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Factors Influencing Individual Performance in An Indonesian Government Office PDF
Factors Influencing Individual Performance in An Indonesian Government Office PDF
Individual Performance In
An Indonesian Government
Office
Azizatul Munawaroh Corina D. S. Riantoputra Sally Bethesda Marpaung
Ministry of Finance Republic of Indonesia Universitas Indonesia Universitas Indonesia
azizatul.m@depkeu.go.id corina.r@ui.ac.id
Reformation in Indonesian government offices leads to many substantial changes, and demands
improved job performances while arguably loading employees with more work. This research aims Abstract
to understand factors that potentially influence job performance in Indonesian government of-
fices that carries on such reformation. Using adapted scales from previous studies, this research
investigates the role of workload, responsibility for others (level of responsibility to care for other
people) and need for achievement on employee’s performance. A survey to all full-time workers in
an Indonesian government office is conducted. Contrary to expectation, workload does not influ-
ence employee’s performance. Instead, regression analysis demonstrates that, employee’s need for
achievement and responsibility for others are significant factors affecting individual performance.
These results are important because they highlight the significance of need for achievement for the
success of reformation in this office, and by extension for reformation in Indonesia. The results are
also interesting because this is the first study that points out to the role of responsibility for others in
influencing individual performance in Indonesia which is characterized by collectivistic culture. This
paper discusses the contributions of these results for theory and practice.
Keywords: Indonesian public, need for achievement, responsibility for others, work-
load.
T
he rapid development of sci- for bureaucratic reformation in Indo-
ence, internet, and informa- nesia. Bureaucratic reformation is a
tion technology, as well as the strategic step to build excellent gov-
changing nature of strategic environ- ernment institutions, to improve the
ment requires excellent service and role of civil servants, and to sustain
support from governments. Unfor- national development. In other words,
tunately, there are many cases of im- bureaucratic reformation is needed
proper governance systems in Indo- to fulfill dynamic changes in society.
nesia which debilitate the government Formally, bureaucratic reformation is
responses and give rise to the demand defined as a continuous and gradual
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Factors Influencing Individual Performance... Munawaroh, Riantoputra, and Marpaung
Table 1. Reliability
Variables Reliability Cronbach’s Alpha N of Items
Individual Performance 0.804 6
Workload quantitative 0.403 5
Workload qualitative 0.510 5
Responsibility for people 0.742 5
Need for Achievement 0.464 4
Further, George and Jones (2002) ar- need for achievement (McClelland,
gue that individuals with a high need 1987). These scales are chosen be-
of achievement have a special desire cause they are commonly used in or-
to perform challenging tasks well and ganizational behavior research.
to meet their own personal standards
for excellence. They like to be in situ- In role behavior (Van Dyne and Yee,
ations in which they are personally re- 2005) is used to measure performance.
sponsible for what happens, like to set It consists of two dimensions: (1) job
clear goals for themselves, are willing knowledge and accuracy of work, and
to take personal responsibility for out- (2) productivity. This tool has 6 items
comes, and like to receive performance with Likert scale from 1 to 6: 1 is for
feedback. In brief, need for achieve- Never, 2 is for Rarely, 3 is for Some-
ment have been linked to various out- times, 4 is for Often, 5 is for More Of-
comes such as performance, intrinsic ten, 6 is for Always.
motivation, response to feedback, and
sales performance (Lee, Sheldon, and Stres Diagnostic Survey (Ivancev-
Turban, 2003). Thus, we hypothesize ich and Matteson, 1987) is measur-
that: ing instrument that is used to measure
stress level at workplace. There are
H4: There is a significant positive 15 statements to measure three work
relationship between need for stress aspect: workload quantitative,
achievement and employee’s per- workload qualitative, and responsibil-
formance. ity for people. This tool uses Likert
scale from 1 to 6. Need for achieve-
RESEARCH METHOD
ment, McClelland (1987) consists of 4
This research is non-experimental re- items. Span of valuation is from -3 to
search where variables are not manip- +3. However, to simplify and to avoid
ulated and controlled by the research- negative response from respondents,
ers because the manifest is in progress the researchers change the valuation to
and cannot be manipulated (Kerlinger Likert Scale from 1 (very inappropri-
and Lee, 2000). The respondents are ate) to 6 (very appropriate).
all fulltime workers in the Pilot Office
A (i.e., 56 employees). The question- Cronbach alpha (α) is used to test data
naire consists of three measurements, reliability in this research. Kerlinger
which are adapted and modified from and Lee (2000) stated that measur-
performance scale. The scales are in ing tools are reliable if its coefficient
Role Behavior (Van Dyne and Yee, α is from 050 to 0.60. However, Ka-
2005), Stress Diagnostic Survey (Iv- plan and Saccuzzo (2005) convey that
ancevich and Matteson, 1987) and measuring instruments are reliable if
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its coefficient α is from 0.70 to 0.80. Table 3). Results show that employee
Table 1 shows the reliability score of workload, in terms of the amount and
each scale. It shows that all scales but quality of work, has no relationship
one (qualitative workload) have ac- with employee’s performance. In other
ceptable reliability score according to words, there is no support for H1 and
Kerlinger and Lee (2000). H2, and can be concluded that in Pilot
Office A, employee’s performance is
RESULT AND DISCUSSION not influenced by the amount of work
or the quality of work that is expected
Table 2 demonstrates that employee’s
from them. Responsibility for people,
in Pilot Office A perceived that they
however, has a positive and significant
performed their job quite well (Means
relationship (see Table 3). It suggests
of 5.25 from a six point scale). They
that, in Pilot Office A, employees tend
also perceive that their workloads
to perform better when they perceive
(quantitative and qualitative work-
that they have higher responsibility
loads) are at a medium to low level
for people. This result is not expected
(mean below 3 in a six point scale),
(H3 is not supported). Finally, table 3
and their need for achievement is at
shows that need for achievement has
a moderate to high level (mean score
significant and positive relationship
4 in a six point scale). Their level of
with employee’s performance (H4 is
responsibilities for people, however, is
accepted). It means that employee’s
at a low level (mean score: 2.06 in a
tend to perform better when they have
six point scale).
a high need for achievement.
To test the hypothesized relationships
CONCLUSION
and know which factors influence em-
ployee’s performance in Pilot Office A, The purpose of this research is to
we conducted a simple regression (see know several factors that influence
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Factors Influencing Individual Performance... Munawaroh, Riantoputra, and Marpaung
Although the study has some limita- The current research also support
tions, it produces many significant Webster, Beehr and Love (2011) who
contributions for theory and practice. argue that individual’s appraisal is the
It demonstrates that, firstly, quanti- key factor in explaining the relation-
tative and qualitative workload has ship between workload and job per-
no relationship with employee’s per- formance. When individuals perceive
formance. These results differ from workload as challenges they may not
previous studies that show negative be debilitated by stress, and thus per-
relationship between workload and formance may not be impacted. Thus,
employee’s performance (Ivancevich the relationship between workload and
and Matteson, 2005; Schultz, 2006). job performance is influenced by indi-
This difference could occur because vidual tendency, including individual
the level of workload in Office Pilot A personality type.
is only at a moderate level. It indicates
that a moderate level of workload may Learning from Lee, Sheldon and Tur-
not cause stress that impairs individual ban (2003) that show the importance
performance. This result is especially of personality type on individual’s
relevant because it was conducted in tendency to perform better, future re-
May 2012 (second quarter) where the search may want know more about
stakeholders had not request payment influence of personality in relationship
from government fund. However, the between workload and performance.
research may produce different finding One such example is a research by
if it was conducted during the months Cox-Fuenzalida, Swickert and Hittner
of October to December (fourth quar- (2004) who argue that higher levels of
ter), because the workload will be high neuroticism would be associated with
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Factors Influencing Individual Performance... Munawaroh, Riantoputra, and Marpaung
desire for social harmony, and confor- fore, responsibilities for others in this
mity with group norms. In this view, kind of culture may produce positive
behavior and attitudes of collectivists drive for employees to perform better.
are determined by norms and demands We call for further research in this area
of the in-group such as extended fam- to test the relationship in other venues
ily or close-knit community (Green, and other collectivistic cultures. By so
Deschamps and Paez, 2005). People doing, there is a possibility to advance
in a collectivistic culture tend to con- organizational behavior theory espe-
struct their meanings of live in terms cially in understanding on individual
of their relationship with others, not and cultural factors affecting individ-
in term of their individual jobs. There- ual behavior.
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