Teachers Performance and its Attitudinal Antecedents

Transcription

1 FAN04091 Teachers Performance and its Attitudinal Antecedents Aidong Zhang National Institute of Education Nanyang Technological University Singapore (65) (Office) and Yongqing FANG Nanyang Business School Nanyang Technological University Singapore (65) (Office) 1

2 Teachers Performance and its Attitudinal Antecedents Abstract The paper studied the factors leading to teaching performance. Specifically, it proposed that the extent of perceived psychological contract fulfillment (overfulfillment or under-fulfillment) would lead to an evaluation of school s distributive justice or fairness, which in turn would affect various attitudinal variables, including job satisfaction and organizational commitment. Finally, teaching performance will be affected by teachers attitudinal states. A hundred and sixty schoolteachers in Singapore participated in the study. The results suggested important directions for managerial efforts in meeting the challenges in improving teaching performance. Among the factors, proper handling of the psychological contract with teachers should take a high priority by school administration. In the case where a psychological contract cannot be fully fulfilled due to various internal and external constrains, much effort was needed in communicating with the teaching staff and seeking their understanding and support. Key words: commitment Teachers, Performance, Psychological contract, Organizational 2

3 Teachers Performance and its Attitudinal Antecedents Teaching performance is among the most important issues in education sectors. A diverse spectrum of factors may affect the performance. But, what are exactly ones need attention? We are not alone. This is a common concern by all organizations in various sectors. Much research effort has been put in in search of the clues. This paper examined the ways a few commonly recognized influencing factors, including psychological contract, distributive justice, organizational commitment, and job satisfaction. Psychological contracts are playing an increasing role in the contemporary employment relationships and have become a much-researched topic in management literature. However, studies on psychological contract in school context are still rare. This project intended to address this deficiency. Literature Review Psychological contract. A psychological contract constitutes an employee s beliefs or perceptions regarding reciprocal obligations between the employee and the employer (Morrison & Robinson, 1997). These obligations include behaviors or contributions on the part of the employee and inducements on the part of the organization (Rousseau, 1990). A key issue is the individual s belief in an obligation of reciprocity; employees believe they are owed something by their employers in return for certain behaviors (Robinson & Rousseau, 1994). Previous research has proposed two types of psychological contract: Relational and transactional (Robinson, Kraatz, & Rousseau, 1994; Robinson & Morrison, 1995; Robinson & Rousseau, 1994; Rousseau, 1990). A relational psychological contract includes obligations that are long term, dynamic and pervasive, have both an economic and emotional focus and is subjective or implicitly understood. On the other hand, transactional psychological contract is defined by performance requirements. It is composed of obligations that are narrow, static, have a specific time frame, an economic focus and are explicit (Rousseau, 1990). 3

4 The psychological contract is based upon belief in a promise or debt (Robinson, Kraatz, & Rousseau, 1994; Rousseau & Wade-Benzoni, 1994). Therefore, if one party fails to comply with its obligations to the other, the affected party s beliefs in the reciprocal obligations of the two parties are likely to be shaken. In other words, violations by an employer may affect not only what an employee feels he or she is owed but also what that employee feels obligated to offer in return (Robinson, Kraatz, & Rousseau, 1994). A significant negative relationship between violation of the psychological contract and trust was found in Robinson & Rousseau s (1994) study of contract violation. Once a contract is broken, and perceived obligations are not met, it may be very difficult for a displaced employee to trust another organization enough to sign another similar contract (Dunahee & Wangler, 1974). Consequences of psychological contract Organizational commitment can be construed as an array of obligations that employees incur as a result of the inducements they accept from employers (Robinson, Kraatz, & Rousseau, 1994). Popular conceptualizations of commitment as affective attachment (Meyer, Allen, & Smith, 1993) and identification with an organization (Mowday, Porter, & Steers, 1982) touch on but do not directly confront the role of obligations, reciprocity and fulfillment. However, there is another viewpoint that the psychological contracts affect the behavior of employees towards customers, as well as the type and degree of commitment to the organization (Iverson, McLeod, & Erwin, 1996). Changing obligations are the essence of the employment contract (Rousseau, 1989). Over the years, psychological contracts have changed from a promise of lifetime employment to an offer of short-term, situational contracts (Hiltrop, 1995). The old contract, which provided for stability, growth, training and advancement in return for hard work and loyalty has shifted to the new contract with a degrading of the employment relationship and trust (Sparrow, 1996). Job Satisfaction is defined as a pleasurable or positive emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one s job or job experiences (Locke, 1976:1300). Job satisfaction depends on an evaluation the employee makes of the job and its environment surrounding. This evaluation involves a comparison between what is and what should be. That is, what the employee actually experiences at work and what values or desires for rewards the employee brings to the workplace (Heneman, Schwab, Fossum, & Dyer, 1989). Job satisfaction is a multi-faceted construct. Three central components thought to affect teacher satisfaction including the nature of the 4

5 work (e.g. teaching responsibilities, students/parents, working conditions), the context of the job (e.g. physical environment), and the consequences associated with teaching (e.g. remuneration, union, career development) (Black-Branch, 1996). Job satisfaction - performance linkage. Researchers have had difficulty determining the relationship between job satisfaction and performance. From the 1930s to the mid-1950s, the views on the job satisfaction performance relationship can be summarized in the statement a happy worker is a productive worker. As a result of the Hawthorne studies, managers generalized that if their employees were satisfied with their jobs, that satisfaction would be translated into high productivity (Robbins & Coulter, 1999). However, by the mid-1950s, a number of studies had failed to establish a clear link between job satisfaction and performance. Researchers have started to assume an alternative view performance leads to job satisfaction. If employees do a good job, they intrinsically feel good about it (Lussier, 1996). Some other researchers have suggested that the reason for the apparently uncertain relationship between job satisfaction and performance is that other variables intervene, of which rewards are the most prominent. Whether job satisfaction is going to be improved depends on whether the rewards match the expectations, needs and desires of the employees (Werther, & Davis, 1996). Commitment has been a subject of interest for some time. The past decades have seen a broadening of the domain within which commitment is studied. Becker (1992) suggested that there are different foci of commitment. Individuals can feel committed to the organization, top management, supervisors, or the work group. Some of the earliest work within the organizational behavior literature (Porter et al., 1974; Mowday, Steers, & Porter, 1979) examined employees commitment to their employers, commonly referred to as organizational commitment. Then, there has been an increase in research examining commitment to unions (Fullagar & Barling, 1989), employment (Morrow & Wirth, 1989), careers (Blau, 1989). In this study, organizational commitment was to be examined. There are two different approaches to define Organizational commitment (Steers & Porter, 1983). In the first approach, organizational commitment is referred to as a behavior; the individual is viewed as committed to an organization if he/she is bound by past actions of sunk costs (fringe benefits, salary) as a function of age or tenure. Thus an individual becomes committed to an organization because it has become too costly for him/her to leave (Blau & Boal, 1987). In the second approach, organizational 5

6 commitment is referred to as an attitude. Organizational commitment has also been viewed as an attitude with three components: (a) Belief in and acceptance of organization s goals and values, (b) Willingness to exert effort on behalf of the organization and (c) Strong desire to maintain organizational membership (Porter et al., 1974; Mowday, Steers, & Porter, 1979, 1982; Johnston & Snizek, 1991; Gregson, 1992). More recently, Meyer & Allen (1991) described three forms of organizational commitment: commitment as an affective attachment to the organization; commitment as a perceived cost associated with leaving the organization; and commitment as an obligation to remain in the organization. These three forms are termed as affective (i.e. individuals stay in the organization because they want to), continuance (i.e. individuals stay in the organization because they need to), and normative commitment (i.e. individuals stay in the organization because they feel they should), respectively. Job Performance is defined as a worker s effective execution of tasks or job and useful contribution to the social work environment (Abramis, 1994). There are three primary theories of the mechanisms by which job stress may affect job performance, motivator theory, interference theory, and combination theory, each predicting a different type of relationship (Abramis, 1994). The purpose of this study was to find out how psychological contract affects other attitudinal variables. And how performance was eventually affected. Hypotheses Relationship between Psychological Contract and Organizational Justice. Teachers enter a school with certain expectations about the way things work. For example, they have certain perceptions of how their bosses treat them, how much is their salary, how decisions are being made and how conflicts are being resolved. The school administrators may explicitly or implicitly promised certain outcomes. These promise or the perceived promise would form the basis of a psychological contact. When these teachers start working in that school, they get to see and feel the way things are done. They are exposed to the way their supervisors deal with them; the ways decision-making and conflict-resolution take place. They also receive a certain amount of salary. If, for example, their supervisors practise favouritism to 6

7 some colleagues, or decisions are made in favour of certain people, or conflicts are being settled to the advantage of certain people, or teachers receive a lower amount of salary compared to colleagues who do the same work, or two teachers receive the same amount of salary but one does more work than the other, the individuals concerned may perceive that they are being treated unfairly. They experience dissonance because what they initially expect and what they encounter in reality is different. From the above reasoning, for our sample of teachers, we would like to test for a relationship between psychological contract and organisational justice. Hypothesis 1: Perceived fulfillment of psychological contract would lead to perceived distributive justice. Relationship between Organizational Justice and Organizational Commitment. When teachers perceive that they are being treated unfairly, for example, their supervisors practise favouritism to some colleagues, or two teachers doing the same amount of work but receiving different salaries, the teachers at a disadvantage are likely to be frustrated. They begin to wonder why the school is treating them in this way. Did they do anything wrong to warrant such a treatment? These teachers tend to reduce their level of commitment to the school. They see no point in putting in so much effort for the school and strongly believing in the school and accepting its goals, when the school does not appreciate their effort, commitment and loyalty. With reference to the above discussion, for our sample of teachers, we would like to test for a relationship between organisational justice and organisational commitment. Hypothesis 3: Perceived distributive justice would lead to higher levels of organisational commitment. Relationship between Job Satisfaction and Organizational Commitment. Teachers who experience satisfaction in the different facets of their work environment, for example, their work itself, their colleagues and supervisors, their compensation and promotion. As their work environment is contained in the larger context of the school, it is likely that the satisfaction employees get from their jobs and the work environment is extended to the school. Therefore, satisfied employees may feel committed to the school. 7

8 Hypothesis 4: Higher levels of job satisfaction would lead to higher levels of organisational commitment. Teachers who are committed demonstrate a strong acceptance of the school s values, tasks, and working manner. Teachers who firmly believe in these values are likely to manifest them in the performance. They keep these values in mind when preparing their lesson plans, when giving students projects, when thinking of examination questions. These teachers are also more conscious of their conduct and work attitudes, as they want to set good examples for their students. The above reasoning would support the following hypothesis: Hypothesis 5: Higher level of organizational commitment would lead to better performance. Method Sampling This study took place in Singapore, which is a small, urbanized state. It has four million population; among them, over 75% are ethnic Chinese. All public schools were under unified administrative policies, compensation packages, curriculum and extra-curriculum activities, and similar working conditions. Each set of the survey contains two separate questionnaires, one for the participating teacher and the other for his/her supervisor. Approval was first sought from the principals or vice-principals of the various schools to conduct the survey on the teachers in their schools. After permissions were obtained, questionnaires were distributed randomly to the teachers. These teachers responded to the teacher s version of the survey and passed the supervisor version to their immediate superior who could be department heads, vice-principals or principals. Completed questionnaires were either personally collected by the researchers or mailed back to the researcher s university in stamped, self-addressed envelopes. Over two hundred sets of questionnaires were personally delivered to 26 randomly selected schools spread over the country. A total of 164 useable questionnaire sets were returned, at a response rate of 76%. There were 135 (82.3%) females and 29 males. The average age was 35. The majority of the teachers were 8

9 Chinese (76.4%). More than half (56.5%) of the teachers were married. A majority of them were teaching in primary schools (62.6%). With reference to highest qualification, 55.5% of the sample had tertiary education and 83.8% had a certificate in education. About 55.6% sample has nonteaching experience, for example, clerical work (17.4%), administrative and management (16.3%), professional and technical areas (11.8%), and sales (10.1%). The respondents had been in the teaching profession for an average of approximately 12 years. The principal subject teaching areas by the highest number of teachers were languages (36.0%), mathematics (25.7%), and science (18.9%). As for extracurricular activities, more than 40% (41.3%) of the teachers were in-charge of clubs. Measures Distributive justice. Distributive justice was assessed from Curry, Wakefield, Price & Mueller (1986) 5 items ( =.8535) Job satisfaction was assessed using 10 items from Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire (MSS) (Weirs, Dawns, England, & Lofquist, 1967). Cronbach a of.86 was obtained. Organizational commitment was measured by 15 items from Organizational Commitment Questionnaire (OCQ) (Porter, Steers, Mowday, & Boulian, 1974). Sample items included I am willing to put in a great deal of effort beyond that normally is expected in order to help this school to be successful, I talk up this school to my friends as a great school to work for, and I feel very little loyalty to this school. The reliability is.85. Performance was measured using two methods. First, the teachers were asked to self-evaluate his/her performance through 2 items from (self-citation, 2001), using a 5-point scale, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). A sample item was I believe that my job performance is well above average. In addition, the teacher was to give himself/herself an overall performance rating on a scale of 1 (much worse than most people) to 5 (much better than most people). Second, the teacher s supervisor was asked to assess the teacher s performance in a separate questionnaire using 15 items, which was used in annual performance appraisal (Ministry of Education, Singapore, 1998), with a 5-point scale ranging from 1 9

10 (excellent) to 5 (not adequate). Areas of evaluation included knowledge in subject area(s) taught, delivery of lessons, and classroom management, etc. In addition, the supervisor was asked to give an overall rating for the teacher s performance in the school, also using a 5-point scale, ranging from 1 (much worse than most people) to 5 (much better than most people). The reliability is.78 for self-evaluation and.98 for supervisor rating. Demographic data were gathered at the end of the questionnaire, including gender, age, race, marital status, academic qualification, professional qualification, other non-teaching experience, number of years in the teaching profession, principal subject teaching area, extra-curricular activities presently in-charge of. Results Table 1 presented the regression analysis result. The column one showed that 41.5% of the variance in distributive justice was predicted by the psychological contract fulfillment (F= , p<.001). Job satisfaction was predicted by both psychological contract fulfillment and distributive justice (b=.037, p<.05; and b=.479, p<.001, respectively). Organizational commitment was predicted by distributive justice and job satisfaction (b=.327, p<.001; and b=.371, p<.001, respectively). Finally, job satisfaction and organizational commitment were significant predictors of teaching performance (b=.210, p<.05 and b=.439, p<.001), explaining 11.9% of variances. Thus, all five hypotheses were supported with two additional linkages were identified. Table : Regression Analysis Distributive Justice Job Satisfaction Org l. Commitment Teaching Performance Psychological contract.644***.037* Distributive justice.479***.327*** Job satisfaction.371*** -.210* Org l commitment.439*** F *** *** *** 4.174*** R² Note: *** p <.001; ** p <.01; * p <.05 10

11 Discussion and Implication Teachers performance is among the most important issues in education sectors. Extending the understanding of employee behavior in other sectors to education fields, this paper examined the ways a few commonly recognized influencing factors affect teaching performance. They were psychological contract, distributive justice, organizational commitment, and job satisfaction. Organizational commitment of teachers takes the form of commitment to the school one teaches in. This factor deserves most attention. It is the most significant predictor of performance and with highest coefficient. It consistently contributed to good performance rated by oneself and by the immediate supervisor. In the Singapore school context, the inter-school competition is stiff. There is an annual exercise of school ranking based on primary school leaving examination (PSLE) for primary schools or General Certificate of Education (GCE) O Level Examination for secondary schools. The ranking criteria include both absolute and value-added performance. The ranking results are made available to the public ( Performance indicators Straits Times, 14 Aug 1998). These add pressure on staff to produce better results every year and bear direct and indirect financial consequences. A highly committed teacher would try the best to perform well and make major contribution. Although part of the inner drive for a good performance may come from the commitment to the teaching profession, commitment to the school seemed to be much stronger motivation for excellent work. Administrators in education sector should pay more attention to strengthen teachers commitment to their schools. Findings from this research suggested a few factors to start with. These include the following. First, to improve perceived distributive justice. This will help to improve both job satisfaction and organizational commitment. This suggests schools to look into their reward-related evaluation and administrative systems and practices. Secondly, since justice is a subjectively perceived factor, good impression management helps. Thirdly, good communication with teachers, particularly on what is to be expected by both schools and teachers. Good communication and mutual understanding will help to form an accurate and realistic psychological contact. 11

12 Forth, if, for unforeseeable reasons, the pre-established psychological contract cannot be fulfilled, a candid explanation will help teachers to understand the situation, and to appreciate the admonitions effort to minimize or to have minimized the gap and delivered the best it can. Built on a sound understanding of the causal relationship among various factors leading to good teaching performance, the school administration will be able to forester a trust culture and build a committed teaching staff. (Bibliography available upon request.) 12