Attitudes at Work Dr Joan Harvey Dr George Erdos

Attitudes “The regularities of an individual’s feelings, thoughts and predispositions to act toward some aspect of their environment.” Can concern almost anything e.g. world, things, constructs and people. Represent the “truth” as we see it Components need not be consistent e.g. I may hate my job but think it is socially desirable and so I do not leave. Salience

Components of Work Attitudes Affective component How a worker feels about his or her job or organisation Cognitive component What a worker believes to be true about his or her job or organisation Behavioural component How a worker is predisposed to behave in his or her job or organisation Work attitudes Collections of feelings, beliefs, & predispositions to behave in one’s job & organisation

Personality The enduring ways a person has of feeling, thinking and behaving Work situation The work itself Coworkers, supervisors and subordinates Physical working conditions Working hours, pay and job security Attitudes to work The collection of feelings, beliefs and predispositions to behave in one’s job or organisation Social influence Coworkers Groups Culture Values Intrinsic work values Extrinsic work values

Personality and work values (most stable) Work attitudes (moderately stable) Work moods (most changing) Stronger relationships Weaker relationships

Why Might Attitudes Matter at Work? Because attitudes to work and/or employing organisation might affect: Whether a person seeks a new job How co-operative they are with others at work Whether they present a positive image of the organisation to clients or customers How they react to change How hard they work (motivation) Their psychological or physical health

Measuring Attitudes 1.Likert scaling - summated scale 2.Statements worded either for or against issue in question 3.Agreement or disagreement is indicated 4.If the statements are responded to in the same way in two occasions, this indicates reliability 5.Overall attitude is the sum or mean of the item responses after any necessary reverse scoring has taken place (see example)

Top management in your company Please respond to the statements below to indicate how you see your top management: 7 = strongly agree with the statement through to 1 = strongly disagree with the statement 1. Top management do their best for the company agree 6 2. Top management in this company disgusts medisagree 2 3. I feel disposed to cooperate with the top management in this companyslightly agree 5 SCORE= 17 [6 + (8-2) + 5] Example of Attitude Measurement

Comments on measurement of attitudes A 6 or 7 point Likert scale is preferable as in last example, depending on whether a mid-point is needed by respondents More extremely worded items are needed [as well as milder ones] to ‘stretch’ the answers across the scale for the overall attitude measure. E.g. “ Top management in this company disgusts me” from previous example

The Theory of Planned Behaviour (Source: Ajzen, 1991, derived from TRA) BehaviourIntention Perceived behavioural control Subjective norm Relative importance to person of attitude and subjective norm Attitude Expected outcomes of behaviour and value of those outcomes to the person Beliefs about how favourably or unfavourably other people would react if one performed the behaviour and motivation to comply with their views

Factors Affecting Attitude Change Credibility of persuader - expertness and trustworthiness Attractiveness of persuader Sleeper effect Extremity of message Use of fear One-sided and two-sided arguments Central vs Peripheral processing

Different types of workplace attitudes: job satisfaction A pleasurable or positive emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one’s job or job experiences (Locke, 1976). Components include: pay and benefits co-workers supervision recognition the work itself career opportunities job security working conditions

Organisational Commitment Meyer and Allen (1997) 1.Affective commitment - personal attachment to organisation 2.Continuance commitment - perception of costs and risks associated with leaving the organisation 3.Normative commitment - moral dimension, obligation and responsibility to your organisation N.B. Multiple commitments can be experienced eg location, department etc.

More complex view of commitment In addition to organizational commitment, there is also commitment to: –The professional organization e.g. Institute of Chartered Accountants, the Law Society –The Union e.g. AMICUS, UCU –The department –The manager –The job Problems arise when these commitments conflict with one another See work by Tom Redman & colleagues on multiple aspects to commitment

Both involved in people’s decisions to stay in or leave jobs and organisations. Both have implications for people’s general well being. Both associated with motivation…. Are connected with people’s performance in their job, but only to 25% shared variance. Anyway, why should people feel committed to their employer? Satisfaction and Commitment

Organizational trust A complex set of attitudes, comprising –Trust in people [trust in management often different to that in peers] –Trust in terms of security [e.g. in computer systems] –Trust in terms of organizational justice and fairness [distributive, procedural]

Some other issues Low trust and low commitment usually associated with stress, labour turnover, absenteeism Cause and effect (attributions) are also reflected in attitudes Reverse causality [Clegg, 1983] shows how attitudes might both predict behaviour and be changed afterwards to reflect it Specific attitudes more related to specific behaviours than are general attitudes [Foxall, 1998]

Exercise in attitude change: safety climate and safety culture are known to relate to workplace safety performance You are asked to set an agenda to improve safety culture in an organization, e.g. a food processing plant What attitude and other components do you think make up safety culture? How would you diagnose what the problem areas are? What do you propose to do to change attitudes to make them more positive? Would you propose to try to change behaviour as well?

Thank you for listening Dr Joan Harvey Dr George Erdos Newcastle University