Sources of Professional Employees’ Job Involvement

Abstract

The purpose of the current study was to investigate antecedents of job involvement of professional employees working in government work settings. In that effort, this study examined whether four key characteristics of professional employees’ jobs: variety, significance, autonomy, and feedback, as well as their perceptions regarding their agency’s mission, rewards system, and the extent of their participation in decision-making process determine the level of their job involvement. These linkages were examined with data collected through an organizational survey from 764 professional employees working in geographically distributed offices in a large state agency. The analysis indicated that more than half of the total variance in professional employees’ job involvement could be predicted reliably by perceptions regarding the characteristics of their jobs and agency’s reward system. The results also showed that perception of an attractive and worthwhile agency mission accentuated the positive effect of task significance on professional employees’ job involvement. Implications of these findings for managing professional employees in government agencies are discussed.

Keywords

job involvement task significance and mission valence

Introduction

The service orientation of government organizations has resulted in an increasing reliance on professionals from various fields such as accounting, education, engineering, law, management, and information technology (Emmert & Taher, 1992). Professional employees play a vital role in the effective implementation of government programs (Denhardt & Denhardt, 2000; Emmert & Taher, 1992). However, recruiting and retaining such highly skilled employees is always a big challenge for government organizations (Kim, 2005). Public organizations often need to compete with their private sector counterparts in hiring skilled employees (Light, 1999). Additionally, with the ongoing budget crisis, federal, state, and local government agencies may have difficulty identifying effective ways to motivate and retain professional employees. Given such circumstances, an improved understanding of the sources of professional employees’ job involvement has significance for public management scholarship.

An important study by Buchanan (1975) suggested that public managers’ level of job involvement might indicate the extent of their dedication and commitment toward public service. Although job involvement and public service ethic are distinct concepts (Rainey, 1982), professional employees’ deep involvement in public service oriented work is likely to have a positive impact in accomplishing their agency’s mission. Additionally, the extent to which employees feel involved in, or alienated from, their work has important implications on their personal as well as their organizational well-being (Kanungo, 1982a, 1982b). Job involvement is an important factor in employees’ personal growth and satisfaction in their workplaces and considered key to their motivation and goal directed behaviors (Argyris, 1964; Lawler, 1986; Pfeffer, 1994). Research has shown that higher levels of job involvement often lead to higher levels of job performance (Diefendorff, Brown, Kamin, & Lord, 2002). Hence, enhancing job involvement in public agencies may have a positive impact on organizational effectiveness by fully involving employees in their work and making public service a meaningful and fulfilling experience (Lawler, 1992; Pfeffer, 1994).

Considerable research has investigated antecedents of job involvement (Brown, 1996). However, much of this research has focused on employees working in business and industry rather in government work settings. The institutional context in which government organizations operate may have unique implications on their capacity to motivate professional employees to become more involved in their work. Several previous studies, for example, showed that managers working in government agencies tend to report lower levels of job involvement than managers working in private firms (Buchanan, 1975) and nonprofit organizations (Word & Park, 2009). This may be attributed partly to higher levels of procedural constraints, lower levels of pay and limited career advancement opportunity that professional employees in government organizations (DeHart-Davis & Pandey, 2005; Emmert & Taher, 1992).

Although job involvement has received limited attention in research in public management, recent studies have attempted to move this work forward by beginning to identify specific antecedents of public employees’ job involvement. Moynihan and Pandey (2007), for example, found that public service motivation, career advancement opportunity, and group oriented culture are positively related to job involvement of managers working in health and human services organizations. Several other studies showed that increased procedural red tape has a negative impact on job involvement of managers working in state agencies (DeHart-Davis & Pandey, 2005; Word & Park, 2009).¹ Recently, Boardman, Bozeman, and Ponomariov (2010) found that private sector work experience has a positive effect on public managers’ job involvement. These works constitute important first steps towards identifying key sources of public employees’ job involvement. However, more research is needed for a comprehensive understanding of the sources of job involvement of professional employees working in government organizations.

The goal of the current study was to examine whether professional employees’ perceptions about their job and employing agency influence them to become more involved in their work. The premise of this effort was that professional employees’ job involvement could be substantially increased by redesigning their work and influencing their perceptions regarding the importance of their work and mission of their agency. This study took cues from earlier research on job involvement in government agencies (Boardman et al., 2010; DeHart-Davis & Pandey, 2005; Moynihan & Pandey, 2007; Reid, Riemenschneider, Allen, & Armstrong, 2008; Word & Park, 2009), but drew heavily from the broader organizational behavior literature (Hackman & Lawler, 1971; Hackman & Oldham, 1975, 1976, 1980). Specifically, this study assessed whether four key characteristics of professional employees’ jobs: variety, significance, autonomy, and feedback, as well as their perceptions regarding the importance their agency’s mission (i.e., mission valence), its rewards system, and the extent of their participation in job-related decisions determine the level of their job involvement. Additionally, given the key role that the mission of a public agency plays in motivating its employees (Rainey & Steinbauer, 1999; Wright & Pandey, 2011), this study investigated whether perception of an worthwhile agency mission accentuates the effect of task significance on professional employees’ job involvement. These linkages were examined with data collected through a survey from 764 professional employees working in 65 geographically distributed offices in a large state agency with 11 distinct divisions of operation. The next section draws from the extant organizational research to develop a theoretical argument and set of testable hypotheses about how job and organization related perceptions may lead to higher job involvement among professional employees.

Theory and Hypotheses

Although a complete review of the job involvement literature is beyond the scope of the current study, it is important to provide a precise conceptualization of the construct. Lodahl and Kejner (1965) first introduced job involvement as an important construct more than 40 years ago. Since then, job involvement has been conceptualized in many ways over the years (Kanungo 1982a, 1982b; Lawler & Hall, 1970; Paullay, Alliger, & Stone-Romero, 1994; Saleh & Hosek, 1976). Paullay and colleagues (1994) conducted a critical review of the literature, identified inconsistencies in past conceptualizations, and provided a clear definition of job involvement. They conceptualized job involvement as the degree to which individuals are cognitively preoccupied with, engaged in, and concerned with their present job (Paullay et al., 1994, p. 224). Fundamentally, job involvement is a cognitive state or belief that reflects individuals’ psychological connection with their present job and the salience of the job to their self-image (Kanungo, 1982a, 1982b; Lawler & Hall, 1970). It consists of two components: The degree to which (a) individuals are involved in specific tasks that make up their jobs, and (b) find carrying out those tasks in their environment as engaging (Paullay et al., 1994). Both of these components are necessary for individuals to experience a high degree of job involvement (Paullay et al., 1994).

Job involvement has been shown to be both conceptually and empirically distinct from other similar worker perceptions and attitudes. One related yet distinct construct is work centrality, which refers to the extent to which individuals view work as the main component of their life (Diefendorff et al., 2002). Work centrality is conceptually broader in scope than job involvement, as it reflects a belief about the importance of work in general in individuals’ lives as opposed to how immersed individuals are in their current jobs. Another related yet conceptually and empirically distinct construct is work motivation. Meta-analytic research has found only a moderate correlation between these two variables (r = .53, reported by Brown, 1996). Additionally, job involvement is both conceptually and empirically distinguishable from job satisfaction (Mathieu & Farr, 1991). A meta-analysis by Cooper-Hakim and Viswesvaran (2005) reported a modest correlation between job involvement and job satisfaction (r = .35).

Antecedents of Professional Employees’ Job Involvement

Job characteristics and job involvement

Job involvement primarily is a function of the situational characteristics in the workplace, though certain individual/personality traits (e.g., work ethic and self-esteem) have been shown to influence employees’ job involvement (Brown, 1996; Lawler & Hall, 1970; Robinowitz & Hall, 1977; Saal, 1978). The situational perspective of job involvement suggests that employees become more (or less) involved in their jobs when the immediate environment in which they perform their work activities improves (or deteriorates; Hackman & Lawler, 1971; Hackman & Oldham, 1975, 1976, 1980). From this perspective, the design of professional employees’ jobs is likely to play a vital role in the level of their job involvement.

When professional employees perceive that their work in government organizations is meaningful and worthwhile, they are expected to become more engaged in their jobs. Employees generally consider their work meaningful when they are required to perform a variety of challenging activities that involve different set of skills. Furthermore, employees consider their jobs worthwhile when they believe that their work makes a positive impact on others in their workplaces and in the greater society (Hackman & Lawler, 1971; Hackman & Oldham 1975, 1976). Thus, perceptions of higher levels of skill variety—the extent to which a job requires a person to perform a wide range of challenging tasks—and higher levels of task significance—the degree to which a job is seen as having an impact on the lives or work of other people—are expected to have positive influences on professional employees’ job involvement. Although research in business and industry settings have shown positive associations between skill variety, task significance, and job involvement (Brown, 1996), these linkages have not been thoroughly investigated in research in public management. While Reid and others (Reid et al., 2008) found no association between skill variety and job involvement among Information Technology professionals in state agencies, DeHart-Davis and Pandey (2005) found a negative relationship between technology routineness² and job involvement of managers working in state agencies. But the linkage between task significance and job involvement has not been investigated in previous studies. Hence, the following two hypotheses were tested in the current study:

Hypothesis 1: Skill variety will have a positive influence on job involvement.

Hypothesis 2: Task significance will have a positive impact on job involvement.

In addition to skill variety and task significance, two other key job characteristics—autonomy and feedback—are likely to have a positive influence on job involvement of professional employees working in government agencies. Professional employees tend to value professional autonomy highly and they like to conform to professional standards and norms rather than bureaucratic standards and norms in carrying out their work activities (Hoff, 2001; Wallace, 1995). Research has shown that when employees have a high degree of autonomy and discretion in carrying out their tasks, they feel a sense of personal responsibility for the successes or failures that occur in their job (Hackman & Lawler, 1971; Hackman & Oldham 1975, 1976). Experienced responsibility for work outcomes is expected to have a positive impact on professional employees’ job involvement. A meta-analysis by Brown (1996) reported a significant positive association between job autonomy and job involvement, but there has not been a direct assessment of this linkage in public management research. Therefore, the following hypothesis was tested in this study:

Hypothesis 3: Job autonomy will have a positive influence on job involvement.

Job feedback, or the extent to which employees know on a continuing basis how effectively they are performing on their job, is likely to play an important role in their involvement with that job (Hackman & Oldham, 1975, 1976). Employees, professional and otherwise, can receive job feedback in many ways (e.g., formal or informal) and from multiple sources (e.g., supervisor, peers, and customers) and, of course, this feedback may be inherent in a job itself (Hassan & Rohrbaugh, 2009). Regardless of the type and source of feedback, when an employee receives direct and clear information about the effectiveness of her work performance, she becomes aware about the impact of her work on her workgroup and others in the society (Hackman & Oldham, 1975, 1976). Therefore, job feedback is likely to be an important factor for increasing employees’ work involvement, motivation, and performance (Locke & Latham, 1990). Additionally, research has shown that job feedback is an essential component in employees’ self-regulation process (Ashford & Tsui, 1991; Bandura, 1991; Locke & Latham, 1990), allowing employees to detect discrepancies in their behaviors and subsequently to select appropriate performance-enhancing strategies such as adjusting their goals and/or their behaviors (Locke & Latham, 1990). Brown (1996) found a positive linkage between feedback and job involvement, though this relation has not been thoroughly examined in public management studies. Therefore, the following hypothesis was tested in the current study:

Hypothesis 4: Job feedback will have a positive effect on job involvement.

Participation in decision making and job involvement

Employee participation has been a key focus of leadership theory and research. From the perspective of subordinates, a critical factor in participation is the extent to which supervisory decisions can be influenced by their involvement (James, Gent, Hater, & Coray, 1979). Perceptions of such influence are indicative of empowerment, that is, the extent to which employees believe that they are members of a strong team in which their efforts are valued and supported (Lawler, 1986). Empowerment promotes trust, increases a sense of control, and makes work experience intrinsically rewarding (Lawler, 1986). Additionally, when employees perceive they have an active role in important organizational activities and have opportunities for their voices to be heard, they are likely to become committed to their organization’s goals and more involved in their work. Hence, participative decision making was anticipated in this study to have a positive influence on professional employees’ job involvement. Although Brown (1996) reported a significant positive correlation between participative decision making and job involvement, recent studies in public management have found inconsistent results. While Word and Park (2009) showed that centralization of decision-making authority has a negative impact on public managers’ job involvement, Dehart-Davis and Pandey (2005) found no evidence for such an association. Nevertheless, the following hypothesis was tested in the present study:

Hypothesis 5: Participative decision making will have a positive influence on job involvement.

Performance contingent rewards and job involvement

This study expected that perception of a performance contingent reward system would have a positive impact on professional employees’ job involvement. Vroom (1964) suggested that employees tend to rationally evaluate alternative work behaviors and then choose behaviors that they believe will lead to desired level of performance, which, in turn, would lead to obtaining valued rewards and outcomes (both material and social). Additionally, research has shown that when employees perceive that their work outcomes are proportional to the efforts they make in their work, they may respond positively by becoming more involved and putting more effort in their work (Adams, 1965; Greenberg, 1982; Latham & Pinder, 2005). Accordingly, the level of professional employees’ involvement in their work may depend on the extent to which they believe its accomplishment will lead to valued outcomes such as more interesting job assignments, promotion, and advancement opportunity within the organization (Porter & Lawler, 1968). However, the degree to which performance contingent rewards have a positive impact on professional employees’ job involvement may actually depend on a number of situational factors, including the availability of adequate resources and employees’ confidence and trust in the organizational procedures through which recognition and rewards are allocated in the organization (Bowman, 2010; Hassan, 2012; Kellough & Lu, 1993; Kellough & Nigro, 2002; Kellough & Selden, 1997). Nevertheless, given the positive connection found between performance contingent rewards and job involvement in previous research (Brown, 1996), a similar pattern of association was expected in this study.

Hypothesis 6: Performance contingent rewards will have a positive influence on job involvement.

Mission valence and job involvement

The central purpose or mission of a public organization can be a powerful and positive force (Wright & Pandey, 2011). Public management researchers have long suggested that the purpose of a public organization is an important asset or resource that can be used in attracting, recruiting, and retaining its employees (Goodsell, 2010). Rainey and Steinbauer (1999, p. 16), for example, noted that “the more engaging, attractive, and worthwhile the mission is to people, the more the agency will be able to attract support from those people, to attract some of them to join the agency, and to motivate them to perform well in the agency.” Hence, mission valence, or perceptions of the attractiveness or salience of an organization’s mission that is derived from the satisfaction that employees experience from advancing that purpose (Rainey & Steinbauer, 1999; Wright, Moynihan, & Pandey, & 2010; Wright & Pandey, 2011), is likely to have a positive on public employees’ cooperative work attitudes including their job involvement. Research on the linkage between mission valence and job involvement of public employees has been limited. One study by Moynihan and Pandey (2007) examined the relationship between “sense of organizational purpose” and job involvement, but found no connection between the two variables. However, the measure that this study used to assess “sense of organizational purpose” was somewhat unique and did not adequately capture employees’ perceptions of mission valence.³ Therefore, the following hypothesis was tested in the present study.

Hypothesis 7: Mission valence will have a positive effect on job involvement.

The final hypothesis that this study examined concerned the potential interaction of mission valence with task significance in predicting job involvement. Rainey and Steinbauer (1999) suggested that the mission of a government agency is an important resource that the agency can rely on to enhance motivation and performance of its employees. When employees view that the goals of their organization are important and consistent with their espoused values, they are likely to internalize those goals as their own’ and view their assigned work roles as meaningful and important (Weiss & Piderit, 1999; Wright, 2007). This is likely to be especially salient in government agencies because of the altruistic nature of their organizational mission or goals (Crewson, 1997; Perry & Wise, 1990; Wright, 2007). As noted previously, the degree to which employees perceive that their work is important and makes a positive contribution to the welfare of others has implications on their level of job involvement (Brown, 1996). The positive linkage between task significance and job involvement is likely to be even stronger when professional employees believe that their agency’s mission is worthwhile and attractive. This is because a worthwhile agency mission would accentuate the perceived importance of professional employees’ work to their organization and the greater society (Wright & Pandey, 2011) and, thereby, motivate them to become more involved in their jobs. The interactive effect of mission valence and task significance on public employees’ job involvement has not been examined in previous research and, therefore, was tested in the current study:

Hypothesis 8: Mission valence moderates the effect of task significance on job involvement, such that the more important and attractive the agency’s mission is, the greater is the effect of task significance on job involvement.

Method of the Study

The eight research hypotheses were tested with data that were collected through an organizational survey from professional employees working in 65 geographically dispersed offices in a state agency with 11 distinct divisions of operation. The agency was responsible for maintaining and administering the states’ accounting, payroll, and retirement systems for all public employees. The agency also was responsible for reviewing states’ contracts, conducting audits of other agencies as well as overseeing fiscal affairs of local governments (including one of the largest municipalities in the United States). The survey was conducted as part of a long-term project undertaken by the agency with a goal of assessing and improving its work climate.

Data were gathered through the design and use of a unique, eight-page survey of 2,614 employees in 2008. Responsibility for internal distribution and collection of surveys was assigned to division managers of the agency. Prior to distributing surveys, the division managers clearly communicated to all participants about the purpose of the study, the voluntary nature of their participation, and the complete anonymity of their responses. Altogether, 2,136 usable surveys were returned for an overall response rate of 82%; response rates by division ranged from a low of 70% to a high of 100%. Because this study focused on professional employees’ job involvement, only employees belonging to occupational groups classified as professionals were included in the data analyses. This included 764 respondents who identified themselves as professional employees and were at and above the salary grade 18 and below salary grade 27.⁴ These professional employees mostly were accountants, auditors, business analysts, lawyers, information technology specialists, and managers in the state agency.

An overview of the demographic data for the sample⁵ is provided in Tables 1 and 2. As indicated in Table 1, a vast majority of the sample (86.5%) identified themselves as Caucasian. Approximately, 7% of the sample identified themselves as African American, 5% identified themselves as Asian, and 2% identified themselves as Hispanic. Nearly half of the sample (45.4%) were females. Additionally, 85% of the sample identified themselves as technical employees and about 15% identified themselves as managers.

Table 1.

Sample Characteristics.

Characteristics	Percent
Ethnicity
Asian	4.7%
African American	6.5%
Hispanic	1.6%
Native American	.5%
Caucasian/White	86.5%
Other	.2%
Gender
Female	45.4%
Male	54.6%
Nature of Position
Technical	85.1%
Managerial	14.9%

Table 2.

Age and Tenure of the Sample.

Measures	Minimum	Maximum	Mean	Standard deviation
Age	23	70	44.2	10.0
Years in current position	1	34	4.8	9.7
Years in agency	1	37	10.7	8.6
Years in state government	1	41	9.3	5.1

Respondents were asked to provide information about their age and length of service. Responses indicated considerable variability. The age distribution of the sample ranged widely from 23 to 70 years with a mean of 44.2 years and a standard deviation of 10 years. The tenure of the sample in their current position also ranged widely from 1 to 34 years with a mean of 4.8 years and a standard deviation of 9.7 years. The tenure of the sample in their current organization ranged from 1 to 37 years with a mean of 10.7 years and a standard deviation of 8.6 years. The length of service of the sample in state government ranged from 1 to 41 years with a mean of 9.3 years and a standard deviation of 5.1 years. All three tenure distributions were positively skewed.

Respondents completed a 130-item survey designed in large part to examine employees’ job involvement and their perceptions regarding their agency’s mission, reward system, decision-making process, as well as their job characteristics. In addition to the variables that are relevant for the present study, data were collected for other agency, office and individual-level variables, the analysis of which is beyond the scope of this study. Most of the survey items were measured on a 6-point (coded 1-6) strength of agreement (strongly disagree, generally disagree, disagree a little, agree a little, generally agree, and strongly agree) or a 5-point (coded 0-4) frequency of occurrence (never, rarely, sometimes, often, and almost always/always) scale.

Each of the eight variables was measured using multiple items and, whenever possible, from previously validated measures.⁶ The 3-item measures of skill variety, task significance, and job feedback derived from the Job Diagnostic Survey (Hackman & Oldham, 1975). Furthermore, Steers’ (1975, 1976) Task-Goal Attribute Scales provided the basis for the 2-item measure of job autonomy and 4-item measure of performance contingent reward system. Mission valence was measured with three items that are similar to items used in recent public management research (see, for example, Wright, Moynihan & Pandey, 2011; Wright & Pandey, 2011). Locke and Latham’s (1990) Goal Setting Questionnaire suggested appropriate items for the 3-item measure of participative decision making about work objectives and procedures.

The dependent measure of job involvement was constructed with four items from the organizational survey. Space constraints in the questionnaire design precluded inclusion of additional job involvement items or, for that matter, a larger number of items for any of the antecedent measures. Although these four items were not selected directly from previously validated measures of job involvement (Kanungo, 1982b; Paullay et al., 1994), they focus on the degree to which professional employees’ are involved in their jobs, or find carrying out their jobs in the present work environment as engaging (Paullay et al., 1994). Furthermore, these four items are similar to items used in recent studies in public management (Hassan, 2012; Hassan & Rohrbaugh, 2011; Word & Park, 2009) to measure job involvement in government work settings.

Results

Table 3 reports the univariate statistics for the eight composite measures. As shown in Table 3, distributions of most of the measures were somewhat negatively skewed, with a greater number of respondents reporting a relatively high level of task significance, job involvement, participative decision making, and mission valence. Although composite scores for all eight measures were slightly skewed, the differences between the average scores and the scale midpoints were not very large. Furthermore, the standard deviations for all of the measures were relatively high, indicating adequate variability in the data sufficient for hypotheses testing.

Table 3.

Univariate Statistics.

Measures	Minimum	Maximum	Mean	Standard deviation
Skill variety	3	18	9.72	3.34
Task significance	3	18	14.37	2.70
Job autonomy	3	18	11.16	3.35
Job feedback	3	18	12.94	3.38
Participative decision making	3	18	10.90	3.17
Performance contingent rewards	3	18	11.05	3.47
Mission valence	3	18	15.29	2.61
Job involvement	4	24	18.66	3.85

A principal components analysis with oblimin rotation was conducted to identify a simple structure of factors underlying the independent measures that are the focus of the present study. Table 4 presents results of the principle components analysis. As shown in Table 4, the resultant 7-factor solution match the expected correspondence of all 21 items to their respective measures as reflected in higher factor loadings. The seven components extracted accounted for approximately 67% of the composite item variance. A set of 7-factor scores was generated for respondents using the standard regression method. A reliability check was made by creating summative scales based on the components for each factor. Reliability coefficients (Cronbach’s α) for these scales ranged from .58 for job autonomy to .84 for job feedback (shown at the bottom of Table 4).⁷

Table 4.

Factor Pattern Matrix for the Predictor Measures (Oblimin Rotation).

Items	Job feedback	Mission valence	Participative decision making	Skill variety	Task significance	Performance contingent rewards	Job autonomy
I am told by my immediate supervisor when I do a good job	.96	−.11	−.04	−.04	.01	−.07	−.03
My supervisor properly instructs me regarding how to do my job	.78	−.07	.16	−.16	.19	−.11	−.10
My last performance evaluation assisted me in improving my work	.70	.16	−.11	.02	−.02	−.01	−.02
Fulfilling the mission and goals of this organization is crucial to the State	.04	.85	−.02	.05	−.08	−.16	.06
The work of this organization is not very significant in the broader scheme of things (R)	−.05	.84	.00	.00	.13	−.02	−.08
I believe priorities of this organization are quiet important	−.04	.79	.00	−.08	.09	.12	−.03
Important decisions are made top down without any consultation (R)	−.11	.05	.87	−.02	−.10	.07	−.02
There is very little opportunity to participate in decisions about work methods and procedures (R)	.02	−.10	.80	.06	.02	−.02	.01
Employees take part in making decisions regarding their work objectives	.10	.01	.79	.05	.03	−.09	−.09
Day after day my on-the-job tasks are almost the same (R)	−.12	.01	.02	.89	.01	−.10	−.02
My daily work routine is predictable (R)	−.08	−.01	.04	.88	−.02	.02	−.04
I get opportunity to do new and different things at work	.23	−.02	.01	.59	.13	.05	.03
I feel that my work is important	.20	.00	−.11	.07	.78	−.05	.05
Through my work I help to provide valuable services to State taxpayers	−.05	.18	−.01	.00	.78	.01	−.06
I work on tasks that seem useless or unnecessary (R)	−.04	−.09	.07	−.01	.63	.23	.12
Rewards and recognition are given to people who deserve them	−.13	−.13	−.13	.01	.21	.92	−.15
Poor performance is ignored in this organization (R)	−.04	.02	.11	−.09	−.07	.80	−.01
Fulfilling all my job responsibilities does little improve my chances for a promotion (R)	.34	.11	.06	.04	−.12	.49	.17
I have seen good job performance rewarded in this unit	.36	.10	.08	.11	−.16	.38	.10
I always check with my supervisor before making important decisions (R)	−.02	−.04	−.17	.01	−.03	−.08	.96
In my job even small matters have to be referred to someone higher up for a final answer (R)	−.13	.03	.26	−.08	.22	−.07	.64
Cronbach’s α	.84	.81	.74	.73	.72	.71	.58

A separate principal components analysis was conducted to create the dependent measure of job involvement. Table 5 presents results of the principle component analysis for the job involvement items. The resultant single factor extracted accounted for over 60% of the composite item variance and factor loadings on all the four items were high (i.e., above .70). Cronbach’s alpha for the 4-item summative scale of job involvement was .75. Factor scores of job involvement for all respondents were generated using the standard regression method.

Table 5.

Principle Component Analysis Results for Job Involvement.

Items	Factor loadings
It has been very hard for me to get involved in my current job (R)	.75
I have the attitude that there is no point in trying harder to accomplish things in my job (R)	.75
At the end of the day, I feel good about what I do here	.83
Time seems to drag while I am on the job (R)	.71
Cronbach’s α	.75

Table 6 presents bivariate correlation coefficients between the factor scores of the eight study measures. All correlation coefficients were statistically significant at p<.05 level. As shown in Table 6, the median correlation between the job involvement factor and the seven predictor factors was .43. The highest observed correlation was between task significance and job involvement (r = .63) and the lowest was between job autonomy and job involvement (r = .34). Additionally, the median correlation between the seven predictor measures was .31, indicating that approximately 9% of variance in pairs of factors was shared. These results provided discriminant validity of the seven predictor measures included in this study.

Table 6.

Bivariate Correlations between the Dependent and Independent Measures.^a

Measures	1	2	3	4	5	6	7
1. Job feedback	—
2. Mission valence	.40
3. Participative decision making	.52	.36
4. Skill variety	.31	.18	.31
5. Task significance	.39	.44	.38	.24
6. Performance contingent rewards	.45	.41	.52	.21	.29
7. Job autonomy	.25	.09	.38	.17	.26	.22
8. Job involvement	.52	.40	.46	.39	.63	.43	.34

All correlation coefficients were statistically significant at p <.05. The correlation coefficients were calculated based on the factor scores.

The eight research hypotheses were tested using step-wise regression analyses with factor scores of the job involvement as the dependent measure and factor scores of the four job characteristics, participative decision making, performance contingent reward system, and mission valence as the independent measures. Additionally, respondents’ age, gender, and organization tenure were included as control variables in the regression analyses. Step-wise or hierarchical regression analysis was specifically chosen to assess changes in the total variance in job involvement (i.e., R² changes) that can be explained by the seven predictor measures as well as the interaction term. Table 7 summarizes results of step-wise regression analyses.

Table 7.

Stepwise Regression Analyses Results for Job Involvement.

	Step 1		Step 2
Measures	β	t	β	t
Gender	.02	.76	.03	1.14
Age	.03	.77	.03	.76
Tenure	.00	.04	.01	.19
Skill variety	.15	5.32*	.15	5.28*
Task significance	.45	13.66*	.47	14.05*
Job feedback	.20	5.77^*	.19	5.66^*
Job autonomy	.11	3.55*	.11	3.59*
Participative decision making	.02	.43	.01	.41
Performance contingent rewards	.13	4.00*	.13	3.96*
Mission valence	.02	.77	.06	1.82
Mission valence × task significance			.12	3.83*
R2	.55		.56
ΔR2	—		.01
F	79.43 *		75.12 *
ΔF	—		14.69 *

p < .01. N = 764.

The seven predictor measures as well as the three demographic control variables were included in the first step of regression analysis. As shown in Table 7, age, gender, and tenure were found to have no influence on professional employees’ job involvement. Hypothesis 1 through 4 predicted that higher levels of skill variety, task significance, job feedback, and job autonomy would be linked with higher levels of job involvement. As predicted, all four job characteristics factors were significantly related to professional employees’ job involvement (p<.01). The standardized regression coefficients (βs) were .15, .45, .20, and .11 for skill variety (H1), task significance (H2), job autonomy (H3), and job feedback (H4), respectively. These results provided empirical support for Hypotheses 1 through 4. Hypothesis 5 expected that participative decision making would positively influence professional employees’ job involvement. The regression results did not provide support for this hypothesis. Empirical support was found for Hypothesis 6, which anticipated that perception of a performance contingent reward system would have a positive effect on professional employees’ job involvement (β = .13, p<.01). Hypothesis 7 suggested that mission valence would enhance job involvement of professional employees, but it was not supported by the regression results. When taken together, the four job characteristics and performance contingent reward system factors accounted for 55% of the total variance in job involvement (R² = .55, F = 79.43, p<.01).⁸

The interaction term was included in the second step of the regression analyses. Hypothesis 8 predicted that mission valence would moderate the effect of task significance on professional employees’ job involvement. The regression results, as shown in Table 7, provided support for this hypothesis. The results indicated that the more attractive and important professional employees perceived the mission of their agency was the greater was the effect of task significance on their job involvement. (β = .12, p<.01). The interaction effect explained one additional percent of the total variance in job involvement (ΔR² = .01, F = 14.69, p<.01). Figure 1 provides a graphical representation of this interaction effect. As shown in Figure 1, when mission valence was perceived high—that is, one standard deviation above the mean (indicated by the blue line)—the effect of task significance on professional employees’ job involvement was significantly stronger than the condition in which mission valence was perceived low—that is, one standard deviation below the mean (indicated by the red line).

Figure 1.

The interaction effect of mission valence and task significance on job involvement.

Discussion and Conclusion

The extent to which professional employees feel involved in, or alienated from, their work can potentially impact the effectiveness of their organizations. However, limited research has examined how government agencies can motivate professional employees to become more involved in their work (Boardman et al., 2010; DeHart-Davis & Pandey, 2005; Moynihan & Pandey, 2007; Reid et al., 2008; Word & Park, 2009). Hence, the present study investigated how key characteristics of professional employees’ jobs, that is, variety, significance, autonomy, and feedback, as well as their perceptions regarding their agency’s mission, rewards system, and the extent of their participation in job-related decisions influence the level of their job involvement. The research model that was relied on in this study accounted for more than half of the total variance in job involvement of 764 professional employees working in geographically distributed offices in large a government agency. Thus, the theory and findings presented here hold some promise for enhancing our understanding of the sources of job involvement of professional employees working in government work settings.

The results of this study indicated that characteristics of professional employees’ jobs have a strong influence on the level of their job involvement. Specifically, the results suggest that professional employees tend to become more involved in their work when they are required to perform a variety of challenging tasks that involve different set of skills, perceive that their work is important, and receive periodic feedback about their work goals and performance, and have sufficient autonomy in carrying out their work activities. While all four characteristics of professional employees’ jobs were influential, task significance appeared to be especially important in enhancing their job involvement. This finding provides support to earlier research that has suggested that, when employees perceive that their work has a positive impact on the welfare of others in their organization and the community, they become highly motivated to perform well in their jobs (Grant 2008, Grant et al., 2007; Hackman & Oldham, 1975, 1976; Wright, 2007). This finding also suggests that cultivating perceptions of task significance is critical for motivating professional employees to become more involved in their work in public agencies.

The results showed that perception of a performance contingent reward system positively affects professional employees’ job involvement. But the magnitude of this effect was much smaller than the effect of task significance on professional employees’ job involvement. While this finding, as well as the results of other studies in public management (Alonso & Lewis, 2001; Cho & Perry, 2012; Christensen & Wright, 2011; Rainey, 1982; Wright, 2007), suggests that public employees, even those with a high level of altruistic motives, value extrinsic rewards, it is not the only mean available to government agencies for increasing employees’ job involvement. Contrary to market-based reform initiatives that emphasize extrinsic rewards as the primary mechanism to enhance public employees’ motivation, the results of this study indicate that government agencies need to focus on both intrinsic and extrinsic sources of motivation, and that the intrinsic sources may play a larger role than the extrinsic sources in enhancing public employees’ job involvement.

The purpose or mission of a government agency has been suggested an important resource that the agency can use to recruit, direct, evaluate, and motivate its employees (Rainey & Steinbauer, 1999; Wright & Pandey, 2011). Mission valence in this study was found to have no direct influence on professional employees’ job involvement. However, mission valence moderated the effect of task significance on professional employees’ job involvement such that, the more important professional employees perceived that their agency’s mission was, the stronger was the positive effect of task significance on their job involvement. This was an important and interesting finding of the current study. It suggests that, while working on significant, high-impact tasks, if employees are provided with additional information about how their work efforts contributes to the welfare of others in the society, they respond positively by becoming more engaged in their work. This finding also parallels results of experimental research by Grant et al. (2007) that showed that task significance interacts with contact with the task beneficiary in increasing individuals’ persistence in completing that task.

The results of this study suggest a number of steps that government agencies can take to increase professional employees’ involvement in their current jobs. Specifically, to increase professional employees’ job involvement, government agencies should pay greater attention to assigning challenging tasks to professional employees, providing them with sufficient autonomy in carrying out their work activities, allocating rewards and recognition based on their efforts, and providing them with feedback about their work goals and performance. Additionally, nurturing perceptions of task significance and mission valence would be critical for enhancing professional employees’ job involvement. Recent studies in public management (Paarlberg & Lavigna, 2010; Wright, Moynihan, & Pandey, 2012) suggest that transformational leadership (Bass, 1985; Burns, 1978) can play an important role in increasing public employees’ awareness about the importance of their job and organizational goals. Specifically, managers in government agencies can enhance employees’ perceptions of task significance and mission valence through articulating a clear and attractive vision about their organizational goals, showing them how their work contributes to accomplishing those organizational goals and benefits others in the society, and inspiring them intellectually to re-examine existing work related problems (Bass & Riggio, 2006; Paarlberg & Lavigna, 2010; Wright et al., 2012). Furthermore, transformational managers can help followers’ to develop confidence and pride in their work and agency’s goals and, thereby, motivate them to become more involved in their jobs (Piccolo & Colquitt, 2006).

The contribution of this research should be acknowledged in light of its limitations. This study relied on a cross-sectional design and, thus, conclusions regarding causal connections between job and organization related factors and professional employees’ job involvement should be made with great caution. Additionally, data for this study were collected from professional employees working in one large state agency. Although this state agency is charged with diverse public responsibilities and was widely dispersed geographically, the results reported in this study may have somewhat limited generalizability. Hence, additional empirical tests of the research model with samples of professional employees taken from a broader range of government organizations would provide further validity for the study results.

The sole use of self-report measures was another noteworthy limitation of the current study. Self-reported data from a single source such as an interview protocol or a questionnaire are vulnerable to common method bias (Campbell & Fiske, 1959). Self-reports in organizational research, for example, may induce patterns of response set such as social desirability, acquiescence, or deviation that can increase observed correlations between measures. Statistical remedies for common method bias remain problematic (Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Lee, & Podsakoff, 2003). A variety of nonstatistical procedures were introduced in the design of this study to reduce potential common method bias. For instance, anonymity of response was assured repeatedly in all correspondence and evidenced in every aspect of data collection. Surveys were completed at different times and in multiple office locations. Furthermore, the particular items used in the present study were interspersed widely over seven pages and nine distinct sections within the larger 130-item questionnaire. These items also were almost evenly split in the directionality of their wording (i.e., both positive and negative). Varied response formats also were presented. The results produced some evidence that the design procedures may have been at least somewhat effective. For example, bivariate analysis of the factor scores indicated that variance shared on average between two measures was limited to less than one tenths of the total variance. Hence, the steps taken in the design of the study successfully attenuated, if not eliminated, common method bias in the results. Nevertheless, future research should rely on longitudinal designs and multiple data sources to assess antecedents of public employees’ job involvement. Future research should also examine the impact of job involvement on in-role and extra-role performance of professional employees working in government agencies.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

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

Funding

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

Notes

Author Biography

Shahidul Hassan currently serves as an assistant professor in the John Glenn School of Public Affairs at The Ohio State University. He received his PhD from the Rockefeller College at the University at Albany (SUNY). His research focuses on the role of leadership and management practices on motivation, commitment and performance of public sector employees.

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