RESEARCH STUDY ON THE CORRELATION

BETWEEN EMPLOYEE JOB SATISFACTION AND

EMPLOYEE MOTIVATION

Teoh Teik Toe

(James Cook University Australia – Singapore Campus)

Werner R. Murhadi

(Universitas Surabaya, Indonesia)

Wang Lin

(Anglia Ruskin University, UK)

ABSTRACT In most companies in today's world, motivating employees to perform to

their maximum potential in their jobs is one of the key elements in modem

Human Resource Management. It is believed that when an employee is

motivated, he will be generally satisfied with his job and because that he is

happy, he will be able to give his best efforts and contribution to the job

assign to him. However, there are various types of motivation to everyone,

and usually it may not be the same for each employee in the company or in

that particular department. Employee motivation can be varied due to a

number of dependent variables like personal needs, external rewards,

recognition, self-actualization and self-esteem. This can be found in many

previous studies and literatures. In this research study, the researcher reviewed

the various motivation factors and examined various employees' demographics

like age, gender, education level and job tenure that may link to their level of

job satisfaction and as a result achieves better performance in their work.

Descriptive analysis using quantitative approach was employed through a

survey questionnaire posted to 120 employees in the company chosen. Factors

like remuneration, job security, teamwork, relations with clients and bosses,

recognition, sense of given authority and autonomy, promotion and fringe

benefits, challenging activities and fear of failures are asked in the

questionnaire and the results were analyzed to observe the correlation

between motivation factors with job satisfaction.

Keywords: Motivation, Job Satisfaction, Intrinsic Motivation, Extrinsic Motivation,

Synergy

1. Introduction

With the fast changing world, especially in the last few decades, in

modern industries that require higher skill sets and knowledge based industries,

employers can hardly continue to exploit workers for maximum output while

not offering the appropriate and competitive commensuration accordingly.

With improved literacy and the easy access to internet, tapping into unlimited

and enormous information through the world almost without boundaries,

people can now see and hear for themselves and compare what they are

currently working as, the job scope and exposure for advancement and the

salary that they are drawing versus what the outside world or other companies

may be able to offer. This new globalization reality need to be understood by

the employer and in order to maintain competitiveness, attracting and

retaining key talents in this highly competitive global markets, the company

requires to model and develop the right workforce to excel in their businesses.

Few people in this world now will just work contentedly for one company for

life if they feel that they can get more elsewhere, whether if it is in terms of

money, exposure, job scope enlargement and career advancement.

Beck (1983) identified that happy employees tend to be more motivated

and will be faithful to a company. They will conduct themselves and work on

the assignments assigned to them more enthusiastically and passionately and

consequently yielding higher quality output. Field (2008) also observed that

company business success is usually tied to having a team of employees who

are greatly satisfied with what they are doing and the conditions and

environment that the company offers them in their workspace. There were

many other studies in the past on this related topic in finding the correlation

between employees job satisfaction versus employees motivation and linking

that to the impact to company's businesses.

According to Beck (1983), there were four basic perspectives that can

ignite motivation at a workplace. They were the economic condition of that

person, the social relationship he has or desire to have, self-actualization of

his aspirations and get recognition and lastly a combination of all the above

elements. A rational economic employee placed economic returns above other

aspects of the job and his behavior and vigor on the job came from the

monetary rewards he gets from his employer for the job. Some organizations

who believed that man was rational and economic will emphasize on dishing

out aggressive monetary rewards like raising salary and fringe benefits to

motivate the employees. The Second theory assumed that the elementary

need of a man is the social relationship he desire to have in the society or his

circle of friends and colleagues. This kind of man will weigh interpersonal

relationships with colleagues, supervisors, customers, suppliers or whoever

they he has to interact with in his job as one of the key motivating factor for

him. As long as the company create that happy environment for him and he

get together well with others, he is happy and motivated. The third theory was

man's self-actualization. He wants to get recognize by his supervisor or the

community whenever he contributed to the success of an assignment or

project. He aspires to get full credit and recognition in the forms of praises or

compliments through non-monetary awards. Organization that believes in this

will create a system to reward high performers and celebrate the success of

each project no matter how big or small the project is. The last perspective

was on a complex person. This person has the emotions, abilities, motives and

desires of all above mentioned elements. His emphasis will change from time to time

and place to place and is also dependent on the kind of assignment he is put

on. He exhibits the behavior of almost wanting everything to come his way

and sometimes over estimated his own capabilities.

Intrinsic conditions are sometimes more powerful than work related

characteristics of a person . Spector (2003) has defined motivation as an inner

state of mind of a person that influences him to display s specific type of

behavior. There were two types of motivation according to Spector (2003).

One kind that motivates a person in the direction of a type of behavior

amongst all other behaviors while the second type was that the individual

achieves motivation with the strong desire to achieve certain goal. The second

type was derived from a person's individual needs and desires. Petri (1996)

described that motivation was a force that exerts on an individual to initiate a

special behavior and sometimes this behavior can be more intense than others

and varies depending on the situation. Under the context of a workplace in an

organization, Pinder (1998) regarded work motivation as a set of internal and

external forces that triggers behaviors that were work related. He defined

work motivation was invisible and created within a person's inner self.

Gouws (1995) also established that consciously or unconsciously, motivation

originates within an individual self. This kind of intrinsic self-motivation

often drives the person to accomplish a particular job with success in mind

and any external rewards or awards are not important to him. Sense of self-

fulfilling and self-accomplishment is all it takes. Niekerk (1987) also stated

that the creation of a motivated workplace environment and conditions can

exert a strong influence on a person to perform on his own wish, whereby he

can attain certain personal goal that satisfies his own needs. Beach (1980)

defined motivation as the readiness to use up the energy to attain a target or

incentive. These behaviors can be repeated on different assignments or jobs

easily with the right incentive but however if the behavior is not duly

rewarded or worse still gets punished for the wrong reason, this behavior will

diminish over time. Eventually this will be linked to whether a person feels

satisfied by performing an activity or just wanting to get involved in the

activity.

In this study, the researcher regarded employee motivation as an

instinctive force that was molded by a set of personal and workplace

characteristics that drive the particular need and motives of the workers. The

concept of motivation has great influence on personnel desire to work whole

heartedly for the organization and can make significant impact in determining

the effectiveness of an organization and company's business success. Thus, it

was critical for an organization to focus on the factors that will result in job

satisfaction and employee motivation. Managers need to have a good

knowledge about different motivational theories and effectively uncover the

real desire in each employee or team and adopt the right theory on the person

or team to get optimal results. This is a vicious cycle, the more motivated

employee will be, the more he / she will be satisfied, and the better he

performs, and because he performs well and is a happy employee, the others

who work around him will be infected and will also be self-motivated to

perform as well and remain happy and satisfied. The morale of the individual,

the team and the company will also improve.

Motivating employees is considered as one key factor that can create the

power in making workers feel satisfied with their jobs. Employer can only

motivate workers in the form by creating the conditions and environment that

make people feel happy and satisfied t o give their heart and soul to the job and

the company. The contributions from the employees are key determinants of

any organizational success and it is closely linked to creating highly motivated

workforce that encompassing great job satisfaction among the employees. So is

this just a perception or is employee job satisfaction really linked to employee

motivation whereby employee will be more devoted and intellectually more

active in working on his job assignment? In this study, we used statistical

measurements to validate this correlation between employee satisfaction and

employee motivation. The question for this research was to validate if there

was any significant correlation between employee job satisfactions with

employee level of motivation. In this study, we was to identify motivation

techniques that will enhance job satisfaction and their significance and the

impact of intrinsic and extrinsic rewards, social relations and employee inner

desire have on job satisfaction. This study also extended to look at the possible

influence of employee job satisfaction with varying demographics.

2. Literature Review

2.1.Employee Motivation

The term motivation is defined as the energy that enables a person in

advancing towards in achieving certain goal. Dunnette, Hough and Triandis

(1990) stated that motivation is a label for determinants of choice to begin

effort on a certain task, the choice to expand a certain amount of effort, and

the choice to persist in the efforts over a period of time." Motivation is therefore

classified as an individual's behaviour which is the result of some inter-related

factors where some of them have to be maintained as constants suck as skills,

abilities and knowledge. Motivation can also be linked to physical and

psychological needs of human beings. Examples of physical needs are hunger

and safety while psychological needs include the aspiration in attaining a

specific goal that may appear to be ideal. Pinder (1998) regarded motivation as

"a set of internal and external forces that triggers work related behaviours that

determine its form, intensity, direction and duration." This relates to both the

influence of environmental forces and personal inherent thoughts on his work

behaviour.

2.2.Job Satisfaction

Job satisfaction can be defined as the overall effect that one person has

towards his job (Arnold and Feldman, 1986) or was a summary of employee

attitudes towards a multi-faceted job (Beck, 1983). Sempane, Rieger and Roodt

(2002) describes job satisfaction as a relation on one person's own assessment

on his job against the matters and concerns that matter to them, and these

sentiments and emotions involved will considerably have an influence on this

person's work attitude.

2.3.Motivation & Job Satisfaction

It was believed that's there was a fundamental correlation between

employee motivation that led to employee job satisfaction, resulting higher

quality and committed workforce which then led to improved companies

performance and profitability. Maslow (1968) stated that the key foundation in

building this relationship was largely due on the individual's insight and

attitude at the workplace depending on their personal needs and their

respective discernment of several aspects that might be related to the job in

the organization. In Vroom's (1964) expectancy theory, he suggested that

each employee possessed his individual needs, and with the right motivation

satisfying his needs, he was able to alter his behaviour and work attitude

towards the job or task assigned to him based on his expectancy of a certain

outcome.

Thus it was important that a company needed to examine this

fundamental relationship between motivation and job satisfaction as the

empirical study (Herzberg, 1966) that different aspects on individual personal

lives ofthe employee could exert a tremendous force to motivate or de-

motivate an employee towards their work performance, and undoubtedly

could be related to the success or failure of the organization. Individual

personal motivation should not be seen as the only justification of work

behaviours of an employee in isolation, but rather should encompass the

combination on company's intervening processes and the surrounding

environment (Luthan, 1977). He argued that motivation is a cognitive process

and can be determined by the behaviours ofthe individual but could not be

associated with the causes of the behaviours.

Many studies had been made in this area of finding a correlation between

employee motivation and employee job satisfaction, and how that could be

linked to work performance under different workplace environment and

culture and also how that could link to the individual personal life (Fried and

Ferris, 1987). Olbert and Moen (1998) had tried to explain the linkage between

motivation and job satisfaction and performance of an individual and if only

the management team understood that intricate relationships, they could then

place the right motivations on specific individuals to enhance their love for

the job and would have better results on their performance. Carnige (1985)

suggested that human resource was one of the most important aspects to

determine the success or failure of a company. As such, the studies on human

psychology and characteristics could not be neglected in motivating the

employees to achieve the right behaviour for the right results. Lawler (2003)

echoed the same and he believed that the employees would eventually be the

deciding factor on whether the company would prosper in the long run.

Roberts (2005) and Rutherford (2002) also stated independently that

organizations that could have a systematic process build into the company's

policies or practices, and by creating the environment that constantly promote

and apply the right motivational catalyst on the employees, would certainly

yield the desired effect on having higher productivity and creativity from the

employees.

2.3.1. Effect of Intrinsic Motivation Factors on Job Satisfaction

Kalleberg (1977) stated that one single greatest effect on employee job

satisfaction was he achieved intrinsic satisfaction. Employee that had greater

job satisfaction was linked to less employee absence and lower turnover rates

which were important to an organization success. Job enlargement, job rotation

and job enrichment were also some techniques that a company used to raise

employees' intrinsic motivation factors. Job enlargement referred to the

designing of the job to increase the work activities and responsibilities to

overcome employees being bored at the job or felt overspecialized in his field

of work. Job rotation on the other hand offered the employee the opportunity to

be exposed to different work areas and responsibilities within an organization

to allow them to have a broader perspective of the company (Einhorn &

Gallegher, 1976). Job enrichment was defined as fostering the intrinsic

motivation through giving the employee higher responsibility tasks in the work

situation. Employees usually saw that as an endorsement of their job capability

in the eyes of their bosses. Receiving due recognition for the work one

individual or team had done was also a key element in intrinsic motivation

(Stoner, 1989). Only if the employee felt that he was being recognized and

appreciated for the success of the job, he would then be more motivated to

quickly wanting to work on the next assignment with great enthusiasm and

energy. Human beings were generally active, inquisitive and curious creatures

who usually liked to explore and learn. That natural motivational tendency was

an important element in cognitive, social and physical development as it was in

ones' interest to grow in knowledge and skills (Ryan & Grolnick, 1986).

Intrinsic motivation had been judged whether employees enjoy the self-

rated task or volunteer to do job without extrinsic reasons, such like higher pay,

incentive or promotion persist. Deci & R y a n ( 1 9 8 5 ) stated that intrinsic

motivation relied on employee's self-determination and self-competence. Locke

(1976) indicated job satisfaction as "a pleasurable or positive emotional state

resulting from an appraisal of one's job or job experiences". Spreitzer, et.al

(2005) thriving at work concept combined the emotions of vigor and enthusiasm

with beliefs that individual is studying, developing towards self-value. Bakker

and Demerouti (2008) also defined it as: "a positive, Fulfilling, work-related

state of mind that is characterized by vigor, dedication, and Absorption", and

"Vigor is characterized by high levels of energy and mental resilience while

working. Dedication referred to being strongly involved in one's work and

experiencing a sense of significance, enthusiasm, and challenge. Absorption was

characterized by being fully concentrated and happily engrossed in one's work,

whereby time passes quickly and one had difficulties with detaching oneself

from work." Shirom (2003) defined vigor at work as positive emotional

experience combined energetic factors like physical strength, positive mental

energy and cognitive activeness. Individuals could be characterized by their vigor

level since it was a stable person level variable. However, a person's vigor at

work may fluctuate due to any reason or anytime, so it should be studied at a

transient scenario also.

2.3.2. Effect of Extrinsic Motivation Factors on Job Satisfaction

Generally extrinsic motivation was defined as when one person was

performing a job under the feeling of pressured, tension or anxiety as he wanted

to achieve certain desired results (Lindenberg, 2001). Extrinsic motivation

would include components like remuneration, working conditions, autonomy,

job security, fringe benefits, bonuses and promotion in position (Ryan and Deci,

2000). Extrinsic aspects also referred to as tangible rewards that were given out

to employees which were generally materialistic or observable by others (Bellenger et

al, 1984). According to those theories, extrinsic motivation played a vital role in

harnessing employee job satisfaction.

The workplace condition was one key factor affecting employee behaviour

or attitude towards the job. The amount of stress level in the job, the leadership

and climatic changes surrounding the workplace could affect the mood and

energy level of the employee. Employee generally performed better if he was

under a more conducive environment with favorable work conditions (Busch and

Bush, 1978). Ritter and Anker (2002) also iterated that job security was one of

the other important extrinsic factor that has a direct relationship to job

satisfaction. When an employee felt that there were risks in losing his job

because of the tasks that he was doing were not adding value to the company, or

not being recognized by his boss, he would always be in the worried mode and

having that constant concern in his mind, he would not be satisfied with his job

and hence had negative impact on his job performance. Promotion and pay also

had direct impact on employee job satisfaction. If the employee felt that he was

underpay or not getting the appropriate salary, bonuses or fringe benefits

compared to others either in the same company of similar job functions or

outside of the company, he would not be motivated and satisfied with his job

(Rehman et al, 2007).

2.3.3. Synergy or Social Relations on Job Satisfaction

There were many researches usually focused on the relationship between

job satisfaction with self-autonomy, promotion or incentive system or other

external factors. However some of the studies also found that the social factors

such like the relationship with customer, colleague or management and

surrounding environment also played an important role towards job satisfactions.

More frequent communication with other people would have stronger effect on

job satisfaction. Employees might not get satisfaction through working

autonomy, promotion or other external factors, but through the good social

relationship and interaction with surrounding people, the satisfaction level might

recover .. "Social support not only predicted satisfaction beyond the task and

knowledge characteristics, but it was also unrelated to training and compensation

requirements, so it is kind of a no-cost improvement," (Meyers, 2007). Jex

(2002) indicated when an individual works with team, a positive attitude

towards their job would be generated, especially when his I her work was

satisfied by surrounding people, he I her job satisfaction level would be raised.

But once the job has been denied by team members, the job satisfaction level

would be dropped. Thus a company needed to train its employees to face the

social situation positively. In general, all the researchers were in agreement that

social factors / environment have strong influence on employee's attitudes and

behaviors. There was a Germany company even stated a rules on its

employments contract that employees who work for the company could not

complain with their job in any reason, they even fired employees who made to many

complains (Brian, 2011).

2.3.4. Effects of Challenges in the Job Requirements on Job Satisfaction

Locke (1976) argued that employee' value would determine by what able

to satisfy them on the job, only the unfulfilled job values that was important to

make them unsatisfied. The relationship between job characteristics and

satisfaction was based on individual's growth need strength (GNS). GNS means

the degree of individual desire for self-development on their career. High level

GNS employees were willing to contribute their ideas to the job, and performing

challenging and rewarding activities. Another way to measure a person's GNS

was by choosing whether "good pay" or "good opportunity to be creative and

challenge". High GNS people prefer a job is interesting and innovative which

allowed them to develop themselves by achieve goals. The researches

established that high GNS employees had higher job satisfaction rate than low

GNS employees. But one exception was that for those employees did not want

to take any responsibly and only preferred a routine job, if giving them a

challenging job, it might decrease their satisfaction(Frye, 1996). The job

characteristics model mentioned that the major factor affects employee

satisfaction was the intrinsic nature of work. Timothy and Ryan (2003) as cited

in Hackman and Oldham (1980) identified that the five major characteristics

contribute to employees' challenging and fulfilling their job: (1) Task Identity -

Enabled employee to perform a job from beginning to the end. (2) Skill Variety

- Increased skills for employee to performing better job. (3) Task Significance

- Provided work that was important and significant. (4) Autonomy - Increased

the degree of decision making, and authority to decide how to conduct own

work. (5) Feedback- Increased the degree of recognition of job performing,

and giving feedback. According to above theory, jobs that were enriched by

addressing these factors were likely to meet employees' needs for challenging

and fulfilling in their job, hence employees might feel more satisfied and

motivated.

3. Research Methodology

The research approach employed for this study was the deductive approach.

This descriptive research design was then selected for this specific

research study to understand the ways how employee motivation would relate

to job satisfaction using quantitative research and analysis through a survey.

IBM was chosen to be the company for this study. This company has a workforce

of 40,000 employees, and it is a multi-faceted company that offers a wide range

of dynamic hardware and software products. A 120 employees working in this

company sample size was decided on this survey. It comprised of employees

from top management team, middle management team as well as general staff

workers. The 120 employees selected from IBM were distributed across the

demographic variables as shown in the table below:

Table 1. Demographic Composition

Demographic Criteria Range Number of Sample

Age Below 30 42

30 – 45 34

Above 45 24

Gender Male 84

Female 36

Years of Service Fresh Graduate/below 5yr

experience

48

5 – 10 years experience 35

Above 10 years 37

Educational level Below College 17

Degree 45

Master 24

Higher than Master 14

A survey was used as the vehicle in collecting this data. The 34 items survey

was carefully designed on Motivation and Job Satisfaction. Four questions were

targeted to have the variable on demographics (age, gender, working experience &

educational level) while 30 questions were on motivating factors that include job

requirement, synergy, intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation, which might

have effect on job satisfaction. To understand the relationship between

variables use of bivariate analysis is done, where the use of contingency

tables, cross tabulations, regression & correlation analysis tests the

relationship between two variable. Data analysis in this study would be done using

SPSS.

4. Results, Analysis & Discussion

Table 2 show Cronbach alpha reliability coefficient table for all the data

range was from 0.54 to 0.851 across all the items. These data were showed

that motivation extrinsic & intrinsic factors were much closed with Job

satisfaction.

Table 2. Motivation Factors Reliability

Indicators Cronbach Alpha

Job Requirement

Activities 0.763

Achievement 0.661

Competition 0.739

Fear of failure 0.851

Synergy

Teamwork 0.733

Relationship with managers 0.552

Ease and security 0.693

Intrinsic Factors

Creativity 0.542

Work Autonomy 0.723

Extrinsic Factor

Increment 0.669

Promotion 0.685

position 0.734

Table 3 was overviewed the raw data have been corrected from the survey and

present in deeply that variance samples on the various factors of employee

motivation and job satisfaction relationship.

Table 3. Descriptive Statistics for Motivation Factors Descriptive

Statistic

(n=118)

Min.

Raw Score

Max

Raw Score

Mean

Raw

Score

Mean

Sten

Std.Deviation

Raw Score

Job Requirement

Activities 9 36 23.37 3.9 5.291

Achievement 20

40

32.81

5.1

3.576

Competition 14

38

29.71

5.89

4.143

Fear of

failure

8

36

17.11

3.97

6.615

Synergy

Teamwork 18 40 31.11 5.52 4.250

Relationship

with

managers

26 40 35.03 6.58 3.586

Ease and

security

25 39 33.12 6.1 3.122

Intrinsic Factors

Creativity 22 39 32.58 4.8 3.465

Work

Autonomy 10 27 19.94 5.1 3.779

Extrinsic Factor

Increment 27 40 36.36 8.65 3.260

Promotion 24

40

34.86

6.61

3.494

position 23

39

32.22

6.38

3.794

The raw score scales range was from 8 to 40. Higher score, higher

motivational value will be attached to the particular scale represented construct.

The mean sten scores in the Job requirement dimension range were from 3.9 to

5.89; those data in the Synergy was from 5.54 to 6.1; intrinsic range was from

4.80 to 5.1; extrinsic dimension was from 4.8 to 8.65. Data showed the lowest

score was injob requirement dimension, From the standard deviations

indicated for each scale was proved that the variance of scores within the

different scales was relatively small. These ranged from 3.122 to 6.615. The

variance between the different scales was also low.

Regarding the relationship between job satisfaction and motivation and

the impact of demographic variable on their relationship, the analysis of

variance test (ANOVA) was used on the below raw scores. The impacts of

demographic variables on the determination of job satisfaction for each level of

employees were related to the findings as discussed in above section. Age,

educational background, gender and years of working are factors that would

have direct influence on the level of job satisfaction.

Table 4. Demografic Factor (Age) and Job Satisfaction Scales:

(Age Group – Mean)

Below 30

(n=64) 30 - 45

(n=31) 45 & older

(n=13)

F-value p value

Raw Score (Sten)

Raw Score (Sten)

Raw Score (Sten)

Competition 30.761

(6.145)

27.436

(5.313)

29.512

(5.540)

3.461 0.044

Position 32.917

(6.718)

31.531

(6.305)

30.122

(5.174)

3.931 0.020

Relationship with

manager

12.139

(7.86)

13.033

(8.29)

13.816

(8.79)

4.069 0.025

Company

Profitability

10.812

(6.87)

11.823

(7.12)

11.547

(7.69)

3.081 0.047

Table 5. Demografic Factor (Gender) and Job Satisfaction Scales:

(Gender = Mean)

Female

(n=62) Male

(n=54) F-value p value

Raw Score (Sten)

Raw Score (Sten)

Fear of Failure 15.846

(3.612)

18.419

(4.238)

-2.16 0.01

Task Characteristics 43.79 48.417 -2.57 0.01

Working environment 25.512 27.619 -2.05 0.03

Creativity 11.051

(7.436)

12.211

(8.315)

-2.38 0.02

Relationship with

manager

13.113

(8.225)

12.363

(7.691)

2.238 0.02

Company

Profitability

11.465

(7.168)

10.667

(6.830)

2.532 0.01

Promotion System 8.658

(6.365)

9.217

(7.247)

-2.55 0.01

Work Autonomy 8.131

(5.519)

9.158

(6.328)

-2.14 0.04

Job Security 10.776

(4.414)

12.032

(4.807)

-2.42 0.01

Teamwork 8.625

(5.603)

9.649

(6.386)

-2.1 0.04

Table 6. Demografic Factor (Working Experience) and Job Satisfaction Scales:

(Working Exp. =

Mean)

Fresh

Graduate

(n=29)

2-5 yr

(n=36) 5-10 yr

(n=22) 10+ yr

(n=10) F-value p value

Raw Score (Sten)

Raw Score (Sten)

Fear of Failure 20.10 20.33 23.14 26.60 3.43 0.011

Creativity 11.59

(7.55)

11.03

(7.06)

10.36

(6.45)

10.60

(6.60)

3.18 0.016

Work Autonomy 10.14

(6.72)

9.17

(6.00)

8.68

(5.68)

9.80

(6.30)

2.68 0.035

Job Security 10.28

(6.86)

9.50

(6.39)

8.68

(5.86)

8.60

(5.60)

2.58 0.041

Table 7. Demografic Factor (Educational Level) and Job Satisfaction Scales:

(Working Exp. =

Mean)

Bellow

College

(n=24)

Degree

(n=43) Master

(n=21) Higher

than

Master

(n=28)

F-value p value

Raw Score (Sten)

Raw Score (Sten)

Raw Score

Raw Score

Competition 30.58

(6.42)

30.40

(6.33)

27.43

(4.90)

29.64

(5.86)

2.97 0.035

Adaptability 32.04

(4.42)

31.79

(4.00)

33.76

(5.52)

33.64

(5.29)

2.74 0.047

Quantity Work 11.88

(7.04)

12.63

(7.51)

13.05

(7.90)

13.54

(8.18)

3.04 0.03

Equal Opportunity 10.88

(6.42)

10.53

(6.23)

12.48

(7.57)

12.29

(7.36)

4.27 0.01

From above analyze, the researcher found that strong impact on job satisfaction

were the age of employees as young aged employees were observed to be more

highly satisfied with their jobs than those at old age. Employee with higher

educational level such as degree holders would have different view in terms of

job satisfaction. Motivation factors such as level of commitment, competition

and challenges connected with their tasks had shown a trend of high job

satisfaction for the more educated employees. Different results were also displayed

with the two scales of gender. Male employees were observed to be more

satisfied than their female colleagues in term of job satisfaction from different

motivation factors. The last demographic variable was years of working. From

the data, it was seen that employees who had a longer number of years

working with the company are gaining more job satisfaction that those who had

less years of working. In this section, the researcher will use SPSS to input the various

Motivation Factors affecting employee Job satisfaction that were designed in the survey questionnaire to analyse the key hypothesis of each motivating factor whether they had any effect on employee job satisfaction.

1. Effect of Intrinsic Motivation Factors on Job Satisfaction

Psychological rewards such as giving a recognized status, authorization in

decision making and recognition of one’s effort would generate high job

satisfaction. According to SPSS analysis, we found that T test = 7.496 and F test

6.936 showed that we can accept the alternate hypothesis, that is there is a

correlation between employee recognition and employee job satisfaction.

2. Effect of Extrinsic Motivation Factors on Job Satisfaction

In the literature review section, we propose that extrinsic motivation such as

employee salary, job security, and employee benefit p ackage that would

contribute to job satisfaction. According to SPSS analysis, we found that T test =

1.753 and F test = 2.1478 showed that we can’t reject the null hypothesis, that is

there is no a correlation between employee salary and employee job satisfaction.

But we found there is positive correlation between employee benefit package and

employee job satisfaction with T test value 5.389 and F Test 6.246. For the job

security, we found that T test = 5.384 and F test 6.891 showed that we can accept

the alternate hypothesis, that is there is a correlation between job security and

employee job satisfaction.

3. Synergy or Social Relations on Job Satisfaction

The relationship with management level and team work were also another

influencing factors on job satisfaction extracted from the aspect of synergy.

According to SPSS analysis, we found that T test = 5.762 and F test 6.178

showed that we can accept the alternate hypothesis, that is there is a correlation

between employee relationship with Manager and employee job satisfaction.

4. Effects of Challenges in the Job Requirements on Job Satisfaction

From the aspect of working environment such as enthusiasm, vigor, & fear of

failure; and achievements were factors would determine the job satisfaction level

of an employee. According to SPSS analysis, we found that T test = 4.762 and F

test 5.178 showed that we can accept the alternate hypothesis, that is there is a

correlation between working environment and employee job satisfaction. For self

achievement, we found that T test = 8.846 and F test 8.284 showed that we can

accept the alternate hypothesis, that is there is a correlation between employee slef

achievement and employee job satisfaction.

The theories from the existing literature had obviously stated that the key

influencing factor that affected the employees' performance is their job

satisfaction level. What type of employee will be beneficial to an organization?

Organization wanted loyal employees who were committed and able to

contribute to the growth and what was deemed as loyal are employees who had

great satisfaction with their jobs. Usually, the resulting factor that mainly why

an employee quitted was because he/she was not satisfied with the jobs. As

such, job satisfaction was an essential factor and to keep a low turnover rate,

employees must be satisfied with their jobs. Not only that, a continuing

energetic and devoted workforce was also preserved. To recruit employees with

great competence level and the basis to retain them for a long term became an

argument factor. Employers should possess the knowledge of employees'

motivation factors and job satisfaction level based on individual characteristic

and capability as empirical data revealed that work commitment and challenges

are easily achieved with high level of motivation and job satisfaction.

Upon comparing the empirical data in review with the existing literature,

the findings had mostly matched with the secondary data that validate with the

study of this research.

Motivation was a complicated matter and is viewed as an individual thing

influenced by many factors. There were many changes in individuals and are

conflicting in terms of expectations and needs which involve in many different

ways for them to be satisfied. The factors extracted from the aspect of extrinsic

motivation were job security, promotions and remunerations that would

contribute to job satisfaction.

Another influential factor in determining job satisfaction was intrinsic

motivation. Psychological rewards such as giving a recognized status,

authorization in decision making and recognition of one's effort would generate

high job satisfaction. Management should introduce intrinsic motivation as

many employees were found to be highly satisfied through the recognition for

what they do and this will just enhance an employee to perform even better.

Nobody wanted to take challenges and usually the worry from the

employee was because of not able to accomplish unattainable goals. Employees

should be assigned with challenging tasks which were attainable with the

opportunity to progress further.

In general, employees were satisfied with their jobs unless they can

foresee that there was progression. What you sowed determines what you

reaped. An opportunity to progress further will result in high job satisfaction.

The relationship with management level and teamwork were also another

influencing factors on job satisfaction extracted from the aspect of synergy.

With regards to that, it did not derive that people were very much satisfied by

having connection with the big names in an organization. However, the result

from empirical data showed that people were highly motivated if they have

connection with those big names at their workplace and that contradicted from

the findings.

From the aspect of enthusiasm and vigor, achievements and fear of failure

were factors that would determine the job satisfaction level of an employee.

However, working in a competitive environment was something that many

people would like to avoid and this has something to do with age. Old age

people were the majority among those who dislike competition. It was thus

suggested that old age employees should avoid working in a competitive level

and employees with younger age should be assigned with more aggressive tasks

and higher competitive level.

5. Conclusion & Recommendations

The conclusions driven by the results of this research that demographic

variables did play a significant role on impacting the level of job satisfaction

for each individual. From the research, it was observed that age has contributed

a big impact on the job satisfaction level of an employee. The trend had shown

that old age employees are less satisfied with their jobs. Factor such as

competitive jobs did not favor the older age employees and would not enhance

their job satisfaction level. In addition, motivation factor such as commitment

and having connection with the organization would have an influencing role on

job satisfaction level for old age employees. As such, organization should

consider such factors in old age employees. A great level of commitment should

be introduced to this scope of employees because that would boost their job

satisfaction level so that the assigned tasks will be accomplished.

Another factor extracted from the demographic variable was the academic

background which also related to the employees job satisfaction level. A

comparison with staff that had lower qualification in terms educational level, the

results displayed that staff with high educational level were less satisfied with

their jobs. This was derived from motivation factor such as competition,

challenges and level of activity being assigned to them. Highly educated

employees would rather prefer tasks with greater responsibility. It was a fact

from the results that this scope of employees was more satisfied with tasks that

were challenging and competitive which will became a motivation factor.

Employers should then plan and consider when assigning task to the various

level of employees with different educational background.

The other significant factor exhibit from the demographic variable that

has impact on the level of job satisfaction was gender. In terms of satisfactory

level, male staffs were seems to be less satisfied as compared to their female

counterparts. Mainly, female have more concern regarding job security, develop

better relationship among colleagues and bosses, high sense on fear of failure

and higher authority in an organization which were factors that was suggesting

why female employees were more satisfied. Women usually disliked challenges

and do not wish to assign with jobs which require high commitment and these

were factors which tell why female employees were unsatisfied. As mentioned,

due to the high sense on fear of failure from male employees, they should be

assigned with more challenging task as that could motivate them to put extra

effort because they would not want to fail their mission and besides, when the

task was accomplished, a sense of achievement will increase their job

satisfaction level.

As shown from the data of this research, different number of working

years also had an impact on employees' job satisfaction level. Usually at start,

employees tended to have higher level of job satisfaction and that was always

at the very first year. With the increased in years of working with an

organization, that level started to decrease. To keep staff from quitting and to

preserve their job satisfaction level, especially staff who had worked after the

first or second years, employers should keep a lookout on these staff behavior

and ample attention should be provided in terms of their needs and necessities.

Motivation factor like creating a more competitive working environment which

would give the employees a sense of achievement and at the same time they

could also assess and understand their level of performance. The job satisfaction

level for this scope of employees would be raised through a competitive and

achievement based environment.

The research work has the following constraints and was described as

follows: the sample taken or used for this research study was only from one

organization and on top of that, sample size was very limited if compared to the

population of a company. If there were more samples taken in terms of sample

size and from more than one organization, then the results attained will be more

specific.

This study can be further researched to extend the findings in the

following areas: 1) Extend the research to other companies in other companies

of different size and different global presence. This was to test if the hypothesis

that employee motivation factors do indeed affect job satisfaction. And 2) This

study can also be extended to include the correlation of motivation factors to

employee job satisfaction and how this will vary in different corporate cultures.

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