examining the relationship between organisational justice, job satisfaction and the innovative...

EXAMINING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEENORGANISATIONAL JUSTICE, JOB SATISFACTION

AND THE INNOVATIVE BEHAVIOUR OFNURSING EMPLOYEES

MATTHEW J. XERRI

Southern Cross University, Locked bag No. 4Coolangatta, QLD 4225, Australia

matt.xerri@scu.edu.au

Published 4 March 2014

This research examines the impact of three organisational factors on the innovative be-haviour of nurses. Social exchange theory is used as a framework to develop an under-standing about a path from organisational justice, to the job satisfaction and innovativebehaviour of nursing employees. This study uses a quantitative approach, surveying 210nurses. The findings confirm that the procedural justice and job satisfaction of nursingemployees are positively and significantly related to their innovative behaviour. In ad-dition, the findings also outline that interactional justice directly effects job satisfaction andindirectly effects innovative behaviour through job satisfaction. This research adds to thecurrent body of literature by providing insight into the impact of organisational justice andjob satisfaction on the individual innovativeness of nurses. This research, therefore,provides implications for management who are aiming to develop positive perceptionsamongst nursing employees, improve job satisfaction and in-turn foster innovative be-haviour in the workplace.

Keywords: Social exchange theory; interactional and procedural justice; job satisfaction;innovative behaviour.

Introduction

In this study, the innovative behaviour of Australian nursing employees is examinedto provide insight into one method that contributes to improving the efficiency andeffectiveness of nurses. It is clear from the literature that there are a plethora offactors contributing to hospitals requiring the improvement of the efficiency andeffectiveness of employees, while needing to maintain or improve patient outcomes

International Journal of Innovation ManagementVol. 18, No. 1 (February 2014) 1450004 (22 pages)© Imperial College PressDOI: 10.1142/S1363919614500042

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and safety (Buchan and Calman, 2004; Skinner et al., 2011). However, there are anumber of issues manifesting within the Australian nursing workforce, includingdeclining morale, job satisfaction, and commitment to the organisation (Bartram etal., 2004; Day et al., 2006). The issues are further exacerbated by the ongoing andcompounding problem of the shortage of skilled nurses (Twigg et al., 2010), andwhere hospitals are often expected to do more with less.

Developing the innovative behaviour of nursing employees is one way ofaddressing the issue that hospitals and nurses are expected to do more with less.Innovative behaviour is referred to as a discretionary process that requires orga-nisational and management support and which is often seen as a task that is notrequired for nursing employees to meet their required performance indicators(Sanders et al., 2010). De Jong and Den Hartog (2007) suggest that one approachfor an organisation to achieve organisational goals and improve organisationalinnovation is to take advantage of their employees’ ability to innovate. Although itis obvious that technological improvements, knowledge development and man-agement foster innovative behaviour, an environment must also be developedwhere nurses themselves are striving to work towards such goals. If nurses arehigh in innovative behaviour they will be able to identify and solve workplaceproblems efficiently and effectively. As a result, fostering innovative behaviourshould contribute to improving the overall performance of nurses and assist theorganisation to achieve their goals.

Fostering an environment that is rich in innovative behaviour has become apopular topic amongst practitioners and academics alike. However, the develop-ment of such an environment has manifested as a major challenge facing orga-nisations. This study therefore aims to provide insight into several antecedents ofinnovative behaviour within a nursing context. A path will be examined from twoorganisational justice factors (interactional and procedural justice) to job satis-faction and innovative behaviour, as well as from job satisfaction to innovativebehaviour. To explain the reason for this examination, it is first important to brieflydiscuss the concepts that will be used in this study. Interactional justice is anemployee’s perception of fairness with regards to their interactions in the work-place and procedural justice is an employee’s perception of fairness with regardsto the organisation’s policies and procedures. Hence, it is proposed that anemployee’s perception of the two organisational justice factors may influence anemployee’s job satisfaction and their willingness to be innovative in the work-place. The path between job satisfaction and innovative behaviour will also beexamined. The thinking behind this relationship is if employees are satisfied withtheir job they are more likely to put in the extra effort required to be innovative.

The contribution of this research is to provide insight into some of the socialexchange interactions that take place amongst nursing employees and their

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employing organisation. With this in mind, this study will use social exchangetheory (SET) as a theoretical framework for examining the path from interactionaland procedural justice, to job satisfaction and innovative behaviour. SET wasfounded on the idea that workplace exchange built on mutual trust and reciprocityforms work relationships where people in the organisation feel obligated to oneanother (Emerson, 1976). Such relationships are thought to benefit all parties thatform the workplace social exchange network. In this case, that would includenursing employees, their supervisors and their employing organisation. There issome literature that has already examined the influence of interactional and pro-cedural justice on job satisfaction (Kickul et al., 2002; Masterson et al., 2000;Mossholder et al., 1998; Wesolowski and Mossholder, 1997). However, the impactof procedural and interactional justice upon job satisfaction is yet to be examinedwithin the context of nursing employees. Additionally, from a review of literatureto-date no studies were located that have examined the impact of job satisfaction onthe innovative behaviour of employees. For these reasons and to address the currentgaps within the literature, the following primary research questions are proposed toguide the direction of the study and in particular data collection.

“What are the impact of interactional and procedural justice on job satisfactionand the innovative behaviour of nursing employees?”

“What is the impact of the job satisfaction of nursing employees on theirinnovative behaviour?”

This study will be written using three main sections. The next section outlines thebackground of the research, examining both the theoretical framework and literatureabout interactional and procedural justice, job satisfaction and innovative behav-iour. The second section discusses the methods that will be used to operationalisethe study. Finally, the last section outlines and discusses the study’s results.

Background

The majority of past and current studies applying SET make reference to theseminal work of Blau (1964). SET builds on Gouldner’s (1960) theory about thenorm of reciprocity. The norm of reciprocity is based on two main concepts. First,people should help others who in the past have helped them and second, peopleshould not harm or plan to harm those who have helped them in the past. Gouldner(1960) postulates that social exchange is a fundamental form of social interactionlearned in childhood, as well social exchange is reciprocal in nature and growsin frequency and value over time, provided that both parties feel the exchangebalances with regards to reciprocity. SET literature outlines the circumstances that

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must be met whereby people feel indebted when they benefit from the actions ofothers or from the organisation that employs them (Cropanzano and Mitchell,2005). Paese and Gilin (2000) argue that reciprocity applies its power of per-suasion through feelings of obligations imparted on a person preceding the benefitthey received from a particular social exchange.

SET theorists contend that the provision of something of value puts the re-cipient under an obligation to reciprocate (i.e., the need to discharge the ‘debt’)(Blau, 1964; Cropanzano and Mitchell, 2005; Gouldner, 1960). However, repeatedfailure to reciprocate (or chronic under-reciprocation) leads to fewer offers in thefuture and a sense of disrupted expectations on the part of the giver, which impactsupon the quality of the relationship (Paese and Gilin, 2000). The concept of‘unspecified returns’ refers to the undefined nature of social exchanges; that is theexact nature, value and timing of any return are left to the discretion of therecipient (Blau, 1964). Notwithstanding this, there is research suggesting thatexchange relationships are more stable and satisfying if the perceived ‘rewards’ areapproximately equal for each partner (Bernerth et al., 2007).

This means within organisations, if employees are satisfied with the outcomesof their workplace exchanges, they are more inclined to respond with greaterperformance (Shaw et al., 2009). Additionally, they are more likely to respond byfulfilling obligations they have to their colleagues, supervisor and/or employingorganisation. According to social exchange theorists, when effective workplacerelationships are developed the organisation benefits in a number of different ways.For example, effective relationships amongst employees at different levels of theorganisation can result in reciprocal information-sharing, trust and respect, so thatemployees have the information they require, feel empowered to and are ac-countable for undertaking their roles efficiently and effectively. Due to the fact thatit is difficult to determine what may be considered as an appropriate return foremployee actions in the workplace, reciprocation is extremely complicated andonly after several interactions will workplace social network members be able todetermine appropriate forms of reciprocation for different exchange situations(Cole et al., 2007; Griffith et al., 2006; Julian and Fiona, 2005; Lavelle et al.,2007; Molm et al., 2007).

SET and organisational justice

Past literature about SET suggests that organisations are based around and operate byentering into transactions with other parties. For instance, one transaction is thesocial exchange between a supervisor and their subordinate (Colquitt et al., 2001).Another example is the interaction between employees in an organisation. In con-trast, an example of a transaction between the organisation and the employee would

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be the work that the employee performs for monetary-gain. Employees form theirown perceptions about the fairness of the organisational and social transactions orexchanges within the organisation. Past literature suggests that perceptions of fair-ness affect an employee’s attitude and behaviour and in-turn can impact upon workbehaviours, an employee’s commitment to the organisation and their overall jobsatisfaction (Konovsky and Pugh, 1994; Niehoff and Moorman, 1993).

Current literature has converged on the idea that the different types of organi-sational justice are linked separately to workplace behaviour and attitudes towardthe organisation and the job (Aryee et al., 2002; Erdogan, 2006; Stinglhamber et al.,2006). An employee’s perception of fairness is said to form the basis of organisa-tional justice. Current literature suggests that an employee evaluates fairness/organisational justice on three distinct experiences: the result they receive from theirexchange with the organisation (distributive justice), formal policies and proce-dures (procedural justice), and the relationships and exchanges they have withcolleagues and supervisors (interactional justice) (Aryee et al., 2002; Colquitt et al.,2001; Luo, 2007; Tekleab et al., 2005). As mentioned, this study will examineinteractional and procedural justice; distributive justice will not be used becausewhile an employee’s exchange with the organisation is important, this study aims toexamine nursing employees’ perceptions of interaction and policies and procedures.

There is empirical research that has examined the relationship between inter-actional justice, procedural justice and job satisfaction. A meta-analysis byColquitt et al. (2001) suggest that past studies (e.g., Mossholder et al., 1998;Wesolowski and Mossholder, 1997) have found high correlations between pro-cedural justice and job satisfaction as opposed to interactional justice and jobsatisfaction. In contrast, other studies have found that interactional justice wassignificantly and positively related to job satisfaction (Kickul et al., 2002; Mas-terson et al., 2000). Therefore, because there seems to be no convergence in theliterature, this study aims to contribute to the understanding about the impact ofprocedural and interactional justice on job satisfaction. Collectively, the literaturediscussed provides the foundation for Hypotheses 1 and 2.

Hypothesis 1. The interactional justice perceptions of nursing employees will bepositively correlated to their job satisfaction.Hypothesis 2. The procedural justice perceptions of nursing employees will bepositively correlated to their job satisfaction.

Job satisfaction

There is no agreement within the literature about an all-encompassing definition ofjob satisfaction, particularly with regards to nurses (Hayes et al., 2010), although it

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is agreed that job satisfaction is an attitude that an employee has about their job(Brief, 1998; Brunetto and Farr-Wharton, 2005). An employee’s attitude towardtheir job is said to be either positive or negative and thus more positive attitudesare associated with greater levels of job satisfaction. There are very few studiesthat have examined job satisfaction and innovative behaviour. More specifically,from the small number of studies that have examined job satisfaction and inno-vative behaviour, most studies examine how innovative behaviour predicts jobsatisfaction. With this said, there is some support that job satisfaction may be apredictor of employee innovative behaviour. The different types of studies willnow be discussed.

Oldham (1996) found that employees are more satisfied with their jobs whenthey work on complex and challenging tasks that require creativity and innovativethinking. Janssen (2003) on the other hand suggests that innovative behaviour maynegatively influence satisfaction with co-worker relations, which may decrease anemployee’s job satisfaction. In contrast to previous studies, Sanders et al. (2010)found that satisfaction with HR practices, which they suggest are a facet ofan employee’s job satisfaction, were positively and significantly related withemployees’ innovative behaviour. Additionally, a study by Mohamed (2002) foundthat group job satisfaction was positively related to group innovative behaviour.Hence, while a review of the extant literature revealed no studies that have directlyexamined individual job satisfaction on innovative behaviour, there is some em-pirical support that individual job satisfaction may be a predictor of employeeinnovative behaviour.

The notion that job satisfaction will predict innovative behaviour has beenestablished, although it is yet to be examined extensively. Also the relationshipbetween the job satisfaction of nursing employees and their innovative behaviourhas not previously been examined. There is, however, more support that jobsatisfaction and innovative behaviour may be related. First, some past researchsuggests that job satisfaction is positively related to organisational citizenshipbehaviour (Hoffman et al., 2007; Messersmith et al., 2011). Organisational citi-zenship behaviour is referred to as a discretionary behaviour that involves extra-role intangible and tangible activities, where an employee goes beyond theexpected call of duty (Podsakoff et al., 2000). Janssen (2000) suggests that in-novative behaviour can be considered as a type of extra-role behaviour. To add tothe argument, Sanders et al. (2010) suggest that individual innovation is a type ofdiscretionary behaviour. With regards to nurses, innovative behaviour requiresgoing beyond the expected call of duty, because innovation is often not included ina nurses expected daily duties.

To summarise in the context of this study, past literature suggests that when anemployee perceives they are treated fairly by the organisation and their managers,

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they are more likely to be satisfied with their job (Masterson et al., 2000). Hence,if an employee is more satisfied with their job, because they have been treatedfairly, this study deduces that they may be more inclined to put in the extra effortrequired to undertake discretionary behaviour and be innovative in the workplace.These notions are translated as Hypothesis 3.

Hypothesis 3. The job satisfaction of nursing employees will be positively cor-related to their innovative behaviour.

Innovative behaviour

Innovative behaviour of employees is a popular topic for practitioners andresearchers alike. Although there are many different conceptualisations of whatcomprises innovative behaviour, there appears to be a basic level of agreementwhen defining innovative behaviour at the individual level. Specifically, it iscommon for innovative behaviour to be considered as an action by an individualthat works towards generating, introducing and applying novel ideas or solutionsto problems in the workplace. Scott and Bruce (1994) and Janssen (2000)support earlier work by Kanter (1988) outlining that there are three facets ofindividual innovative behaviour: problem recognition and the development ofan innovative solution, promotion of the solution within the organisation, andthe realisation of the solution into organisational practice. While there is someagreement between researchers about the definition of innovative behaviour,there is some debate about how innovative behaviour in the workplace shouldbe measured.

To explain, some studies have suggested that innovative behaviour can bemeasured using a one-dimensional construct, while other studies suggest that amore robust approach may be to measure innovative behaviour as a multi-di-mensional construct. To ensure clarity within this discussion, it is important tohighlight that there is agreement within the literature that there are multiple-facetsof innovative behaviour. However, some studies examine the multiple-facets ofinnovative behaviour with a one-dimensional measure and others with a multi-dimensional measure. For example, Kleysen and Street (2001) proposed fivedimensions of innovative behaviour, including opportunity exploration, gen-eratively, formative investigations, championing and application. In contrast, otherstudies have acknowledged three dimensions of innovative behaviour (problemrecognition and idea development, promotion of solution, and realisation of thesolution), but have examined the three dimensions using a one-dimensional con-struct (Carmeli and Spreitzer, 2009; Janssen, 2004; Scott and Bruce, 1994).This study will examine the three dimensions of innovative behaviour using a

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one-dimensional construct, because the aim of this study is to examine somefactors that influence the overall innovative behaviour of nursing employees.Specifically, the aim of this study is not to determine how organisational justiceand job satisfaction impact on the different facets of innovative behaviour, thus aone-dimensional construct will suffice.

A study conducted by Janssen (2004) examined the impact of distributive andprocedural fairness on the innovative behaviour of nurses from the perspective oftheir first-line managers. The findings from the study suggest that both distributiveand procedural fairness did not predict innovative behaviour. However, accordingto Buech et al. (2010) with regards to research about innovation in the workplace,organisational justice is important because it contributes to fostering discretionaryextra-role activities, for instance innovative behaviour. The issue with the con-tradictions in the literature highlights a need for further empirical examinationinto the relationship between organisational justice and innovative behaviour. Alsothe findings from the study by Janssen may be problematic because the studyexamined nurses’ perceptions of fairness from the perspective of their first-linemanager and not the nurses themselves. This study, therefore, aims to contributeto the understanding of the relationship between organisational justice and inno-vative behaviour from the perspective of nurses. As such, this study will examine,amongst other things, the impact of interactional and procedural justice uponthe innovative behaviour of nurses. On the basis of the discussed literature, thefollowing hypotheses are derived.

Hypothesis 4. The interactional justice perceptions of nursing employees will bepositively correlated with their innovative behaviour.Hypothesis 5. The procedural justice perceptions of nursing employees will bepositively correlated with their innovative behaviour.

Methods

Sample and procedure

As previously mentioned, this study examined nursing employees from threehospitals in Australia. The nursing employees participated in a cross-sectional self-report questionnaire. The questionnaire has two main sections. The first sectionassessed the demography of nursing employees. The second section assessednursing employees’ perceptions of interactional and procedural justice, job satis-faction and innovative behaviour. A total of 1,000 questionnaires were distributedfrom which 210 useable questionnaires were returned, inferring a response rateof 21%.

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Measures

Four survey measures were used in this study to provide insight into three ante-cedents of innovative behaviour. The survey consisted of two main sections;demographic questions and questions/items examining the four variables to betested. The items examining the variables require participants to rate on a six-pointLikert scale whether they agree or disagree with the statements (1¼ stronglydisagree to 6 ¼ strongly agree).

Organisational justice was measured using an instrument developed by Luo(2007). Two dimensions of organisational justice were applied within this study;procedural and interactional. The procedural justice dimension contains eightitems and examines nurses’ perceptions about the fairness of formal policies andgovernance, including “The procedures used in formulating and structuring theorganisation are fair.” On the other hand, the interactional justice dimensioncontains six items and examines nurses’ perceptions about the fairness of theinterpersonal exchange that takes place during the application of formal policiesand governance. The items included “In the process of making strategic deci-sions relating to organisational operations, my input is always respected.” Dueto the fact that the instrument measuring organisational justice is relatively new,it has not been applied within current nursing literature. However, the instru-ment was developed and applied by Luo (2007) who found the measures to bereliable and published the use of the instrument in the Academy of ManagementJournal.

Job satisfaction was measured using a four-item instrument developed byJohlke and Duhan (2000) and included items such as “I feel that my job issatisfying.” The instrument developed by Johlke and Duhan was a modification ofthe original industrial salesperson (INDSALES) satisfaction-with-work determi-nant developed by Churchill et al. (1974) and an additional item was includedfrom Hunt et al. (1985). The survey instrument contained four items and wasfound by Johlke and Duhan (2000) to be a reliable instrument (� ¼ 0:81).

This study used a modified version of Scott and Bruce’s (1994) measure ofinnovative behaviour to examine the innovativeness of nursing employees. Thesurvey instrument was modified to suit a self-report approach and contained sixsurvey items. The following are two examples of the modified items “I search outnew working methods, techniques, or instruments” and “I generate originalsolutions for organisational problems.” Carmeli et al. (2006) reported a high re-liability (� ¼ 0:86) when measuring innovative behaviour from the perspective ofthe supervisor and the employee.

Control variables included time in company (tenure) and education level.Time in company is measured by asking respondents to select how long they have

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been employed by their current organisation. The time that an employee has beenemployed by the organisation is included as a control variable because employeesdevelop workplace networks and build knowledge overtime (Granovetter, 1973).Therefore, because networks and knowledge are essential to fostering innovativebehaviour, time in the company might have some effect on the model that needs tobe controlled. Education was measured by asking respondents to list their highesteducational qualification. The level of education has been included as a controlvariable because education is an external source of knowledge that may influenceinnovative behaviour.

Analysis

Quantitative analysis

Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) techniques using SPSS 20.0 and AMOS20.0 were applied to examine the proposed hypotheses. This study follows a two-step latent variable covariance-based SEM process involving a confirmatoryfactor analysis (CFA) and a path analysis (Anderson and Gerbing, 1988). Thepath analysis was conducted to examine the hypotheses, while controlling fortime in company and education level. When undertaking covariance-based SEM,it is important to first ensure an appropriate sample size is attained to conduct theresearch. There are many contrasting views about the minimum sample sizerequired for SEM. For example, Kline (2011) suggests that journal editors andreviewers routinely reject SEM manuscripts with sample sizes smaller than 200.Other studies have proposed that there should be a minimum sample of five foreach parameter examined (Bentler and Chou, 1987). However, the issue withsuch prescriptions is that they do not take into account specific conditions of thestudy or the fact that goodness-of-fit indices (GFIs) become sensitive with largersample sizes.

This study, therefore, follows more recent prescriptions by Hair et al. (2010)who suggest that SEM can be conducted with smaller samples, in a stable manner,if a number of conditions are met. For example, a sample size of 150 is consideredadequate if the structural equation model is restricted to five constructs or less,each construct has three or more observed variables, and each observed variablehas communalities equal to or greater than 0.6. Hence, this study used four latentconstructs all with four or more observed variables, which were found to havecommunalities above the required 0.6.

An additional requirement of SEM suggests that the data should be normallydistributed; otherwise parameters may be over or under estimated. To test thenormality of the data both graphical and statistical tests should be used (Hair et al.,

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2010; Kline, 2011). The graphical tests conducted depict the data to be normallydistributed and this is further confirmed with skewness ranging from �1.65 to 1.11and kurtosis ranging from �1.254 to 0.872.

As previously mentioned this study is cross-sectional in nature and may sufferfrom issues related to a common method variance, which may also cause para-meters to be over-estimated. Similar to Carlson and Kacmar (2000) and based onthe prescriptions of Podsakoff et al. (2003) this study used two approaches todetermine the extent of common method variance in the study. Harman’s one-factor test is conducted first, which resulted in five eigenvalues being extractedthat explained 65.51% of the variance. Additionally, not one eigenvalueexplained majority of the variance, so at this stage there appears to be no issueswith common method variance. To confirm the results, an approach is used tocontrol for the effects of an unmeasured latent methods factor (Podsakoff et al.,2003). This approach requires the development of an unobserved latent factor thatregresses onto each of the observed variables in the SEM model. The resultsindicate that model-fit decreased slightly, but overall was unchanged. Such resultsonly accounted for a small portion of the variance (9.6%), providing furthersupport that common method variance is not an issue in this study (Carlson andKacmar, 2000).

Due to the low response rate, non-response bias was tested by examining earlyand late respondents (Armstrong and Overton, 1977). This process of non-re-sponse bias testing assumes that late respondents are similar to non-respondents.The results indicate no significant differences of the mean values between earlyand late respondents, providing support that there are no major issues withresponse bias.

Results

Analysis of survey

As previously mentioned, the demographic results depict that 210 useable surveyswere returned from a sample of 1,000 nursing employees. Hence, the response rateis 21%. The nursing employees that participated in the survey consisted of 187(89%) females and 23 (11%) males (see Table 1). The sample was derived fromthree hospitals: 108 (51.4%) nurses participated from hospital A, 62 (29.5%)participated from hospital B, and 40 (19%) participated from hospital C. Theaverage age for the nursing participants was over 45. For example, 111 (52.9%)participants were above the age of 45, 70 (33.3%) were aged between 30 and 45,and 27 (12.9%) were under the age of 30. Therefore, this study supports pastliterature that proposes the Australian nursing workforce is ageing.

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A CFA was conducted, which based on past literature, involves testing how wellthe proposed model fits the data. While there are several proposed methods to testmodel fit, this study will use an adjusted chi-square test (��2) (chi-square/ degreesof freedom), Root Mean-Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) (Steiger,1989), GFI, Comparative Fit Index (CFI) (Bollen, 1989) and the Tucker–LewisIndex (TLI) (Tucker and Lewis, 1973). There are a number of prescribed cut-offvalues regarding model fit. For example, the normed chi-square should be betweenone and three and should not be significant, however some studies suggest that thep value is sensitive to sample size and may not provide the best indication ofmodel fit (Salanova and Schaufeli, 2008). The RMSEA should be below 0.08 for areasonable fit or below 0.05 for a good fit (Browne and Cudeck, 1993), and theother indexes at 0.95 indicate superior fit and at 0.90 indicate an adequate fit(Byrne, 2010).

The first step for conducting CFA is to test the validity of the model. Factorloadings were all above 0.7 and no factor loadings were greater than one (Kline,2011). To test discriminant validity, the average variances extracted (AVE) and thecomposite reliabilities were examined and all were above the prescribed cut-offvalues of 0.5 and 0.7, respectively (Hair et al., 2010). Additionally, three models

Table 1. Survey demographics.

Demographics Nursing employees (%)

HospitalHospital A 108 51.4Hospital B 62 29.5Hospital C 40 19.0

GenderMale 23 11.0Female 187 89.0

Age< 30 years 27 12.931–44 years 70 33.3> 45 years 111 52.9

PositionNursing Unit Manager 16 7.6Clinical Nurse 34 16.2Registered Nurse 99 47.1Endorsed Enrolled Nurse 36 17.1Enrolled Nurse 10 4.8Assistant in Nursing 1 0.5Other 14 6.7

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were tested, which found that model 3 provided the best fit for the data (see Table 2),which also highlighted that there were no issues with discriminant validity.

Descriptive statistics and correlation matrix

The means, standard deviations, Cronbach alphas and inter-correlations for allvariables including innovative behaviour, job satisfaction, interactional and pro-cedural justice are presented in Table 3.

Testing the hypotheses

Figure 1 represents the SEM results of the hypothesised paths. Considering thatthe control variables were not significantly related to innovative behaviour, theyhave been removed from the figure. The results depicted in Fig. 1 provide supportfor the acceptance of Hypotheses 1, 3 and 5. The results will now be discussed inmore detail.

Table 3. Means, standard deviations and correlations of the organisational factors tested.

Variable Mean SDInnovativebehaviour

Jobsatisfaction

Proceduraljustice

Interactionaljustice

Time incompany

Innovative behaviour 4.15 1.42 (0.91)Job satisfaction 4.95 0.72 0.169* (0.77)Procedural justice 4.05 0.95 0.152* 0.064 (0.92)Interactional justice 4.66 0.87 0.019 0.174* 0.218** (0.90)Time in company 3.37 1.38 0.029 0.065 0.037 �0.049 —

Education level 3.35 1.24 0.012 �0.056 �0.037 0.020 �0.056

N ¼ 210. Numbers in parentheses on the diagonal are the Cronbach’s Alpha in coefficients of thecomposite scales.*Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (two-tailed).**Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (two-tailed).

Table 2. Preliminary models examining goodness-of-fit.

��2 p CFI GFI TLI RMSEA

Model 1: Job satisfaction — IBa 1.88 0.000 0.92 0.87 0.91 0.11Model 2: 1.86 0.000 0.92 0.88 0.92 0.09Job satisfaction — IBa

Procedural justice — job satisfactionProcedural justice — IBa

Model 3: All paths 1.64 0.098 0.96 0.91 0.97 0.04

aInnovative behaviour.

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Hypothesis 1 proposed a positive and significant path between interactionaljustice and job satisfaction. The results support Hypothesis 1 suggesting that theinteractional justice of nursing employees is positively and significantly relatedto their job satisfaction (� ¼ 0:15, p < 0:05). As such, Hypothesis 1 should beaccepted.

Hypothesis 2 suggested a positive and significant path between proceduraljustice and job satisfaction. The results support the rejection of Hypothesis 2outlining that while the procedural justice of nursing employees is related to theirjob satisfaction (� ¼ 0:02), this relationship was not significant (p > 0:05). Thus,Hypothesis 2 should be rejected.

Hypothesis 3 proposed a positive and significant path between job satisfactionand innovative behaviour. The results support Hypothesis 3 suggesting the jobsatisfaction of nursing employees is positively and significantly related to theirinnovative behaviour (� ¼ 0:23, p < 0:01). Therefore, Hypothesis 3 should beaccepted.

Hypothesis 4 postulated a positive and significant path between the interac-tional justice of nursing employees and their innovative behaviour. The resultsprovide support for the rejection of Hypothesis 4 outlining that the relationshipbetween interactional justice and innovative behaviour was neither positivenor significant (� ¼ �0:051, p > 0:05). Hence, Hypothesis 4 should be rejected.

Hypothesis 5 proposed a positive and significant path between proceduraljustice and innovative behaviour. The results support Hypothesis 5 suggestingthat the relationship between the procedural justice of nursing employeesand their innovative behaviour is both positive and significant (� ¼ 0:15,p < 0:05). As a result, Hypothesis 5 should be accepted. The final model (model3) including all hypothesised parameters explained 10.8% of the variance ofinnovative behaviour.

Innovative behaviour

Job satisfaction

Procedural justice

Interactional justice

0.23**

−0.051

Fig. 1. Examining the path from interactional and procedural justice to job satisfaction and inno-vative behaviour.

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Discussion

The results from this study provide new insight into the impact of procedural andinternational justice on the job satisfaction and innovative behaviour of nursingemployees. As well, new knowledge is contributed about the relationship betweenjob satisfaction and innovative behaviour. In support of some past literature byKickul et al. (2002) and Masterson et al. (2000) interactional justice was found tohave a positive and significant relationship with job satisfaction. However, incontrast to findings by Mossholder et al. (1998) and Wesolowski and Mossholder(1997) procedural justice was found to be not significantly related to job satis-faction. Therefore, the findings from this study support the notion that a perceptionof fairness regarding workplace relationships will have a greater impact on jobsatisfaction compared to the perception of fairness regarding organisational poli-cies and procedures. Such findings support other research that has found work-place relationships to have a strong impact on job satisfaction (Morrison 2004).

Past research by Janssen (2004) found that nursing supervisors did not perceivethat procedural or distributive justice was related to the innovative behaviour ofnurses. There is however some concern about Janssen’s findings because in thestudy nursing supervisors were asked to rate the perceptions of justice for theirnursing employees. The issue is that when attempting to develop an understandingabout nurses’ perceptions, it may be best to examine the nurses themselves. Incontrast, this study found that nursing employees’ perceive that procedural justiceis directly related to their innovative behaviour. Hence, the findings from thisstudy contribute to the understanding about nurses’ perceptions regarding thefairness of organisational policies and procedures and their innovative behaviour.The contribution is derived because previous research examining organisationaljustice and innovative behaviour (Janssen, 2004) has only examined this rela-tionship from the perception of the nurse supervisors. In summary, while results byJanssen (2004) suggest that nursing supervisors do not consider procedural justiceto be related to the innovative behaviour of nurses, nursing employees do considerthere to be a relationship.

According to SET, employees who perceive their interactions in the workplace,and organisational policies and procedures as being fair are likely to reciprocatepositively in the workplace (Byrd, 2006). The results from this study suggest thatnursing employees slightly agree that they perceive their interactions (M ¼ 4:66),and organisational policies and procedures (M ¼ 4:05) as being fair. Nursingemployees slightly agree that they perceive the current workplace environment tobe conducive for fostering job satisfaction and innovative behaviour in hospitals.So, hospital managers know that there are factors currently in place that arepositively contributing to both interactional and procedural justice. Considering

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that nurses only slightly agree about procedural and interactional justice, organi-sational justice could be improved. To improve interactional and procedural justicewill most likely require a change in the relationship between supervisors andsubordinates, and a modification of current organisational policies and procedures.The difficult part for management will be ensuring that any changes do not undoanything currently positively contributing to either interactional or proceduraljustice.

As previously mentioned, some past studies have examined the relationshipbetween organisational justice and job satisfaction (Kickul et al., 2002; Mastersonet al., 2000; Mossholder et al., 1998; Wesolowski and Mossholder, 1997), andbetween job satisfaction and innovative behaviour (Mohamed, 2002). No paststudies have, however, examined a model where job satisfaction intervenes be-tween organisational justice and innovative behaviour. Also no studies have ex-amined how job satisfaction impacts on individual innovative behaviour in theworkplace. As such, the findings from this study provide new information aboutthe relationship between organisational justice, job satisfaction and innovativebehaviour. For example, procedural justice has a positive and direct effect oninnovative behaviour, but as mentioned not on job satisfaction. While interactionaljustice positively and directly influences job satisfaction, it only has an indirectrelationship with innovative behaviour.

These findings contribute to an understanding about SET and how the frame-work can be used when examining innovative behaviour in the workplace. First,the results indicate that job satisfaction does not intervene in the relationshipbetween procedural justice and innovative behaviour. Using SET, becauseemployees perceived procedures and policies as being fair, they are likely toreciprocate with positive behaviour in the workplace. Additionally, if the orga-nisation promotes innovative behaviour in the workplace, employees are likely toreciprocate by attempting to be innovative. Second, job satisfaction did intervenein the relationship between interactional justice and innovative behaviour. Re-ferring to SET, these results provide support that if an employee perceives inter-actions as being fair, this is likely to contribute to greater job satisfaction and theemployee is likely to reciprocate with positive behaviour in the workplace. Thisstudy has contributed to the understanding about how procedural and interactionaljustice, job satisfaction and innovative behaviour may relate to one another.

Conclusion

This study has contributed to the understanding about SET and developing em-ployee innovative behaviour. The results from the study indicate that while nurses’

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slightly agree that they perceive procedural and interactional justice as being fair,there is room for improvement. It can therefore be said that a gap has formedbetween what SET theorists prescribe as being an ideal environment to foster jobsatisfaction and innovative behaviour (an environment where nurses agree orstrongly agree that they perceive procedural and interactional justice as being fair),and the environment examined within this research. As discussed, the results alsosuggest that procedural justice directly influences innovative behaviour and in-teractional justice indirectly influences innovative behaviour through job satis-faction. These results provide a number of implications for management whosegoal is to foster innovative behaviour in the workplace.

The implication from this study for management provides information aboutimproving organisational justice, job satisfaction and in-turn facilitating the in-novative behaviour of employees. The results provide an indication that man-agement processes may need to be modified so as to maximise employees’perceptions of interactions in the workplace, and organisational policies andprocedures. While a change in management practices may be required, it is firstimportant to derive exactly where interactional and procedural justice can beimproved. An understanding of what employees’ perceive as currently being fairand what they perceive as being unfair will provide insight into what managementare doing well and what may require some modification to improve employeeperceptions. The results also provide management with the information that todirectly influence innovative behaviour, a change in organisational policies andprocedures is required. Although, it is in the best interests of management toensure that current organisational policies and procedures are perceived as beingfair, it is also imperative that policies and procedures are designed to support andfacilitate the innovative behaviour of employees.

There were a number of limitations in this study that need to be identified.Typical of a study focusing on the perception of employees, it is difficult tomeasure outcomes in the context of an employee when the data is collected fromthe employee themselves (self-report bias) (Spector, 1994). Spector (1994) argueshowever, that as long as there is enough supporting evidence of the hypothesisthen the self-report method is practical when outlining trends and providing insightinto the thoughts and perceptions of the people completing the survey. Therefore,although this study will provide results from three hospitals and a variety ofdifferent hospital wards, the self-reporting of innovative behaviour is a limitationof the study. It is suggested that future research could measure employees’ level ofinnovative behaviour from the perception of the supervisor or work colleagues.

Another limitation is the cross-sectional nature of the study and as such thestatistical causations that can be drawn from the data are limited (Bowen andWiersema, 1999). It is therefore recommended that further research be undertaken

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to strengthen the generalisability of the results and to test for causation and me-diation of the proposed structural model. The study is also quantitative and does notprovide the information required to pin-point what employees’ currently perceive asbeing fair and what may require some adjustment to improve the perception offairness. This is not to say that quantitative research is incapable of attaining dataabout specific issues relating to interactional and procedural justice, but that thequantitative approach undertaken in this study did not capture such data.

As such, one possible solution to attain specific data on issues relating toprocedural and interactional justice may be further studies that include a qualita-tive approach. A qualitative approach should provide researchers with an oppor-tunity to probe the current issues regarding procedural and interactional justice inthe workplace. Such in-depth information will provide management with an un-derstanding about what may be required to maximise organisational justice. It isalso suggested that further research could be guided by SET, that is, how work-place social exchange provides a way of examining and fostering innovative be-haviour. For example, past research using SET suggests that interactional justice ismore likely to be influenced by leader-member exchange (LMX) as opposed to anorganisational factor such as perceived organisational support (POS) (Luo, 2007).Also some literature suggests that procedural justice is more likely to be influencedby POS as opposed to LMX (Niehoff and Moorman, 1993). Therefore, furtherresearch is required to determine if such findings pertain to the model examinedwithin this study and to nursing employees.

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