Readers' Corner - Job Satisfaction

Julia Mcintosh
Service Canada / HRSDC Library
Source: Workplace Bulletin, September 29, 2008

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Job Satisfaction

Alfano, Adele; and Kathy Glover Scott, editors
Awakening the Workplace: Achieving Your Connection, Fulfillment, and Success at Work
Kanata: Experts Who Speak Books, 2006
HD 6955 A92

This is a collection of tips and experience from 16 trainers, facilitators, coaches, and consultants who provide the reader with tools, skills, and systems in a solution-focused manner.

A sampling of the chapters is: An Awake Attitude: Four Keys That Work at Work by Paul Huschilt, which discusses stress, life balance, the power of laughter, and getting rid of negativity; It's All About Me and My Perspective by Theresa Syer, which discusses how one can find their passion, alter their perspective, and create their success; Creating an Authentic Workplace by Audrey Ciccone discusses the presentation of the company's vision and values so that employees are engaged and motivated.

Boucher, Jane
How to Love the Job You Hate: Job Satisfaction for the 21st Century
Reno: Beagle Bay Books, 2004
HF 5549.5 J63 B68 2004

The key to loving your job starts by loving yourself. Boucher offers advice on how employees can improve their attitude about their jobs, thereby deriving personal satisfaction and engagement in their working lives. She discusses identifying personality types, building on communication skills, dealing with criticism and building self-esteem, the changing tone of the workplace and its employees, and achieving balance, to name a few.

Harvard Business Review on Bringing Your Whole Self to Work
Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 2008
HD 6955 H37

Part of a management series, this recent compilation covers the following: Overloaded Circuits: Why Smart People Underperform; The Human Moment at Work; The Making of the Corporate Athlete; Are You Working Too Hard?; Sleep Deficit: The Performance Killer; Decisions and Desire; Leading by Feel; and The Danger of Feeling Like a Fake. The message is you're making a living—but are you having a life? To stay productive, everyone needs to balance professional and personal lives.

Designed to bring managers the basic information they need in our fast-paced world, this series presents pertinent topics in a concise format.

Ressler, Carl, and Jody Thompson
Why Work Sucks and How to Fix It
Toronto: Penguin Group, 2008
HF 5549.5 J63 R46

The premise of this book is that success, particularly in business, comes when you can believe in people— every single person having a unique perspective, passion, talent, and knowledge. The authors have re-worked the assumptions about our work structure—how work gets done and what it looks like—to better fit the current 24/7 global economy.

To this end, they came up with what they call ROWE (Results-Only Work Environment), in which people can do whatever they want, whenever they want, as long as the work gets done. The concept was tried at Best Buy, the result being that employees were happier with their lives and with their work. The company benefited with an average increase in productivity of 35%, coupled with a sharp decrease in voluntary turnover rates.

Stride, Chris, Toby Wall, and Nick Catley
Measures of Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment, Mental Health, and Job-Related Well-Being: A Benchmarking Manual, 2nd ed.
Chichester: John Wiley, 2008
HF 5549.5 J63 S87 2007

A more theoretical work, this benchmarking manual provides information for four widely-used measures of employee affective reactions at work. These measures, determined by their frequency of use, are job satisfaction, organisational commitment, mental health, and job-related well-being.

Intended for an audience of occupational and organizational psychologists, management consultants, and in-house practitioners involved in auditing, monitoring or evaluating organizations through the use of attitude surveys, this manual presents evidence from a sample of almost 60,000 respondents across a wide spectrum of industries and occupations.

The chapter on job satisfaction covers overall job satisfaction, intrinsic job satisfaction (people's affective reactions to job features integral to the work itself, e.g., variety, autonomy, etc.), and extrinsic job satisfaction (features external to the work itself, e.g., pay, the way the organisation is managed).