BNC1 - Chapter 3 (Attitudes & Job Satisfaction)

What Are the Main Components of Attitudes?

- Cognitive Component - Affective Component - Behavior Component

Name the 5 powerful moderators of the attitudes relationships:

1. Importance of attitude 2. Correspondence to behavior 3. Accessibility 4. Presence of social pressures 5. Whether a person has direct experience with the attitude

The desire to reduce dissonance depends on three factors, name them:

1. Importance of the elements creating them 2. Degree of influence we believe we have over them 3. Rewards of dissonance, high rewards accompanying high dissonance tend to reduce the tension inherent in the dissonance

Most of the research done on OB has focused on three attitudes, name them:

1. Job satisfaction 2. Job involvement 3. Organizational Commitment

Name the Two Approaches for Measuring Job Satisfaction:

1. Single global rating 2. Summation of job facets

Define: Employee Engagement

An individual's involvement with, satisfaction with, and enthusiasm for, the work she does.

Define: Cognitive Dissonance

Any incompatibility an individual might perceive between two or more attitudes or between behavior and attitudes. Any form of inconsistency is uncomfortable and that individuals will therefore attempt to reduce it.

Define: Attitudes

Attitudes are evaluative statements—either favorable or unfavorable—about objects, people, or events. They reflect how we feel about something.

Define: Core Self-Evaluations

Belief in inner worth and basic competence Those with higher CSE are more satisfied with their jobs than those with negative CSE. Exists separate from job conditions.

Define: Psychological Empowerment

Closely related to Job Involvement. Employees' beliefs in the degree to which they influence their work environment, their competence, the meaningfulness of their job, and their perceived autonomy.

Name the 2 dimensions that exist on the exit-voice-loyalty-neglect framework?

Constructive/Destructive and Active/Passive

Define: Job Satisfaction

Describes a positive feeling about a job, resulting from an evaluation of its characteristics

Components of Attitudes: Behavior (Action)

Describes an intention to behave in a certain way to ward someone or something "I am going to look for a new job that pays better"

Components of Attitudes: Cognitive (Evaluation)

Description or belief in the way things are; it sets the stage for more critical part of an attitude "My pay is low"

Define: Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB)

Discretionary behavior that is not part of an employee's formal job requirements and that contributes to the psychological and social environment of the workplace

Components of Attitudes: Affective (Feeling)

Emotional or feeling segment of an attitude and is reflected in a statement; can lead to behavioral outcomes "I am angry over how little I am paid"

Define: Organizational Commitment

Employee identifies with a particular organization and its goals and wishes to remain a member

Easier ways to describe cognition, affect, and behavior are _____, _____, _____.

Evaluation, Feeling, Action.

Name one framework that helps in understanding job satisfaction

Exit-voice-loyalty-neglect

T/F: Job Satisfaction is correlated with LOWER organizational citizenship behavior.

False.

T/F: Regular surveys do not reduce gaps between what managers think employees feel and what they really feel

False.

T/F: Attitudes have always come before behaviors and that is how they are studied today

False. In the 60's, Leon Festinger argued that Attitudes FOLLOW behaviors. Ex: Someone hates American cars until they get one. His attitude about the cars followed the behavior of being gifted one.

Describe Measurement Job Satisfaction: Summation of Job Facets

Identify key elements in a job such as the nature of work, supervision, present pay, promotion opportunities, relationships with co-workers and rate them on a standardized scale. Researchers then add the ratings to create an overall job satisfaction score

Summary:

Managers should be interested in their employees' attitudes because attitudes give warnings of potential problems and influence behavior. Creating a satisfied workforce is hardly a guarantee of successful organizational performance, but evidence strongly suggests that whatever managers can do to improve employee attitudes will likely result in heightened organizational effectiveness. Some takeaway lessons from the study of attitudes include the following: 1. Positivity: satisfied and committed employees have lower rates of turnover, absenteeism, and withdrawal behaviors. They also perform better on the job. Given that managers want to keep resignations and absences down--especially among their most productive employees--they'll want to do things that generate positive job attitudes. 2. Valid measurement: managers will also want to measure job attitudes effectively so they can tell how employees are reacting to their work. 3. Job Appeal: the most important thing managers can do to raise employee satisfaction is focus on the intrinsic parts of the job, such as making the work challenging and interesting. 4. More than money: Although paying employees poorly will likely not attract high quality employees to the org or keep high performers, managers should realize that high pay alone is unlikely to create a satisfying environment.

Define: Job Involvement

Measures the degree to which people identify psychologically with their jobs and consider their perceived performance levels important to self worth Employees with high levels of job involvement strongly identify with and really care about the kind of work they do.

Describe Measurement Job Satisfaction: Single Global Rating

Response to one question such as "all things considered, how satisfied are you with your job"

Define: Perceived Organizational Support

The degree to which employees believe the organization values their contribution and cares about their well-being

Exit-Voice-Loyalty-Neglect Framework for Understanding Job Satisfaction: Exit

The exit response directs behavior toward leaving the organization, including looking for a new position as well as resigning.

Exit-Voice-Loyalty-Neglect Framework for Understanding Job Satisfaction: Loyalty

The loyalty response means passively but optimistically waiting for conditions to improve, including speaking up for the organization in the face of external criticism and trusting the organization and its management to "do the right thing."

Exit-Voice-Loyalty-Neglect Framework for Understanding Job Satisfaction: Neglect

The neglect response passively allows conditions to worsen and includes chronic absenteeism or lateness, reduced effort, and increased error rate.

Exit-Voice-Loyalty-Neglect Framework for Understanding Job Satisfaction: Voice

The voice response includes actively and constructively attempting to improve conditions, including suggesting improvements, discussing problems with superiors, and undertaking some forms of union activity

T/F: Higher Job Satisfaction is related to higher Customer Satisfaction.

True.

T/F: Higher job satisfaction is linked to less turnover.

True.

T/F: Individuals who are committed to an organizations goals are less likely to leave than ones with high job satisfaction.

True.

T/F: Relationship between pay and Job Satisfaction virtually disappears after 40K?

True.

T/F: Single Global Rating is more effective in determining Job Satisfaction that Summation of Job Facets

True.

T/F: When employees have high "human capital" (high education, high ability), job satisfaction is more likely to translate into turnover because they have, or perceive, many available alternatives

True.

T/F: Higher job satisfaction is related to less absenteeism.

True. But only moderately so.