Human resource management practice I also available by michael armstrong

Motivation and job 

satisfaction

Job satisfaction can be defined as the attitudes and 

feelings people have about their work. Positive and 

favourable  attitudes  towards  the  job  indicate  job 

satisfaction.  Negative  and  unfavourable  attitudes 

towards the job indicate job dissatisfaction. It can 

be  distinguished  from  morale,  which  is  a  group 

rather than individual variable, related to the degree 

to  which  group  members  feel  attracted  to  their 

group and want to remain a member of it.

The factors that affect job 

satisfaction

Levels of job satisfaction or dissatisfaction are in-

fluenced by:

 

●

The intrinsic motivating factors. These relate 

to job content, especially the five dimensions 

of jobs identified by Hackman and Oldham 

(1974): skill variety, task identity, task 

significance, autonomy and feedback (the job 

characteristics model).

 

●

The quality of supervision. The Hawthorne 

studies (Roethlisberger and Dixon, 1939) 

resulted in the claim that supervision is the 

most important determinant of worker 

attitudes. Elton Mayo (1933) believed that  

a man’s desire to be continuously associated 

in work with his fellows is a strong, if not  

the strongest human characteristic.

 

●

Success or failure. Success obviously 

creates satisfaction, especially if it enables 

individuals to prove to themselves that they 

are using their abilities to the full. And it is 

equally obvious that the reverse is true of 

failure.

Job satisfaction and performance

It is a commonly held and not unreasonable belief 

that  an  increase  in  job  satisfaction  results  in  im-

proved  performance.  The  whole  human  relations 

movement  led  by  Mayo  (1933)  and  supported  by 

the Roethlisberger and Dixon (1939) research was 

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