The present dissertation consists of two studies that combine personnel selection, safety performance, and job performance literatures to answer an important question: are safe workers better workers? Study 1 tested a predictive model of safety performance to examine personality characteristics (conscientiousness and agreeableness), and two novel behavioral constructs (safety orientation and safety judgment) as predictors of safety performance in a sample of forklift loaders/operators (N = 307). Analyses centered on investigating safety orientation as a proximal predictor and determinant of safety performance. Study 2 replicated Study 1 and explored the relationship between safety performance and job performance by testing an integrative model in a sample of machine operators and construction crewmembers (N = 323). Both Study 1 and Study 2 found conscientiousness, agreeableness, and safety orientation to be good predictors of safety performance. While both personality and safety orientation were positively related to safety performance, safety orientation proved to be a more proximal determinant of safety performance. Across studies, results surrounding safety judgment as a predictor of safety performance were inconclusive, suggesting possible issues with measurement of the construct. Study 2 found a strong relationship between safety performance and job performance. In addition, safety performance served as a mediator between predictors (conscientiousness, agreeableness and safety orientation) and job performance. Together these findings suggest that safe workers are indeed better workers, challenging previous viewpoints to the contrary. Further, results implicate the viability of personnel selection as means of promoting safety in organizations.

Compensation is a discretionary concept whose determinants may not necessarily be the same in all organisations. This study reports on the extent to which a limited number of determinants of compensation, as identified in this study, namely job performance, external equity, job families, organisational tenure and employee skill, predict employee compensation in an organisation. A convenience sample was drawn from the target population in the Gauteng area. Three small and medium-sized organisations were included in the sample, which consisted of a state-owned organisation in the aviation sector, a parastatal company in the finance development sector, and a private company in the banking sector. A categorical multiple regression analysis was conducted. The findings of this study reflect a greater consistency in four of the six variables as strong predictors of employee compensation, namely employee skill, employee performance, job family and job grade. These factors are strongly related to employee compensation and are regarded as strong predictors of it. The other predictors, namely external equity and tenure, can be considered to be of marginal significance as predictors of employee compensation. However, the results also indicate that these predictors may be more significant in state-owned and parastatal companies, in comparison to private companies. In addition, the determinants of employee compensation may also depend on the type and size of the organisation.

Remote work has become a popular topic within organizations and the popular press. However, academic research has been inconclusive as to whether remote work is related to benefits of increased job performance and lessened work-family conflict. This study examined remote work resources to gain an in-depth understanding of how remote work relates to job performance and work-family conflict. One hundred fifty-one salespeople participated in two time-lagged surveys regarding remote work resources (autonomy, feedback, access to information and interaction with one’s supervisor), outcomes (subjective and objective job performance and work family-conflict) and demographics. Remote work resources were not significantly related to job performance. Contrary to hypotheses, more control over work schedule and control over work process were related to more FIW. In support of hypotheses, more interaction with one’s supervisor was related to less FIW and more access to information was related to less WIF. There was no support for hypothesized mediation or moderation but exploratory analyses revealed that proactive personality moderated the relationship between interaction with one’s supervisor and objective job performance such that the relationship was stronger for less proactive employees than for more proactive employees. Overall, findings support the value of fine-grained analysis of remote work’s resources to provide a nuanced look into their relationships with outcomes.

I present the results of two studies designed to explore how Expectation Violation Theory may explain biases in performance ratings. Study 1 examines how pre-hire information biases on-the-job ratings of task performance. Study 2 replicates the findings of Study 1 for on-the-job ratings of OCB performance. Results of these studies suggest that expectations violations do occur when on-the-job performance is either higher or lower than suggested by pre-hire information. However, first impressions of the employee appear to bias performance ratings of both task and OCB performance rather than expectation violations. Findings suggest applicants that make positive first impressions are rated higher on both OCB and task performance than equivalently performing co-workers who make less favorable first impressions.

The study was aimed at exploring the role of the Employee Assistance Programme in addressing the job performance of educators in the Eastern Cape Department of Education as it is affected by both personal and work related challenges. Non-probability purposive sampling was used to select schools that had once utilized the EAP and had more than ten educators in their staff establishment. One school was selected from each of the 3 clusters into which the province is divided, with cluster C having two schools chosen because of its size and demographics. A focus group interview method was used to collect the data. According to the findings of this study most educators are frustrated and demoralized due to various challenges they encounter in both their personal and work lives but, what was outstanding was the fact that they were blaming the new political dispensation for the deteriorating culture of teaching and learning. Among the things they mentioned as the source of their frustration were the lack of support by both the government and the parents, lack of learner discipline and commitment, too many curriculum changes, lack of incentives and opportunities for promotion, and lack of resources. It transpired that even though they were faced with so many challenges, they had no coping mechanisms and were not aware of any EAP services available in the department. They all admitted to have been taken to team buildings when they had conflicts in their respective schools and that relationships improved after that, but were not aware that it was a service available from EAP since they were organized by their EDOs. From this study it was clear that EAP was not marketed well enough to the intended beneficiaries hence it was not fully utilized and seemed not to be playing its role in improving job performance of educators in the department. There were no differences in the views shared by participants based on school location but there were more negative emotions on the older participants compared with the younger ones. One challenge that became obvious in the execution of the EAP mandate was the absence of a specific EAP Act. / Dissertation (MSocSci)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Social Work and Criminology / unrestricted

MAdmin / Department of Public and Development Administration / While globalization has created new opportunities for economic and social progress, it has also brought some costs such as the reduction of employee training programmes in the developing world and in private companies. As a result, poor employee job performance and failure to retain employees have become the norm in companies. This study explored the influence of employee training on employee job performance and employee retention in the Zimbabwean private sector. The study was quantitative in nature and it was conducted in two private sister companies namely Annualvest and Vast Africa. Stratified random sampling was used to choose the sample. A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect data. This questionnaire comprised of four sections which measured the biographical data of the participants, employee training, job performance and retention. The training instrument was used to measure training and the individual work performance instrument (IWPQ 1, 0) was used to measure employee job performance. The turn-over intention instrument was used to measure employee retention. A statistical Software Package for Social Science (IBM- SPSS-2015) version 23 was used to analyse data. To establish the relationship between the research variables, the Spearman product moment correlation coefficient was used. Linear multiple regression analysis was performed to determine which dependent variable between job performance and employee retention is mostly affected by the independent variable (employee training). The study concluded that employee training has an influence on employee job performance and employee retention. However, a look at the different sub-scales of training shows that the availability of training proved to be the biggest predictor of job performance and employee retention of employees as compared to supervisor support and co-worker support on training. The study recommends that organisations should consider finding more resources to boost employee training. Policies must be put in place to encourage supervisor support and co-worker support on training.

En el mundo laboral actual, conviven tres grupos generacionales: Baby Boomers, Generación X y los Millennials, cada uno de ellos con diferentes características y necesidades en cuanto a su desarrollo en las organizaciones. La finalidad de la presente investigación fue de analizar la influencia del Liderazgo en el Desempeño Laboral de un grupo generacional que se encuentra en aumento notablemente, los millennials, centrado en tres empresas reconocidas del sector de Tecnologías de la Información. Para ello, se realizó un cuestionario conformado por 32 preguntas al público objetivo, medidas bajo la escala de Likert agrupadas en 5 dimensiones. En los resultados, se obtuvo que el instrumento utilizado muestra un alto grado de confiabilidad (Alfa de Cronbach) con resultados muy similares en cada una de las dimensiones planteadas para el Liderazgo (0.88) y Desempeño Laboral (0.61). Finalmente, en la investigación se llegó a la conclusión que la hipótesis general queda aceptada, pues se obtuvo un resultado de 0,754. Es decir, que el Liderazgo influye significativamente en el Desempeño Laboral de los millennials en el sector de Tecnologías de la Información en el presente año, en especial el Liderazgo Transformacional tiene un mayor impacto en ello. / In today's world of work, there are three generational groups: Baby Boomers, Generation X and Millennials, each with different characteristics and needs in terms of their development in organizations. The purpose of the present investigation was to analyze the influence of Leadership in the Job Performance of a generational group that is increasing notably, the millennials, centered on three recognized companies of the Information Technology sector. For this, a questionnaire was made consisting of 32 questions to the target audience, measured under the Likert scale grouped into 5 dimensions. In the results, it was obtained that the instrument used shows a high degree of reliability (Cronbach's Alpha) with very similar results in each of the dimensions proposed for Leadership (0.88) and Job Performance (0.61). Finally, in the investigation it was concluded that the general hypothesis is accepted, since a result of 0.754 was obtained. That is to say, that Leadership has a significant influence on the Job Performance of millennials in the Information Technology sector this year, especially Transformational Leadership has a greater impact on this. / Tesis

The purposes of this study were to determine 1) the tasks that the Nigerian university vice-chancellor should perform personally, 2) the functions that the vice-chancellor should delegate to other university staff to achieve effective administration, 3) the factors that should be considered in the selection of a vice-chancellor, and 4) the criteria that should be considered in the evaluation of the vice-chancellor's job performance effectiveness. Chapter 1 includes a statement of the problem, purposes, research questions, background, significance of the study, definition of terms, limitations of the study, and basic assumptions. Chapter II is a review of related literature, and Chapter III presents information on the procedure followed in the collection and treatment of data. The analysis and evaluation of the findings are presented in Chapter IV; and the summary, findings, implications, and recommendations of the study are presented in Chapter V.

Stress och dess påverkan på människans arbetsprestationer är väldokumenterade sedan tidigare. Hur den påverkar manliga byggnadsarbetare specifikt under en pandemi är däremot okänt och har därför valts att i denna studie närmare undersökas. Datainsamlingen genomfördes med hjälp av semistrukturerade intervjuer med åtta byggnadsarbetare. Den insamlade datan analyserades därefter genom en tematisk analysprocess där materialet slutligen kom att delas in i sex teman. Temana benämndes: oförutsedda händelser, att tillfredsställa kundens krav, oro över att bli smittad, ökad arbetsbelastning, minskad noggrannhet och säkerhet samt försening av tidsplan. De fyra förstnämnda temana var de stressorer som deltagarna upplevde och de två sistnämnda temana var hur deltagarna upplevde att stressorerna påverkade deras arbetsprestationer. Varje funnet tema i resultatet presenterades av citat ifrån flera deltagare i studien. Den slutsats som kan dras är att byggnadsbranschen hade gynnats av att förbättra byggnadsarbetares psykosociala arbetsmiljö genom exempelvis ökat inflytande för att arbeta förebyggande mot byggnadsarbetares mentala ohälsa.

Understanding the factors that influence Job Satisfaction of managers is vital because satisfied managers will improve overall effectiveness of an organisation. State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) play a crucial role within economies, however a lack of attention has been focussed on understanding the concept of job satisfaction within this context. The main objective of this research was to identify the factors which are most important to influencing job satisfaction of managers at SOEs and to verify whether these factors are influenced by demographics. A survey was developed and utilised to gather data regarding the importance of several factors to a manager’s job satisfaction. The data that was gathered was statistically analysed in order to support or reject the research propositions. The findings of the research indicated that three factors predominantly influenced the job satisfaction of managers at SOEs; namely, Inspirational Leadership and Purposeful Work, Equitable Rewards and a Facilitative Work Environment and Effective Working Relationships and Work Life Balance. The results also provided support for the research propositions concluding that the factors influencing job satisfaction are certainly affected by demographics. A Three Factor Framework and Organisational Effectiveness Framework were developed to graphically represent the findings of the study. Copyright / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / unrestricted