Research and Academic Writing

Contents

Task 1 - Literature Review....................................................................................................................2

1.1 Literature Review Summery........................................................................................................2
1.2 Employees Turnover....................................................................................................................2
1.3 Types of Employee Turnover......................................................................................................3
1.4 Reasons for Employee turnover...................................................................................................3
1.5 Consequences of labor turnover...................................................................................................4
1.6 Employee Motivation..................................................................................................................6
1.7 Motivation Types.........................................................................................................................6
1.8 Motivation Factors.......................................................................................................................7
1.9 Job Satisfaction............................................................................................................................8
1.10 Employee motivation, job satisfaction vs. employee turnover...................................................8
1.11 Summery...................................................................................................................................9
References...........................................................................................................................................10

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 Research and Academic Writing

Task 1 - Literature Review

Influence of Employee Motivation and Job Satisfaction of Employee Turnover at an

organization

1. Literature Review

1.1 Literature Review Summery

Objective of this Literature Review is to support the basis on which the primary research will be
constructed by critically reviewing and evaluating existing key academic concepts of employee
motivation job satisfaction and employee turnover. Initially literature was reviewed with association
to the research topic employee turnover, reasons and their consequences which followed with
literature on employee motivation and job Satisfaction.

1.2 Employees Turnover

In many cases the organization will succeed to get the human resources who are efficient and
effective in the tasks and duties that they are doing within the organizational unit, but the key point of
challenge comes up when organizations try to make sure that the employees who are good in their
jobs and duties will be retained within the company itself. This is where the concept of employee
turnover is coming into the picture because it is a concept that is revolving around how exactly an
organization will try to capture and keep its workforce with itself rather than letting them leave the
organization.

Over the last two decades, the issue of employee turnover still exists among the all other managerial
issues of the organizations in the entire world. The rate of workforce turnover is very high even in
industrially developed nations. According to Blahnam (2005) high turnover affects firms of all sizes.
Employees play a major role in organizational efficiency, quality, and profitability therefore they must
be given the support they need in order for them to stay with the organization. Otherwise, this will
create a high employee turnover that could undermine the success of the organization.

According to Bridger et al., (2013) employee turnover starts with an intention; while Hwang et al.,
(2013) adds that perceived job stress has significant negative relationships with job satisfaction and
significant positive relationships with turnover intention. According to Bluedorn (2001) turnover
intention is the attitude or the level where an employee has the possibility to leave the organization or
resigned voluntarily from the organization. Further described Mobley, Horner & Hollings (2001) the
desire to move can be early symptoms of turnover in a company.

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Employee turnover refers to the end of a relationship between an employee and an organization and
an employee turnover rate is the percentage of employees that leave the organization (Phillips &
Edwards, 2008). Adams & Beehr (1998) define organizational turnover as ‘leaving any job of any
duration’. Woods (1995) describes each time position is vacated, either voluntarily or involuntarily, a
new employee must be hired and trained. This replacement cycle is known as employee turnover.

1.3 Types of Employee Turnover

The phrase "employee turnover" has a negative connotation – a stigma associated with an employer's
obligation to reduce turnover at all costs. However, there are different types of turnover and not all
types of employee turnover are negative. Turnover occurs for a variety of reasons, ranging from
termination for poor performance to the departure of highly-skilled employees who resign after they
help grow start-up businesses to sustainable levels.

How many people are leaving each year Turnover = Number of staff leaving per year x 100 / average
number of staff
(Morrell et al, 2001)

According to Lee et al., (2008) There are other two types of employee turnover as well,
 Functional turnover – low performing employees leaves the organization. Again the employer has
less control but can minimize with proper training and education.
 Dysfunctional turnover – high performing employees leaves the organization. This is an issue for
the organization which directly affects organizations performances.

1.4 Reasons for Employee turnover

Hewitts (2006) and Sherman et al., (2006) highlight reasons for employee turnover in the
organizations as hiring practices, managerial style, lack of recognition, lack of competitive
compensation system, toxic workplace environments, lack of interesting work, lack of job security,
lack of promotion and inadequate training and development opportunities, amongst others. If the
company determines the most common causes of employee turnover, it would certainly be able to
take the necessary steps for recruiting and retaining well-qualified personnel (Armstrong 2006).

1.4.1 Work Environment

According to Moureen (2004) work environment is also one of the main causes for employee
turnover. Employees prefer to work in an environment which is suitable for them. Spencer (2001)
reports Poor furniture and working equipment lowers the level employees’ job satisfaction and this

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plays a role towards realization of increased employee turnover rates. This agreed with findings by
Homer (2001) that safe working environment increases employees job satisfaction and helps the
origination to retain employees for a long time.

1.4.2 Job Recognition

According to Agyeman & Ponniah (2014) the absence of recognition and appreciation may cause
turnover intention among employees. One of the key causes of employee turnover in Saudi
organizations is lack of recognition (Iqbal, 2010). Michael (2008) reported that recognition is the most
important motivational variable that contributes to retain employees in the organization. Tizazu
(2015) indicated that recognition had a positive and significant effect on employee retention so lack of
this factor of motivation may cause turnover intention.

1.4.3 Ineffective Communication

Charles (1981) suggested that the communication is one of the factors of employees’ turnover.
Similarly Branham (2005) states that poor communication between management and employees and
between the departments as one of the reasons why employees leave their organization. From the
above studies it can assume that poor communication from management leads to low employee
morale and high turnover.

1.4.4 Career Advancement

Personal development opportunities provided by organization is inversely proportion to the employee
turnover rate (Wang, Chen & Xu, 2001). Although financial incentives will encourage employees to
stay over the short term, over the long term they need opportunities for growth (Tyani, 2001). Donald
(1999) explained that existence of career development opportunities like staff training in
organizations helps to minimize employee turnover rates.

1.5 Consequences of labor turnover

Replacing a valued employee is expensive. Some costs are difficult or impossible to measure, like
added stress on remaining workers or disruptions in customer service. Other costs — including
recruitment, hiring and training expenses — can be estimated accurately. The costs of employees
turnover normally includes; advertising expenses, headhunting fees, resource management expenses,
loss of time and efficiency, work imbalance, and employee training and development expenses for
new joiners (Harrie,2002).
Turnover is no less a problem for major companies, which often spend millions of dollars a year on
turnover-related costs (Miller, 2006). For the smallest of companies, a high turnover rate can mean
that simply having enough staff to fulfill daily functions is a challenge, even beyond the issue of how
well the work is done when staff is available (Richard, 2008).

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Achoui & Mansour (2007) identified both positive and negative consequences of employee turnover.
Negative consequences includes tangible cost like recruitment, selection, training and production lost
and intangible cost like moral impact, workload impact and tam performance disruption. Also other
negative cost associated with employee turnover is separation, replacement and both financial and
non-financial. The financial costs mainly involve the cost of people’s time, cost of materials and
equipment, cash outlays, and productivity losses.

1.5.1 It is expensive
Employee turnover can be very costly for an organisation, particularly if it is a voluntary resignation
of human capital investment from the organisation and the subsequent replacement process. These
replacement costs may include the search of the external labour market for a possible substitute,
selection between competing substitutes, induction, formal and informal training of the replacement
until he or she attains a reasonable level of performance that is equivalent to that of the individual
who quit.

1.5.2 It results in the loss of experienced employees

Building a culture that encourages knowledge transfer and succession is a mission-critical strategy for
the growth and sustainability of an organisation. According to Urbancová Hana and Linhartová Lucie
“Labour turnover results in an organization’s inability to ensure knowledge continuity.”

1.5.3 It affects productivity

Employee productivity and general firm performance can be negatively affected when there is high
employee turnover. As stated earlier, employee turnover leads to loss of experience and trained staff
that know the policies and goals of the organisation and their individual roles in achieving these goals.
Companies with fewer employees may find it especially difficult to replace workers, as workers may
fill a variety of different specialized roles; this can create a serious problem for small businesses,
which will affect their performance and productivity.

1.5.4 It affects profit

Aside from the cost of replacing an employee discussed earlier, other negative effects stated here and
others not discussed could combine to affect a firm’s profit. The cost settlement of employees’
benefits (gratuity and others) and the cost of litigations, as some separations may lead to legal
disputes, all combine to affect company performance, which ultimately affects the overall profit of the
firm.

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1.6 Employee Motivation

Motivation is an employee's intrinsic enthusiasm about and drive to accomplish activities related to
work. Motivation is that internal drive that causes an individual to decide to take action. An
individual's motivation is influenced by biological, intellectual, social, and emotional factors. As such,
motivation is a complex force that can also be influenced by external factors.
Employee motivation is a critical aspect at the workplace which leads to the performance of the
department and even the company. Motivating the employees needs to be a regular routine. There are
companies that sadly fail to understand the importance of employee motivation. Research shows that
many companies have disengaged employees with low motivation; only 13% of employees are
engaged at work (Gallup).
Motivation has been defined as 'a decision making process through which the individual chooses
desired outcomes and sets in motion the behaviors appropriate to acquiring them' (Huczynski &
Buchanan, 1991).

1.7 Motivation Types

Employee motivation is a factor, or factors, that cause(s) an employee to pursue work tasks or goals.
It's what causes you to act in a certain way. There are two primary theories of motivation that are
often used by employers: intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation. 
The act of being motivated by internal factors to perform certain actions and behavior is called
intrinsic motivation. In other words, intrinsic motivation means doing something just because you
want to. There is neither pressure nor any sort of reward for your actions, but you still do them
because you want to or you believe it’s the right thing to do. Intrinsic motivation is defined as a
motivation that appears to be self-sustained (Young, 1961).
Extrinsic motivations are factors external that causes an employee to act toward fulfillment of a work
task or goal. They are usually punishments or rewards. A punishment motivates an employee to act in
order to avoid the punishment, while rewards motivate an employee to act in order to receive the
reward. It's easy to remember because extrinsic motivations come from external forces. Extrinsic
motivation occurs when individual is motivated by a specific goal, reward or price providing
satisfaction independent of the type of the actual activity itself (Young, 1961).

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Figure 1.1: intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation

Source: https://www.leadership-central.com/types-of-motivation.html

1.8 Motivation Factors

Drivers of human behavior related to the intrinsic nature of the work, but not necessarily to the
surrounding circumstances or environment. Motivating factors include achievement, advancement,
autonomy, personal growth, recognition, responsibility, and the work itself.
There are four factors of motivation that exist in every organization or business. These factors
determine the levels of motivation of the staff, whether positive or negative. Fortunately, each of these
ingredients can be changed in a positive way usually when a manager or supervisor replaces a leader
whose management style has not been conducive to bringing out the very best in each person. There
are four factors that are the basics of motivating anyone, in any organization. These four factors are,
i. leadership style,
ii. the reward system,
iii. the organizational climate
iv. the structure of the work.
Work motivation divided into two big factors, individual factor and organizational factor. Individual
factor includes needs, employee competencies, employee characteristics and goals. The organizational
factor includes salary, supervisory, development, work safety and job clearance (Vina, 2009 cited on
Pradifa & Welly, 2014). Key factors that determine employee motivation are satisfaction, recognition,
appreciation, inspiration and compensation (Bowen, 2000).
Motivation or employee rewards come in various forms such as improving working conditions,
providing opportunities for growth, and recognizing employee accomplishments or remuneration,
however, using intrinsic motivators like providing a sense of belonging for the employee and
recognition of a job well done goes a long way in making them excited about their jobs. Similarly, job
enrichment, empowerment and sharing power help some employees feel motivated at work (Honore,
2009; DiPietro et al., 2014).

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Herzberg’s Motivation Theory model, or Two Factor Theory, argues that there are two factors that an
organization can adjust to influence motivation in the workplace.
These factors are:
 Motivators: Which can encourage employees to work harder.
 Hygiene factors: These won’t encourage employees to work harder but they will cause them to
become unmotivated if they are not present.

1.9 Job Satisfaction

Job satisfaction is used to explain whether employees are happy, contented, fulfilling their needs and
desires at the work. Armstrong (2010) states job satisfaction as the attitudes and feelings people have
about their work. This implies that positive and favorable attitudes towards the job indicate job
satisfaction while negative and unfavorable attitudes towards the job indicate job dissatisfaction.
Overall job satisfaction is actually a combination of intrinsic and extrinsic job satisfaction:
 Intrinsic job satisfaction is when workers consider only the kind of work they do, the tasks that
make up the job.
 Extrinsic job satisfaction is when workers consider work conditions, such as their pay, coworkers,
and supervisor.
According to Spector (1997) there are three vital features of job satisfaction. Firstly it create a good
emotional and mental state of employees and to achieve this organizations should be guided by human
values particularly in the aspect of respect and fair treatment of the employees regardless of positions
so this eventually lead to high job satisfaction. Secondly, job satisfaction leads to positive behavior
while job dissatisfaction will result to negative behaviors which in general affect the business
activities and the functioning of the organization. Thirdly, job satisfaction is one of the determinants
of successful organizations.
Lipi~nik (1998) states that dissatisfied employees:
 tend to talk about their job dissatisfaction to many of their acquaintances,
 tend to neglect their work duties in order to perform non-work related activities in their working
time,
 tend to spend time at work thinking about the things that bother them instead of thinking of
potential opportunities,
 tend to withhold information about their work progress,
 tend to see their managers as bad managers.

1.10 Employee motivation, job satisfaction vs. employee turnover

Motivation is the combination of all the factors both external and internal that stimulate desire and
energy in people and make them constantly interested and committed to a job, role or subject, and

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enable them to make efforts for achieving organizational goals. Less motivated people can cause low
performance, bad inspiration for co-workers, employees burnout etc. every organization tries to utilize
their employees in an optimal way but sometimes motivation does restrict their desired goals.
Motivated employees are less likely to leave the organization, which leads to lower turnover rate
(Gomez-Mejia & Balkin, 1992). The more subordinates lose motivation and their performance
decreases, the more physical problems, absenteeism and turnover arise (Crainer, 2004). According to
De Vos & Meganck training and development motivate employees to work and also retain them in the
organizations. Talented who have competencies that are critical for the survival of an organization are
difficult to retain because they often pay more importance to their own career path than organizational
loyalty, which in turn can result in voluntary turnover.
The more the subordinates lose motivation the more their performance decreases, the more physical
problems, absenteeism and turnover arise (Crainer, 2004). Organizations can choose to use intrinsic
and extrinsic rewards to increase their employees’ motivation to stay in the organization (Sanjeev &
Surya, 2016).
Fair pay is a major part of any employee turnover management strategy employed by many
organizations. Workers will not be motivated to stay in a job where their skills are underappreciated
and underpaid (Robert, 2007)
Employees who feel conflicted about which job responsibility they are to handle at any given time
results in a lack of job satisfaction, which often results in turnover intention (Conant, 2017).
A study done by Koh & Goh (1995) in Singapore on “The effects of various types of job satisfaction
on turnover intention”, classified job satisfaction into eight categories namely: supervision, company
identity, kind of work, amount of work, physical working conditions, co-workers, financial reward,
and career future. Their findings based on the job satisfaction and organization commitment.

1.11 Summery
A positive workplace is the basic element that will get a company to the top. This can understand that
it may be time consuming and difficult to encourage employee motivation at the workplace. However,
in order to achieve a high level of employee productivity, management needs to encourage a positive
workplace environment.
It’s important to ensure that the employees feel that their work and efforts is an important contribution
to the company’s success. Lack of employee motivation and job satisfaction may lead employee
turnover. So examining the motivation and job satisfaction factors in relation to employee turnover
will help organization to minimize employee turnover.

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References

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Spector, P.E. (1997), Job satisfaction: Application, assessment, causes and consequences, Thousand
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Tyani, B.I.N. (2001). Absenteeism: A nursing service problem in the Republic of Transkei. Pretoria:
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