In part two of his series on New Zealand employment, Professor of Human Resource Management Dr Peter Boxall asks what it is that makes workers happy. Read part one here.
In repeated surveys, New Zealand workers have been found to be generally satisfied with their work, committed to their organisations and trusting of their managers. However, while these surveys report a high average level of work satisfaction, they do contain variation.
It's clear that some people are more positive than others. Analysis, then, of the surveys enables us to throw light on the question: what makes the workforce happy, and how can we build on it?
While this is a complex question whose nuances cannot be contained in a short article, let me highlight some key factors.
First, our surveys show that New Zealand workers respond positively to 'empowerment', to being involved in decisions over how to do their job. Managers in our organisations tend to give people good levels of authority and freedom, and the more they do, the more we like it.
In fact, New Zealanders generally have a higher level of influence over their day-to-day work activities than in either the United States or the United Kingdom. This may be because we tend to work in smaller, less bureaucratic organisations in which people need to take initiative and assume more flexible roles.
On the negative side, excessive work pressure - consistently having too much work to do - undermines satisfaction and work-life balance. This can manifest in pressure to work longer hours, but often relates to the level of demand the individual feels during their normal working time.
In surveys with Dr Peter Haynes (Waikato University) and Associate Professor Keith Macky (AUT), we found that New Zealand workers are generally satisfied with their work, committed to their organisations and trusting of their managers.
We find that Kiwi workers who face high pressure with little control over how they do the job are the least satisfied of all our workers, as predicted in similar studies in Europe and America. Not all workers face demanding workloads, but those who do are much happier when they can control how they will respond to the challenge.
We also find that people are more satisfied when they feel rewarded for their performance: they want their pay, promotion and other forms of recognition to reflect their contribution. People look for a fair balance between the effort they put in and the rewards they receive. Reciprocity at work leads to better physical health and emotional well-being.
This, of course, is much harder to achieve than it sounds but, whichever methods are most appropriate to relate rewards to performance, our research shows that the demand is there. The workforce, and not simply management, seeks this link.
On top of this, we find that people are happier when they are well informed on company plans, and have regular opportunities to have their say. This is not simply about top-down communication but about an organisation in which managers facilitate two-way communication, thus building greater trust and commitment.
In the immediate work team, people are happier when they feel their supervisor is responsive to their individual needs and cares about their well-being.
Finally, we are happier when our organisation provides good opportunities for job-related training and for ongoing career development. People like jobs in which they can deploy, and develop, their particular abilities, whatever they may be. The organisations we prefer are the ones that can keep providing us with stimulating work as we grow in our capabilities.
This last point brings me to the Achilles' heel of the New Zealand labour market, which stems from the limited scale of New Zealand industry.
While our small organisations are more flexible, the downside is that they often lack the resources needed to support good levels of workplace training and they have a limited range of opportunities for individual development, something that fuels the 'brain drain'.
This is a strategic issue for New Zealand's future, but our workplaces do have strengths we can build on. For me, these are threefold.
First, our fundamental managerial style is sound: we have a culture of empowerment, which the workforce likes, and which we can use to enhance quality and innovation.
Second, our organisations are not as hierarchical as those in larger countries, something that can help us to build greater flexibility and trust.
And, third, we have a consensus that it is important to reward people for good performance, a principle that we can spread astutely throughout the workforce.
Dr Peter Boxall is Professor of Human Resource Management and leads a research group on high-performance work systems at The University of Auckland Business School.
