Non-family employees: levels of job satisfaction and organizational justice in small and medium-sized family and non-family firms

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to explore differences between non-family employees of family firms and employees of non-family firms regarding their levels of job satisfaction. Moreover, focusing on family firms, we assess the impact of non-family employees’ perceptions of organizational justice on their levels of job satisfaction; we also seek to understand which dimensions of job satisfaction are most affected by the employees’ perceptions of organizational justice. The empirical evidence is provided by a sample of 205 Portuguese employees (98 non-family employees of family firms and 107 employees of non-family firms), working in small and medium-sized privately-owned enterprises. The findings reveal that non-family employees of family firms do not differ from employees of non-family firms regarding their levels of job satisfaction. Furthermore, it was found that, in family firms, there is a positive influence of the perceptions of organizational justice on the job satisfaction levels, in particular regarding to the satisfaction with the benefits and with the supervision.