Job Challenge Research Articles

Locus of Control as an Indicator of Hong Kong Teachers' Job Attitudes and Perceptions of Organizational Characteristics

Abstract This study investigated how teachers' locus of control is related to multiple aspects of job attitudes and perceptions of a school's organizational characteristics in a sample of 588 teachers in 54 secondary schools in Hong Kong. The findings were surprisingly consistent with those about populations in Western societies. Locus of control seems to be a powerful indicator of teachers' job attitudes and organizational perceptions. Teachers with a belief in internal control tend to have a more positive job attitude in terms of organizational commitment, intrinsic satisfaction, extrinsic satisfaction, social satisfaction, influence satisfaction, role clarity, and feeling of job challenge. They also tend to have more positive perceptions of the school organization in terms of principal's leadership, organizational structure, teachers' social norms, and organizational culture and effectiveness.

What enhances or inhibits learning a new job? A basic career issue.

A model of the factors that enhance or hinder learning a new position is proposed and partially tested. Time on the job explained 27% of the variance in the facility with which a position was learned, and individual-differences, job-characteristics, context, and environmental factors explained an additional 24%. Job characteristics such as role complexity and lack of job challenge and individual differences such as self-efficacy and immediate prior similar experience were strongly related to job learning. In addition, contextual factors representing the organization's climate, pace, and stage contributed to the explanation of job learning along with the individual's marital status

Job challenge, work effort, and job performance of young engineers: a causal analysis

The author explored the causal relations among job challenge, work load, and job performance of a group of young engineers during their first industrial work assignments as coop engineers in college, then three years later as professional engineers. Causal relations among the three key variables were analyzed using both path analysis and the method of cross-lagged correlation differentials. The results showed that the job challenge and work load not only have direct causal effects on current job performance they also have indirect causal effect on current job performance. Moreover, work load was found to have a more dominant effect on job performance than job challenge. This study points out how different causal assumptions can lead to different interpretations of observed results by prior researchers as well as different theories of professional development for young engineers. Overall, the findings support the proposition that it is work experience that determines job performance. The implications of the present findings for management policy are also discussed.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">&gt;</ETX>

Job demands and managerial learning in the research and development function

AbstractAn increased focus on innovation as a means for gaming competitive advantage has forced organizations to look more closely at the managerial skills of their research and development (R&amp;D) managers. The current study uses the Job Challenge Profile to explore how managerial skills are developed on the job by R&amp;D managers. Compared to other managers, research and development managers faced more job challenge from lack of top management support and from problematic relationships with their bosses and subordinates. However, they reported learning less from their jobs. Implications for developing managerial skills in the R&amp;D function are discussed.

Managerial thinking. A study of public managers from developing countries

AbstractThe field of comparative public administration/management in the United States has been criticized for theoretical underdevelopment and methodological narrowness. Utilizing advances made in comparative business management and taking into consideration the assertion that an agenda based empirical research programme in comparative public administration should highlight managerial processes, the individual, and group‐level behaviours, this paper focuses on examining the attitudes of public managers towards their own organizations. It analyses the responses of 110 public sector managers from 58 different countries of the world while they were in residence for professional development at 12 major universities in the United States. Examining public managers outside their own working environment makes this research on public sector managers to some extent unusual. For purposes of data collection a stratified sample was utilized. The principal instrument consisted of 79 items. Managers were asked to state their attitudes towards problem‐solving and decision‐making, leadership, job challenge, change, and organizational culture. Primarily descriptive statistics are used to analyse the data. Limited use is made of the One‐way ANOVA test. Results show that public managers from developing countries tend to view themselves somewhat differently from the traditional western perspective, especially as it relates to organizational innovativeness and job challenge. Public managers also confirm the earlier held western perspective that personnel in the public sector are more concerned with their personal welfare rather than organizational welfare and that their leadership is more directive. While one has to be careful interpreting the data, the emerging profile of public managers should influence future policy makers in both developing and developed nations of the world.

Management Practices and the Uninvolved Manager: The Effect of Supervisory Attitudes on Perceptions of Organizational Trust and Change Orientation

This paper examines supervisor attitudes towards management practices (work group relationships, relationships with their own supervisors, performance appraisal systems, and organizational commitment) and their relationship to the supervisor's own sense of managerial involvement (as measured through Organizational Trust and Change Orientation scales). Using regression analysis, a relationship between “organizational humanist” management practices (especially with respect to intergroup relationships and job challenge) and managerial involvement is confirmed.

Predictors of organizational commitment: Variations across career stages

The matching of five predictors of organizational commitment to five career stages was investigated within a sample of 1536 employees. Between-stage analysis showed that, relative to other stages, the effect of team cohesion was stronger during the second stage, task challenge was stronger during the third stage, supervisory behavior was stronger during the fourth stage, and organizational climate was stronger during the fifth stage. Within-stage analysis showed that, relative to the other predictors, team cohesion had a larger effect at the second stage, job challenge had a larger effect at the third stage, and supervisor behavior had a larger effect at the fourth stage. Self-efficacy failed to predominate during the first Stage.

Adjusting to a New Organization

Abstract Entering a new organization and assuming a new job marks a career transition common to adult life. The three stages of anticipatory socialization, encounter, and change and acquisition form a model of socialization which is used to depict what newcomers can expect to experience during the adjustment process, including Stressors to be encountered. Strategies are suggested for newcomers and for organizations which can ease the transition for both parties. For newcomers, these strategies include making a realistic job choice, preparing for the experience of reality shock, and seeking out social support from others. For organizations, the recommended strategies are forming psychological contracts with integrity, providing early job challenges, flexible scheduling, and timely feedback to newcomers, and ensuring that multiple sources of social support are available for newcomers.

Teller Job Satisfaction and Organization Commitment as They Relate to Career Orientations

In a study of 264 bank tellers, different job characteristics were found to be associated with job satisfaction and organization commitment based on career orientation. For career tellers, satisfaction and organization commitment are enhanced by participation in decision making, job challenge, promotion opportunities, and a people-oriented supervisory style. For the non-career-oriented teller, job satisfaction and organization commitment will be affected positively through association in a cohesive, effective work group. Non-career tellers prefer a supervisory style characterized by a task orientation.

Mentoring as an antidote to stress during corporate trauma

AbstractThis article examines mentoring as a potentially useful resource in an organization's adaptation to global competition and the need for improved learning capabilities. We were surprised to find that mentoring relationships were perceived as more desirable under conditions of corporate stress, low job challenge, and low job involvement. We were further surprised to find that individuals in early and later career stages were as likely, or more likely than, their midcareer colleagues to embrace the mentoring role. Thus, it appears that mentoring may be more readily available as an antidote to stress than previously considered, and that it may be an important form of coping with the stressful, nonrewarding conditions that typically characterize corporate downsizing. Not only is mentoring an important form of promoting development (for self and for others), but it also may represent a valuable vehicle for social support and learning during times of major corporate change.

Integrating work environment perceptions: Explorations into the measurement of meaning.

Many of the perceptual variables used in industrial/organizational psychology assess the meaning that work environment attributes have for individuals (e.g., the ambiguity of role prescriptions). This study represents an initial attempt to test the hypothesis that a unifying theme exists for integrating diverse measures of meaning. The unifying theme is based on a hierarchical cognitive model wherein each assessment of meaning reflects a general appraisal of the degree to which the overall work environment is personally beneficial versus personally detrimental to the organizational wellbeing of the individual. Results of confirmatory factor analyses on multiple samples supported a hierarchical cognitive model with a single, general factor underlying measures of meaning. These results are used to explain the substantive impact of work environment perceptions on individual outcomes. Industrial/organizational (I/O) psychologists use many variables to assess perceptions of work environments. Examples include perceptual indicators of job attributes (e.g., job challenge, job autonomy), characteristics of leaders and leadership processes (e.g., leader consideration and support, leader work facilitation), workgroup characteristics and processes (workgroup cooperation, workgroup esprit), and interfaces between individuals and subsystems or organizations (e.g., role ambiguity, fairness and equity of reward system). The following two principles have guided many applied psychologists' efforts to measure work environment perceptions: (a) Individuals respond to environments in terms of how they perceive them and (b) the most important component of perception is the meaning or meanings imputed to the environment by the individual (Ekehammer, 1974; Endler & Magnusson, 1976; Lewin, 1938, 1951; Mischel, 1968).

Person characteristics and the perception of organization climate

An issue in research on organization climate is the extent to which the climate reflects the personality of the organization members. The purpose of this study is to explore the overall relationship of person characteristics to climate and to explore ways in which person factors relate to specific climate dimensions. Previous research has used distal measures of person characteristics such as demographic variables or biographical measures. The present study uses proximal measures of person characteristics, 16PF scales, and the Embedded Figures Test. The finding, which results from the canonical correlation analysis and the multivariate regression analysis, is that person-climate relationships are of sufficient size that they deserve the attention of corporate culture theorists. A significant relationship was found between cognitive style and the climate dimension of administrative efficiency, job challenge, management, concern with employee involvement, open-mindedness, egalitarianism, altruism. A significant relationship was found between the aggregated scales of the 16PF and the aggregated climate scales. The process by which climate perceptions are formed represents the organization members' attempt to structure social reality to define their place within it and to guide their search for meaning and gratification. Personality and cognitive style have been shown to be important determinants of the perceptions employees have of their work organization.

Effects of leadership training upon changes in self-image among female managers

The present study tested a hypothesis stating that effects of leadership training conducted for female managers would lead to enhancing their self-image in terms of masculinity and femininity dimensions. Moreover, this study examined that the effect would be more significant if participants were lower in hierarchical positions, voluntarily participated rather than by the company order, and had higher orientations toward challenging tasks.To test these hypotheses, 34 female managers participated in the “Leadership Seminor for Female Managers” that was sponsored by the Aichi Prefecture were asked to respond the questionnaire before and after the training. Results of the analysis indicated that masculinity self-image did not change, while femininity one decreased significantly. This apparently opposite results to the hypothesis were attributed to the severity of training experiences by which female managers were forced to redefine their self-image by sacrificing femininity. The tendency to change femininity were found stroner if female managers were lower in management positions, and higher in orientations toward job challenge.

The influence of unionization on job satisfaction and work perceptions

Unionized and nonunionized processing employees were compared on their perceptions of job characteristics and different facets of satisfaction. In addition, the relationship between job characteristics and job satisfaction were compared for unionized and nonunionized samples. Jobs generally were not significantly different in relation to job challenge for the two groups, but nonunionized employees reported higher levels of some satisfaction measures. The correlations between job characteristics and job satisfaction were stronger in the unionized sample. Implications of the present results and suggestions for further research are discussed.

Profile of the uninvolved worker: an examination of employee attitudes to wardmanagement practices

This paper examines the relationship which employee' attitudes toward work grop relationships, supervisory relationships, performance appraisal systems,and organizational commitment have on worker involvement. Discriminant analysis demonstrates that these “organizational humanist” attitudes do discriminate between the involved and uninvolved worker. Because this analysis also suggests a unidmensional nature to the concept of worker involvement, further analysis was conducted using a regression technique. The regression analysis confirms a relationship between these nothions (especially with respect to intergroup relationships and job challenge and employee involvement.

PREDICTORS OF TEACHER BURNOUT

This paper describes the nature of burnout among teachers, examines the differences in burnout between teachers and school‐based administrators, and explores the extent to which specific work factors predict teacher burnout. Teachers were experiencing less Emotional Exhaustion and Depersonalization burnout, but more Personal Accomplishment burnout than other helping service professionals. Their levels of Emotional Exhaustion and Personal Accomplishment burnout were higher than those for administrators. Both job satisfaction and job challenge were significant predictors of each burnout sub‐scale. The findings indicate that burnout is both the result of organizational factors such as work load, as well as the result of failure of the job to satisfy the motivational needs of teachers to be challenged and rewarded by their work. These results dispute some established research findings, and contribute new evidence to the growing data base on educator burnout.

Career Ladders

Career ladders or lattices with incentives for teachers have become an important professional issue across the United States. Forty-two states to date have enacted legislation dealing with some phase of career ladder plans (Terrel 1984). The United States Department of Education (1984-85) has encouraged experimentation in this area and the Secretary of Education has funded several projects to test the feasibility of career ladder plans. Although no specific mention of career ladders was made in the National Commission on Excellence in Education report, A Nation at Risk (1983), many state reform committees have featured them in reform proposals. According to a report on career ladders in Great Britain by Michael Murphy (1985), career ladder plans are being implemented in increasing numbers in the United States for numerous reasons. First, they are consistent with the idea that people should gain responsibility, status, and pay as they grow in experience and acquire more work skills. Organizational theorists have argued for some time that individuals need new job challenges, periodically, in order to stay motivated and to sustain their role in the work place. Second, career ladder incentives are presented as an alternative to merit pay or across-the-board raise systems within the general school reform area. Many educational reformers are looking for replacements for the indexed single salary schedule operative in most school districts because this schedule rewards only seniority and additional training, rather than considering the value of the individual to the organization. Third, career ladder incentives can reflect merit without merit pay. That is, they allow school districts to identify, reward, and utilize competent teachers through promotion and other incentives. Teachers with proven ability can be better utilized by placement in leadership positions. They can be models to younger staff members and can promote better teaching in general. They can also contribute to the development of a good, workable curriculum that will enhance student learning and the professional work place. A career ladder concept offers incentive for teachers to grow, to develop new skills, and to meet new challenges. It is not a panacea for the ills of education, but it can make teaching a more rewarding occupation. It can become a powerful incentive to attract and retain qualified people in the profession. A career ladder concept can be effective in leadership development. A cadre of teachers placed in leadership positions would be the training agent for teachers who desire administrative experience. Because this concept promotes the sharing of leadership, more teachers care about school performance and more people are directly involved in school improvement. It motivates teachers to regulate part of their work lives and to participate in determining their rewards. This is a key to sustaining productivity. The following model is intended as a guide to be implemented according to the particular circumstances of the individual school district. Many of the alternatives reflect the results of a survey of teacher satisfaction conducted in two northwestern states (Engelking 1985). Several areas will be addressed: longitudinal career plan, including effective systems of teacher evaluation and supervision, long-term employment, participatory decision making and collective responsibility, and enhancement of the professional work place.

Humanistic Management and Organizational Success: The Effect of Job and Work Environment Characteristics on Organizational Effectiveness, Public Responsiveness, and Job Satisfaction

This paper is based on a 1983 attitudinal survey of Iowa public employees examining the effect of job (job challenge, role clarity, and performance appraisal fairness) and work environment (personal significance, supervisory relationship, and employee freedom), characteristics — used here as indicators of humanistic management — on organizational success (perceptions of organizational effectiveness, public responsiveness, and job satisfaction). The results document three findings: (1) organizations are perceived as being successful, (2) job and work environment characteristics are viewed as favorable, and (3) an across-the-board, albeit moderate, relationship between organizational success and humanistic management practices is perceived to exist.

Development for New Managers

The “formative years in business”, to borrow a phrase, are crucial to career progression in management. Variables especially relevant to the early career years (i.e., variables which have been found, or are generally thought to be associated with advancement and other criteria of success) include early job challenge, realism of expectations, matching individual abilities and interests to job assignments, establishing relationships with sponsors and mentors, accurate assessments of skills, constructive feedback, and learning to handle family‐career conflicts and dual careers. This article examines four topics aimed at a comprehensive approach to new manager development:

The motivational effects of task challenge: A laboratory investigation

The popular hypothesis concerning the effects of job challenge upon performance was investigated in a laboratory setting. The effect of experiencing initial (first assignment) and later (second assignment) task challenge upon subsequent performance and three hypothesized process variables—performance standards, task-related attitudes, and perceptions of skill competence—were examined. The experience of later challenge was found to affect all three process variables. An interaction of initial and later challenge was found upon subjects' performance on a separate, third assignment. Implications for the use of initial and later job challenge as organizational placement strategies and directions for future research are discussed.