Attitudes and Job Satisfaction Written by Lise M. Saari and Timothy A. Judge - Article Example

ARTICLE CRITIQUE: “EMPLOYEE ATTITUDES AND JOB SATISFACTION” BY LISE M. SAARI AND TIMOTHY A. JUDGE By (Name) The Name of the Class (Course) Professor (Tutor) The Name of the School (University) The City and State where it is located The Date Article Critique: “Employee Attitudes and Job Satisfaction” by Lise M. Saari and Timothy A. Judge Introduction The article Employee Attitudes and Job Satisfaction written by Lise M. Saari and Timothy A. Judge in 2004 addresses the question whether happy employees are more productive or less productive. They attempt to answer this question by addressing what they term as practitioner knowledge gaps and giving recommendations on job satisfaction and employee attitudes. There are three major knowledge gaps related to employee attitudes and they include their causes, results of negative and positive attitudes and how they can be influenced and measured (Saari & Judge, 2004, p.395). In this paper, I will critically analyze the article Employee Attitudes and Job Satisfaction giving personal opinions on the strengths and weaknesses as regards to the research topic. Saari and Judge (2004, p.396) use job satisfaction to represent employee attitudes arguing that it is the most focal attitude of employees. Job satisfaction is described as the positive or pleasurable state of emotion that occurs when an employee appraises his/her job. An emphasis is placed on thinking, cognition, feelings and affect. Thinking and feeling are involved when people assess their jobs as they are related psychologically and biologically. In my view, job satisfaction can effectively represent employee attitudes because it represents the thinking and consequently the feelings of the employees. Job satisfaction has also been described as one of the important attitudes at the work place that influence human behavior. Other attitudes include job involvement, organizational commitment, and job, task and contextual performance (Hettiararchchi & Jayarathna, 2014, p. 76-77). Causes of Job Satisfaction and Employee Attitudes Saari and Judge (2004, p.396) argue that the disposition of the individual employees is an important factor of employee attitudes. People who show dissatisfaction in one job are more likely to be dissatisfied even if they change companies or jobs. The differences in disproportion, and adult and childhood temperament have been found to influence job satisfaction. This may be due to the emotional experiences at work that affect individuals, their perception of work and personality traits. This view is accurate in my opinion. Erol-Korkmaz (2010, p.5) also supports the argument by stating that genetic predispositions may exist where individuals persistently like or dislike their jobs. Other influences on job satisfaction are culturally oriented. Culture is a challenge to the human resource departments because it is influenced by globalization. Saari and Judge (2004, p.396) state that there are four cross cultural dimensions that influence attitudes including individualism-collectivism, risk taking verses uncertainty avoidance, unequal power distribution and femininity/masculinity. It is true that the culture influences the employee attitudes and this is supported by Erol-Korkmaz (2010, p.117) who states that cultural differences can be attributed to the differences in the perception of self, others and their interdependence. Work situation is also noted to be an important influence of employee attitudes and job satisfaction. The nature of the work is the most important influence on satisfaction. The extent to which a job is interesting and challenging has more influence on job satisfaction than the coworkers, promotion opportunities, pay and supervision. The nature of work is also described by its scope, variety and autonomy (Saari & Judge, 2004, p.397). The importance of the work is the last factor discussed by the authors of this article. While the nature of the work is an important factor the factors of job satisfaction should have been considered. Aziri (2011, p. 83) states that the organizations should consider the job description index factors which include promotion opportunities, coworker relations, attitudes towards the supervisors, compensation and benefits and the nature and importance of the work. The Consequences of Job Satisfaction Saari and Judge (2004, p.396) first discuss the relationship between job performance and job satisfaction under the consequences of job satisfaction. They state that most of the early research showed that there is a trivial relationship between the relationship between the attitudes of the employees and their performance. Later research showed that there is an important relationship if performance is re-defined to include organizational citizenship behavior and other performance appraisals with professional jobs having stronger relationships. The validity of this argument is confirmed by Hettiararchchi and Jayarathna (2014, p. 74) in their statement that low performance is unlikely to be associated with satisfied and committed employees and that attitudes influence the work-related behavior. The article also illustrates the interplay between life satisfaction and job satisfaction. The three forms of this relationship include spillover, where non-work life experiences and job experiences spill into each other; segmentation, where the experiences are separated and compensation, where one seeks satisfaction in one area to compensate for the dissatisfaction in the other. The most important form is the spillover (Saari & Judge, 2004, p.398-399). The authors here suggest that job satisfaction influences life satisfaction. The argument is supported by the argument by Erol-Korkmaz (2010, p.5) that the relationship between life and job satisfaction is linked to the stability of the predispositions of an individual towards dissatisfaction and satisfaction. Dissatisfied employees are more likely to show the signs of withdrawal than satisfied employees. Many studies support this argument showing that dissatisfied employees exhibit lateness, absenteeism, low turnover, and deciding to retire. Finally, Saari and Judge (2004, p.399) state that some researchers have been able to determine the financial impact of employee attitudes. This is the last consequence of employee attitude discussed by the authors and the effects are not comprehensively covered. The most appropriate approach in this article should have been to study the impact of employee attitudes on job performance, job involvement, and organizational commitment and job satisfaction (Hettiararchchi and Jayarathna (2014, p. 75). Measuring and Influencing Employee Attitudes The authors recognize two employee attitude survey measures that are validated. The Job Descriptive Index (JDI) assesses satisfaction regarding the work, supervision, coworkers, promotion and pay. The Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire (MSQ) is versatile with the availability of long and short forms. It gives overall measures and can be faceted. The authors suggest that organizations can measure the job satisfaction facets and use them to take and overall satisfaction measure and they can also use the overall questions on satisfaction (Saari & Judge, 2004, p.400). However, the authors do not describe the specific details of the survey measures to be taken. The authors could have for example recommended the JDI because it simple, the most commonly used and easily applicable (Aziri, 2011, p. 82). JDI also has many aspects which can be customized depending on the nature of the organization involved. Saari and Judge (2004, p.400) assert that for an organization to take appropriate action, it has to effectively analyze and interpret survey data. They recommend norm based comparisons because they effectively drive change by comparing the organization with the competition. Internal comparisons are also advocated for as they have the same effect as norm based comparisons. In my view, the authors do not give a clear guideline on how the data should be analyzed and interpreted. The authors should give options to take when the survey results are positive or negative. The authors also fail to mention the appropriate actions that should be taken. The International Public Management (IPMA-HR) (2006, p.11) states that the action planning and feedback are critical after analyzing the data. This can be achieved by sharing the results with the management and workers, consultations, determining the resources required, responsibilities and follow up. Closing the Knowledge Gaps One suggestion given by the authors in closing the gaps between practice and research is that the human resource practitioners should be more knowledgeable about the research and basic statistics. They argue that organizations today require human resource practitioners who can carry out effective employee attitude surveys, analyze the data and use it to improve employee attitudes (Saari & Judge, 2004, p.400). This suggestion is useful but limited in scope. The authors here only address human resource practitioners. In my opinion, the entire management of an organization should have knowledge of the research for it to be effective. However, the view of the authors is supported by (Aziri, 2011, p. 84) who states that Human resource managers must understand employee loyalty. Conclusion This paper has demonstrated that the article Employee Attitudes and Job Satisfaction gives various insights to the relationship between the attitudes and job satisfaction but it is not comprehensive. The authors effectively use job satisfaction to represent employee attitudes because it represents the thinking and feelings of the patients. The list of the factors that influence employee attitudes covered is not comprehensive, but it adequately covers disposition, culture and work situation. The authors also inadequately cover the consequences of employee attitudes. They mostly focus on its relationship to life satisfaction and employee withdrawal and fail to mention job performance, job involvement, and organizational commitment and job satisfaction. The recommendation for measuring employee attitudes as given by the authors is JDI and MSQ but the specifics of how they are to be used are not given. The authors do not give a clear guideline on how the data should be analyzed and interpreted. The authors finally suggest that human resource practitioners should be more knowledgeable in the research. I support their suggestion and also add the entire management should also be knowledgeable in that field. References Aziri, 2011. Job satisfaction: A literature review. Management Research and Practice, 3(4), pp: 77-86. Erol-Korkmaz, H., 2010. The relationship of categories of work events to affective states and attitudes in the workplace: a test of the affective events theory. Middle East Technical University, Available at [Accessed 9 SEP 2015]. Hettiararchchi, H. & Jayarathna, S., 2014. The effect of employee work related attitudes on employee job performance: A study of tertiary and vocational education sector in Sri Lanka. IOSR Journal of Business and Management, 16(4), pp. 74-83. International Public Management, 2006. Employee attitude surveys. IPMA-HR. Available at [Accessed 9 SEP 2015]. Saari, L. & Judge, T., 2004. Employee attitudes and job satisfaction. Wiley Periodicals, 43(4), pp. 395-407. Read More