Determinants of job satisfaction among livestock development assistants of West Bengal, India

M Maity, B S Malik, M K Mandal¹, Gautam¹ and A Roy Choudhary²

Division of Dairy Extension, NDRI, Karnal, Haryana, India
¹Division of Veterinary and A H Extension, FVSc&AH, SKUAST-J, RSPura, Jammu, India
²Division of Dairy Economics, Statistics and Management, NDRI, Karnal, Haryana, India
monajammu@yahoo.com

Abstract

The present study was conducted in purposively selected four districts of West Bengal State to assess the level of job satisfaction among Livestock Development Assistants. A total of 100 livestock development assistants having a minimum of 3 years of experience were included in the study. The study measured the level of job satisfaction of livestock development assistants on the basis of affiliation, recognition, behaviour of superior, opportunity for advancement, rewards and punishment and self perception of job responsibility.

The study revealed that, factors like affiliation, recognition, behaviour of superior and self perception of job responsibility had positive and significant relationship with the job satisfaction. The overall level of job satisfaction of livestock development assistants was moderate. Regarding personal traits of livestock development assistants, age, education, monthly income, experience, weekly hours, opportunity for advancement and rewards and punishment had positive but non-significant relationship with job satisfaction. On the other hand, only one personal trait namely, distance of positing from native place had negative and non-significant relationship with job satisfaction.

Key words: Job satisfaction, livestock development assistant, role performance

Introduction

Organization is considered as a structural process in which individuals bound together in a formal relationship and interacts (acts and reacts) with each other to accomplish certain common objectives. The success of any organization depends highly on the efficiency, role performance and job satisfaction of its employees. The assessment of employees' attitude such as job satisfaction has become a current concern worldwide. Job satisfaction is the degree to which people like their jobs (Spector1997) and it can be regarded as one aspect of life satisfaction, experiences on the job influence perceptions of the job and vice-versa (Davis and Newstrom 1989). If the job or work assigned to an individual is interesting, meaningful, challenging and satisfactory he will have a favourable attitude for it and his motivation will be higher. Job satisfaction affects job performance, employee turnover, and absenteeism. High job satisfaction results into high work performance, less employee turnover and less absenteeism.

Planned development of any sector of a state depends upon the state organization. In West Bengal the all round development of dairying is the responsibility of the Department of Animal Resources and Animal Health. Livestock Development Assistants are the lowest level functionaries of this organization, who work at the grass roots level, directly dealing with the dairy farmers and livestock. They are responsible to provide all technical and clinical supports and to carry out any dairy development programme in real sense. At the same time they are responsible for the extension activities also. They are engaged in such a vantage point of the organization that it becomes imperative that their level of job satisfaction is assessed and their performance is appraised in light of what is expected from them.

Behavioural and social science research suggests that job satisfaction and job performance are positively correlated (Bowran and Todd 1999). A better understanding of job satisfaction and factors associated with it helps managers guide employee's activities in a desired direction. On this guidelines, Rownowski and Hulin(1992) suggested that the most useful information to have about an employee in an organization is a valid measure of their overall level of job satisfaction. Job satisfaction factors allow individuals to reach their psychological potential and are usually associated with the work itself.

Keeping all these in view the present study was planned and undertaken with the following specific objectives:

1. To study the personal traits of livestock development assistants in context of job satisfaction.

2. To find out the level of job satisfaction among livestock development assistants

3. To establish the relationship between livestock development assistant's personal traits and their level of job satisfaction.
 

Methodology

The present study was conducted in purposively selected four districts of West Bengal State, India during the year 2001-2002. [i.e. two from high milk producing districts (Burdwan and North 24 Pargana) and another two from low milk producing districts (Birbhum and Purulia)]. Twenty five livestock development assistants were randomly selected from each district that fulfilled the criteria of having a minimum experience of 3 years at the present place of posting. Thus, a total of 100 livestock development assistants participated in this study.

A specific questionnaire was developed to measure the level of job satisfaction of livestock development assistants. The questionnaire consisted of two parts- part I pertained to personal traits of the livestock development assistants like age, education, monthly income, experience, weekly hours, nature of job and distance of posting from native place. Part II contained job satisfaction variables like affiliation, recognition, opportunity for advancement, behaviour of superior, self perception of job responsibility and rewards and punishment.

Personal interview techniques were used for collection of data and the responses were subjected to descriptive and inferential statistical analysis to draw meaningful conclusion.

Operational definition of job satisfaction variables

The study measured the level of job satisfaction of livestock development assistants on the basis of affiliation, recognition, behaviour of superior, opportunity for advancement, rewards and punishment and self perception of job responsibility. The operational definition of job satisfaction variables are presented as below.

Affiliation

The term affiliation means connection or association. It was operationalized as the livestock development assistant's feeling of belongingness and their affinity with work and workplaces. It was measured by developing a Likert type scale for this purpose. There are ten statements and each statement was measured in a 5 point continuum viz., strongly agree (SA), agree (A), uncertain (U), disagree (D) and strongly disagree (SD). For each positive statement score was 5, 4, 3, 2, and 1 respectively and reverse in negative statements.

Recognition

Recognition can be defined as degree of acknowledgement of praise, respect received by a person from his relatives and society. This variable was measured by developing a Likert type scale specially constructed for this purpose. The scale consists of six statements and each statement was measured in a 5 point continuum viz., strongly agree (SA), agree (A), uncertain (U), disagree (D) and strongly disagree (SD). Scoring technique was same as it was in case of affiliation.

Opportunity for advancement

It referred as the provision of promotion for livestock development assistant i.e., what is the basis for promotion in this organization. Schedule was developed with 3 point continuum viz., always, sometimes and never to measure this variable. For positive statement score was 2, 1, and 0 respectively and reverse in negative statements.

Behaviour of superior

It refers to the relationship between superior and the livestock development assistant. Specific schedule was developed with 3 point continuum (i.e. always, sometimes, and never) to measure this variable. Scoring technique was same as it was in case of opportunity for advancement.

Self perception of job responsibility

Self-perception of job responsibility means the perception of livestock development assistant about the responsibilities of his different jobs. A specific schedule was developed to measure this variable.

Rewards and punishment

This indicated the feeling of a livestock development assistant, whether good work is recognized in the organization or not and with what degree, if so. This was measured by using the scale developed by Rao (1982) with needed modifications. The scale consists of eleven statements and each statement was measured in 4 point continuum viz., very often (3), often (2), rarely (1) and never (0). For each statement the livestock development assistant was asked to indicate how often the authorities in the organization encourage (reward) or discourage (punishment) for good or poor performance of the livestock development assistant. The score obtained was summed and percentage of knowledge about rewards and punishment was calculated and it was treated as the score for this variable.
 

Results and discussion

Personal traits of livestock development assistants in context of job satisfaction

Age

The data presented in Table 1 reveals that the majority of the livestock development assistants (66%) belonged to the middle age group, while 19 per cent  were from young age group and 15 per cent from the old age group.

Education

Education is one of the important factors which accelerate the changes in overall behavior, since it is the process of imparting or acquiring knowledge and habit through instructions or study. With respect to educational status of the respondents it can be observed from Table 1 that the majority of the livestock development assistants (50%) were graduates, followed by 43 per cent educated up to higher secondary. Only 4 per cent and 3 per cent were educated up to madhyamik and above graduate level, respectively.

Monthly income

A cursory look at Table 1 shows that the majority of the livestock development assistants (69%) belonged to medium level of monthly income group (Rs. 5001-8000), followed by 21 per cent and 10 per cent belonging to high (above Rs. 8000) and low level (less than Rs. 5000) income group, respectively.

Experience

The data in Table 1 indicate that the majority of the respondents (68%) had medium level of experience ranging from 8 to 23 years, followed by 27 per cent respondents that had high level (above 23 years) of experience. Only 5 per cent of respondents had low level (less than8 years) of experience.

Weekly hours

All of the respondents were government employees and they were supposed to work for some specific times in their office. The respondents were placed in four different categories according to their time spent on the job. It was observed from Table 1 that 93 per cent of them devoted above 30 hours for their job, and only 7 per cent of them admitted that they worked for 21-30 hours in a week. None of the respondent belonged to either low or very low category.

Distance of posting from native place

The majority of the respondents (78%) stayed between 11 to 35 km. away from their place of posting. On the other hand 12 per cent and 10 per cent of them resided at a distance of up to 10 km and more than 34 km away from the place of their posting, respectively.

Job satisfaction of livestock development assistants

Affiliation

A perusal of Table 2 shows that 81 percent of the livestock development assistants were having medium level of affiliation towards their work and work places, followed by 12 percent and 7 percent of livestock development assistants that were having low and high level of affiliation, respectively.

Recognition

As far as recognition is concerned it can be observed from Table 2 that eighty seven percent of them received medium level of recognition, followed by low (9%) and high (5%) level of recognition.

Opportunity for advancement

The livestock development assistants belong to the same government department so they should have similar opportunity for advancement. But in real situation the perception towards this variable varies. The findings of Table 2 indicates that sixty eight per cent livestock development assistants perceived that opportunity for advancement was medium, while distribution of respondents in high and low perception category was nearly equal at 15-17 percent. 

Behaviour of superiors

The data presented in Table 2 reveals that majority of the respondents (78%) thought that behaviour of their superiors with them was average/OK. Whereas 13 per cent thought the behaviour of superior to be good and 9 per cent reported it to be bad.

Self perception of job responsibility

It is clear from the Table 2 that 69 per cent respondents in the whole study area had medium level of perception about their job responsibility, followed by 17 percent and 14 percent having low and high levels of perception with a mean score of 111..

Job satisfaction level among livestock development assistants

Job satisfaction of the livestock development assistants was computed, analyzed and presented in Table 3.

A perusal of data presented in Table3 reveals that majority of the livestock development assistants (74%) were moderately satisfied, followed by 15 per cent livestock development assistants who admitted that they were less satisfied with their jobs. Only 11 per cent of the livestock development assistants were found to be highly satisfied with their jobs.

Relational analysis for job satisfaction

In this section an attempt has been made to discuss the extent of relationship between livestock development assistant's personal traits and their level of job satisfaction. At the first stage the relationship between independent and dependent variables were computed by zero order correlation. Then the data were subjected to multiple regression analysis to delineate the contributory factors of these independent variables. The findings are presented and discussed under the following subheads:

- Correlation coefficients between independent variables and job satisfaction

- Multiple regression analysis between independent variables and job satisfaction

Correlation coefficients between independent variables and job satisfaction

The correlation coefficients between various independent variables towards job satisfaction are shown in Table 4.

It is evident that affiliation, recognition, behaviour of superior and self perception of job responsibility had positive and significant relationship with the job satisfaction of livestock development assistants at 1 per cent level of significance. On the other hand, opportunity for advancement and rewards and punishment had positive but non-significant relationships with job satisfaction.

Affiliation had positive and very significant effect to job satisfaction (r = 0.75). High affiliation indicates high association and deep feeling of belongingness of livestock development assistant with their work and the work places. So it is very natural that a person having high affiliation should have high level of job satisfaction. Similar findings were also reported by Hallakatti and Swamy (1998 ).

Recognition is a universal need of human beings and  livestock development assistants are not an exception. Fulfillment of this need must bring a sense of satisfaction. So the positive and highly significant relationship between recognition and job satisfaction is well justified. This finding is in agreement with the findings of Keregero and Mthupa (1997a).

Cordial and informal behaviour of superior with his employees creates comfortable situation for functioning of the employees. On the other hand when the superior is very strict, formal and does constant criticism, the subordinate cannot be happy with it. Same thing was proved from the table (r = 0.526), which shows positive and significant effect of behaviour of superior on job satisfaction. The findings are in consonance with those of Keregero and Mthupa (1997a), El-Sakran (1997) and Manjunath et al (1997).

Self-perception of job responsibility means the perception of livestock development assistants about the responsibilities of their different jobs. The positive and significant relationship between self perception of job responsibility and job satisfaction may be due to the fact that those who are satisfied with their job, are generally more responsible towards their job. Similar findings were also stated by Keregero and Mthupa (1997b).

Regarding personal traits of livestock development assistants it was observed that, age, education, monthly income, experience and weekly hours had positive but non-significant relationship with job satisfaction. On the other hand, only one personal trait namely, distance of positing from native place had negative and non-significant relationship with job satisfaction. This seems to be natural that living away from native place results in lack of comfort and dissatisfaction and this might be the reason behind negatively affecting job satisfaction.

Multiple regression analysis between independent variables and job satisfaction

In order to determine the contribution of independent variables towards job satisfaction, multiple regressions analysis has been done and is presented in Table 5.

A perusal of the Table 5 shows that among the personal traits monthly income influenced the job satisfaction positively and significantly (b = 0.0040) at 5 per cent level of significance. It may be concluded that the livestock development assistants who earned more were satisfied more with their job.

On the other hand, experience had negative and significant (b = -0.9994) contribution at 5per cent level of significance. This, however is justified with the fact that a highly experienced person becomes bored of doing the same job again and again and this may be the latent cause why experience is affecting job satisfaction negatively. Other personal traits had negligible influence on job satisfaction. Education, weekly hours and distance of posting from native place had negative influence whereas age had positive effect on the dependent variable.

The Table 5 also shows that affiliation (b=0.898), recognition (b=1.28) contributed positively and significantly to the job satisfaction of livestock development assistants at 1 per cent level of significance. Affiliation and recognition resulted in higher job satisfaction of livestock development assistants, which might be due to the fact that association with the work and work place help them to be satisfied with their job. In this way when a job gives recognition obviously the person will be more content with it.

The behaviour of superior also had positive and significant effects on job satisfaction (b = 1.63, p<0.05). This can be justified as the behaviour of superior always affects the work environment where a person can perform his job with more satisfaction. The significant b value of behaviour of superior also supported this.

Other job satisfaction variables like opportunity for advancement, self perception of job responsibility and rewards and punishment had non-significant influence on job satisfaction.

It can be concluded that the explained variables had 66 per cent contribution to the dependent variable and that 33 per cent of the variation was due to the numerous uncontrolled variables.
 

Conclusions

• The study highlighted the fact that job satisfaction of livestock development assistants of West Bengal is influenced by several factors such as personal traits, working conditions and environment around and within the job. Thus, it can be concluded that job satisfaction is a multi-dimensional phenomena where it is not so easy to assign one factor as the sole determinant of satisfaction / dissatisfaction with the job.

• Simultaneously, more work needs to be done to link the perception of livestock development assistants with the organizational context in which they work with the social, political and economic context of Veterinary service.
   

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