Exploring work motivation: The case of a government-owned and controlled corporation in Davao City Philippines

Transcription

1 Exploring work motivation: The case of a government-owned and controlled corporation in Davao City Philippines Edjan S. Parreño Davao City Water District Km. 5, Jose P. Laurel Avenue, Bajada. Davao City Philippines edjanajde@gmail.com Date received: 4 July 2016 Date accepted: 3 September 2016 Date published: 16 December 2016 ABSTRACT This paper argues that employee motivation come from both extrinsic and intrinsic sources. While there are motivation sources, there are also demotivation sources. This study is anchored on Self- Determination theory where motivation is discussed to move along a continuum of motivation and demotivation sources based on the degree of self-determination. The study first determined the motivation construct of employees. Further, the characteristics of respondents such as age and sex were used as predictor variable to determine its relationship with the motivation factors. The exploratory factor analysis was used in this study in order to find out the factors that constitute worker motivation. EFA revealed four factors explaining work motivation. These are 1) interest in task at hand, 2) income, 3) drive to compete and 4) Amotivation or the level of demotivation. Ordinal regression was also used because the motivation scales as dependent variables takes on an ordinal form. It revealed that motivation sourced from interest in task at hand and the drive to compete was lesser in age group Income, as a source of motivation, was also lower among job order contracts than tenured employees. The lack of motivation to work is higher in male respondents than their female counterparts. Overall motivation was lesser in age group and Keywords: Exploratory, Factor, Analysis, Ordinal, Regression. INTRODUCTION Corporate performance is mainly affected by individual workers motivation. The idea that employee s motivation boosts corporate performance has been backed by legitimate studies over the years. This is one of the reasons why companies all around the world devise business strategies, taking so much time and effort to decode and analyze possible means to make their employees motivated in the performance of duty (Nohria, Groysberg & Lee, 2008). While companies thrive to achieve a level of understanding on what keeps an employee motivated, some of them made sound practices to motivate employees based from established theories available (Ramlall, 2004). The sustainability perspective in the paper of Kooij (2015) argues that as employees grow in age in the organization, a person-job fit should always be required in order for an employee to maintain motivation, thus, successfully age at work. Moreover, the relationship of employee age and job performance was positive for older employees when companies use compensation strategies as motivation (Yeung and Fung, 2009 as cited in Zacher, 2014). Indeed, the productivity employees achieve and their performance related to the job is a function of motivation (Pinder, 2008). Motivation by definition is something that causes a person to do something and that motivation is rooted from individual s needs, wants and drives (Timm & Peterson, 2000). A more suitable term to be used to constitute the evolving definition of motivation is the explanation that work motivation is both intrinsic and extrinsic to the individual such that it can make a certain kind of action related to work (Pinder, 2008). 56

2 Intrinsic and extrinsic types of motivation among employees are in a dynamic movement in every organization today. Companies pay important attention to extrinsic type of motivation which addresses the socio-economic needs of employees that are basically outside the premise of what constitute work and organization like remuneration and incentives. While extrinsic motivation is a vital part of the programs of companies, great companies make a big leap by making employees intrinsically motivated such that the finished work of the employee is already considered as a satisfied need regardless of the pay attributed to it (Frey & Osterloh, 2002). This study is grounded from the Self-Determination Theory (SDT). The SDT views motivation in a multidimensional form where distinct forms of motivation is an autonomous and can be controlled. These types of motivation fall under three categories. First is amotivation, is defined as the lack of motivation to do certain task. Second is intrinsic motivation where in doing the task in hand is already a fulfillment of the need. Intrinsically motivated person finds happiness and satisfaction from what they are doing. Third is extrinsic motivation. This type of motivation is definitely an action done because of instrumental reasons (e.g. receiving reward, affirmation, increase in self-esteem, et cetera) (Deci & Ryan, 2000, cited in Gagne et al., 2014). This study made use of exploratory factor analysis (EFA) to determine types of motivation employees have in a government office particularly in a water supply service GOCC situated in Davao City. EFA is a statistical tool used to explore the constructs that would explain a certain phenomenon (Field, 2013). Factors extracted from the EFA are subjected to ordinal logistic regression to determine the odds that an employee/s will likely to have the kind of motivation. Further the coefficient will determine how the characteristic of respondents (sex, age group and job status) will likely have the kind of motivation. This is important because not only will the exploration of motivational factors give context to the theory at hand, its relationship with respondent characteristics will also be investigated. In the context of the locale of the study, an employer-employee relationship does not exist between job order contract (JOC) employees and the company. It is with this concept that JOC s do not have equal remuneration and benefits with tenured employees. While having this dilemma, it is vital and equally important for the company to keep its workforce motivated. Hence, this study will focus on the motivational factors and how respondent characteristics relate with each factor. MATERIALS AND METHODS A survey tool was administered to 154 respondents identified using convenient sampling. Convenience sampling was employed in this study because it is cost-efficient and the researcher could not have access to pertinent information of the company as needed in other sampling techniques such as simple random sampling. However, in view of ethical research, the researcher did the convenience sampling with utmost caution. The researcher also explained carefully each statement in the instrument to the respondents before they answered. The survey tool is composed of statements of which the respondents shall choose a number, from a 7- point Likert scale, that indicates their perspective about each item in the instrument. Scale 7 indicates that the type of motivation identified in the statement that corresponds exactly to that of the respondent while scale of 1 does not correspond at all to the respondent. Factor Analysis In order to determine the constructs of motivation among the respondents, the exploratory factor analysis was used. This study used the principal component analysis (PCA) to obtain factor solutions. In order to interpret variables a lot easier, rotating the factors is necessary using oblique rotation. The use of oblique rotation assumes that factors loaded are theoretically correlated. Factor loading was set to.600 and higher loading indicates high substantive importance of a variable to a factor. 57

3 Ordinal Logistic Regression and the Ordinal Model After extracting the factors using EFA, the corresponding scores of clustered variables representing a factor was converted to ordinal data with values from 1 to 7, 1 being the lowest and the 7 being the highest. The characteristics of the respondents were treated as predictor variables to explain the scale choice of a certain factor. In order to predict an ordinal dependent variable given one or more independent variable, the ordinal logistic regression statistical tool was employed. The ordinal logistic model is given as = where the j goes from 1 to the number of the categories minus one. The minus sign preceding the coefficient of the explanatory variable states an explanation that coefficients with large values are associated with larger scores. A dichotomous factor with a positive coefficient indicates that higher scores are more likely for the first category. While a negative coefficient indicates lower scores. In the case of continuous variables, the probability that a larger score increases as the value of the variable increases is determined by a positive coefficient. Smaller cumulative probabilities which is less likely to occur is a result of association with high scores. All logits have the same coefficient β but each has its assignment. This means that for different logit functions, the effect of the explanatory variable does not vary. This is also the essence why the ordinal model is a proportional odds model. Moreover, the term which is the threshold value acts like an intercept which is the same with linear regression but in this case, each logit has its own intercept. The same type of ordinal regression method was used in the study of Tamayo (2011) entitled, Psychographic measure of service quality of fastfood chain in Davao City. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION The respondents were government employees serving under a water supply service GOCC. Majority (52 or 33.8%) of the respondents belong to the age bracket 30 to 39. Forty three or 27.9 percent are within the age groups. Twenty seven or 17.5 percent are within the age groups and sixteen or 39 percent belong to the age group. Most of the respondents were Female, (78 or 50.6%) while sixty or 39% were Male. Further, ninety five or 61.7% of the respondents were regular employees holding tenured positions while (43) (27.9%) were Job Order contract. Table 1 illustrates the profile of the respondents. Table 1. Profile of the Respondents Frequency Percent Male Sex of Female Respondents Missing Total Age of the Respondents Job Status years old years old years old years old Missing Total Regular Job Order Contract Missing Total n =

4 Sampling adequacy and test of sphericity The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) measure of sampling adequacy statistic tests determines the measure of sampling adequacy. It investigates and compares the sum of partial correlations and sum of correlations. If there is observation of diffusions in the pattern of correlations such that the sum of partial correlations is relatively larger than the sum of correlations, then factor analysis is the right course. KMO statistic will suggest, based on its value ranging from 0 to 1, whether variables are desirable for factor analysis. A KMO value which is approximately close to 1 suggests that correlation patterns are relatively compact resulting to unique and reliable factors (Field, 2013). Hutcheson and Sofroniou (1999, cited in Field 2013) suggested that KMO values in the.50 s are miserable,.60 s are mediocre,.70 s are middling,.80 s are meritorious and.90 s are marvelous. KMO values.50 below are considered unacceptable. Based on the KMO (.872), sample size of this study is adequate for factor analysis and resulting motivation factors were reliable and unique. Table 2 illustrates this result. Table 2 KMO and Bartlett's Test Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy. Bartlett's Test of Sphericity.872 Approx. Chi-Square df 153 Sig..000 Bartlett s test has a value of and a degree of significance of p<0.001 which means that the variables are dependent with each other. This proves that the variables representing motivational factors are related with each other. Factor analysis output Out of the 18 factors extracted, only 4 factors were retained for rotation. The first four factors, having passed the criterion of having an eigenvalue equal or greater than 1, account for 39.08%, 13.45%, 6.90%, and 5.91% of the total variance, respectively. The total variance that can be attributed to these four factors is 65.35%. The remaining 12 factors only account for 34.7 of the variance. Hence, the four factors was the model to represent the type of motivation the respondents have in this study. Table 3 Factor loading of motivation factors Work is motivate d by worker s interest and Indicators enjoyme nt in task and goal orientati on Work is motivate d by income Work is motivated by the drive to compete Because I derive much pleasure from learning new things Because it has become a fundamental part of.891 who I am Amotiva tion 59

5 For the satisfaction I experience from taking on.742 interesting challenges Because this is the type of work I have chosen to attain.728 certain important objectives Because I chose this type of work to attain my career.629 goals. Because it allows.925 me to earn money For the income it.868 provides me Because I want to be very good at this work, otherwise I.978 would be very disappointed Because I want to succeed at this job, if not I would be.870 very ashamed of myself Because I want to be a winner in life.715 I don t know why, we are provided with unrealistic.867 working conditions I don t know, too much is expected.844 of us I ask myself this question, I don t seem to be able to manage the.807 important tasks related to this work Note: KMO=0.872, Bartlett's test of Sphericity (chi-square)= , p=0.000,<0.01 The rotated pattern matrix identified items that best correspond in a motivation factor. Five items loaded on factor one, two items on factor two, three items on factor three and three items on factor four. An inspection of the items in factor 1 (5.3) indicated that employees are motivated by interest in task at hand. Factor 2 (5.0) reflected income motivation. Items loaded on factor 3 (4.7) explained motivation caused by the drive to compete and the factor 4 (3.8) represented the absence of motivation. Table III shows the four factors representing the data and the qualitative explanation for each factor. 60

6 Estimation using ordinal regression After extracting the factors using EFA, the factors scores were converted into ordinal form and treated as outcome variable having the characteristics of respondents as the predictor variable. Statistical measurement revealed that the odds of being motivated by the interest and enjoyment in task and goal orientation was lesser in age group (30-39) with an odds ratio of.236 (95% CI,.079 to.702), Wald = 6.744, p =.009. Moreover, the odds of Job order contract (JOC) employees having income as motivation was.418 (95% CI,.182 to.961) times lower that of regular employees, a statistically significant effect, Wald = 4.218, p = It was also observed that the odds of employees belonging under age group (30-39), in terms of being motivated by the drive to compete, was.324 (95% CI,.114 to.915) times lower that of other age groups, a statistically significant effect, Wald = 4.343, p =.037. Lastly, the odds of demotivation is higher in males as with females with an odds ratio of (95% CI, to 4.259), Wald = 6.355, p =.012. Finally, total motivation scores were computed and subjected to ordinal logistic regression. Results revealed that age group (30-39) was less motivated to work with an odds ratio of.228 (95% CI,.078 to.668), Wald = 7.256, p =.007. Likewise, age group (40-49) is in tow with less motivation to work with an odds ratio of.139 (95% CI,.043 to.450), Wald = , p =.001. CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION The study found out that employee motivation has varying degrees of sources. In simple terms, both internal and external factors take on a different form when applied contextually. Motivational factors were 1) interest in task at hand, 2) income, 3) drive to compete and 4) Amotivation or the level of demotivation. The results prove that motivation, as proposed by the Self Determination theory, is a multi-dimensional construct. Hence, motivation should be viewed as behavior that moves along the continuum of both intrinsic and extrinsic sources (Gagné & Deci, 2005). Second, age of respondents has a direct effect to employee motivation. The result shows that motivation is diminished as employee s age. This result falls along the arguments of Kooij (2015) and Zacher (2014) where a need to have comprehensive plan to keep aging workers motivation should be addressed. This result traces its root back to Marx (1844, as cited in Ariely, Kamenica, Prelec, 2008) where he argues that for industrial work where the laborer is distinct from its work, labor goals and production process, the laborer or the employee in this case, cannot find fulfillment in ones work and integration with the work and task at hand. Hence, it is recommended for the GOCC being studied in this research to implement programs that would enhance the motivation factors identified in this study. Moreover, motivational programs should be more focused on age groups and as this group s motivation is lower with other age groups. Programs, project and activities to be implemented should enhance and increase the motivation level of the age group and such that there would be avenues where career goals is clear and reachable at this point in their lives. Further, activities, programs and project should uplift the drive to compete among these employees to enhance efficiency that which translates to productivity. Moreover, to host organization to review and revisit policies regarding the remuneration of Job Order Contract employees. Income as motivation to work is lesser among this type of employees. Augmenting the daily wage of these workers can make way for higher work motivation. Furthermore, raising the number of respondents to 300 or more will produce more reliable results. Exploring additional characteristics that would affect the motivation of employees is also recommended. A confirmation model of a multi-dimensional construct of motivation can also become subjects for future researches. 61

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