In the past decades, the public sector has undergone important organisational policy changes, referred to as New Public Management. These management strategies focus on continuous cost improvements and rationalisation of operations. In the aftermath of these policy changes, we have seen reports of increased work demands and less professional autonomy amongst welfare workers. Against this background, the thesis sets out to explore welfare workers’ relationship to their organisation. This was done by investigating how psychosocial and organisational factors related to a number of outcomes assumed to be indicators of the quality of the relationship. Theoretically, the thesis was inspired by psychological contract theory, but also relates to other concepts and theories found in organisational research. The thesis is based on four empirical studies, all of which relate to how welfare workers have perceived their relationship to their organisation. Study I aimed to qualitatively investigate how turnover processes evolved amongst statutory social workers who voluntarily had resigned from their jobs. The results showed that dismissive/admonishing organisational responses to the social workers’ perceived work-related dissatisfactions reinforced their beliefs in psychological contract violation, which led to resignation. Study II and III employed national web-based questionnaire data collected from employees and managers in the social services. The results of Studies II-III showed that if organisations want welfare workers to stop considering exit, want to counteract silence, want to reduce stress-related ill health and want to improve organisational commitment and job satisfaction, management strategies need to be developed that lead to fewer conflicting demands, a reasonable workload and a greater professional autonomy. The results also showed that the organisation’s open climate and attitude towards employees was of great importance for the studied outcome variables. Study IV was based on questionnaire data from different occupational groups in two municipal organisations. The results showed that organisational resources explained additional variance in organisational identification and organisational pride, beyond the contributions of workgroup resources. From the findings of this thesis, it can be concluded that the psychosocial demands need to be balanced with organisational resources in order to (re)build a trustworthy employee-organisation relationship. Further, organisations need to reconsider their human resource management strategies and practices, e.g., by enabling a continuous and open dialogue between the strategic and operational levels. Such changes may lead to balanced psychological contracts between welfare workers and the organisation that can improve the organisation’s stability, continuity and, ultimately, the quality of the welfare services.

Handelsbranschen utgör en betydande del av den svenska arbetsmarknaden och har under senare år stått inför stora förändringar till följd av den växande näthandeln, något som kan tänkas ha förändrat situationen för säljare i fysiska butiker. För att undersöka hur anställda i detaljhandel upplever sin arbetssituation har kvalitativa intervjuer med personer från sport- och fritidsbutiker genomförts. Säljarnas arbetssituation förstås utifrån upplevelsen av vilka krav som ställs i arbetet, möjligheten att påverka arbetssituationen och vilket socialt stöd som ges, således tolkas säljarnas upplevelser med hjälp av Karaseks och Theorells krav-kontroll-stödmodell som kompletterats med en fördjupad del om stöd till lärande och utveckling. Det empiriska resultatet visar att kundbemötande och service upplevs vara det största och viktigaste kravet att leva upp till. Dessutom ställs kvantitativa krav på säljarna i form av att arbetsgruppen ska leva upp till dagliga försäljningsmål. Till följd av begränsade möjligheter att påverka arbetstidens förläggning och en vilja att spara in på personalresurser, kan perioder av hög arbetsbelastning leda till upplevelsen att inte hinna utföra arbetsuppgifterna på utsatt tid. Socialt stöd framstår som en viktig förutsättning som möjliggör att säljarna lyckas hantera kraven som ställs i arbetet och utökar möjligheten att själv påverka när och hur arbetet utförs. Särskilt avgörande är möjligheten att kunna lämna över arbetsuppgifter till sina kollegor, något som däremot förutsätter att enskilda säljare i arbetsgruppen har tillräcklig kunskap och kompetens för att kunna utföra arbetsuppgifter på olika avdelningar i butiken. Trots att kundbemötandet uppges vara det enskilt största kravet i yrket som butikssäljare, upplevs däremot varken tillräckligt fokus eller tillräckliga resurser läggas på att utveckla säljarna i just det avseendet. / The retail industry is a significant part of the Swedish labor market and has in recent years been facing major changes because of the growing ecommerce. Something that may have changed the situation for sellers in physical stores. To investigate how employees in retail industry experience their work situation, have qualitative interviews with people from sport shops been conducted. The sellers’ work situation is understood based on the experience of the demands placed on the worker, the possibility of influencing the work situation and what kind of social support is provided. The theoretical framework underpinning the experiences is Karsek’s and Theorell’s job demand-control-social support model, which is supplemented by an in-depth section on support for learning and development. The empirical result shows that costumer service is perceived to be the biggest and most important demand to live up to. In addition, quantitative demands are set for the sellers in the form of the working group living up to the daily sales goals. Due to limited opportunities to influence the organization of working hours and a willingness to save on human resources, periods of high workload can lead to the experience of not having to carry out their tasks on time. The social support facilitates the sellers’ ability to fulfill their tasks, manage the demands and extend the possibility to influence when and how the work is done. Particularly crucial is the possibility of handing over tasks to other colleagues, which, on the other hand, requires that individual employees in the working group have sufficient knowledge and competence to be able to perform tasks in different departments in the store. Although customer satisfaction is said to be the single largest recruitment in the profession as a store salesman, neither sufficient focus nor sufficient resources are devoted to developing salespeople in that regard particularly.

Bakgrund: Den 11 mars 2020 bekräftade World Health Organisation att världen drabbats av en pandemi. Tidigare forskning visade att distriktssköterskan ställdes inför en utmaning genom nya riktlinjer dagligen och omorganisationer av arbetsuppgifter med en ökad arbetsbelastning som följd. Syfte: Syftet med studien var att beskriva distriktssköterskans upplevelser av arbetskrav och resurser under Covid-19 pandemin inom primärvården. Metod: Kvalitativ design med induktiv ansats valdes som metod. Semistrukturerade intervjuer låg till grund för datainsamlingen. Tio distriktssköterskor som var verksamma inom primärvården Region sydöstra Sverige intervjuades. Insamlade data analyserades via kvalitativ innehållsanalys. Resultat: Resultatet mynnade ut i ett tema: ”En tillvaro präglad av konstant förändring och att befinna sig i ett sammanhang” och två huvudkategorier: ”Stress, otrygghet och osäkerhet när arbetet blir oförutsägbart” samt ”stabilitet och trygghet med inre och yttre resurser för att hitta nya lösningar”. De väsentligaste fynden av arbetskrav som framkom i studien var osäkerheten och otryggheten som uppstod på grund av ovissa och oförutsägbara förändringar som Covid-19 innebar. Resurserna fanns i den stabilitet som stöd av kollegor, ledning och inre personliga resurser gav för att ta sig vidare. Detta bidrog till en känsla av trygghet och stabilitet i arbetsmiljön, trots ovisshet och oförutsägbarhet. Slutsats: Chefer inom Region Kalmar måste ta ett övergripande ansvar för distriktssköterskans arbetsmiljö när distriktssköterskan ställs inför extraordinära händelser som en pandemi. Pandemier skapar stress, otrygghet och en känsla av att tappa kontrollen, där ett aktivt och tydligt ledarskap hjälper distriktssköterskan till en trygg och stabil arbetsmiljö. / Background: On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared a world pandemic. Previous research showed that the district nurse was faced with challenges through new daily guidelines and reorganizations of tasks with an increased workload as a result.  Purpose: The purpose of the study is to describe the district nurse's experiences of work requirements and resources during the Covid-19 pandemic in primary care.  Method: The method was qualitative with inductive approach. Semi-structured interviews formed the basis for the data collection. Ten district nurses active in the Primary Care Region in south-eastern Sweden were interviewed. Collected data were analyzed in a qualitative content analysis.  Results: Resulted in a theme: "A life characterized by constant change and being in a context" and two main categories: “Stress, insecurity and uncertainty when work becomes unpredictable and stability” and “security with internal and external resources to find new solutions”. The most significant findings of work requirements that emerged in the study were the uncertainty and insecurity that arose due to uncertain and unpredictable changes that Covid-19 entailed. The resources were in the stability that support from colleagues, management and internal personal resources provided to move forward. This contributed to a feeling of security and stability in the work environment, despite uncertainty and unpredictability.  Conclusion: Managers within Regions must take overall responsibility for the district nurses work environment when district nurses are faced with extraordinary events such as a pandemic. Pandemics create stress, insecurity and a feeling of losing control, where active and clear leadership helps the district nurse to a safe and stable work environment.

The impact of occupational stress on physiological and psychological well-being of employees is well documented, as well as the adverse effects of occupational stress on organisational functioning. Nursing occupational stressors are divided in nursing-specific demands, job demands and lack of organisational support. If unattended, occupational stress may progress to burnout. Burnout is a type of response to chronic emotional and interpersonal stressors on the job and it is conceptualised as emotional exhaustion, depersonalisation and personal accomplishment. It has been an issue particularly prominent in the human service occupations. The nursing profession specifically meets these criteria. Individuals who work under these circumstances are at greater risk of developing burnout. 53 nurses completed a biographical questionnaire, the Nursing Stress Survey (NSS) and the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI). Results indicate that trauma unit nursing staff experience moderate levels of occupational stress and average levels of burnout. Various stressors were identified that nursing staff experienced relatively severely. Emotional exhaustion is related to nursing-specific demands, job demands and lack of organisational support with large effect, indicating the importance of occupational stress in the development of burnout. It is important that management take cognizance of the relationships in order to have a pro-active approach to organisational stress management with the implementation of preventative interventions. / Dissertation (MCom (Human Resources Management))--University of Pretoria, 2004. / Human Resource Management / unrestricted

Background and Aim The South African higher education sector has undergone numerous changes over the past years due to external factors such as globalisation, managerialism and neo-liberalism (Ntshoe, Higgs, Higgs&Wolhuter, 2008). Furthermore De Villiers and Steyn (2009) add that state funding of higher education in South Africa has been decreased to such an extent that higher education institutions (HEI’s) have been unable to parallel the increase in the number of students enrolled per year. As mentioned by Mouton (2010) universities in sub-Saharan Africa continue to operate under conditions which are seriously under-resourced, which poses significant challenges for the scholars concerned. The changes in the Higher Education Institutional environment have forced HEI’s to increase their level of output in terms of: enrollments, qualifications awarded, research output and institution size and number of disadvantaged students (De Villiers&Steyn, 2009) in order to remain competitive. The number of changes in performance outputs as well as the growing market for competitive higher education (HE) has greatly impacted the job demands of academics in South Africa. The environment in which academics in South Africa function now demands more of them than in previous years. For example the employment relationship has changed (i.e. teacher-driven to student-driven), altering the type of work that people do, when they work and how much they do (Barkhuizen, Rothmann&Van de Vijver, in press). Accordingly, it appears that the job demands of academics have escalated, whilst the levels of support and other resources have declined. The objective of this study was to investigate whether job demands and resources are significant predictors of dispositional employability of academics in South Africa. Method A cross–sectional research design was followed. The Job Characteristics Scale developed by Barkhuizen and Rothman (2005) and the Dispositional Measure of Employability (Fugate&Kinicki, 2008) were used as measures in this study. A total of 360 questionnaires were sent out to the sample, of which 158 completed questionnaires were received, but only 146 of these responses could be used for data analyses. This represents a 40.55% response rate. Results The results showed that there is a significant relationship between job demands and the change identity of the academics and that job demands do act as a predictor of the dispositional employability of academics in terms of their change identity. No significant relationship between the job resources and the dispositional employability of the academics were found, however all of the dimensions of DE had a positive relationship with job resources. A significant relationship between job demands and the ethnicity, home language, age, the respondent’s job level and the number of hours they work was found. However, no statistically significant differences were found within gender, qualifications, job categories, years in service and the number of years in current positions. According to the results the white ethnic group experiences higher job demands than the black ethic group. Furthermore respondents speaking either Afrikaans or English experience higher job demands then respondents speaking indigenous languages. In relation to this, the age group 50 to 59 experience higher job demands compared to that of the age group 20-29. Associate professors experience higher job demands than junior lecturers. No significant relationship between the academics’ perception of their job resources and their demographic characteristics was found. There are significant differences between the DE of the academics and their ethnicity, home language, job category, years in service and hours of work. No statistically significant differences were found within gender, age, qualifications, job level or years in the current position. The Black ethnic group indicates higher levels of resilience and motivation compared to the other ethnic groups, and indigenous languages have higher levels of resilience compared to the other two language groups. Academics that function as both researchers and lecturers have higher levels of career proactivity compared to the academics that function only as a researcher or lecturer. Respondents that have been in the industry for between zero to 10 years have a higher level of resilience compared to the respondents who have served for longer. The working hours of group four (between 31 to 40 hours) show higher levels of resilience compared to the other groups. / Dissertation (MCom)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Human Resource Management

<div>To capture the dynamic nature of frontline employees’ subjective well-being (SWB) and turnover intention in the hotel industry, this study used Affective Events Theory (Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996) and the unfolding model of employee voluntary turnover (Lee & Mitchell, 1994) to argue the short-term variability in SWB and turnover intention. Using the job demandsresources model (JD-R model) as the framework, this study examined the role of daily job</div><div>demands (challenge stressors, hindrance stressors, and emotional dissonance) and the role of daily job resources (supervisor support, coworker support, and job autonomy). Given that hotel employees work with different supervisors and co-workers and face various guest situations during each shift, these employees may face high work stress and workload. Furthermore, employees in this industry are often requested to perform non-routine tasks. Therefore, their work is highly associated with high job demands and resource variability. Moreover, the study results stress the importance of the moderating role of day-level job resources and the multilevel moderating effects of employees’ individual levels of resilience and self-efficacy. </div><div>The design of the study employed an experience sampling method. Participants were employees who are in guest-facing positions from food & beverage and front office departments in full-service or luxury hotels in the United States. Sixty-five participants completed a one-time baseline survey and a daily diary study twice per day for at least five working days, resulting in a total of 416 day-level observations. The data structure is day nested within each person. The multi-level data was analyzed by using multilevel linear modeling. </div><div>In summary, this study shows that SWB and turnover intention may not always be stable phenomena among hotel employees due to the daily influences of job demands and job resources. In addition, both personal resources and daily job resources were found to mitigate the negative daily influences of job demands. This study helps managers to better understand employees’ feelings on a daily basis and apply strategies for daily management of employee SWB and turnover intention.</div>

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has caused a major shift towards remote work and its practices are predicted as here to stay. It entails many challenges since both the physical and psychosocial working conditions vastly differ from an office-setting, posing a threat for employee well-being. Leaders have the ability to control employee well-being through activities and their leadership style, emphasizing the importance of exploring the topic from a leader’s perspective.  Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to explore employee well-being in a remote work setting from a leader perspective, including the leadership activities used to manage it and how leaders adapt their leadership to the remote setting.  Method: The primary data is collected from ten in-depth, semi-structured interviews with leaders in both public and private organizations. The data have been analyzed and interpreted using an explorative approach and inductive thematic analysis.  Conclusions: This study adds multiple aspects within the common theoretical themes of the social context, communication, work-life balance and stress identified as affecting employee well-being remotely. Moreover, it expands the knowledge of leader activities used to enhance employee well-being remotely such as providing opportunities for social interactions. Lastly, the study suggests leaders to balance remote work’s demand for employee independence by providing job resources such as support and adapt their leadership not only to the employee readiness, but also the expectations set on them, their own readiness and the remote situation.

Background Employee turnover has been a major concern for organisations as far as a global competitive advantage is concerned. Amongst the proximal antecedents of turnover, intention to quit has been determined to exhibit the feelings and perceptions of employees concerning alternatives for the possibility of quitting the current employment relationship. Globally, an increasing portion of employees experiences some form of work overload, emotional and technological demands at the workplace, consequential in the feelings of being vulnerable and insecure. The current study, therefore, investigated the moderating role of pf psychological safety in the relationship between job demands, job resources, and intention to quit. The rationale for the research study Knowledge as to whether job demand and job resources have implications for employee retention will make it possible for practitioners to devise strategies to ensure that employees' level of intention to quit is reduced. For instance, to ensure that job demands are managed to prevent emotional and physical drain and consequently intention to quit. To ensure that employees are offered access in terms of resources to improve their motivation, and thereby reduce the intention to quit. Moreover, knowledge and consideration of the moderating effect of psychological safety on the relationship between job demands and job resources will allow managers to enhance retention strategies and thus provide assurance for higher organisational productivity. Aim of the study The current research study was an exploratory attempt to investigate the moderating effect of psychological safety on the relationship between job demands, job resources, and intention to quit. Whereas the existing literature on conservation resources theory provides valuable frameworks for understanding intention to quit, few researchers have investigated how the intention to quit may be influenced by job demands and job resources, through the mediating effect of psychological safety. Research Design, Sampling, and realised sample The cross-sectional study was used in the current research study as a quantitative approach through descriptive statistics to measure the relationship between intention to quit, job demands, and resources, and this associated being moderated by psychological safety. In other words, by applying descriptive statistics, the cross-section design was used in the current study to enable a detailed analysis of the variables in a systematic and standardised manner (ZangirolamiRaimundo, Echeimberg, &amp; Leone, 2018). This research implemented a structured questionnaire method to get primary data. In other words, the respondents were asked to respond to similar questions in a prearranged manner (Doyle, 2009). A realised sample of n= 114 from the central banking environment was obtained using a convenience sampling approach. Statistical analyses To statistically analyse data, the Statistical Package for the Social Science (SPSS) programme was used. Exploratory Factor Analysis discovered common factors among the items; factor analysis was used to identify common variances. Through direct extraction and rotation methods to improve the interpretation of the factor loadings to reduce ambiguities in the initial analysis. The reliability and validity of the intention to quit, job demands-resources, and psychological safety were assessed through coefficient alpha and factor analysis. In other words, in evaluating the results, the test of reliability data was conducted to determine the Cronbach alpha, which would be acceptable when found to be at a minimum of 0.7 (Taber, 2018). Descriptive and correlational designs were used to provide analysis of data. First to classify and summarise data, and secondly to determine and test for the relationship between intention to quit, job demands-resources and psychological safety as variables of this study Results In investigating the association between job demands (work overload and technological demands) and intention to quit, correlation analysis results indicated a weak and negative relationship between technological demand and intention to quit. to determine whether job resources (job autonomy and performance feedback) would be able to predict the intention to quit, the multiple regression model was performed. Although a weak and negative correlation between job resources and intention to quit existed, there was no sufficient evidence that job resources could be a good predictor of intention to quit since the regression model highlighted an insignificant value of 0.411 which is greater than 0.05. The multiple regression highlighted that when psychological safety was introduced, it was found that combined psychological safety and job demand were good predictors of intention to quit and it was significant at 0.05 since the significance level of the model was 0.03. The multiple regression highlighted that when psychological safety was introduced, it was found that combined psychological safety and job demand were good predictors of intention to quit and it was significant at 0.05 since the significance level of the model was 0.02. Findings The findings from the results supported various discussions and studies in the literature and practice, that psychological safety moderates the relationship between job demands, job resources, and intention to quit. Further evidence was also found in support of the conservation of resources theory. Managerial Implications The results of the present research study embrace a practical implication for organisations in that the findings support the literature suggesting that psychological safety moderates the relationship between job demands, job resources, and intention to quit. The findings further contribute to a growing body of knowledge surrounding intention to quit, job demands, job resources, and psychological safety fields of research.

Magister Commercii (Industrial Psychology) - MCom(IPS) / In the 21st century the nature of work and life has become characterized by unavoidable changes. These changes are brought about by various environmental, social and technological developments or unforeseen occurrences. It has become more challenging for economies, countries and organizations to bounce back from these volatile fluctuations in all markets and industries (Martine & Alves, 2015). Examples of the above-mentioned changes is emphasized by Wales (2013) who identified that trends such as climate change, globalization and social inequality have created a significant challenge to the traditional business model. The “credit crunch”, corporate scandals and possible corruption have led to a loss of trust in business, and companies are facing pressures from governments, consumers, employees and investors to demonstrate that they are adopting ethical and sustainable business practices (Pfeffer, 2015). Similarly, Martine and Alves (2015) question whether the economy, society and environment in the 21st century are indeed the three pillars of sustainability. These factors highlight the importance of critically discussing factors surrounding economic growth and the sustainability thereof.

Disengaged employees decrease organizations' efficiencies and profitability. Engaged employees provide greater productivity and performance while being less likely to incur job burnout and exhaustion. However, public sector organizational leaders still struggle to engage their information technology (IT) employees. Partnering with a large public sector organization in the Phoenix, Arizona, metropolitan area, in a case study design, this study explored the strategies that public sector business leaders use to increase productivity through engaging IT employees. The conceptual framework for this study was the job demands-resources framework. Four participants were selected through purposeful sampling from a population of 7 IT leaders who had successfully increased employee engagement and their teams' performance. After collecting data through in-person semistructured interviews from 4 participants, member checking, and organizational documentation, an iterative pattern-matching data analysis process revealed key themes from coded words and phrases. The themes were also verified through methodological triangulation through comparisons with related organizational documentation. The key themes for engaging public sector IT employees were developing positive relationships, providing empowerment with support, and connecting work with meaningful purpose. Each theme included specific supporting implementation strategies. The implications for social change are that engaged employees are less likely to experience job burnout and incur fewer health problems, and therefore have a greater capacity to care for family, friends, and communities.