31-56. Gremler, D. and Gwinner, K. 2000, “Customer-employee rapport in service relationships”, Journal of Service Research, Vol. 3 No. 1, pp. 82-104. Groth, M. 2005, “Customers as good soldiers: examining citizenship behaviors in internet service delivery”, Journal of Management, Vol. 31, pp. 7-27. Hartline, M.D. and Ferrell, O.C. 1996, “The management of customer-contact service employees: an empirical investigation”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 60, October, pp. 52-70. Brady, M.K. and Cronin, J.J. Jr 2001, “Some new thoughts on conceptualizing perceived service quality: a hierarchical approach”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 65, pp. 34-49. Brief, A.P. and Motowidlo, S.J. 2006, “Prosocial organizational behavior”, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 11, pp. 710-25. Brown, S.P. and Lam, S.K. 2008, “A meta-analysis of relationships linking employee satisfaction to customer responses”, Journal of Retailing, Vol. 84 No. 3, pp. 243-55. Homburg, C. and Giering, A. 2001, “Personal characteristics as moderators of the relationship between customer satisfaction and loyalty – an empirical analysis”, Psychology & Marketing, Vol. 18 No. 1, pp. 43-66. Hoyle, R. and Panter, A. 1995, “Writing about structural equation models”, in Hoyle, R. Ed., Structural Equation Modeling, Concepts, Issues, and Applications, Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA, pp. 100-19. Iedema, J. and Poppe, M. 2001, “The effect of selfpresentation on social value orientation”, Journal of Social Psychology, Vol. 134 No. 6, pp. 771-82. Lengnick-Hall, C.A., Claycomb, V. and Inks, L.W. 2000, “From recipient to contributor: examining customer roles and experienced outcomes”, European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 34 Nos 3/4, pp. 359-83. Livingstone, L.P., Roberts, J.A. and Chonko, L.B. 1995, “Perceptions of internal and external equity as predictors of outside salespeople’s job satisfaction”, Journal of Personal Selling & Sales Management, Vol. 15, Spring, pp. 33-46. McKee, D., Simmers, C.S. and Licata, J. 2006, “Customer self-efficacy and response to service”, Journal of Service Research, Vol. 8, pp. 207-20. Staw, B.M. and Ross, J. 2005, “Stability in the midst of change: a dispositional approach to job attitude”, Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 70, pp. 469-80. Stone, E.F. and Hollenbeck, J.R. 1989, “Clarifying some controversial issues surrounding statistical procedures for detecting moderator variable: empirical evidence and related matters”, Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 74 No. 1, pp. 3-10. Sujan, H., Weitz, B.A. and Kumar, M. 1994, “Learning orientation, working smart, and effective selling”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 58, July, pp. 39-52. Mano, H. and Oliver, R.L. 2003, “Assessing the dimensionality and structure of the consumption experience: evaluation, feeling, and satisfaction”, Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 20, December, pp. 451-66. Netemeyer, R.G., Boles, J.S., McKee, D.O. and McMurrian, R. 2007, “An investigation into the antecedents of organizational citizenship behaviors in a personal selling context”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 61, July, pp. 85-98. Pereay, M.T., Dellaert, B.G.C. and De Ruyter, K. 2004, “What drives consumers to shop online? A literature review”, International Journal of Service Industry Management, Vol. 15, pp. 102-21. Ramsey, R.P. and Sohi, R.S. 1997, “Listening to your customer: the impact of perceived salesperson listening behavior on relationship outcomes”, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Vol. 25, Spring, pp. 127-37. Robinson, S.L. and Morrison, E.W. 2005, “Psychological contracts and OCB: the effects of unfulfilled obligations on civic virtue behavior”, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. 16 No. 3, pp. 289-98. Schlesinger, L.A. and Zornitsky, J. 1991, “Job satisfaction, service capability, and customer satisfaction: an examination of linkages and management implications”, Human Resource Planning, Vol. 14, pp. 141-50. Wofford, J.C. and Liska, L.Z. 2003, “Path-goal theories of leadership: a meta-analysis”, Journal of Management, Vol. 19 No. 4, pp. 857-76. Yoo, B. 2002, “Cross-group comparison”, Psychology & Marketing, Vol. 19, pp. 357-68. Yi, Y. and Gong, T. 2008, “If employees ‘go the extra mile’, do customers reciprocate with similar behavior?”, Psychology & Marketing, Vol. 25 No. 10, pp. 961-86. Read More