Comparing the motivations of Spanish and Finnish computer personnel with those of the United States

A survey of perceptions of IS personnel – managers, technical specialists and programmer/analysts – was conducted by the Association for Technical Information in Spain, using the JDS/DP, a modification of the job diagnostic survey instrument. Data were collected on fifteen job variables, related to four motivation aspects: job components, satisfaction levels, need for growth/achievement and goal participation/feedback. The results were compared with those of a similar survey for the same job types in Finland. Results were also compared with the norms developed for computer personnel in the USA. The survey revealed that personnel attracted to the computer field have a high need for growth and a low need for social interaction. It also revealed that the work itself was ranked highest among eleven motivating factors. For both Spain and Finland, the technical specialist job had a mis-match between the job's motivating potential and the employee's need for growth, compared with similar personnel in the USA. By examining the core job dimensions, managers can redesign the job to produce a match between these two major components of motivation.     

Training and experience as predictors of job satisfaction and work motivation when using computers: a correlational study

This paper examines the extent to which the previous work experience and method of training to use computer systems augment the predictability of the motivation and satisfaction of computer users. A sample of 154 computer users are studied, utilizing a version of the Job Diagnostic Survey questionnaire (Hackman and Oldham 1975). The job characteristics model upon which the questionnaire is based contends that the internal work motivation and general job satisfaction of job holders can be predicted from core job characteristics (task identity, task significance, skill variety, autonomy, and feedback from the job itself)- Results show that type of training and previous experience add little more to the job-holder's job satisfaction and internal work motivation than is predicted by the job characteristics model. The implications of the results for the management and staffing of computer-based systems are noted. Limitations of the data are recognized.     

Effects of individual characteristics,organizational factors and task characteristics on computer programmer productivity and job satisfaction

Several individual characteristics of computer programmers (self- esteem, level of experience, and mathematical aptitude); four organizational factors (perceived supervisory initiated structure, perceived supervisor consideration, perceived level of performance feedback, and perceived degree of participation in organizational decisions); and five task characteristics (skill variety, task variety, task significance, autonomy, and feedback) are related to computer programmer productivity and job satisfaction. Measurement was accomplished via questionnaires; least squares multiple regression was used to test the hypotheses.     

Impact of Lean Production on Perceived Job Autonomy and Job Satisfaction: An Experimental Study

Previous studies have indicated positive and negative effects of lean production on employees’ perceived work characteristics and job attitudes. The most detrimental consequence of lean production is a decrease in the perceived job autonomy of workshop employees. To reduce these negative consequences, we propose human resource practices for integration with lean production. Drawing on the job characteristics model, we hypothesized that the implementation of lean production combined with human resource practices would enhance perceived job autonomy, job satisfaction, and operational performance. To evaluate our hypotheses, we used an experimental design consisting of a simulation game that mimics a manufacturing company. We implemented lean production combined with human resource practices in this simulated company. The results indicated a significant increase in perceived job autonomy, job satisfaction, and operational performance. Moreover, the results revealed a positive relationship between job satisfaction and operational performance.     

Evaluating the motivating environment in Finland compared to the United States—a survey

A comparison was made of perceptions of IS personnel—especially of analysts, programmers and managers—on factors relating to motivation and goal setting in Finland and the United States. The JDS/DP, a modification of the job diagnostic survey instrument, was used to collect data in these locations. The survey covered a statistically unbiased and representative sample in both countries. The results indicated significant similarities between the two populations. Not only were individual characteristics of growth-need and social-need similar, but their perception of job-related variables were also quite similar. The only differences found were in the job satisfaction of technical experts and in the feed-back on goals in most job-categories, both of which were lower in the Finnish population. In addition, the growth-need perceptions in both populations are among the highest of all jobs measured by JDS. Therefore, computer personnel tend to be more like each other, regardless of their country and origin, than their own cultural counterparts. With this information, IS managers in both countries can use proven techniques, such as job characteristic theory, to improve the motivation of IS personnel.     

Workers' intrinsic work motivation when job demands are high: The role of need for autonomy and perceived opportunity for blended working

Work overload or work pressure may undermine workers' intrinsic motivation. In the present research, we tested the conditions under which this may (not) occur, including the perceived opportunity to blend on-site and off-site working through the effective use of computers and modern information and communication technology. Our sample consisted of 657 workers (51% female) representing a variety of industries. As hypothesized, it is not high job demands per se, but high demands in combination with a high need for autonomy and a lack of perceived opportunities for blended working that undermines intrinsic work motivation. When workers high in need for autonomy perceived opportunities for blended working, their intrinsic work motivation was not negatively affected by increasing job demands. This main finding suggests that, particularly for workers high in need for autonomy, the perceived opportunity for blended working is an effective, contemporary resource to cope with the increasing job demands typically observed in today's workplace. Theoretically, these findings contribute to the refinement and extension of influential demands-resource models and Person-Job Fit theory. Practically, our findings may show managers how to effectively keep workers intrinsically motivated and productive in their jobs when job demands are high.     

From Job Characteristics to Job Satisfaction of Foreign Workers in Taiwan's Construction Industry: The Mediating Role of Organizational Commitment

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationships among job characteristics, organizational commitment, and job satisfaction of foreign workers in Taiwan. Overall, 440 Thailand foreign workers were recruited and structural equation modeling was used to test the research hypotheses. The results of this study supported all proposed hypotheses. Job characteristics had a positive effect on job satisfaction of foreign workers. However, the results showed an indirect effect of job characteristics on job satisfaction via organizational commitment. Moreover, the findings suggested that job autonomy is better compared to other job characteristics. This study contributes to the existing literature by stressing the importance of such relationships in the cross‐cultural management enterprises, particularly those concerning foreign workers.     

Alternative date entry technologies and settings: Impact on worker attitudes and behavior

Changes in technology and the movement of key entry functions into user areas are altering the traditional work environment. These changes can effect worker attitudes and associated behaviors, such as absenteeism and productivity. This study examines the effect of differences in key entry settings and technologies on perceived job characteristics and worker attitudes and behaviors. The results are based upon a study of 350 operators working in 87 key entry environments drawn from 29 organizations. It is found that new technologies and the movement of key entry into user areas affect perceived task characteristics, including task significance, autonomy, and feedback from the job. Job satisfaction, worker motivation, absenteeism, and productivity are also influenced (but to a lesser degree) by changes in key entry technology and setting. The implications of the findings for the design of key entry equipment and jobs are discussed. The conclusion is drawn that designers of key entry technologies and environments will benefit from a knowledge of the dimensions comprising meaningful work.     

Data processing people — Are they satisfied/dissatisfied with their jobs?

Job satisfaction of 202 data processing personnel as assessed by the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire (MSQ) are presented. Comparisons of twenty job satisfaction levels are made for these DP personnel and other studies of accountants and engineers utilizing the MSQ. Satisfaction with Advancement and Compensation was particularly low for the DP personnel. When compared with accountants and engineers, these DP personnel consistently reported lower job satisfaction. DP operations personnel reported lower job satisfaction than the other DP functional groups.     

Which reduces IT turnover intention the most: Workplace characteristics or job characteristics?

Studies have shown that positive perceived job characteristics, such as job significance and task autonomy, tend to decrease IT personnel turnover intention. In addition, employee perception of their workplace characteristics may affect turnover. Few studies have examined this. We tested whether workplace characteristics – structural fairness, trust in senior management, employee information sharing, and job security – affected turnover intention as much as did job characteristics. We found that workplace characteristics out-predicted job characteristics. However, this was true only for programmer/analysts. The reverse was true for technical support personnel. Practical implications are discussed.     

Learning demand and job autonomy of IT personnel: Impact on turnover intention

Information technology jobs require a significant amount of learning to maintain currency and perform expected activities, more so than in many other professions. The sheer volume of learning can increase work exhaustion, with a negative effect on turnover. However, jobs can be designed to provide a large amount of autonomy over pace and process in the hands of the IT employee. According to job demand and control models, the ability of an employee to pace oneself and make task decisions can lessen negative impacts. From another perspective, IT employees differ in their desires to learn as part of personal and career growth. Thus, negative effects of learning demand should be lessened by the IT employee’s motivation to learn, and motivation is a crucial antecedent in turnover models. A model based on the job demand-control model establishes and tests these relationships and finds them to hold in a sample of 306 IT employees. Work exhaustion is reduced by instilling job autonomy in the presence of learning demands and motivation, which then lessens turnover intentions of the IT workers.     

The reasons for turnover of information systems personnel

The study examines the effects of the individual characteristics, job type, role stressors, boundary spanning activities, career outcomes, and job characteristics on the turnover propensity of 464 information systems personnel. Results show that age, organizational level, organizational tenure, job tenure, and number of years in the computer field are negatively correlated with the intention to leave the organization. Education was found to be positively correlated with turnover intentions, and while project leaders are more likely to leave the organization, IS managers are less likely. Results also show that both role stressors (role ambiguity and role conflict) and boundary spanning activities are positively correlated with turnover intentions, and that job involvement, career plateau, promotability, salary, organizational commitment, job satisfaction, satisfaction with progress, promotion, pay, status, and projects are negatively correlated while career opportunity is positively correlated with turnover intentions. Finally, all job characteristics are negatively correlated with turnover intentions. Implications of the results for practice and research are offered.     

A confirmatory factor analysis of IS employee motivation and retention

It is widely recognized that the relationships between organizations and their IS departments are changing. This trend threatens to undermine the retention of IS workers and the productivity of IS operations. In the study reported here, we examine IS employees’ motivation and intent to remain using structural equation modeling. A survey was conducted among existing IS employees and analyzed with LISREL VIII. Results showed that latent motivation has an impact on latent retention, with job satisfaction and perceptions of management on career development as indicator variables for the former, and burnout, loyalty, and turnover intent as indicator variables for the latter. Implications for management in developing strategies for the retention of IS employees are provided.     

Work organization and Low back pain in nursing personnel

Nursing personnel are at a high risk from occupational low back injury. Work organization has been suggested as one factor playing a part in the aetiology of occupational low back pain. Baseline data for a prospective epidemiology study were gathered by means of a questionnaire. One part of the questionnaire elicited characteristics of work organization, perceived autonomy, the relationship with head nurse and satisfaction in the relationship with co-workers. Information on history of musculoskeletal problems, reported frequency of lifting and personal characteristics was also gathered. Of 787 nursing staff at two acute care hospitals, 154 (19-6%) reported troublesome low back pain occurring within the previous 6 months. From univariate analyses, such characteristics of work organization as shift, type of schedule and primary versus functional nursing were not associated with low back pain. The relationship with head nurse and perceived autonomy of the job also were not related to recent back pain. Recent low back pain was significantly associated with younger age, the job category ‘registered nurse’ and greater satisfaction in relationships with co-workers. These associations were confirmed in multivariate analysis. None of the work organization factors examined, with the exception of satisfaction with co-workers, were associated with back pain in this study. Moreover, the positive association of satisfaction with coworkers suggests that interventions to improve working relationships may not be helpful in prevention programmes. To some extent, these results are susceptible to biases resulting from selective attrition from nursing and selective participation in the study.     

A strategy for improving worker satisfaction and job attitudes in a repetitive industrial task: application of production standards and performance feedback

Worker satisfaction improved significantly as a consequence of the provision of the assigned and participative standards with performance feedback in a repetitive industrial production task. The maximum improvement in worker satisfaction was found for the participative standard and feedback condition. Only this condition had a significant positive effect on worker job attitudes. Monetary incentive, when provided with an assigned or participative standard with feedback, added no incremental worker satisfaction or job attitudes gain. The participative standard with feedback condition emerges as the optimum strategy for improving worker satisfaction and job attitudes in a repetitive industrial production task.     

A model of job satisfaction for collaborative development processes

Modern software development relies on collaborative work as a means for sharing knowledge, distributing tasks and responsibilities, reducing risk of failures, and increasing the overall quality of the software product. Such objectives are achieved with a continuous share of the programmers’ daily working life that inevitably influences the programmers’ job satisfaction. One of the major challenges in process management is to determine the causes of this satisfaction. Traditional research models job satisfaction with social aspects of collaborative work like communication, work sustainability, and work environment.This study reflects on existing models of job satisfaction in collaborative environments, creates one for modern software development processes, and validates it with a retrospective comparative survey run on a sample of 108 respondents. In addition, the work investigates the impact on job satisfaction and its model of the agile practice of Pair Programming that pushes job sharing to the extreme. With this intent, the questionnaire also collected feedback from pair programmers whose responses were used for a comparative analysis. The results demonstrate that Pair Programming has actually a strong positive effect on satisfaction, work sustainability, and communication.     

Perceptions of equity,job satisfaction,and intention to quit among data processing personnel

More than 1,200 personnel (963 systems analysts and programmers and 261 operations employees) from nine companies provided questionnaire data on perceptions of fairness (equity), job satisfaction, and expressed intention to quit.Results disclosed that job satisfaction for both groups is significantly related to perceptions of equity in treatment by the supervisor and the employing organization. Fairness in providing latitude is the most significant individual variable in dealing with job satisfaction for both employee categories. Intention to quit is also strongly related to perceptions of equitable treatment. Fairness in rules for compensation is by far the most significant fairness element relating to intention to quit among both groups.The research shows that the key factors which affect job satisfaction and intention to quit are under the direct control of management.     

Job and organizational determinants of nursing home employee commitment,job satisfaction and intent to turnover

The purpose of this study was to examine whether job characteristics, the work environment, participation in quality improvement activities and facility quality improvement environment predicted employee commitment and job satisfaction in nursing homes, and whether those same predictors and commitment and satisfaction predicted turnover intention. A total of 6584 nursing home employees from 76 nursing homes in a midwestern state participated. A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect the data. The results supported the hypotheses that job and organizational factors predicted commitment and satisfaction while commitment and satisfaction predicted turnover intentions. The implications for retaining nursing home employees are discussed.     

Job characteristic perceptions of manual drafting and CADD: A field study of the effects of computerization on drafting & design personnel

The introduction of CADD equipment into an engineering department provided the opportunity to identify job characteristic perceptions of drafters and designers. Drafters and designers responded to a job characteristic questionnaire which asked them to describe their job twice, first when using manual drafting and second when using CADD. Because the CADD equipment was phased in over time, the questionnaire sampled personnel with varying experience levels. The job perceptions are compared between job technologies and across experience levels. Information on changes in job characteristic perceptions may be useful in designing systems which improve employee motivation, performance and satisfaction.     

Dimensions of Employee Satisfaction as Determinants of Organizational Commitment in the Hotel Industry

In today's dynamic environment, the role of employees and their level of organizational commitment are becoming increasingly important for business success, which is especially relevant for the service industry in general and for the tourism sector in particular because of problems associated with employee turnover, loyalty strategies with the customer, and so forth. Employee satisfaction is considered an essential ingredient for developing organizational commitment. The main purpose of this study is to analyze the influence of different facets of employee job satisfaction, that is, job conditions, reward system, relations with superiors and co‐workers, organizational human resources (HR) policies, on employees’ organizational commitment in the hotel industry. The research hypotheses are tested with a sample of 760 hotel employees on Gran Canaria, Spain. The results show the relevance of the working conditions, direct rewards, relationships with managers, and the HR policies in order to develop a high level of organizational commitment.