ATTITUDES IN ORGANIZATIONS (JOB ATTITUDE)

People’s attitudes also affect their behavior in organizations. Attitudes are complexes of beliefs and feelings that
people have about specific ideas, situations, or other people. Attitudes are important because they are the
mechanism through which most people express their feelings. An employee’s statement that he feels underpaid
by an organization reflects his feelings about his pay. Similarly, when a manager says that she likes a new
advertising campaign, she is expressing her feelings about the organization’s marketing efforts.

How Attitudes Are Formed

Attitudes are formed by a variety of forces, including our personal values, our experiences, and our personalities.
For example, if we value honesty and integrity, we may form especially favorable attitudes toward a manager
whom we believe to be very honest and moral. Similarly, if we have had negative and unpleasant experiences
with a particular coworker, we may form an unfavorable attitude toward that person. Any of the “big five” or
individual personality traits may also influence our attitudes.

Understanding the basic structure of an attitude helps us see how attitudes are formed and can be changed.

Attitude Structure

Attitudes are usually viewed as stable dispositions to behave toward objects in a certain way. For any number of
reasons, a person might decide that he or she does not like a particular political figure or a certain restaurant (a
disposition). We would expect that person to express consistently negative opinions of the candidate or
restaurant and to maintain the consistent, predictable intention of not voting for the political candidate or not
eating at the restaurant. In this view, attitudes contain three components: cognition, affect, and intention.

Cognition is the knowledge a person presumes to have about something. You may believe you like a class
because the textbook is excellent, the class meets at your favorite time, the instructor is outstanding, and the
workload is light. This “knowledge” may be true, partially true, or totally false. For example, you may intend to
vote for a particular candidate because you think you know where the candidate stands on several issues. In
reality, depending on the candidate’s honesty and your understanding of his or her statements, the candidate’s
thinking on the issues may be exactly the same as yours, partly the same, or totally different. Cognitions are
based on perceptions of truth and reality, and, as we note later, perceptions agree with reality to varying degrees.

A person’s affect is his or her feelings toward something. In many ways, affect is similar to emotion—it is
something over which we have little or no conscious control.
Intention guides a person’s behavior. If you like your instructor, you may intend to take another class from him
or her next semester. Intentions are not always translated into actual behavior, however. If the instructor’s course
next semester is scheduled for 8 a.m., you may decide that another instructor is just as good. Some attitudes, and
their corresponding intentions, are much more central and significant to an individual than others. You may
intend to do one thing (take a particular class) but later alter your intentions because of a more significant and
central attitude (fondness for sleeping late)

Attitude Formation

Attitudes are generally formed around a sequence of cognition, affect, and behavioral intention. That is, we
come to know something that we believe to be true (cognition). This knowledge triggers a feeling (affect).
Cognition and affect then together influence how we intend to behave in the future

Cognitive Dissonance

When two sets of cognitions or perceptions are contradictory or incongruent, a person experiences a level of
conflict and anxiety called cognitive dissonance. Cognitive dissonance also occurs when people behave in a
fashion that is inconsistent with their attitudes. For example, a person may realize that smoking and overeating
are dangerous yet continue to do both. Because the attitudes and behaviors are inconsistent with each other, the
person probably will experience a certain amount of tension and discomfort and may try to reduce these feelings
by changing the attitude, altering the behavior, or perceptually distorting the circumstances. For example, the
dissonance associated with overeating might be resolved by continually deciding to go on a diet “next week.”
Cognitive dissonance affects people in a variety of ways. We frequently encounter situations in which our
attitudes conflict with each other or with our behaviors. Dissonance reduction is the way we deal with these
feelings of discomfort and tension. In organizational settings, people contemplating leaving the organization may
wonder why they continue to stay and work hard. As a result of this dissonance, they may conclude that the
company is not so bad after all, that they have no immediate options elsewhere, or that they will leave “soon.”
Attitude Change

Attitudes are not as stable as personality attributes. For example, new information may change attitudes. A
manager may have a negative attitude about a new colleague because of the colleague’s lack of job-related
experience. After working with the new person for a while, however, the manager may come to realize that he is
actually very talented and subsequently develop a more positive attitude.

Likewise, if the object of an attitude changes, a person’s attitude toward that object may also change. Suppose,
for example, that employees feel underpaid and as a result have negative attitudes toward the company’s reward
system. A big salary increase may cause these attitudes to become more positive. Attitudes can also change
when the object of the attitude becomes less important or less relevant to the person. For example, suppose an
employee has a negative attitude about his company’s health insurance. When his spouse gets a new job with an
organization that has outstanding insurance benefits, his attitude toward his own insurance may become more
moderate simply because he no longer has to worry about it. Finally, as noted earlier, individuals may change
their attitudes as a way to reduce cognitive dissonance. Deeply rooted attitudes that have a long history are, of
course, resistant to change. For example, over a period of years a former airline executive named Frank Lorenzo
developed a reputation in the industry of being antiunion and of cutting wages and benefits. As a result,
employees throughout the industry came to dislike and distrust him. When he took over Eastern Airlines, its
employees had such a strong attitude of distrust toward him that they could never agree to cooperate with any of
his programs or ideas. Some of them actually cheered months later when Eastern went bankrupt, even though it
was costing them their own jobs

KEY WORK-RELATED ATTITUDES

People in an organization form attitudes about many different things. Employees are likely to have attitudes
about their salary, their promotion possibilities, their boss, employee benefits, the food in the company cafeteria,
and the color of the company softball team uniforms. Of course, some of these attitudes are more important than
others.

1. JOB SATISFACTION

Job satisfaction reflects the extent to which people find gratification or fulfillment in their work. Extensive
research on job satisfaction shows that personal factors such as an individual’s needs and aspirations determine
this attitude, along with group and organizational factors such as relationships with coworkers and supervisors
and working conditions, work policies, and compensation.

A satisfied employee tends to be absent less often, to make positive contributions, and to stay with the
organization. In contrast, a dissatisfied employee may be absent more often, may experience stress that disrupts
coworkers, and may be continually looking for another job. Contrary to what a lot of managers believe, however,
high levels of job satisfaction do not necessarily lead to higher levels of productivity. One survey indicated that,
also contrary to popular opinion, Japanese workers are less satisfied with their jobs than their counterparts in the
United States.

Job satisfaction focuses on employee attitude towards his job. It has threeimportant dimensions:
1. Job satisfaction can be measured by the emotional response to a job situation, hence it cannot
be seen, and it can only be inferred.

2. Job satisfaction is related to what you actually get as reward and what you expect to get. If the
difference between the actual reward and expectation is minimum or negligible them a person
will display a positive attitude and if there is wide difference between the two, a person will
display a negative attitude towards his job and therefore the satisfaction level will be low.

3. Job satisfaction is related to job dimensions. These can be expressed in terms of job content,
remuneration, attitude of co-workers, and opportunity of growth that job is able to provide in
 terms of promotion and last but not the least the expert loyal and experienced leadership is
available in terms of supervision.

Factors determining job Satisfaction

There are number of dimensions which effect job satisfaction. Important factors that determine job
satisfaction of the employees in the organization is as under:

Work Content: The content of the work should be encouraging and interesting and have variety
inbuilt in it so that it is not boring. Positive feedback from the job and autonomy has been considered
to be important for motivation of employees. Too tough or job having two little challenge brings
frustration and feeling of failure hence the job should be moderately tough so that the individual has
to stretch his ability, imagination and skills. Once such job is completed successfully, the workers get
a great sense of satisfaction.

Pay and promotion policy: Salary and wages play decisive part in the study of job satisfaction.
Equitable rewards is multi- dimensional in nature. The benefits are of varied nature namely pay,
perks and rewards are associated with motivation of employees. Pay system and promotion policy
of the organization must be just, unambiguous and in line with the prevalent industry norms and
employee expectations.Employee wages and salary must ensure him the social status and should be
able to fulfill the expectations. Individual must perceive salary administration and promotion
policy as being fair. Organization should ensure that their polices are growth oriented and
incremental in nature so that employees take on an additional responsibility voluntarily. Apart
from financial benefits, organizationmust provide adequate perks and non-financial benefits so that
they are motivated and display high level of satisfaction.
Supportive working condition: Working conditions have a modest but lasting effect on job
satisfaction. Due to fast development of technology, it is necessary that the organizations are
operating on upgraded technology, latest systems and procedures. The layout of work place must be
ideally suited from operational point of view and the employees should display great degree of
satisfaction. The place should be neat and clean with necessary facilities as per Factories Act. Light,
ventilation, cleanliness, enough space for work, immediate availability of supervision, adequate latest
tools and generally good surrounding will definitely add to job satisfaction. If the work place were
closer to home, it would add to employee retention.

Work group: The concept of work group and work teams is more prevalent today. Work group of
multi skilled persons with one goal will be able to function effectively if they are friendly and co-
operative. The work group serves as a source of support, comfort, advice and assistance to
individual worker. A good work group makes the job more enjoyable. The factor of work group
support is essential for job satisfaction. If the reverse conditions prevail, the people may not be able to
get along with each other and the level of job satisfaction will be reduced.

Supervision: Supervision is one of the moderate factors, which affect job satisfaction. Qualified
supervisors should be available for advice, guidance and problem solving. Supervisors should be
placed close to the place of work and should be available. They should take personal interest in the
affairs of employees both on personal and official level. Supervision is related to leadership.

In Defence Services the leadership is so proactive that the leader carry on him details of
each soldier under his command. The details include dependants of soldier’s family, their
economic position, details of children, the class they study, home address and other
demographic details, soldier take his boss as guide and philosopher who is always available to
him for advice. Such supervision improves the morale and job satisfaction of employees.
 Personality job fit: Individuals should be assigned the job, that suit their interest. Recently it has been seen
that MBA graduates are satisfied with their job if they get the job related to the “specialisation” they
have chosen during the MBA degree.

EFFECT OF JOB SATISFACTION ON PERFORMANCE

Satisfaction and productivity: Based on research carried out in Hawthorne studies, further research to
prove that “happy workers are productive” was carried out, which has been proved negative. Based
on theconclusion of Hawthorne studies, managers began their efforts to make their employees happier
by improving work conditions, providing Laissez- faire type of leadership, expanding various
facilities to the workers, but it has been found that there is no direct relationship between happiness
and productivity

Satisfaction and absenteeism: There is an inverse relationship between satisfaction and absenteeism.
When workers are more satisfied the absenteeism is low. When satisfaction level is low absenteeism
tends to be high. There are certain moderating variables like sick leave and degree to which people
feel that their jobs are important. Where there is a provision for sick leave, employees would take the
benefitand absent themselves.

Satisfaction and turnover: It have been found that employees who are not satisfied with their jobs
will have high turnover. Employees who are satisfied will not have high turnover. Satisfaction is also
negatively related to turnover but the co-relation is stronger than what we found in absenteeism.
Employee performance is a moderating factor of the satisfaction—Turnover relationship. In recent
times a phenomenon amongst the software engineers whose performance is high, their turnover has
been noticed as high because of competition for personal growth. Organization lures the competent
person for their organizational growth. Organization cares for such high performers and their
retention. Poorperformers do not leave the organization for fear of lack of job opportunityoutside.
 2. ORGANIZATIONAL COMMITMENT

Organizational commitment, sometimes called job commitment, reflects an individual’s identification with and
attachment to the organization. A highly committed person will probably see herself as a true member of the
firm (for example, referring to the organization in personal terms such as “we make highquality products”),
overlook minor sources of dissatisfaction, and see herself remaining a member of the organization. In contrast, a
less committed person is more likely to see herself as an outsider (for example, referring to the organization in
less personal terms such as “they don’t pay their employees very well”), to express more dissatisfaction about
things, and to not see herself as a long-term member of the organization.

Organizations can do few definitive things to promote satisfaction and commitment, but some specific guidelines
are available. For one thing, if the organization treats its employees fairly and provides reasonable rewards and
job security, its employees are more likely to be satisfied and committed. Allowing employees to have a say in
how things are done can also promote these attitudes. Designing jobs so that they are stimulating can enhance
both satisfaction and commitment.

Research suggests that Japanese workers may be more committed to their organizations than are U.S. workers.
Other research suggests that some of the factors that may lead to commitment, including extrinsic rewards, role
clarity, and participative management, are the same across different cultures.

2. JOB INVOLVEMENT
Job involvement refers to the degree to which a person identifies himself (psychologically) with his job, actively
participates and considers his perceived performance level important to self-worth (Robbins). High level of
involvement indicates that the individual cares for his job, that has an impact on high productivity. Higher the
job satisfaction, lower will be absenteeism and employee turnover.

3. EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT

It is a strong sense of connection with the organization and passion for one’s job. Active employee
engagement shows up as a willingness to help others, to always try to do something extra to improve
performance, and to speak positively about the organization.