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This research investigates how feedback affects the motivation of software engineers and develops a model of feedback in software engineering. Motivation has been reported as having an impact on software engineers’ productivity, the quality of the software they produce, the overall success of a software development project, and on the retention of software engineers. Findings from the last 30 years of research investigating motivation in software engineering have identified several factors that influence the motivation of software engineers, but the impact of each individual factor remains unclear. Feedback was identified as a factor affecting motivation by several studies investigating motivation in software engineering. Several theories of motivation exist which identify factors affecting motivation and models of how motivation is affected. Feedback is identified as a factor in four theories of motivation. In 2008 a systematic literature review identified that the majority of previous studies investigating motivation in software engineering were not grounded in motivation theory. This suggests that the majority of previous research investigating motivation in software engineering has not adequately considered theories of motivation and their relevance in software engineering. This research explored the importance of feedback and the effect of the characteristics of feedback on the motivation of software engineers, collecting their thoughts, perceptions, reflections and reactions to feedback using a range of different research methods. The research began with a preliminary study investigating how software engineers perceived feedback, and if the characteristics they identified were comparable to those identified in other disciplines, notably clinical education. Further studies followed by investigating feedback in software engineering, the short-term impact of received feedback, and the effect of the ‘source’ and ‘medium’ feedback characteristics. The findings of the preliminary study were that software engineers identified characteristics of feedback comparable to those found in clinical education, which gave a basis for further studies. Software engineers reported that feedback was the most common method of tracking their individual progress in a software project. A diary study collecting instances of feedback reported by software engineers found that positive feedback typically increased the engineers’ job satisfaction, and that negative feedback typically led to a change in their behaviour. Building on the earlier findings of this research, a scenario study and an online survey combining both scenarios and questions investigated the effect of the source and medium feedback characteristics. The findings of the four studies identified that the feedback recipient’s values and perceptions of the feedback source, and any preference they had to the medium used to send the feedback, affected the impact of received feedback. The findings suggested that the feedback software engineers report as the most valuable is not the same as feedback reported as having the most impact. The findings suggest that in software engineering, theories of motivation do not adequately consider the impact of the characteristics of feedback and the effect of different forms of feedback on motivation. A model of feedback in software engineering was identified by combining the findings of the four empirical studies and relevant literature. The model captures how feedback is experienced by software engineers. Software engineers perceive the characteristics of the received feedback, which provides information that is used to make several assessments about the feedback. Each engineer’s individual value set influences their assessments, and their current state of mind / mood / emotions affect the engineer’s perceptions, assessments, and individual value set. The assessments of the feedback then result in the impact of the received feedback, which can have an effect on the engineer’s attitude, behaviour, motivation, performance, job satisfaction, and feelings.

This thesis aims to provide an examination of theory and practice of empowerment in an Indonesian context. It develops a theoretical analysis of empowerment based on literature from several disciplines including organisational behaviour, human resource management, community psychology, and political science. It integrates perspectives by taking advantage of the diversity offered by these disciplines, while recognising the limitations of one discipline, in order to produce a richly contextualised understanding of empowerment. As a consequence, this study also combines their different methodologies. It consists of four cases of manufacturing plants in Indonesia. The empirical work involved a survey of employees, interviews with management and employees, and analysis of corporate documents.

Management science, as well as psychology, has tended to avoid the issue of why people like different activities, and why they tend to be good at the activities they like. The aim of this thesis is to tackle this issue by motivating and introducing a construct, called “natural competencies”, and exploring it empirically. “Natural competencies” are defined as resources that enable activities that are inherently rewarding or exciting for the subject, thereby creating positive emotions. Performing them is viewed as being part of their personal identity which transcends the social roles in which a person engages. Utilizing “natural competencies” may also result in feelings of fulfilment. It is hypothesized that natural competencies tend to appear in leisure (non-working) activities, that is, activities chosen by the subject because they are pleasurable and, therefore, motivating. So, leisure activities should be a source of information regarding an individual’s natural competencies. Ideally, occupational activities reflect natural competencies too, but alienation may prevent this. An empirical investigation was performed by in-depth-interviewing 20 subjects whose hobby it is to collect art. Collecting art may stimulate informal learning and may be intellectually challenging; so it might elicit pleasure, engagement, and ultimately fulfilment, thereby being relevant to natural competencies. Analysis of interviews was performed by “modified grounded theory”, an approach blending inductive and deductive, theory-driven methods. By combining the interviews with observations, a triangulation method was also utilized. The results are preliminary and qualitative, but they indicate that subjects experiencing and utilizing their natural competencies at occupational activities will experience a greater level of fulfilment. This basic result is stated in the “competency fulfilment model”. A basic practical implication of the work is that non-working activities may be fruitful for identifying and developing competencies in working adults. However, more work is needed to test and develop the competency fulfilment model in other domains, and to continue sharpening the concepts involved

The purpose of this thesis is to conduct empirical research in corporate Thailand in order to (1) validate the Spirit at Work Scale (2) investigate the relationships between individual spirit at work and three employee work attitudinal variables (job satisfaction, organisational identification and psychological well-being) and three organisational outcomes (in-role performance, organisational citizenship behaviours (OCB), and turnover intentions) (3) further examine causal relations among these organisational behaviour variables with a longitudinal design (4) examine three employee work attitudes as mediator variables between individual spirit at work and three organisational outcomes and (5) explore the potential antecedents of organisational conditions that foster employee experienced individual spirit at work. The two pilot studies with 155 UK and 175, 715 Thai samples were conducted for validation testing of the main measure used in this study: Spirit at Work Scale (Kinjerski & Skrypnek, 2006a). The results of the two studies including discriminant validity analyses strongly provided supportive evidence that Spirit at Work Scale (SAWS) is a sound psychometric measure and also a distinct construct from the three work attitude constructs. The final model of SAWS contains a total of twelve items; a three factor structure (meaning in work, sense of community, and spiritual connection) in which the sub-factors loaded on higher order factors and also had very acceptable reliability. In line with these results it was decided to use the second-order of SAWS model for Thai samples in the main study and subsequent analysis. The 715 completed questionnaires were received from the first wave of data collection during July - August 2008 and the second wave was conducted again within the same organisations and 501 completed questionnaires were received during March - April 2009. Data were obtained through 49 organisations which were from three types of organisations within Thailand: public organisations, for-profit organisations, and notfor-profit organisations. Confirmatory factor analysis of all measures used in the study and hypothesised model were tested with structural equation modelling techniques. The results were greatly supportive for the direct structural model and partially supportive for the fully mediated model. Moreover, there were different findings across self report and supervisor rating on performance and OCB models. Additionally, the antecedent conditions that fostered employees experienced individual spirit at work and the implications of these findings for research and practice are discussed.

This research explores - in depth - critical drivers and outcomes of engagement as perceived by individual employees in Australia. This research also looks at employee engagement from a reverse perspective by exploring critical drivers and outcomes of disengagement. In addition, the impact of psychological contract violation on employees' disengagement is explored. The theoretical framework subsequently includes employee engagement (from academic and practice perspectives) and psychological contract violation. The objective of this sociological study is to advance our understanding of the (dis) engagement phenomenon as a process including critical drivers and outcomes as generically perceived by individual employees. As part of the empirical inquiry investigating the (dis) engagement phenomenon within its real-life context, this study has involved researching 131 participants across three Australian case studies through face-to-face interviewing (82 participants) and focus groups interviewing (49 participants). Acknowledging this study's sociological inquiry at the micro-level of organisation, it does consider the perceptions of participants to be potentially representative of the larger scale macro- levels of social organisation. The first main finding suggests that critically perceived drivers of engagement are recognition and flexible working. The second main finding suggests that psychological contract violation can be a critical driver of disengagement. The final main finding suggests that potential (toxic) outcomes of disengagement can be counterproductive behaviours at work exemplified through bullying, fraud, lying, breaches of confidentiality, and non-compliance of organisational rules and processes

This study investigates the effects of service climate on (1) psychological antecedents of frontline employees' (FLEs) work engagement-i.e., psychological meaningfulness and psychological safety, (2) work engagement itself, (3) a performance outcome of work engagement-i.e., FLEs' service performance quality, and (4) the relationships between FLEs' psychological meaningfulness, psychological safety, work engagement, and service performance quality. It also examines the mediating roles of work engagement in the relationships between its psychological antecedents and its performance outcome. An emphasis is placed on respecting the levels of analysis of the constructs. Service climate represents a group's work environment. It is, therefore, a collective-level variable. Psychological meaningfulness, psychological safety, work engagement and FLEs' service performance quality are mental and behavioural phenomena. They are individual-level variables. In this study, service climate is operationalised as a configuration or combination of a work unit's service-related policies, practices, and procedures. Questionnaires were distributed in three call centres of a major telecommunications services provider in the UK. Analyses were conducted on responses from 193 customer service representative-supervisor dyads. Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) aids in multi-group comparisons. Partial Least Squares (PLS) latent variable modelling aids in establishing the relationships among the individual-level constructs. The findings suggest that FLEs' work engagement processes are independent of service climate and that work engagement, together with its psychological antecedents, and service climate are two independent determinants of FLEs' service performance quality. This study does not find support for the effects of service climate on FLEs' psychological meaningfulness, psychological safety, and work engagement. The empirical evidence also gives no indication that service climate moderates the relationships among the individual-level constructs. However, the results reveal that a more favourable service climate engenders higher levels of FLEs' service performance quality. Work engagement is negatively related to and suppresses the positive effects of psychological meaningfulness and safety on FLEs' service performance quality.

Employee or staff engagement has an elusive, hidden quality with a premium appeal. Here, engagement specifically refers to behavioural engagement; the extent to which people cooperate in groups and exhibit pro-social helping behaviours. These are effects that have been associated with the field of procedural justice, a field which is concerned with the capacity of processes to enhance a sense of fairness and in so doing encouraging cooperation, trust, and organisational citizenship behaviours. This study has demonstrated that it is possible to rapidly increase engagement levels, evidenced by participation in innovation activities, and provide a way of sustaining this in the longer term through forming new trusting relationships. A range of process management techniques, communications tools, and managerial behaviours, based on a review of established theories in the field of procedural justice, was tested, validated and refined for their ability to contribute to attitude shifts related to encouraging behavioural engagement. These were integrated into an established innovation framework and employed in an elaborate and ambitious Action Research field study involving 750 people, and over 18 months of field work. This longitudinal qualitative research differd substantially from the correlation studies that are the norm in the field. Critically, it enabled justice to be researched 'as it was happening' and to develop theory based on the complex interplay of phenomena and rich context. Using an established model of procedural justice as an explanation, it was found that the quality of treatment participants received was significantly more important than the quality of the processes used to organise activities or make decisions, when attempting to encourage cooperative behaviour associated with innovation. Unlocking engagement was found to be about unlocking identification by providing a valuable reason for people to express discretionary behaviour and by appealing to socio-emotional motivations for increased status within the group or to reciprocate fair treatment. The changes experienced in the quality of relationships in the group, described in terms of social capital, were seen to contribute to the longer term value of the implementation approach used

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