Employee Attitudes and Work-Related Behaviour - Essay Example

Employee attitudes and work related behaviour Name Course Instructor Date Introduction Employee attitude and work-related behaviour has been an ongoing challenge for the contemporary manager. Over the years, considerable research has been carried out in order to ascertain the connection between an employee’s job-related attitudes for instance job satisfaction, organisational commitment and how they influence job performance. An employee attitude towards their job is usually influenced by job satisfaction which in turn determines their job commitment. Most employees usually harbour different points of view regarding their jobs and the organisations that they work with. Job satisfaction refers to an enjoyable or an affirmative arousing status that arises after an evaluation of an individual’s job or career experience (Saari & Judge 2004). While evaluating job satisfaction, an employee’s feelings come into play and thus trigger a mental thought process that usually evaluates the entire job experience. To this extent, job satisfaction can be simply defined as a specific way that explains how individuals feel or consider their employment and how they relate to the diverse characteristics of their jobs (European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions 2007). Job satisfaction usually leads to organisational commitment because when one is satisfied, they usually want to identify with the organisation that they are working with. Moreover, job satisfaction often creates in them a strong longing that make them want remain with their organisations and thus push forward its principles, goals and aspirations (Tella, Ayeni & Popoola 2007). This paper is aimed at establishing how employee attitudes and work related behaviour is an ongoing concern for the contemporary manager. Employee attitudes and job satisfaction are usually caused by several other factors. In many organisations, the work situation is usually a major contributing factor that greatly influences the employee’s attitude and job satisfaction. Most human resource departments identify with this and know that with the correct programs that enable the creation of a suitable working environment, the employees’ attitudes toward their employment can be greatly influenced (Saari & Judge 2004). Moreover, effectual organizational practices can also positively influence employees’ attitudes and in so doing inform their job satisfaction. Research shows that personality as a factor has been very crucial in manipulating an employee’s attitude. An employee’s attention to detail and extraversion are usually essential in determining their attitude and hence their disposition towards job satisfaction (Judge, Heller & Mount 2002). In such cases, an employer’s commitment in selecting the employees is usually essential. Even though organisations cannot straight forwardly influence their employees personality, attitudes and behaviours, they can show a commitment by recruiting individuals that are well matched with the job descriptions available because this often helps in developing job satisfaction. Relationship between job satisfaction, organisational commitment and job performance In any organisation, these three aspects, which usually influence employee attitudes, are linked to each other. Many organisations usually invest in their employees because they seen as the foundation of quality production within the organisation. In this regard, the employees and the organisation are usually identical and thus much is usually done to ensure that much is invested in the employees because they are the organisation (Tella, Ayeni & Popoola 2007). Through the employees, an organisation usually ensures that it realizes its objectives, and this is usually facilitated by how effective and committed an organisation is to its employees. Effective organisations often ensure that a sense of collaboration exists between the organisation and its employees, and through such avenues, an atmosphere of organisational commitment and job satisfaction is usually created. When job satisfaction and organisational commitment has been achieved, job performance is usually enhanced because the employees are happy and thus do everything within their power to ensure that the organisation prospers. For job satisfaction, organisational commitment and job performance to exist within an organisation, a lot of motivation is usually required in order to make the employees feel that they are at ‘home’ in the said organisation. Research has it that motivation can easily influence the employees’ attitudes and behaviour thus making them commit their futures to the organisation. According to Judge, Thoresen, Bono and Patton (2001), job satisfaction is directly related to job performance because an employee’s motivation and satisfaction is usually reflected in their level of output. They further their argument by asserting that happy and contended employees are usually industrious, thus concluding that job satisfaction directly influences performance. When this happens, an employee’s commitment to the organization is usually guaranteed because they always want to be linked with the success of their organization and thus they strive in their performance in order to achieve their goals, which are mostly in line with the organisations. Change in organizations and its influence on job satisfaction and organizational commitment In today’s organizations, change has been a consistent feature. Trends, for instance globalization, social change, technology and diversity have been major drivers of change in many organizations. As an effect of these changes, many organizations have turned to their employees and now view them as essential business drivers (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development 2013). As an after effect, organizations now expect much from their employees because they now view them as their human capital and thus essential in ensuring that organizations are still productive and marketable. Many organizations have now realized the importance of the human capital and are using it maximally in order to ensure that they accomplish their values and goals. This has greatly reduced the employees to a level that they are expected to anticipate what their employers require of them and thus ensure that they deliver on that. In this regard, employees have been forced to establish a relationship between their attitudes and behaviours in order to ensure that their performance matches the employer’s expectations (CIPD 2013). As change keeps taking shape in organisations, and with the presence of economic meltdowns that have been affecting organisations as a result of globalisation, many employees have found themselves working part-time or temporarily. This has made it a little bit harder for them to raise their performance to their optimum best because they have the fear of being laid off because organisations are downsizing. Moreover, organisational commitment and job performance are being a farfetched achievement because most organisations are outsourcing, and thus in order to attain the organisational goals, unyielding job descriptions are usually put in place. With the shifting markets, expertise and goods, the customers are slowly becoming more and more demanding and thus more pressure is being put on the human capital to ensure that these needs are met. This pressure often makes employees feel like they are being used as a means to an end and thus it becomes hard for them to commit to the organisation. To this extent, change is usually a major hurdle to organisations because it often affects an organisation’s values, technique of administration and the employee’s attitudes and behaviours (Rashid, Sambasivan & Rahman 2004). Moreover, employees often take change differently; some are usually opposed to it while others embrace it. To effectively manage change, handling the human element of the organisation is usually essential because if it is embraced, the other facets of the organisation often fall in place. Specific factors and their influence on employee’s job satisfaction and organisational commitment An employee’s personal characteristics often affect their job satisfaction and hence their organisational commitment because diverse individuals are usually interested or motivated by different things. According to Franek and Vecera (2008), an individual’s level of education has been a contributing factor with effect to how they react to satisfaction and commitment. As employees advance in education, so does their job satisfaction levels and subsequently their organisational commitment because education often comes with a certain level of prestige, opportunities and ambitions which push them to want more. Moreover, Franek and Vecera found that age was another trait that affected employee commitment and satisfaction. Research has it that as employees age, their desires and aspirations change and in so doing influence their performance. As individuals age, they become more dissatisfied with their jobs because some find that their aspirations may not be met thus reducing their job satisfaction and organisational commitment. In most cases, personal and job characteristic cannot be easily told apart but they both influence an individual’s job satisfaction and their commitment to their organisations. Research shows that teamwork, candidness, workplace assertiveness and the general work drive influence job satisfaction and organisational attachment (Lounsbury, Moffitt & Drost 2010). The salary and the challenges of the job under study were the other factors that determined an employee’s job satisfaction and commitment. Research has it that pay and the hurdles involved in doing organisational duties were major factors employees’ considered and thus it resulted in huge employee turnovers (Burke 2002). Burke argues that since the information technology industry has challenging jobs, the employee turnover was very high. Employees usually expect their supervisors to treat them with formality and respect at the workplace even if they have position and personal power. Fair treatment in an organisation is not usually founded on how an organisation treats an employee but rather on the employee’s feelings about the treatment. An employee’s point of view regarding interactional justice usually influences their attitudes, behaviours, job satisfaction and organisational commitment (Janssens, Sels & Van den Brande 2003). Researchers are of the view that any alleged unjust treatment on the part of the management should be effectively handled by the organisation because how such issues will be handled will inform the employees’ behaviours and attitudes (Kennedy, Homant & Homant 2004). Literature argues that supervisors who push the workers too far or expect more than they can deliver under the prevailing situation often leave the employees strained. Poon (2003) is of the idea that a strained employee will attain a negative attitude towards the organisation; a case that usually result in job dissatisfaction, reduced organisational commitment, unexplainable absenteeism from duty and unpunctuality. According to Lambert (2004), an employee’s work environment usually affects their attitudes, behaviours and thus has a bearing on their job satisfaction and organisational commitment. For an environment to give an employee job satisfaction, it should adequately satisfy their needs, aspirations and desires. If the environment fails to satisfy their needs, the employees are usually withdrawn, attain negative attitudes and the organisational commitment is usually limited because they feel that they should be somewhere better where they can meet their values, goals and desires. The responsibilities to be performed, the duties that one has at the place of work and the incentives that come with accomplishment often define the work environment and thus if an employee feels that their needs have been taken care of, they often find satisfaction in their jobs and thus develop an organisational commitment. When organisations hire employees, they often hire those that they believe are best suited to perform the expected tasks. An organisation’s human resource department is usually essential because it often influences the employee’s behaviours and attitudes thus informing their job satisfaction and organisational commitment. In order to ensure that employees attain job satisfaction, most HR departments often organise training sessions to enhance what they know so as to ensure that their workers can adequately deal with the workplace changing trends. Moreover, some ensure that they put in place a reward structure that often enables the organisation to reward the best performing groups and individuals thus increasing group and individual effort towards goal attainment. Others ensure that there are employee promotions and that they are done on merit (Sial, Jilani, Imran & Zaheer 2011). Through such measures, HR department are usually out to ensure that their employees are fully satisfied thus and in so doing are able to retain them. An HR department that makes sure that it taps into an employee’s motivation and maximally utilises the employees’ talent pool while ensuring that in return the employee is fully satisfied, often reaps the benefits (Liu 2004). Conclusion In conclusion, an important role of a contemporary manager is to consciously work to build and sustain the job satisfaction and organisational commitment of their workforce. This is usually essential because it ensures that issues like employee absenteeism, withdrawal while at work and employee turnovers are eradicated. Contemporary managers need to ensure that the working environment, the organisational structures and practises, the HR departments and the reward schemes are in line with the aspirations and goals of the employees in order to influence their behaviours and attitudes hence impacting on their job satisfaction and organisational attachment. Ensuring that employees build a positive attitudes and behaviours is usually beneficial to the organisation because it is usually in line with its goals, values and objectives. This usually creates a satisfied employee, and as research literature asserts, a satisfied employee is usually productive, and this is profitable to the organisation because its quality of production will be doubled. To sum up, contemporary managers should ensure that the changing trends do not adversely affect the attitudes and behaviours of their employees because this will negatively impact on the production of their organisations. These managers can ensure a safe transition that factor in the attitudes of the employees because human capital is usually essential to all organisations. Since these managers acknowledge the fact that the human capital is usually a major hurdle in the implementation of change within organisations, it is essential for them to bring all the players on board so that everybody’s views are factored in the implementation process. All said and done, the employees job satisfaction and organisational commitment are usually essential because they can be used in the organisations interest to drive change because once employees attain positive attitudes, they are always ready to work towards the realisation or both personal and organisational goals. 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