Download topic 9: application of social psychology to job satisfaction.

TOPIC 9: APPLICATION OF SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY TO JOB
SATISFACTION.
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Social psychology provides many insights into the complex world of work.
Work Related Attitudes
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Attitudes concerning one’s own job or work are generally referred to by the term
job satisfaction(JS).
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J S refers to a range of very positive (high job satisfaction) to very negative (low
job satisfaction / high job dissatisfaction) (Halin, 1991).
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In contrast, attitudes towards one’s company are known as organizational
commitment. This term refers to the extent to which a person is willing to be
identified with and stay at his / her company.
Factors affecting job satisfaction
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Although some jobs may be boring and repetitive people usually report high JS
this may be a result of cognitive dissonance (job changes are risky therefore
cannot leave boring job – saying they are not satisfied with their jobs creates
dissonance and to avoid this they report high JS and they believe this rating)
Two factors affect JS and these are:
(a) Organizational factors
(b) Personal factors
Organizational Factors
1) Company’s reward system – the way in which raises, promotions and other
rewards are distributed.
Fairness is important – JS is high when people believe their rewards are
distributed fairly
2) Perceived quality of supervision – the extend to which employees believe that
their bosses are competent, have employee’s best interests at heart and treat
then with respect
3) Being able to participate in organizational decision making (the higher the
participation the high the JS) (Callon, 1993)
4) Nature of the job – not only do boring monotonous jobs reduce satisfaction they
undermine psychological and even physical health too.
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Jobs that expose people to under load (do not give pple enough to do or below
their capacity cause strong feelings of monotony therefore produce
low JS,
psychological distress and even physical illness)(Malemed et al 1995)
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Repetitive jobs are hectic (person does the same job repetitively and has to be
quick.
Personal factors
1) Job satisfaction is related to several personal traits, such as Type A behaviour
pattern who tends to more satisfied than Type B.
2) JS is also related to status and seniority the higher the person’s position within a
company the greater his/her JS
3) The longer the person has been on her job the higher the satisfaction (Zeitz,
1990)
4) The greater the extend to which are congruent with people’s interest the greater
the satisfaction.
5) JS is related to general life satisfaction.
Organizational commitment
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Altitudes held by people towards their companies. It refers to the extend to which
individuals identify with, and are willing to leave their organizations (universities
etc)
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A model by Allen and Meyer (1990) reveals that organizational commitment
involves three separate components.
Affective Component
Continuance Component
Organizational Commitment
Normative Component
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Affective Component – this involves emotional attachment to and identification
with the organization. A person high on this feels good about his/ her company.
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Continuance component – refers to potential cost in leaving the company – after
working for a long period a person may have a lot of money in pension funds – if
he leaves is may be lost.
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Normative Component – feelings of obligation to stay with the company because
of norms and values indicating that loyalty is desirable.
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These three combine to form an individual’s level of organizational commitment.
Research shows that some different conditions play a role in each of the three
components

Affective component – referenced by quality of supervisory feedback ,autonomy
(freedom to structure one’s work), task identity (being able to complete a whole
piece of workfrom beginning to end), skill variety (working on a job that requires a
variety of activities), Tenure (length of time with the company) the more people
have stayed with a company the more they loose if they leave.

Normative
component – influenced by commitment on the part of one’s co
workers and the extend to which individual are allowed to participate decision
relating to their jobs – more leads to a sense of obligation to stay with a
company.
Effect of organizational Commitment
People high in OC show lower levels of absenteeism and voluntary turnover. Also
people will be more willing to make scarifies for their company even to their own cost.
Such actions are known as organizational citizenship behaviour.
Organizational Politics
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Actions taken by individual to further their own goals, often at considerable costs
to others or their organization. It is the opposite of organizational citizenship
behaviour.
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OP represents various forms of social influence applied to purely selfish ends.
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Tactics used by individual in Organisational Politics
1) Controlling access to information
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Information is power in any organization, those who have information, know how
to use it and can get want they want. People in OP manipulate information- they
hold information so that others will not know what is happening. They Conceal
information that make them look bad, protecting own image.
2) Cultivating a good image
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People in OP use tactics to make them look good better than their rivals. They
do this by associating themselves with successful persons and projects, by
drawing attention to their own accomplishments.
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People who do this are called organizational chameleons – they will do whatever
it takes to make a favourable impression to others and build their own reputation.
3) Developing a base of support
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People ensure that others are committed to then and will support them in times of
trouble. Use the principle of reciprocity – doing small things to people inorder to
get big things they get what they want with little effort.
4) Dirty Tricks
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Actions people would view as down night unethical one common one is hidden
agenda eg meeting called – issues not on agenda discussed – people will not be
prepared and the person in OP will usually win.
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Another dirty is spreading false rumors about office romances.
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OP occurs when there is a lot to be gained by winning, when individual or group
in an organization have conflicting interest, when parties involved have equal
power so that no party can demand.
Reducing Organizational Politics
a) Clarify job expectations – understand what is expected of your job. You will not
be manipulated or treated unfairly.
b) Insists or encourage open communication help to reduce manipulation
c) Be on the lockout for and do not tolerate political game players.
Cases of conflict in Work settings
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Conflict are actions taken by individuals to block or interfere with others interest
because of perceptions of incompatible interest and the belief that others may be
interfering with the perceiver’s interests.
Organizational Causes of Conflicts
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Competition over resources
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Power differentials
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Ambiguity over responsibility or jurisdiction
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Interdependence with respect to work
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Competitive reward system
Interpersonal Causes
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Faulty Communication
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Faulty attributions
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Stereotypes
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Prejudice
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Grudges
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Feelings of in equity
Dealing with conflict
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Research shows that in times of conflict people may
(a) Compete – get as much as possible for oneself / group
(b) Compromise – split everything equally
(c) Accommodation – give up and let others take all benefits
(d) Avoidance – avoid conflict-in any possible way including withdrawal from the
situation
(e) Collaboration- try to maximize everyone’s gains
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The above reactions are related to two underlying dimensions
(i)
Concern with one’s own outcomes
(ii)
Concern with others outcomes
Competition
Collaboration
Concern with
One’s own
Outcomes
Compromise
Avoidance
Accommodation
Concern with other outcomes
Perceiving causes of other individual’s performance
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Casual attributions of other peoples` emotional and behavioral reactions to an
event at work
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Weiner et al (1971) put forward a model for categorizing the kinds of casual
explanations that people give 4 success a failure outcomes. They use internal
and external dimensions.
(a) Internal Dimension – distinguishes between factors pertaining to the person
whose performance led to the outcome e.g. ability(a characteristic of the
individual) a stable XCT
(b) External dimension- The environment in which the performance occurred e.g.
Luck unstable and con D
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A student’s failure because of lack of effort- on internal stable, is more shameful
than failure due to difficulty task.
Perceiving one’s own performance
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Wilson and Linville (1982) investigated the impact of attributionally
relevant
information on students in the 1st year of university studies- there were two
groups
(i)
No information group
(ii)
Group given information – experimental group given the following information
1)* eg statistical data showing that majority of students grades improve one
time *2) other students describing how their grade points increased over the
later years.
Results – there were greater grades points in the information or experimental group and
higher dropouts in the non information group.
The explanation for higher performance that was found in the group shows a link
between attributions to specific cases and motivation to strive in failure performances.
Attributes and employee development
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For new comers in an organization, attribution training is useful with positions in
which there are many things to learn e.g. undergraduates students
How do you achieve attribution retraining
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Self efficiency
(belief that one has the ability to perform effectively in a particular manner/ activitywithout these beliefs people are not motivated because there is no reason to exert effort
.
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Self efficiency is instilled by vicarious experience and by direct experience.
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Preferential hiring
(hiring according to sex, gender and race) Acc to the attribution theory when individual
are aware that there are factors that have attributed to their hiring they question
Whether their abilities are equal to those not hired.
Experiments show that women`s evaluations of their leadership abilities suffered when
told they have been given leader because of their gender.
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Supervisor’s response employee performance
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After discovering poor performance the supervisor forms causal attributions. This
is influenced by situational factors e.g. the behavior. The explanations of the
behaviour may be an outcome of baises that the supervisor may have.
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e.g nurse fails to put a rail on patient’s bed- do other nurses do the same
(consensus information)- was the rail left down in other cases (distinctiveness)
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Blame is put on the nurse when consensus is low, consistency is high and
distinctiveness is low.
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Attributions to personal characteristics are also made when outcomes are severe
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In organizations people have baises-this hinders rational and systematic
information processing. The fundamental attribution error- refers to attributing
causes internal factors
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Poor performers in organizations should be given remedial lessons and those
outstanding performers should be rewarded.