Abstract

 The purpose of the study was to determine the factors that influence employee job satisfaction in RENAPROV. The following research questions guided this study: What are the extrinsic factors that influence the level of employee job satisfaction in Unilever Kenya? What are the intrinsic factors that influence the level of job satisfaction in an organization? What impact does job satisfaction have on the level of employee performance. A descriptive research design was adopted, with RENAPROV being the focus organization. The population of interest was the employees of RENAPROV across various functions and divisions since this was the company under study. The data collection instrument was a tailor-made structured questionnaire developed by the researcher, specifically for this study. Data was analyzed using statistical methods that is, descriptive statistics; measures of central tendency such as mean, mode, and median, and measures of dispersion such as variance, standard deviation, range, percentiles, and quartiles, and inferential statistics (T-test was used to determine the factors that influence job satisfaction and its impact on employee performance. Statistical Package for Social Scientists (SPSS) version 21 was used to facilitate the data analysis. The results were presented in tables and charts such as pie charts, and bar graphs.  Conclusion was made that although all the extrinsic factors analyzed had an influence on employee job satisfaction; leadership style, remuneration structure, nature of the job and job security had the strongest influence. Among all the intrinsic factors, it was concluded that the level of responsibility at work, Recognition, work meaningfulness and the extent to which employees believe their work has a significant contribution to the organization’s vision and mission had the strongest influence on job satisfaction. Among all the impacts of job satisfaction on employee performance that were under study, the ones which ranked highest were; impact on quantity of work, impact on quality, impact on creativity and impact of job satisfaction on ability of employee to meet company set objectives. The researcher recommends that the extrinsic factors where emphasis should be based are leadership style, remuneration structure, nature of the job and job security. The intrinsic factors where much emphasis is recommended include level of responsibility at work, Recognition, work meaningfulness and the extent to which employees believe their work has a significant contribution to the organization’s vision and mission. It was recommended that if these are parameters that the company values, then they should ensure that they keep their employee’s job satisfaction high through the various factors that influence job satisfaction as were discussed in the study.

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the study

For decades, job satisfaction has been one of the most extensively researched concepts in work and organizational psychology. Job satisfaction is believed to reflect an individual’s affective and/or cognitive assessment of his or her working conditions and job attributes (Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996); it has been traditionally used to confirm the effectiveness of job redesign and motivational conditions at work. Since the 1980s, however, an increasing number of studies indicated that job satisfaction is influenced by personality dispositions (e.g. Arvey, Bouchard, Segal, & Abraham, 1989; Staw & Ross, 1985). This provoked a new approach to job satisfaction, which involved particularly the pursuit of two questions: first, to what extent is job satisfaction determined by personality? A meta-analysis of the stability of job satisfaction concluded that up to 35 per cent of the variance in job satisfaction might reflect stable, unchangeable traits in contrast to changeable environmental conditions (Dormann & Zapf, 2001). The second question pursued relates to the type of personality variables that could be the building blocks of a trait-based part of job satisfaction. This research has primarily focused on affective traits such as negative affectivity (NA) and positive affectivity (PA; e.g. Brief & Roberson, 1989). Negative and positive affectivity are believed to underlie job satisfaction as they decrease the threshold to experience negative and positive emotions, respectively; and in fact, they do explain considerable variance in job satisfaction (e.g. Thoresen, Kaplan, Barsky, Warren, & de Chermont, 2003).

A recent dispositional approach to job satisfaction goes beyond affectivity: the model of core self-evaluations (CSE; Judge, Locke, Durham, & Kluger, 1998).  The industrial and business sectors of various countries specially developing countries including India (where per capita income is very low) are facing the problem of job dissatisfaction among the employees and high rate of turnover. JOB SATISFACTION is regard to one’s feeling or state of mind regarding the nature of their work. Job satisfaction can be influenced by variety of factors such as kind of supervision, organization policies & administration, salary & quality of life etc.  Employers have a need to keep employee from leaving and going to work for other organizations. The best way of retaining employees is to provide the job satisfaction and opportunities to build up their careers. “The good hope is hard to find, is even truer these days than ever before because the job market in becoming increasingly tight”. (Eskildesen, Hammer).

One of the biggest preludes to the study of job satisfaction was the Hawthorne studies. These studies (1924-1933), primarily credited to Elton Mayo of the Harvard Business School, sought to find the effects of various conditions (most notably illumination) on workers’ productivity. These studies ultimately showed that novel changes in work conditions temporarily increase productivity (called the Hawthorne Effect). It was later found that this increase resulted, not from the new conditions, but from the knowledge of being observed. This finding provided strong evidence that people work for purposes other than pay, which paved the way for researchers to investigate other factors in job satisfaction.  Scientific management also had a significant impact on the study of job satisfaction. Frederick Winslow Taylor’s 1911 book, Principles of Scientific Management, argued that there was a single best way to perform any given work task. This book contributed to a change in industrial production philosophies, causing a shift from skilled labor and piecework towards the more modern approach of assembly lines and hourly wages. The initial use of scientific management by industries greatly increased productivity because workers were forced to work at a faster pace. However, workers became exhausted and dissatisfied, thus leaving researchers with new questions to answer regarding job satisfaction. It should also be noted that the work of W.L. Bryan, Walter Dill Scott, and Hugo Munsterberg set the tone for Taylor’s work.  Some argue that Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory, a motivation theory, laid the foundation for job satisfaction theory. This theory explains that people seek to satisfy five specific needs in life – physiological needs, safety needs, social needs, self-esteem needs, and self-actualization. This model served as a good basis from which early researchers could develop job satisfaction theories.

In many organizations in Cameroon job satisfaction has been neglected. Employers neglect that fact that’s when employees are satisfied with the conditions in which they work it increases organizational performance. Thus the employees working environment should be convenient for working. Also employees should be rewarded for their efforts at work, also the reward should be consistent to enable employees know their efforts are always appreciated. This will enhance job satisfaction and consequently increase organizational performance.

1.2 Problem statement

Job satisfaction is becoming an important concept in human resource and assumes increasingly higher significance. It has been underestimated by many organizations. Job satisfaction therefore is the attitudes and feelings people have about their job. It is the degree to which an employee has positive emotions towards the job role. There has been a great challenge on the part of managers in RENAPROV on determining how exactly they can attain maximum job satisfaction for their employees whom they believe would go a long way to improve on the organizational overall performance. Many have tried to attain job satisfaction of their employees by trying to use methods that were successful in other areas around the world and have met with failure, but the reason is simply because this research was not directly relevant to their own employees. This therefore is the knowledge gap that is trying to be filled in this research.  This further pushes me to ask the following questions;

1. What impact does job satisfaction have on organizational performance?
2. What are the effects of extrinsic factors on job satisfaction in RENAPROV?
3. What are the effects of intrinsic factors on job satisfaction in RENAPROV?

1.3 Objectives of the study

The main objective of this study is to examine the impact of job satisfaction on organizational performance.

The specific objectives of this study are to;

1. examine the effects of extrinsic factors on job satisfaction.
2. Examine the effects of intrinsic factors on job satisfaction.
3. Establish the impact of job satisfaction on organizational performance.