Job Satisfaction Among Federal Employees: The Role of Employee Interaction With Work Environment

Abstract

U.S. federal agencies seek ways to retain valued workers and simultaneously recruit new blood. By focusing on compatibilities between federal employees and work environments, this study incorporates person–environment fit theory and tests the impact of three compatibilities on job satisfaction of federal civil servants based on the 2015 Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey. Results show that perceived compatibilities between federal employees and their jobs, work group, and supervisors have significant effects on job satisfaction among federal civil servants. Based on these results, we argue that interactional perspectives offer a useful additional theoretical framework for understanding employee job satisfaction.

Keywords

interactional compatibility human resource management job satisfaction

Introduction

The federal government has struggled with a human resource deficit for decades. The federal workforce has been losing high-quality employees due to their dissatisfaction with pay, promotion opportunities, and access to the tools for doing their jobs, (Lewis, 1991; Light, 2008), but federal agencies have also failed to recruit new talent (Lewis & Cho, 2011). Furthermore, Lewis and Cho (2011) show that the public sector workforce is aging noticeably, and we know that many white-collar employees and executives are becoming eligible for retirement (U.S. Government Accountability Office [GAO], 2007). Particularly in the federal government, employees who are younger than 30 years old account for only 17.6% of the workforce, whereas 33.9% are 50 years and older. Although the federal government has made a series of efforts not only to improve its recruitment and hiring but also to retain current employees (“OPM: Stop Using KSAs When Hiring,” 2009; U.S. Office of Personnel Management [OPM], 2015), yet it seems that the federal government appears to be continuously experiencing a severe human resource crisis. This situation makes job satisfaction research more important and necessary to retain valuable current employees and attract young talent (Cho & Lewis, 2012; K. Yang & Kassekert, 2010).

Job satisfaction has been defined as the “pleasurable or positive emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one’s job or job experience” (Locke, 1976, p. 1300). Given this definition, job satisfaction can be understood as “the congruence between what employees want from their job and what employees feel they receive” (Wright & Davis, 2003, p. 70). Despite a wide range of research on job satisfaction of public servants, there is a dearth of established knowledge. In particular, the public management literature has paid limited attention to the interaction between individuals and their work environments. If job satisfaction is about the congruence between what individuals give and take (Wright & Davis, 2003), we might question why job satisfaction literature in the public sector often employs a unidirectional approach that privileges one standpoint with two parts—work environments and employees. With some exceptions (e.g., Trottier, van Wart, & Wang, 2008; Voon, Lo, Ngui, & Ayob, 2011), scholars focus on specific factors in the work environment and attempt to show their unilateral impacts on job satisfaction. That is, job satisfaction is seen as an outcome created by the quality of work environments. This approach has been helpful to understand some aspects of job satisfaction. Although some leadership literature, especially for followership research, takes into account interactional perspectives, theoretical and practical concern about how a public civil servant interacts with his or her work environment is generally less well-known in public management research about job satisfaction. To overcome the limitations of research on job satisfaction in public management literature, this study incorporates an interactional psychological axiom that people have different levels of compatibility with their work environment including job, groups, supervisor, organization, and others (Kristof-Brown, Zimmerman, & Johnson, 2005). Following the interactional psychological perspective, we suggest that the attitudes and behaviors of public employees may vary by the perceived quality of interactions with their work environments. Thus, this study focuses on the compatibility of federal civil servants with their jobs, coworkers, and supervisors and examines how three types of compatibility affect job satisfaction.

Literature Review on Job Satisfaction

Rainey (2014) suggested that job satisfaction is one of the most well-established research topics for work-related behavioral studies. Given the classic definition (Locke, 1976), job satisfaction appears to consist of a number of facets and relates to various job attitudes (Judge, Parker, Colbert, Heller, & Illies, 2001). In general, job satisfaction appears to lead to positive and desired organizational behaviors and outcomes (Harrison, Newman, & Roth, 2006). For instance, job satisfaction is negatively associated with absenteeism, turnover, and perceived job stress (Bright, 2008; Judge et al., 2001; Wang, Yang, & Wang, 2012). Within the body of job satisfaction research, public management scholars argue that public employees have a number of obstacles to job satisfaction such as lack of promotion opportunities, low pay, red tape, and goal ambiguity (Finlay, Martin, Roman, & Blum, 1995; Light, 2008; Rainey, 2014; Wright & Davis, 2003). Furthermore, the literature offers comparison research on job satisfaction between public and private sector. Some scholars argue that public employees are less likely to be satisfied with their jobs than are private sector employees (Baldwin & Farley, 1991; Rainey, 1983). Others maintain that job satisfaction of public employees is often greater than private sector employees (DeSantis & Durst, 1996; Steel & Warner, 1990; Wang et al., 2012). Thus, an ongoing debate in the literature about job satisfaction of public employees reveals mixed findings (Baarspul & Wilderom, 2011; Rainey, 2014; Rainey & Bozeman, 2000).

Despite the mixed findings, public management scholars and practitioners have underlined the importance of job satisfaction and attempted to discover various ways to enhance it. Although researchers have explored how work environments affect job satisfaction, they have paid less attention to interactions between individuals and their work environments and the ways that these interactions affect public sector job attitudes and behaviors. Thus, most existing literature considers job satisfaction as determined by two critical factors—personal traits and environmental determinants. In keeping with the Attraction-Selection-Attrition framework (Schneider, 1995), Perry and Wise (1990) offered public service motivation (PSM) as a characterological framework to help identify individuals who are well suited to the public sector (Bright, 2008). Also, Cooper, Knotts, McCord, and Johnson (2013) found that personal traits drawn from the Big Five Model affect public servants’ job satisfaction.¹ Recently some authors have argued for a more nuanced connection between personal traits such as PSM and attitudes and performance (Bright, 2008; Cooper et al., 2013).

A second view assumes that environmental factors in the workplace affect individual attitudes. Regarding job satisfaction of public employees, the literature provides a number of important factors such as goal ambiguity and clarity (Finlay et al., 1995; Moynihan & Pandey, 2007), human resource practices (Wright & Kim, 2004), and performance management practices (K. Yang & Kassekert, 2010) as predictors. What is left unclear are the social mechanisms through which these environmental factors are transmitted to and converted by the employee to attitudinal dispositions.

Our study addresses this gap by investigating the interaction between individuals and their work environments; we do this from the perspective of person–environment fit explanations (Kristof-Brown et al., 2005). This approach addresses the compatibility of an individual with his or her job, group, and supervisors as important work environment elements. The fit framework proposes that individuals can have a different compatibility level with each of three aspects of the work environment. Following this view, we argue that the perceived compatibility of federal civil servants with their jobs, coworkers, and supervisors can be helpful to advance understanding of job satisfaction in the public sector.

Theoretical Framework: Person–Environment Fit

Individuals are nested in various multiple systems in the work environments (Von Bertalanffy, 1972). Thus, individuals’ behaviors (B) can be the results of both person (P) and environment (E), which is consistent with Lewin’s (1951) equation B = f(P, E). Based on the notion that individuals’ behaviors and attitudes can result from interactions between person and environment, scholars developed a theoretical framework that focuses on compatibility within this interaction and began to investigate its effects (Edwards, Caplin, & van Harrison, 1998; French & Kahn, 1962). Research on work compatibility, called person–environment fit, is widespread in the field of organizational behavior because it can address aspects of the individual and of the relationship between individual and context (Edwards, 1996; Edwards et al., 1998; Pervin, 1989). Person–environment fit refers to the compatibility between an individual and a work environment that occurs when their characteristics are well matched (Schneider, 2001). Person–environment fit can be theoretically conceptualized and designed by the similarity, need–satisfaction, and demand–ability match of two parties (J. N. Choi, 2004; Kristof-Brown et al., 2005). These content dimensions have been variously operationalized as skills, needs, preferences, values, personality traits, goals, and attitudes (Kristof-Brown et al., 2005). Although some have criticized the comprehensiveness and breadth of the fit perspective, person–environment fit advocates have responded by articulating concepts and measures for various types of compatibility. Person–environment fit has been particularly useful, for example, in explaining sources of occupational stress (Edwards, 1996; Edwards et al., 1998; Ivancevich, Matteson, & Preston, 1982), job satisfaction (Cable & DeRue, 2002; Kristof-Brown, Jansen, & Colbert, 2002), and commitment and performance (Greguras & Diefendorff, 2009).

This study focuses on three types of compatibility—individual–job, individual–coworkers, and individual–supervisor—to explore the perceived compatibility of federal employees with their work environments. The previous literature underscores that a variety of individual behaviors and attitudes can be determined by those compatibilities (Edwards et al., 1998; Kristof-Brown et al., 2005). To date, only a few public management scholars have employed the fit perspective, using it, for example, to study predictors of turnover intention (e.g., Moynihan & Pandey, 2008) and PSM (Christensen & Wright, 2011; Steijn, 2008; Wright & Pandey, 2008). Most of these have employed person–organization (P-O) fit (e.g., Vigoda-Gadot & Meiri, 2008). Except for Starks’s (2007) study on the effect of individual–job compatibility (I-JC) on retention, other types of work compatibilities have received less attention in the current public management literature. Consequently, this article focuses on the perceived compatibilities of federal civil servants with their jobs, coworkers, and supervisors to examine the effects of work compatibilities on job satisfaction.

Individual-Job Compatibility (I-JC)

Compatibility between an individual and his or her job means the degree to which a person’s characteristics match those of the job or work tasks that are performed. If an individual has the necessary abilities to perform the tasks effectively or the individual’s needs can be fulfilled by the job, then the compatibility between individual and job is favorable (Edwards, 1991; Kriostof-Brown et al., 2002). These studies assume that individuals perceive whether or not they fit characteristics of a particular job. Thus, management scholars regard the job compatibility of an individual as the match between individual knowledge, skills, abilities, and demands of the job or the needs/desires of an individual relative to what is provided by the job (Carless, 2005; Edwards, 1991).

There are two basic ways to conceptualize the compatibility between individual and job (Edwards, 1991). The first is to examine the match between demand and abilities, thus assessing a person’s knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSA) against job requirements. If an individual has relevant KSA to accomplish his or her job, it is more likely that he or she perceives high compatibility. The second approach examines whether a person’s needs, desires, or preferences are met by the job. That is, if the current job fulfills the needs and desires of an individual, then it is likely he or she has good compatibility with the job. Although the two approaches are operationally different, theoretical justification for the two is similar (Kristof-Brown et al., 2005).

Capturing the quality and level of I-JC begins with defining the job. Often this is difficult as job requirements are complex and reflect a variety of organizational characteristics and goals. Kristof-Brown (1996) argued that a job can be objectified by identifying the tasks a person is expected to accomplish in exchange for employment as well as the characteristics of those tasks. Job compatibility of an individual can be identified as (a) the subjective evaluation of an individual for his or her job or (b) an objective assessment of how well individuals’ reported preferences or characteristics correspond to a job’s characteristics. Various measures have consistently shown that fit has positive effects on work attitudes such as job satisfaction and commitment (Kristof-Brown et al., 2005). The overall argument is that good job compatibility of an individual not only increases job satisfaction but also reduces the intention to quit (Lauver & Kristof-Brown, 2001). Following these arguments and evidence from private sector studies, we assume that I-JC will be positively associated with job satisfaction among federal civil servants.

Hypothesis 1: I-JC will be positively associated with federal civil servants’ job satisfaction.

Individual–Group Compatibility (I-GC)

A second arena of fit is interpersonal compatibility between individuals and their work group members (Kristof, 1996; Werbel & Johnson, 2001), as most positions require interpersonal interactions with group members. Recent evidence suggests that numerous organizations have experimented with team structures because they can provide various benefits such as flexible design for work processes. Daft (2001) characterized teams as permanent task forces that are often used in conjunction with a full-time integrator. An effective team enhances task behaviors and group process by integrating them with each other and with the needs and wants of the people who comprise the group (Cummings & Worley, 2008). Also, current public management literature shows the importance of teamwork to improve performance and build a performance-oriented culture (Brewer & Selden, 2000; Osborne & Gaebler, 1992).

Despite growing attention to teamwork in both private and public sectors, there are only a few studies on work group compatibility in the business literature (Riordan, 2000). Public management scholars in particular have not challenged this question. In previous business literature, research on group compatibility focused on the impact of demographics. Evidence suggested that demographic aspects and characteristics affect values or goals (Harrison, Price, & Bell, 1998; Riordan, 2000). These studies showed that group compatibility measured by demographic features is positively related with organizational outcomes. More recent studies have also examined psychological compatibility between coworkers. Interpersonal compatibility among work group members is presumed to be an important determinant for public organizational performance (Brewer & Selden, 2000; Osborne & Gaebler, 1992), but empirical evidence for this relationship has not been forthcoming.

Based on the premise of psychological compatibility under person–environment fit theory, private sector I-GC research shows a positive impact on job-related attitudes and organizational outcomes. The research shows that value congruence between coworkers is related with work-related outcomes such as job satisfaction and work attendance in industrial settings (Adkins, Ravlin, & Meglino, 1996). Kristof-Brown, Barrick, and Stevens (2005) also found that higher attraction of the team to individual team members can create greater individual contributions to team success. Regarding job satisfaction, Kristof-Brown et al. (2005) argued that interpersonal compatibility among work group members has a positive impact on job satisfaction and organizational commitment and an inverse effect on turnover intention. They suggest that high I-GC enables members to relieve conflict and integrate members, thereby reducing stress and enhancing individual satisfaction. We propose that perceived interpersonal compatibility among work group members has a positive effect on job satisfaction.

Hypothesis 2: I-GC will be positively associated with job satisfaction among federal civil servants.

Individual–Supervisor Compatibility (I-SC)

Among various dyadic relationships between coworkers, applicants and recruiters, and mentors and protégés, the relationship between a supervisor and subordinate has been recognized as a critical aspect of job attitudes and work outcomes in many work situations (Kristof-Brown, 1996; Kristof-Brown et al., 2005). As an important type of compatibility in person–environment compatibility, the characteristics of the supervisor can be considered a critical work environment factor for individuals. As a component of person–environment theory, I-SC refers to the psychological match between supervisor and subordinate (van Vianen, Shen, & Chuang, 2011).

Unlike other compatibility perspectives, interest in psychological compatibility with the supervisor has developed relatively independently from the person–environment compatibility framework because I-SC primarily concentrates on a vertical dyadic linkage between the supervisor and the subordinate (Kristof-Brown, 1996). In fact, because the nature of person–environment compatibility framework investigates the dyadic relationship between supervisor and subordinate, most previous studies on psychological compatibility with the supervisor are related to leader–member exchange (LMX) theory. Although LMX theory underlines an overall dyadic relationship, I-SC has generally investigated underlying aspects of the relationship between the supervisor and subordinate such as values, personality, and goal congruence.

To capture the match between the supervisor and subordinate, studies on I-SC focus on value congruence, personality similarity, and goal congruity between the leader and subordinates (Kristof-Brown et al., 2005). Concerning personality similarity, one important approach captures the match between supervisor and subordinate based on a Big Five Factor Model of Personality that helps meaningfully categorize personality characteristics (Mount & Barrick, 1995). If the supervisor and subordinate share personality traits, the relationship is presumed to be a good fit. Finally, the goal congruence approach focuses on the extent of agreement about goal priorities between the supervisor and subordinate (Witt, 1998).

A meta-analysis by Kristof-Brown et al. (2005) maintained that psychological compatibility with the supervisor has a strong and positive relationship with organizational commitment and performance and is inversely related with turnover intention. Previous research from each of three different types of psychological compatibility with the supervisor provides consistent and solid empirical evidence with regard to its positive impact on work attitudes and outcomes. For example, value congruence research between supervisor and subordinate has found a positive relationship with employee satisfaction and commitment (Meglino, Ravlin, & Adkins, 1989) and desirable work attitudes (Posner, 1992). Studies on personality similarity or dissimilarity also show that promotion decision, performance rating, coworker satisfaction, and organizational commitment can be affected by perception-based personality similarity or dissimilarity between supervisor and subordinate (Liao, Joshi, & Chuang, 2004; Strauss, Barrick, & Connerley, 2001).

Although not specifically about psychological compatibility between leader and subordinate, some public sector research has shown an association between leadership style and employee satisfaction (e.g., Trottier et al., 2008; Voon et al., 2011). Likewise, goal congruence research has found its impact on job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and performance (Vancouver & Schmitt, 1991; Witt, 1998). Extant literature suggests that psychological compatibility with the supervisor can affect job satisfaction for public employees. When goals and missions are ambiguous, the roles and impact of leaders on their subordinates’ behaviors and attitudes become significant. As a result, public civil servants are likely to feel more job satisfaction when they perceive high compatibility with the supervisor.

Hypothesis 3: I-SC will be positively associated with job satisfaction among federal civil servants.

Data and Method

Data

We employed data from the 2015 Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey (FEVS) conducted by the OPM. FEVS was intended to provide information about how the federal government runs human resource management systems and to assess the progress of strategic management of human resource management for human capital in individual agencies. Furthermore, it provides leaders with valuable information to improve agency performance (OPM, 2015). The samples are full-time and permanent employees of large agencies as well as small and independent agencies. A total of 82 federal agencies including 37 departments/large agencies as well as 45 small/independent agencies participated in the 2015 FEVS.

Measurement

As conceptualization and measurement of compatibility with work environments vary widely, the elusiveness of compatibility constructs has been criticized (Judge & Ferris, 1992; Kristof-Brown et al., 2005). Nevertheless, theorists have developed alternative ways to conceptualize fits with need–satisfaction, demand–ability, and similarity, and value congruence between individuals and work environments. Measured characteristics have included needs, preferences, personality traits, values, goals, skills, and attitudes (Kristof-Brown et al., 2005; Verquer, Beehr, & Wagner, 2003). Some scholars ask individuals directly about perceived fit while others indirectly measure fit with comparisons (Cable & DeRue, 2002; Kristof-Brown et al., 2005). The developed measures have been applied to a variety of organizations, focusing on mutual interaction between individuals and their work environments (Cable & DeRue, 2002). Based on the current measurement of various fits, we employed survey questions that can capture the nature of reciprocal interaction between parties.

We acknowledge that our measures of three types of compatibilities are not perfect or direct, but they are relevant and reasonable proxies. These measures are typical of what frequently occurs in empirical research that uses existing data (Caillier, 2012; Lee & Whitford, 2008). On FEVS, public management scholarship assessed its strengths and weaknesses. Fernandez, Resh, Moldogaziev, and Oberfield (2015) argued that FEVS data have advantages such as the representativeness, generalizability, consistency, availability for the public, and compatibility with other government data sources whereas they would have issues with quality of measurement, lack of information on the survey design and process, longitudinality, and others. Nonetheless, FEVS is one of the most extensive sources of survey data in the public sector, which enables researchers to investigate various public management issues. Accordingly, we have carefully selected survey questions that best reflect theoretical conceptualizations and worked assiduously to establish validity and reliability for our research constructs.² First, principal component analysis reduced multiple survey questions to our three types of compatibilities.³ Furthermore, we justified factor structure of our research variables by conducting confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). With regard to compatibility, we found that a three-factor model, χ² = 6,971.10, degree of freedom (df) = 17; comparative fit index (CFI) = 0.995; Tucker–Lewis index (TLI) = 0.992; root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) = 0.036; standardized root mean squared residual (SRMR) = 0.014, has a better fit than a single-factor model that treats three types of compatibilities as one factor, χ² = 272,324.26, df = 20; CFI = 0.819; TLI = 0.746; RMSEA = 0.206; SRMR = 0.09. The difference between models was statistically significant (Δχ² = 265,353.16, Δdf = 3; p < .01). The CFA results answered our two inquiries. First, the results supported our conceptualization that three types of compatibilities showed distinctive validities, which implies that they are different from each other. Second, factor analysis results showed that each of the four dimensions was characterized by a single strong factor loading that was not shared with any other dimension. Detailed information on factor loadings is provided in the appendix.

In addition, we consider whether the 2015 FEVS may have common source biases. Thus, we conducted Harman’s single-factor test by examining the unrotated factor solution with all variables of our model in a principal component factor analysis. If one single factor explains the majority of variance, one concludes that the bias of common method variance is serious (Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Lee, & Podsakoff, 2003). The analysis revealed five factors with eigenvalues greater than 1.0, and the first factor takes into account only 32.9% of the entire variance. Thus, common method variance biases were not a serious issue.

Dependent variable

Job satisfaction is measured by creating an additive index with two questions: “Considering everything, how satisfied are you with your job?” and “Considering everything, how satisfied are you with your organization?” For both questions, the answer scale ranges from 1 very dissatisfied to 5 very satisfied. Previous studies have used these items for measuring job satisfaction (Oberfield, 2014; K. Yang & Kassekert, 2010). These questions have been shown to demonstrate content validity for job satisfaction, and we found that they also show scale reliability (Cronbach’s α = 0.88).

Independent variables

Regarding I-JC, recall that two different measurement approaches, demand–abilities and needs–supplies or supplies–values fit are common. Therefore, I-JC was measured by an additive index of three items: “I am given opportunity to improve my skills,” “My work gives me a feeling of personal accomplishment,” and “My talents are used well in the workforce” (Cronbach’s α = .83). These three items capture both the extent to which the needs of public employees can be met by their agencies’ providing for skill improvement and personal accomplishments, which is consistent with the need–supply model, and the extent to which abilities are used in their agencies’ work, consistent with the demand–ability model.

The I-GC variable is captured by two items: “The people I work with cooperate to get the job done” and “Employees in my work unit share job knowledge with each other.” These items have been used for collaborative behaviors in the literature (Y. W. Kim & Ko, 2014; Oberfield, 2014). However, other scholars conceptualized them as quality of team or group interaction and relationship with coworker (S. Choi & Rainey, 2010; Ertas, 2015; Pitts, Marvel, & Fernandez, 2011). In spite of the varying conceptualization, it is common in empirical studies with the existing data as stated above (Fernandez et al., 2015). With careful consideration in measure selection, this study regards these items as perceived compatibility among the employee’s work group members that gauge overall quality of the interpersonal match within the work group (Cronbach’s α = .74). These items show how well individuals interact with each other, which can represent the level of I-GC. Finally, because the dyadic relationship between the supervisor and subordinate is the underlying idea of I-SC, this study employs three closely applicable items: “My supervisor/team leader treats me with respect,” “Discussions with my supervisor/team leader about my performance are worthwhile,” and “My supervisors/team leaders provide me with constructive suggestions to improve my job performance” (Cronbach’s α = .91). These items allow us to capture how compatible individuals are with their supervisors. In particular, these items can measure compatibility with the supervisor from activities done on a daily basis. Different from our dependent variable, the answers scale for each of survey questions on three types of compatibilities ranges from 1 strongly disagree to 5 strongly agree. The survey questions of three types of compatibilities would reflect the perception and behaviors of federal employees on work environment. Also, the CFA results supported our conceptualization by showing that they are statistically distinctive from one another, which are provided in the appendix.

Control variables

This study includes two categories of control variables that are extrinsic and demographic factors that may relate to job satisfaction. The extrinsic factor is physical work conditions. Given the importance of physical work conditions (Gordon, 2011), we include two items: “Physical conditions (for example, noise level, temperature, lighting, cleanliness in the workplace) allow employees to perform their job well” and “Employees are protected from health and safety hazards on the job” (Cronbach’s α = .65). Also, we include control variables that focus on demographic aspects including, supervisory status, gender, years of service, education, age, minority, and disability.

Results and Discussion

Results

Table 1 contains the descriptive statistics for all variables and Cronbach’s alpha for variables that are made up of summative indices. With the exception of the physical condition variable, all Cronbach’s alphas are greater than 0.70. The final samples for this study contain 321,505 federal employees after eliminating cases with missing data. The results of descriptive analysis demonstrate that federal employees have generally positive perceptions of their jobs (M = 6.20/SD = 2.09). They have similarly positive perceptions of work environment including I-JC (M = 8.92/SD = 2.98), I-GC (M = 6.77/SD = 1.81), I-SC (M = 9.61/SD = 3.12), and physical conditions under which they work (M = 6.64/SD = 1.80).

Table 1.

Descriptive Statistics.

Variables	N	Minimum	Maximum	M	SD
Job satisfaction	321,505	1	9	6.201	2.090
Individual–job compatibility		1	13	8.924	2.983
Individual–group compatibility		1	9	6.774	1.814
Individual–supervisor compatibility		1	13	9.607	3.118
Physical conditions		1	9	6.636	1.800
Supervisory status (supervisor)		0	1	0.215	0.411
Gender (male)		0	1	0.470	0.499
Years of service		1	3	2.243	0.756
Education		1	3	2.044	0.808
Age group		1	4	2.436	0.996
Minority		0	1	0.336	0.472
Disability		0	1	0.130	0.337

Table 2 presents a correlation matrix. Results indicate that the three-fit variables have moderately strong relationships with each other. In particular, I-JC has a strong relationship with job satisfaction, while I-GC and I-SC have moderately strong relationships with job satisfaction. Regarding control variables, physical conditions, supervisory status, gender (male), education, age, and minority status show statistically significant and positive relationships with job satisfaction whereas years of service and disability present inverse relationships.

Table 2.

Correlation Matrix (N = 321,505).

Variables	JS	I-JC	I-GC	I-SC	Physical condition	Supervisory status	Gender	Years of service	Education	Age group	Minority
I-JC	.77**
I-GC	.52**	.52**
I-SC	.60**	.62**	.50**
Physical condition	.47**	.46**	.38**	.38**
Supervisory Status	.10**	.14**	.10**	.07**	.12**
Gender	.01**	.01**	−.05**	−.02**	−.07**	−.09**
Years of service	−.02**	.02	.01**	−.04**	.00	.18**	.07**
Education	.02**	.04**	.09**	.04**	.07**	.11**	−.06**	−.13**
Age group	.04**	.04**	.02**	−.03**	.01**	.10**	−.04*	.44**	−.10**
Minority	.00*	−.01**	−.06**	−.03**	−.01**	−.05**	.12**	−.01**	−.08**	−.04**
Disability	−.05**	−.06**	−.06**	−.06**	−.06**	−.04**	−.10**	−.08**	−.08**	.08**	.04**

Note. JS = job satisfaction; I-JC = individual–job compatibility; I-GC = individual–group compatibility; I-SC = individual–supervisor compatibility.

p < .05. **p < .01.

To see the impact of work compatibility with job, coworker, and supervisor, we conducted hierarchical regression analysis. According to prior research (Mowday, Porter, & Steers, 1982), demographic variables and work conditions affect individual attitudes. Table 3 provides the results of the robust hierarchical regression analysis on job satisfaction as dependent variable, including coefficients, standard errors, and significance levels.³ Model 1 that uses work conditions and demographic characteristics is statistically significant (F = 10,752.70, R² = 0.231, p ⩽ .001). The second model adding three compatibilities with Model 1 explains substantially more variation in job satisfaction (F = 50,223.25, R² = .638, p ⩽ .001). The difference between the two models showed statistical significance (ΔF = 39,470.55, ΔR² = .407; p < .01), which implies the three compatibilities explain significant and unique variation in job satisfaction.

Table 3.

Hierarchical Robust Regression Results on Job Satisfaction.

	Model 1 (control variables)			Model 2 (full model)
	Coefficient	Robust SE	t value	Coefficient	Robust SE	t value
Physical condition	.543***	.002	278.32	.131***	.002	79.65
Supervisory status	.270***	.008	33.23	−.032***	.005	−5.78
Gender	.199***	.007	29.95	.077***	.005	16.85
Years of service	−.162***	.005	−33.41	−.084***	.003	−25.06
Education	−.043***	.004	−10.50	−.050***	.003	−17.48
Age group	.121***	.004	33.41	.068***	.003	27.24
Minority	.027***	.007	3.99	.089***	.005	18.64
Disability	−.195***	.010	−19.14	−.016*	.007	−2.28
Individual–job compatibility				.401***	.001	320.54
Individual–group compatibility				.117***	.002	65.38
Individual–supervisor compatibility				.102***	.001	87.43
R ²	.231			.638
F value	10,752.70***			50,223.25***
N	321,505

p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

The results of hierarchical robust regression analysis from Model 2 lend considerable support to all hypothesized relationships between perceived compatibility in work environments and job satisfaction.⁴ Specifically, I-JC was highly significant (p ⩽ .001). This positive relationship implies that job satisfaction among federal civil servants increases when federal employees perceive that their abilities are suitably employed with their talents and when an agency provides a sense of personal accomplishment and opportunity for skill improvement. Both I-GC and I-SC are also statistically significant and positively related with job satisfaction among federal employees (p ⩽ .001), which suggests that interpersonal compatibilities with group members and supervisors are important influences on job satisfaction. Concerning control variables, physical conditions, gender (male), age, and minority status are statistically significant and positive predictors, whereas supervisory status, years of service, education, and disability are statistically significant but negatively related with job satisfaction.

Discussion

In this section, we elaborate theoretical and practical implications of the results. First, I-JC is positively associated with job satisfaction. Simply stated, federal employees’ job satisfaction varies depending on the level of compatibility between the individual and his or her job. Thus, federal employees should be more satisfied with their jobs if agencies utilize the employees’ talents well. Furthermore, job satisfaction is influenced by the extent to which their work provides a sense of personal accomplishment and opportunity for developing job-related skills. Discerning what kinds of talents a federal employee has for the job can be critical, not only in the matter of positioning, but also for his or her job satisfaction and performance. Through sophisticated and complete analyses on jobs and individuals, federal agencies should identify employees’ KSA and, insofar as practical, try to match these with their jobs in an effort to enhance job satisfaction.

Extant research suggests that interpersonal relationships influence various job attitudes such as job satisfaction, stress, and organizational commitment (e.g., Kristof-Brown et al., 2005). In practice, many organizations increasingly employ team structures to facilitate various organizational tasks. The team or group structure assumes frequent interactions between and among workers and portends better communication and cooperation on the job (Daft, 2001; Levi, 2007). It has been less well known how interpersonal compatibility affects job-related attitudes in public organizations. Our results identify an important link between interpersonal compatibility with coworkers and job satisfaction for federal employees. These results invite attention to specific strategies for improving the quality of this interaction. Along with S. B. Yang and Guy’s (2011) work that found a positive effect of teamwork on job satisfaction, our findings also suggest that the employee’s sense of compatibility with coworkers positively influences his or her job satisfaction.

Finally, public management scholars acknowledge that supervisors significantly influence a wide range of organizational phenomena (Rainey, 2014; Trottier et al., 2008; van Wart, 2008; Voon et al., 2011). Our results confirm this precept and illustrate that perceived compatibility with the supervisor is critical for reinforcing job satisfaction. Arguably, the explanatory power of I-SC may simply confirm the obvious. Moreover, as the task of managing subordinates constitutes both the empirical and normative focus of our field, we abstain here from a pedantic inventory of prescriptions for enhancing manager–follower relations. Our findings nonetheless reinforce the notion that building compatibility by respecting subordinates and interacting with them on their performance with constructive suggestions and discussion can help enhance job satisfaction.

In sum, this study helps fill the research lacuna regarding interactional compatibilities with the job, group, and supervisor. To date, public management scholars have found the importance and effects of compatibility between individuals and their work environment (e.g., Wright, 2007). Interestingly, it seems that current research mostly focuses on the value congruence of P-O fit with PSM (Bright, 2008; Steijn, 2008; Teo, Pick, Xerri, & Newton, 2016), commitment and job satisfaction (S. Kim, 2012), job stress (Mostafa, 2016), and turnover intention (Moynihan & Pandey, 2008). Only a few studies have empirically examined person–job fit with job choice (Christensen & Wright, 2011), job satisfaction (Liu, Tang, & Yang, 2015; Quratulain & Khan, 2015), and retention (Starks, 2007). In spite of the theoretical and practical benefits of compatibilities with job, group, and supervisor, limited research has been conducted about these combined effects. Thus, this study provides both theoretical knowledge and empirical evidence on the extent to which compatibility with the job, group, and supervisor can affect public employees’ job satisfaction. Furthermore, this article offers a useful advantage in generalizability of the findings by examining large volume observations in the federal government. As an additional contribution, this study advances our understanding of job satisfaction of public employees within an interactional psychological perspective. Like the axiom of interactional psychology (Kristof-Brown et al., 2005), this study argues that attitudes and behaviors of public employees are not generally formed by the unidirectional influence of their work environment, but by interaction between them and their work environment, which offers an alternative understanding of work attitudes and behaviors in the public sector. Because of limitations in the existing database, our research cannot fully unravel how these elements interact, but we suggest that the effects of job fit, group fit, and supervisor fit on the individual’s sense of job satisfaction reflect a fluid interaction rather than mere additive effects. Thus, the level of job satisfaction among federal employees is likely determined by perceived compatibilities with distinct elements of the work environment, rather than by unilateral influence from the work context.

Conclusion

Both practitioners and scholars lament the loss of high-quality employees to frustration and retirement in the work of federal agencies. Furthermore, the human resource deficits of the federal government will continue to be aggravated not only if federal employment is seen as unattractive to potential employees but also by ongoing retirements of experienced employees (Lewis & Cho, 2011). As we explained above, public management scholars have not generally attended to the ways that interaction between employees and their environment affect employees’ workplace attitudes. To respond to the research question on job satisfaction and to overcome the conventional assumption that sees individuals as passive media through which contextual and personality factors determine behaviors and attitudes, this study introduced the person–environment compatibility framework, which focuses on employees’ compatibility with the job, coworkers, and supervisor.

Research interest in job satisfaction has shown that work environment influences employees’ job satisfaction (see Wright & Davis, 2003). Unfortunately, this implied unilateral causation from the work environment to job satisfaction may neglect important interaction between individual and work environment. Accordingly, our study incorporates theoretical perspectives on compatibility from person–environment theory in interactional psychology to fill a significant gap in research on employee attitudes. The findings suggest that compatibility with job, group, and supervisor can illuminate interaction between the individual and work environment and extend current public management scholarship on their effects for job satisfaction among federal employees.

In keeping with the interactionalist axiom, all public employees, including federal civil servants, may have varying levels of compatibility with their work environments. These research results offer important implications for both academics and practitioners. Theoretically, the perceived compatibility of federal employees with their jobs, colleagues, and supervisors is a critical ingredient for enhancing and sustaining job satisfaction. In practice, human resource managers in federal agencies should explore ways to increase compatibility between their employees and various work environments. To retain the current workforce and attract promising newcomers, academics and practitioners must address three key questions. First, what talents do current public employees have? Second, how can public agencies maximize these talents and give employees a feeling of personal accomplishment? and Third, how can public agencies set up a favorable work environment that helps increase interpersonal compatibility between employees and their coworkers and supervisors? These questions will most readily be resolved from ongoing research and from managerial experimentation.

Limitations and Future Studies

We acknowledge some limitations in measurement and analysis in our study and explain how we dealt with them. First, the questions in this study were drawn from a large survey not originally operationalized for the fit framework. We have described above how we carefully selected questions from our secondary data set, which were reasonable proxies for fit indicators. Despite the fact that CFA and rotated solution results support our conceptualization for the three types of work compatibilities, we believe better operationalizations may be possible. Thus, future research needs to employ measures developed intentionally to maximize construct validity for the three types of compatibility. Second, this study could not investigate another important fit, P-O fit, as the 2015 FEVS does not have questions that capture value congruence between individuals and environment. As we stated above, the literature has shown that P-O fit is a significant factor for behaviors and attitudes of public employees (Bright, 2008; S. Kim, 2012; Mostafa, 2016; Moynihan & Pandey, 2008; Steijn, 2008; Teo et al., 2016). Future studies need to include P-O fit with other fits and examine the overall and relative effects of the extent to which public employees perceive their interactions with the work environment. Also, it would be interesting to see the effect of compatibility between a supervisor and subordinate for certain conditions such as performance appraisal because interpersonal relationship between a supervisor and subordinate could affect the fairness and compliance of performance appraisal. Such research would give us further understanding on the impact of subordinate–supervisor compatibility on performance management practices in the public sector. In addition, research might well investigate further interactional effects in which P-O fit elements extend through job satisfaction to job turnover, organizational commitment, performance, and other outcome measures. Third, the model violates the heteroskedasticity assumption on equal variance of residuals.⁵ Consequently, we employed robust regression analysis which is designed to accommodate violations of the heteroskedasticity assumption (Andersen, 2008). In addition, the data have two limitations with common sources bias and uncertainty of the sample weights. Although Harman’s single-factor test shows that common source bias is not serious, future research should employ multiple data sources to overcome potential bias. Concerning the sample weights, FEVS did not provide detailed information on how they were developed (Fernandez et al., 2015), which could not allow us to employ the sample weights for the statistical analysis. Future research should consider ways to incorporate the sample weights and utilize them for more accurate statistical inferences. Finally, it would be necessary that future research should employ time-series analysis approach to overcome the issue of causality in the cross-sectional data.

Footnotes

Appendix

Variable Measurement.

Dependent variable
Job satisfaction	Considering everything, how satisfied are you with job?^a Considering everything, how satisfied are you with your organization?^a
Independent variables
Individual–job compatibility	I am given opportunity to improve my skills.^b
Individual–job compatibility	My work gives me a feeling of personal accomplishment.^b My talents are used well in the workplace.^b
Individual–group compatibility	The people I work with cooperate to get the job done.^b Employees in my work unit share job knowledge with each other.^b
Independent variables
Individual–supervisor compatibility	Discussions with my supervisor about my performance are worthwhile.^b My supervisors provide me with constructive suggestions to improve my job performance.^b My supervisor treats me with respect.^b
Control variables
Physical conditions	Physical conditions (e.g., noise level, temperature, lighting, cleanliness is the workplace) allow employees to perform their jobs well.^b Employees are protected from health and safety hazards on the job.^b
Supervisor status	What is your supervisory status? 0 = nonsupervisor/team leader 1 = supervisor or manager/executive
Gender	Are you?
Gender	0 = female	1 = male
Years of service	How long have you been with the federal government (excluding military service)?
Years of service	1 = 5 or fewer years 3 = 15 or more years	2 = 6 to 14 years
Education	What is the highest degree or level of education you have completed? 1 = education prior to a bachelor’s degree 2 = bachelor’s degree 3 = post-bachelor’s degree
Age	What is your age group?
Age	1 = below 40 3 = 50-59	2 = 40-49 4 = 60 or older
Minority	Minority status
Minority	0 = nonminority	1 = minority
Disability	Are you an individual with a disability?
Disability	0 = no	1 = yes

Items were measured on a 5-point scale (very dissatisfied, dissatisfied, neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, satisfied, and very satisfied).

Items were measured on a 5-point scale (strongly disagree, disagree, neither disagree nor agree, agree, strongly agree).

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author Biographies

Tae Kyu Wang is an assistant professor in Department of Social Welfare at Catholic Kwandong University in Republic of Korea. His research interests include public and non-profit management, performance management, and organizational theory and behavior.

Ralph Brower is a professor, Askew School of Public Administration and Policy, Florida State University. His teaching and research focus on organization studies, voluntary organizing, and international/comparative administration. His work has appeared in numerous public administration and nonprofit journals.

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