M. Tech. Human resources Management / The retention of employees is very important for many organisations to survive and prosper in today's economy. While organisations invest in the training and development of their employees, return on investment cannot be guaranteed, as skilled employees continue to be lost to competitors. The need for a competitive advantage necessitates the development of employees and retaining them. The study examined the retention dynamics of bursary holders at the Department of Labour. The study's objective was to investigate bursary holders' intention to leave, and their reasons for considering leaving the Department of Labour, while testing whether these factors differ according to demographic variables, including gender, age, region, number of years at the Department of Labour, qualifications and level of position, thereby conducting an analysis of employee retention needs.

Public child welfare agencies experience front line worker turnover rates as high as 25% a year. Worker turnover has significant financial costs to agencies, and has been linked to negative outcomes for children in care. Prior research has linked organizational factors, such as organizational climate, culture, and supervisor satisfaction, to turnover intent in child welfare populations. This research uses an empowerment framework to turn to workers directly to answer the question, "What are the organizational factors that lead frontline child welfare workers to stay or leave the agency, and what, then, are the implications for agency administrators?" This study relies upon secondary data of a workforce study conducted by the Child Welfare Partnership at Portland State University's School of Social Work. The data was collected via a pilot internet survey of approximately 400 State-employed Oregon child welfare case workers across all geographic regions in the state, and focuses on workers who plan to leave for preventable reasons. This study explored links between organizational factors and turnover in a sample of Oregon public child welfare workers. This research finds that climate, culture, supervision, and knowledge of the job prior to hire are all significantly correlated with intent to leave. Climate is most significantly correlated to Intent to Leave, and explains 25% of the variance in intent to leave in a regression model. These research findings suggest that agency administrators who are interested in improving worker retention can monitor and address local culture and climate as one tool for increasing workforce stability. Retention may be improved by maintaining an organizational culture and climate that is empowering to workers and that encourages workers to be a part of the change process. Additional implications for the child welfare workforce, social work research, and social work education are discussed.

Health Professionals are critical in the provision of health services, more especially when it comes to nurses who are next to the patient most of the time. It is critically important for the Eastern Cape Department of Health to ensure that skilled health professionals such as doctors, pharmacists, nurses and the like are retained and the staff turnover regarding this category of staff is appropriately managed. The difficulty to attract and retain health professionals is negatively affecting service delivery in the Eastern Cape department of Health and leaves the department with an unacceptably high vacancy rate. This often put more of a burden on to the health professionals who remain within the organization. Some of them will end up leaving the organization. There is a great shortage of health professionals in South Africa and it becomes easier for the health professionals to get employment elsewhere, particularly in the private sector which appears to have a competitive advantage as compared to the public sector. In this study, both quantitative and qualitative methods were used to gather information through the utilization of a questionnaire and interviews were conducted mainly to confirm the results obtained. The results of the study have assisted to reflect factors that could be influencing the health professionals to leave health facilities of the Eastern Cape Department of Health. The respondents were drawn from the two areas within the Health Department, and these are, Mthatha and Port Elizabeth areas. One hundred (100) questionnaires were issued to the health professionals and sixty three responded. Documents that were received from the department were helpful in determining the turnover rate. The study has revealed that the Eastern Cape Department of Health may succeed in retaining the health professionals if they can be made to feel that their job is important. It appears that health professionals would like to be given enough opportunity to perform their functions and participate in the decision making processes of the department. Some factors may be contributing to the staff turnover and these are, lack of career opportunities to develop, challenges in the workplace, conflict with the management and colleagues. It is always important for the organizations to recognize its employees by giving them space to practice their profession and create a comfortable workplace that could have an impact in influencing the employee to remain within the organization. Employee turnover can be minimized, if employees can be exposed to a healthy workplace environment that will assist if fostering happiness, and in the process, enhance their motivation. It is imperative for the Eastern Cape Department of Health to focus on the training and development of its employees in order to increase the efficiency and competitiveness. As the employees gain the necessary skills to perform their job, productivity may improve. The performance of the employees should be properly managed, and the resultant incentives and rewards must be fairly distributed. This could promote harmony in the workplace and that could help in building relationships among employees. If employees are satisfied, there is an increased chance that they will stay within the organization and it becomes difficult for other competitors to attract them. Employees must be given adequate space to participate in the decision making processes of the organization, and by doing so, their loyalty to the organization could be increased.

The purpose of this study was to examine a select set of organizational variables and determine their relationship to nursing assistants' intentions to quit in state-owned veterans' long-term care facilities located across the United States. America's long-term care industry (e.g., nursing homes, assisted living facilities) is a multibillion dollar industry. Because the U.S. government is projecting a 250% increase in the elderly population, staffing these nursing homes and related facilities is a critical concern. A vitally important but often overlooked factor of the long-term care industry is employee turnover. Of the staff in long-term care facilities, the nursing assistant (NA) position is particularly susceptible to turnover. Approximately 80% of NAs who enter the workforce leave within the 1st year and many leave within the first 3 months of employment. Some facilities report that they are unable to accept new residents because of a lack of qualified NAs. While many studies have researched this issue, staff turnover in long-term care facilities remains a serious and widespread problem. This study provides a foundation for future research related to the perceptions of intentions to quit of nursing assistants (NAs) working in state-owned veterans long-term care facilities by providing primary data regarding NAs intentions to quit. Results of this study indicate that NA intentions to quit might be reduced provided that pay and rewards are increased, workplace violence is addressed, and better access to patient care plans is provided. This research is useful to state-owned and operated long-term care facilities by giving them additional insights into nursing assistants' intentions to quit perhaps resulting in lower rates of turnover. It is suggested that future research be performed using populations of individuals from other segments of the long-term care industry, mainly, for-profit institutional care nursing homes, and federally owned veterans long-term care facilities.

M.Tech. Business Administration. Business School. / The City of Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality was established on 5 December 2000 and incorporated 13 previous local authorities into a category 'A' metropolitan municipality. The City of Tshwane's three departments: Finance, Information & Management and Public Works & Infrastructure Development have been experiencing a high employee turnover since January 2005. The key research objectives of this study are (1) to determine the cause of high turnover rate, (2) how the City of Tshwane can retain talented employees, (3) to reduce employee costs, (4) to build capacity and (4) to turn the City of Tshwane into a most desired employer. It is recommended that the City of Tshwane devise organisational policies and practices that increase the excitement of employees with regard to their work in ways that will result in a funneling of their minds and efforts towards the goals of the organisation.

This study investigated the causes of employee dissatisfaction by means of a case study of the Business Application Solution Centre (BASC) at the Eskom Academy of Learning (EAL). The rationale for the study was to contribute further to a general understanding of employee dissatisfaction. This study highlighted the issue of the under-representation of blacks and females (of all races) in senior positions, and further emphasised appointment and recruitment issues that promote unfair labour practices, organisational culture and structure issues that undermine workplace relations, and the extent to which management responds to the abovementioned issues. A mixed method approach was employed to gather data from BASC employees. Qualitative data was collected by means of one focus group discussion and nine in-depth, face-to-face interviews. For the focus group and face-to-face interviews, purposive sampling was used for the selection of respondents, in order to ensure representation on all race, gender and occupational strata. A semi-structured questionnaire was used for both the focus group and face-to-face interviews. The questioning route was guided by the themes of gender, appointment and recruitment issues, culture and structure issues, and management response and practice. Quantitative data was collected by means of an online survey. Even though the online survey link was sent to employees on all strata, top managers did not participate. The use of a web-based online survey had an element of immediacy and also ensured maximum confidentiality, as responses were transferred to a development server with no link or trace to the respondents. The study revealed many underlying causes of employee dissatisfaction, such as the following: (1) the main drivers of black and female under-representation in top positions were lack of skills development, mentoring and career-pathing; (2) among the recruitment and appointment practices leading to employee dissatisfaction was the appointment of employees to ‘acting’ rather than permanent management positions; (3) there was a perception that managers abused their authority by promoting their favourites and overlooking those who they did not like; (4) although an affirmative action (AA) policy had been implemented at BASC, it was felt that employees should be appointed and promoted on merit, and that this should be accompanied by mentoring; (5) in some instances, the hiring of consultants deprived employees of opportunities to perform critical tasks. The fact that consultants were paid more than employees was also a source of discontent; (6) appointment criteria were non-transparent, and respondents revealed that they knew who was going to be appointed even before the recruitment process had been completed; (7) a bureaucratic culture was found to be the main organisational culture issue undermining workplace relations. On the other hand, a culture of teamwork appeared to reduce dissatisfaction and enhance unity; (8) the major organisational structure issues undermining workplace relations were managers who lacked managerial competencies and unequal payment on the same grade; (9) employees who stood their ground were given a low rating during performance appraisals. Others were bullied by senior managers and colleagues, who were rude towards them; (10) a hostile working relationship between managers and employees was caused by managers who lacked human resource skills; and (11) junior managers were undermined by employees who bypassed them and went straight to senior managers to discuss workplace issues. This study addresses both the general lack of information regarding the causes of employee dissatisfaction in South Africa, and of employee dissatisfaction in the information and communication technology (ICT) workplace environment. The findings of the study will also contribute towards a better understanding of the general causes of employee dissatisfaction. The results of this study suggest that more in-depth investigations of the causes of employee dissatisfaction are necessary to fully address this issue, and in order to ultimately prevent a further increase in the rate of employee turnover. Some implications for further research became apparent during the course of this study: similar studies on employee dissatisfaction should be conducted with top managers; studies on the experience of managers appointed to acting positions should be undertaken; and follow-up studies on employee dissatisfaction should be conducted as causes are addressed and relevant interventions are implemented. / Business management / D.Litt. et Phil. (Sociology)

Ce travail doctoral s’interroge sur les déterminants des comportements d’épargne salariale. Le chapitre 1 présente un état des lieux de l’épargne salariale. Nous détaillons ensuite les principales règles de fonctionnement de l’épargne salariale. Nous présentons enfin les principaux déterminants des comportements d’épargne salariale identifiés par la littérature. Le chapitre 2 examine les déterminants socio-économiques de l’efficience des portefeuilles d’épargne salariale. Il propose également une analyse des déterminants des erreurs d’investissement des salariés mesurées par un indice. Nous dissocions les investissements faits dans le cadre des augmentations de capital réservées aux salariés et ceux faits au titre des autres plans d’épargne entreprise. Nous nous intéressons d’une part à la décision binaire d’investir ou pas, et à l’efficience du portefeuille d’autre part. Notre échantillon porte sur 30 000 salariés d’un groupe bancaire français et contient des informations sur les caractéristiques individuelles des salariés et le détail des montants investis dans les plans et leurs caractéristiques de rentabilité et de risque. Les caractéristiques des salariés affectent significativement l’efficience des portefeuilles. Nous mettons en évidence une forte concentration en actions de l’entreprise. Nous montrons également que l’investissement des salariés est sous optimal compte tenu de l’écart existant entre le ratio de Sharpe optimal que nous avons calculés et le ratio de Sharpe des salariés. Nous régressons enfin cette différence sur les caractéristiques des salariés. Le chapitre 3 analyse empiriquement les déterminants de l’investissement en actions de l’entreprise. L’actionnariat salarié diminuerait les comportements de retrait des salariés tels que l’absentéisme et la rotation du personnel. Or, la causalité inverse que nous postulerons n’avait jamais été analysée : l’effet de l’absentéisme et de la rotation du personnel sur l’investissement en actions de l’entreprise par ses salariés. Nous montrons que l’absentéisme et la rotation du personnel affectent significativement la participation. Nous validons nos hypothèses de recherche à l’aide de diverses méthodes de régression. Nous analysons un panel d’environ 15 000 salariés de près de 900 filiales d’un groupe français coté appartenant au secteur de la construction, des travaux publics et des concessions sur une période de 5 ans. La participation au plan d’actionnariat salarié dépend du niveau d’absentéisme et de rotation du personnel au sein de l’entreprise. L’absentéisme et la rotation du personnel influencent l’investissement en actions de l’entreprise différemment selon la catégorie socioprofessionnelle du salarié et les motifs d’absences et de sorties Le chapitre 4 administre un questionnaire à des épargnants individuels afin d’évaluer leur connaissance financière. Nous nous sommes inspirés des enquêtes de Lusardi et de la Banque Centrale Européenne afin de réaliser un questionnaire adapté au cas français. Nous constatons l’influence de l’éducation financière sur les décisions d’investir. Le questionnaire a été diffusé auprès des salariés d’un établissement bancaire d’une part et de leurs clients d’autre part. Bien que nos résultats confirment dans l’ensemble la littérature sur la connaissance financière, nous identifions plusieurs nouveaux résultats. / This dissertation questions the determinants of employee savings behavior. Chapter 1 presents an overview of employee savings schemes. We then detail the main rules of employee savings schemes. Finally, we present the main determinants of the behavior of employee savings schemes identified by the literature. Chapter 2 examines the socio-economic determinants of employee savings’ portfolio efficiency. It also proposes an analysis of the determinants of investment errors of employees measured by an index. We dissociate investments made in the context of Employee stock purchase plan and those made through other employee savings plans. We are interested in the binary decision to invest or not on the one hand and in the portfolio efficiency on the other hand. Our sample covers 30,000 employees of a French bank, contains information on the individual characteristics of employees and details of the amounts invested in the plans, their risk and risk characteristics. The characteristics of the employees significantly affect the efficiency of the portfolios. We highlight a strong concentration of company stocks. We also show that the investment of employees is not optimal given the gap between the optimal Sharpe ratio and the actual Sharpe ratio. We finally regress this difference on the characteristics of the employees. Chapter 3 empirically analyzes the determinants of investment in company shares. Employee stock ownership would reduce the withdrawal behavior of employees, such as absenteeism and turnover. However, the reverse causality we assume had never been analyzed: the effect of absenteeism and the staff turnover on the investment in employer’s stocks. We show that absenteeism and staff turnover significantly affect participation. We validate our hypotheses using a variety of regression methods. We analyze a panel of approximately 15,000 employees of nearly 900 subsidiaries over a period of 5 years of a French listed company belonging to the construction, public works and concessions sector. Participation in employee stock ownership plan depends on the level of absenteeism and turnover of employees within the company. Absenteeism and staff turnover influence the investment in company shares differently depending on the employee's occupations category and the reasons for absences and departures. Chapter 4 analyze the results of a survey we sent to individual savers to assess their financial literacy. We translated the surveys of Lusardi and the European Central Bank to produce a questionnaire adapted to the French case. We see the influence of financial education on investment decisions. The questionnaire was distributed to the employees of a bank on the one hand and their customers on the other. Although our results generally confirm the literature on financial literacy, we identify several new findings.

The aim of this research was to understand the main factors that explain turnover and retention at DOA Ukhahlamba District and to recommend to the District and Provincial management the appropriate strategy for retaining staff. To be able to achieve this aim, the following research objectives have been visited, namely: a) turnover trends, b) analysis of primary and external turnover factors and c) primarily retention factors. Data for analysing turnover trends was collected from the 2004 to 2007 DPSA and DOA annual reports. Primary data on labour turnover and retention factors was collected from 41 employees across different sections at DOA Ukhahlamba District by means of a questionnaire survey. The data was analysed using statistical methods, including frequency distribution, chi-square test and Pearson product-moment correlation. The findings have revealed that there is no clear pattern of turnover trends at DOA and DPSA, and DOA percentage turnover figures are low in comparison with those of the DPSA. In terms of organizational-specific factors, the top three primary turnover factors were identified, namely: a) communication within the organisation, b) leadership and the organisation and participation in decision making. The research results further revealed that communication within the organization had a significant impact with regard to race, but division, location, and grades did not. With regard to the external factors, research results identified the following most important external labour turnover factors arranged according to their importance, namely: lack of availability and quality of health care services and infrastructural development; lack of available sport and recreation facilities; crime in the area and people living in the neighbourhood; lack of educational opportunities available for the family, and geographic location of place of employment. The findings further revealed the top three retention factors, were strongly significantly correlated to each other, namely: resource availability, use of discretion in handling customer complaints, and the impact of the job on society. These are positively related to intention to stay. The implications these results to the management would require the review of the organisational Human Resource Management Policy and the introduction of Attraction and Retention Policy because at present its is non existence at DOA Eastern Cape. Research limitations: the study did not fully explore ethnicity when analysing the communication within the organisation as a labour turnover factor despite having an organisation that is diverse in nature, future academic research should focus more on labour turnover at management level and moderating variables to external labour turnover factors as there is little research done in this area. The factors identified for labour turnover and retention should be treated with caution as it may not be applicable to all sector Departments in the Eastern Cape and may be limited to Ukhahlamba District due to its geographic location. This study will contribute to the body of knowledge as it will serve as a guide to Eastern Cape DOA and other sector Departments in choosing factors to consider when designing their retention strategy in order to reduce labour turnover. To the academic researchers, the first three primary retention factors identified in the survey have not been seen before, grouped and rated amongst the top three retention factors which therefore means that the management support becomes more important than looking more on salary package as the first priority factor as revealed by most of the research literature consulted (Gustafson, 2002; Mobley, 1982; Mobley, 1979; Herzberg, 2003). This shows that labour turnover and retention factors will not be the same to all organisations, the location of the business and surrounding environment should be considered carefully when designing the appropriate policy and retention strategy of the organisation.

This study investigated the causes of employee dissatisfaction by means of a case study of the Business Application Solution Centre (BASC) at the Eskom Academy of Learning (EAL). The rationale for the study was to contribute further to a general understanding of employee dissatisfaction. This study highlighted the issue of the under-representation of blacks and females (of all races) in senior positions, and further emphasised appointment and recruitment issues that promote unfair labour practices, organisational culture and structure issues that undermine workplace relations, and the extent to which management responds to the abovementioned issues. A mixed method approach was employed to gather data from BASC employees. Qualitative data was collected by means of one focus group discussion and nine in-depth, face-to-face interviews. For the focus group and face-to-face interviews, purposive sampling was used for the selection of respondents, in order to ensure representation on all race, gender and occupational strata. A semi-structured questionnaire was used for both the focus group and face-to-face interviews. The questioning route was guided by the themes of gender, appointment and recruitment issues, culture and structure issues, and management response and practice. Quantitative data was collected by means of an online survey. Even though the online survey link was sent to employees on all strata, top managers did not participate. The use of a web-based online survey had an element of immediacy and also ensured maximum confidentiality, as responses were transferred to a development server with no link or trace to the respondents. The study revealed many underlying causes of employee dissatisfaction, such as the following: (1) the main drivers of black and female under-representation in top positions were lack of skills development, mentoring and career-pathing; (2) among the recruitment and appointment practices leading to employee dissatisfaction was the appointment of employees to ‘acting’ rather than permanent management positions; (3) there was a perception that managers abused their authority by promoting their favourites and overlooking those who they did not like; (4) although an affirmative action (AA) policy had been implemented at BASC, it was felt that employees should be appointed and promoted on merit, and that this should be accompanied by mentoring; (5) in some instances, the hiring of consultants deprived employees of opportunities to perform critical tasks. The fact that consultants were paid more than employees was also a source of discontent; (6) appointment criteria were non-transparent, and respondents revealed that they knew who was going to be appointed even before the recruitment process had been completed; (7) a bureaucratic culture was found to be the main organisational culture issue undermining workplace relations. On the other hand, a culture of teamwork appeared to reduce dissatisfaction and enhance unity; (8) the major organisational structure issues undermining workplace relations were managers who lacked managerial competencies and unequal payment on the same grade; (9) employees who stood their ground were given a low rating during performance appraisals. Others were bullied by senior managers and colleagues, who were rude towards them; (10) a hostile working relationship between managers and employees was caused by managers who lacked human resource skills; and (11) junior managers were undermined by employees who bypassed them and went straight to senior managers to discuss workplace issues. This study addresses both the general lack of information regarding the causes of employee dissatisfaction in South Africa, and of employee dissatisfaction in the information and communication technology (ICT) workplace environment. The findings of the study will also contribute towards a better understanding of the general causes of employee dissatisfaction. The results of this study suggest that more in-depth investigations of the causes of employee dissatisfaction are necessary to fully address this issue, and in order to ultimately prevent a further increase in the rate of employee turnover. Some implications for further research became apparent during the course of this study: similar studies on employee dissatisfaction should be conducted with top managers; studies on the experience of managers appointed to acting positions should be undertaken; and follow-up studies on employee dissatisfaction should be conducted as causes are addressed and relevant interventions are implemented. / Business management / D.Litt. et Phil. (Sociology)