ANALYZING JOB SATISFACTION BY QUALITY MANAGEMENT FOR ETHIOPIAN LEATHER INDUSTRY

Abstract

Job satisfaction is considered as one of the most important factor that enable organizations achieve competitive advantages over their competitors. Also, lack of job satisfaction results in work-related fatigue and affects organizations from a holistic 360 degree point of view. Accordingly, improving satisfaction of employees is typically viewed as a ‘win-win’ proposition, as it is worthy for both workers and organizations. Hence, organizations should understand how employees can be kept satisfied, in searching for greater organizational wide performance. Previous research has extensively linked practices within quality management with various organizational outcomes such as productivity and customer satisfaction. On the other hand, the literature portrays a widespread consensus that the behavioral aspects in organizations such as job satisfaction is considered as one of the most important driver of customer satisfaction and ensuing customer retentions, and even their relationship is underlined as unilateral rather than bilateral. However, the wellbeing of employees is vaguely described in many of management philosophies like quality management. There would seem to be great gains if organizations can establish sustainable workplace satisfaction among their employees. The purpose of the research described in this thesis was to examine how job satisfaction can be attained and to generate a knowledge on the interconnection between job satisfaction and quality management, with a focus of examining what it is within quality management that influences job satisfaction of shop floor workers. Accordingly, the purpose was also to contribute to the understanding of the relation between sustainable job satisfaction and quality Management. To fulfil the purpose of the research, research questions were formulated. The findings are described in the studies performed throughout the research endeavor. The focus of the studies were limited to Ethiopian organizations, particularly to the leather industry. Structured survey questionnaire was used to evaluate the extent to which workers themselves perceive the contextual work factors in Ethiopia and to investigate the quality management practices in relation to promoting workplace satisfaction among shop floor workers. In addition to the questionnaire survey, focus groups discussions were carried out in order to find out what is of most importance when practicing quality management in order to influence sustainable shop floor satisfaction. The focus groups interviews were important in obtaining an extended useful qualitative data, which helps to obtain a deeper understanding of workers’ perceptions of their working life and interpretation of the quantitative results. The research has V employed Fuzzy QFD for setting JS improvement programs. A systematic fuzzy QFD procedure is proposed that used to establish priority of the technical solutions for the improvement of JS. The results are descriptions of behaviors, practices and measurement approach to be used by the organizations to support workplace satisfaction. Specifically, the results pointed to ‘top management leadership commitment’ as the most central of the practices for achieving sustainable job satisfaction among the shop floor workers. Furthermore, the practices ‘everybody’s participation’ and ‘continuous improvement’ were found to be related to job satisfaction. These three quality management practices were then further elaborated during the focus groups discussions and dimensions are extracted that are important to realize sustainable job satisfaction. From the practice ‘top management leadership commitment’, four dimensions were extracted. They are ‘manage through visibility’, ‘compensation’, ‘bottom-up communication’, and ‘continuity’. The results showed relations between the practice ‘top management leadership commitment’ within quality management and sustainable job satisfaction. The results indicate that managers need to work in accordance with the practice ‘top management leadership commitment’ that are characterized by the dimensions mentioned above to achieve results in the work towards sustainable job satisfaction among shop floor workers. According to the identified dimensions, managers have to avail themselves in workplaces and act as a leader, establish a formal compensation system to encourage individuals for quality enhancement, communicate employees and be alert to listen and understand their voice and stay long enough in their positions to build up trust and execute a long-term paradigm shift in the organization. Second, the practice ‘everybody’s participation’ has been shown to be related to sustainable job satisfaction, signifying the importance of working in accordance with this practice to achieve job satisfaction among the shop floor workers. Three dimensions characterize the practice ‘everybody’s participation’: ‘keep employees informed’, ‘belongingness’, and ‘influence’. These three dimensions denotes the extent of communication of managers to employees, the involvement of employees in organizational issues and empowerment of employees to make decisions and solve problems. The practice ‘continuous improvement’ has also been shown to be related to sustainable job satisfaction among the shop floor workers. Three dimensions were extracted that characterize this practice. These are ‘appraisals and development’, ‘trialability and innovation’ and ‘thrust’. These dimensions denotes the requirement of the organization to give concern for the evaluation VI and career advancement of workers, encouragement of innovative thinking, and keeping moral and freedom of employees in workplaces. Finally, based on the identified dimensions, the research developed a measurement approach called ‘job satisfaction-related quality management’. The measurement approach can be administered regularly in workplaces to evaluate the extent to which the practices, ‘top management commitment’, ‘everybody’s participation’ and ‘continuous improvement’ permeate an organization. It can be used as a pre-test baseline measurement in order to detect and resolve changes associated with QM efforts. This helps to bring sustainability of JS. Managers may also use the measurement approach longitudinally to assess before and after working conditions carrying through an organizational change. In future, studies may use longitudinal approaches to ascertain the nature and direction of the causal relationships between the QM practices and satisfaction at different stages of QM implementation. Also, future studies may extract different QM dimensions following the dynamic nature of working environment that may influence job satisfaction.