The Indicators of Quality of Work Life in the Patterns of Work Motivation of Public Organizations: A Case Study of Company X

Abstract

In today's fast-paced, constantly changing world of business, organizations have begun to see the importance of human resources as the primary source of development within institutions. These human resources are so essential in a company's growth that companies put immense effort in giving its employees the proper motivation and in making the workplace personally satisfying for them, thereby improving their quality of work life. Work motivation refers to the dynamics acting on or within a person that causes the person to behave in a specific, goal-oriented manner (Robbins 130). In a similar sense, Quality of Work Life (QWL) has been defined as the overall quality of an employee's relationship with his or her working environment (Gordon 656). These two concepts pertain to how effectively an employee works within an organization based on definitive components provided by the organization. There are eight indicators of QWL that organizations strive to fulfill as part of the patterns of motivation employed in their companies. These are 1) adequate and fair compensation, 2) safe and healthy working conditions, 3) integration of work and total life space, 4) the immediate opportunity to use and develop human capacities, 5) social relevance of work life, 6) constitutionalism in the work organization, 7) future opportunities for continued career growth and security and 8) social integration in the work organization. These indicators form the various ways by which organizations fashion the patterns of work motivation they employ. Relative to these, it was noted that the satisfaction or dissatisfaction of the individual components of QWL make up the pattern of work motivation in an organization. The said patterns vary according to the type of bureaucracy, whether government or private, that the individual is a part of. This variation leads to a difference in work output caused by varying qualities of motivation offered by the company. On the whole, it is perceived that employees working in public organizations are not as properly motivated as those from private organizations, and in turn, their QWL is supposed to be lower than those from private bureaucracies. In view of the above stated assumptions, the study seeks to verify which factors of QWL are applied in public organizations that most influence the work motivation of employees. With this, the researcher aimed to answer this problem: "What are the patterns of work motivation employed in Company X, a public organization, in terms of its employees' perceptions of their quality of work life?" To answer this question, the researcher used descriptive method of research. Both quantitative and qualitative techniques of data gathering were utilized, specifically the survey questionnaires and the interview schedules. The researcher conducted this research in one organization. The respondents of this study consisted of employees from Company X, a public organization. From the data gathered through the survey questionnaires and interview schedules, it is shown that public organizations put emphasis on only social integration, social relevance of work life and tenure stability in motivating their employees. The organization does not consider giving a high salary and holding training and development sessions as a motivator for employees. The pattern of motivation of public organizations gives their employees a relatively neutral view of their quality of work life. Taking into consideration all the data gathered from both the survey and interview schedules, the researcher concludes that the patterns of work motivation in public organizations gives the employees of public sectors a relatively neutral view of their quality of work life.