ACKNOWLEDGMENTS During the process of doing and learning the dissertation, I received many helps, supports, encouragements, etc from many people It was kind of you to help me; without all of you, my d[.]
iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS During the process of doing and learning the dissertation, I received many helps, supports, encouragements, etc from many people It was kind of you to help me; without all of you, my dissertation would have been possible First and foremost, I would like to express my gratitude to Dr Dominic Mwenja, President of School of Business, California Miramar University for his valuable advices and encouragements from the initial to the end of my learning process Futhermore, my thanks also goes to Dr Pham Thi Nhuan, Head of Academic Department, Center for System Development, Vietnam National University for her support me in conducting the survey as well as completing the dissertation I also would like to thank Dr Pham Hung, Director of Center for System Development, Hanoi National University for his effort to organize the doctorate program which facilitates me to access the global huge knowledge resource Last but not least, I am indebted to my family and friends who encourage me going on my way to the destination of the challenging program as well as fulfillment of the dissertation Thank you all very much! v Table of Contents Page Dedication .iv Acknowledgements v Table of Contents vi List of Tables .viii List of Figures ix Abstract x Chapter I: Research Overview .1 Problem statement .1 Basic researches Purpose of the research .3 Importance of the research The importance of the research for the leader Fundamental of the research .7 Research questions and hypothesis .9 Theories 12 Population and research sample 15 Key terms 16 Assumptions of the research 19 Scope and Limitation of the research 19 Conclusion 20 Chapter II: Overview of Previous Research 21 Background to the research .21 Workforce reduction 21 Knowledgeable workers 22 Overview of research history 24 Motivational theory 24 Recent findings .26 Researches of retention 27 Personal characteristics .50 Research model and hypothesis 56 Conclusion 57 vi Chapter III: Methodology .61 The study design .61 The main hypotheses 52 The questionnaire 64 Design and Survey conducting 65 The validity of the study 66 Methods of data collection 67 The method of estimated data analysis 69 The feasibility and relevance 71 Conclusion 71 Chapter IV: Analysis and Presentation of Study Result .73 Pilot study .74 Population and selected study sample .74 Data Collection .75 Reliability of the questionnaire .76 Data Measurement 77 Demographics information .79 Data analysis 82 Hypothesis test 88 Conclusion 95 Chapter V: Conclusions, Research Implications and Recommendations 96 Comparing the research findings with the findings of previous researches 96 Data analysis and findings 99 Implications for Research .104 Responsibilities of leaders in state – woned companies .105 Recommendations 106 Recommendations for the organization's leaders 107 Recommendations for organizations .108 Suggestions for further researches 108 Conclusion 109 Reference 111 Appendices 120 vii LIST OF TABLES Appendices Table 2.1: Findings on researches of employee retentions p 46 Table 2.2: Independent variables selected for the research p 53 Table 4.1: Age of respondents p 80 Table 4.2: Respondent’s seniority p 78 Table 4.3: Respondent’s educational level p 81 Table 4.4: Respondent’s gender p 81 Table 4.5: Respondent’s marital status p 82 Table 4.6: Summary of respondent’s position in the organization p 82 Table 4.7: Distribution of survey questions excluded in p 83 demographic characteristics Table 4.8: Summary of study variables p 84 Table 4.9: Parametric correlation p 88 Table 4.10: Non-parametric correlation p 89 Table 4.11: Stepwise multiple regression creating most appropriate p 90 equation Table 4.12: The most appropriate synthetic model p 91 Table 4.13: ANOVA p 91 viii LIST OF FIGURES Appendices Figure 1.1: Maslow hierarchy of needs p 24 Figure 2.2: Research Model p 56 Figure 4.1: Organizational commitment, gender and marital status p 92 Figure 4.2: Organizational commitment and education level p 93 Figure 4.3: Organizational commitment and years of working p 94 experience Figure 4.4: Organizational commitment and age range p 94 Figure 4.5: Organizational commitment and position p 95 ix Abstract In the increasingly competitive environment, the state-owned as well as foreign enterprises are facing with major challenges in attracting talented employees This also becomes more difficult for the state owned construction companies to attract and retain qualified technical staffs With 10% technical staffs resign in the past five years, the urgent issues facing the state owned construction enterprises are how to make current employees have long-term organizational commitment as well as how to attract qualified technical staff The dissertation is conducted to partially solve the challenges threatening the development of the state owned construction companies Three questions which need addressing in the research are: What is the relationship between job satisfaction and organizational commitment? What can factors best measure the level of motivation and organizational commitment? What is the influence level of personal factors on employee retention? By defining the dependent variable in this study which is organizational commitment and the independent variables are salary, benefits, job satisfaction, promotion opportunities, training, relevance of job, stress level, work-life balance, relationship with colleagues, leadership style, job stability, the work of the wife/husband or other relatives; along with the use of the questionnaire which have been developed from an existing questionnaire of the previously foundation survey, the dissertation has identified some important results such as personal factors have large impacts on employees’ organizational commitment; the higher the job satisfaction level is, the longer-term the organizational commitment is; etc CHAPTER ONE: RESEARCH OVERVIEW Many big state-owned construction companies are now facing with the fierce competition in terms of attracting good employees technically In the discussion of attracting qualified employees, Rainey (2001) suggested that in the current competitive environment "strong competition in attracting the qualified people of companies has happened in many decades and now is becoming more urgent” The demand for qualified employees has become a reality in the state companies of over the World It is hard to find these employees and retain them (Rainey, 2001; Kaliprasad, 2006; Dey, 2012; Vijay & Sheldon, 2004) Expenses related to an engineer left and replaced by another will be high as it relates to recruitment fee, training fee till new staff can go on board (Hur, 2012, Shaw, et al., 2005) This is becoming a reason that state – owned enterprise in every where in the world meet difficulties in finding new employees Therefore, for the companies in the world in general and the Vietnamese construction companies in particular need to find ways to encourage their staffs to engage and commit to the development of them (e.g Fields et al., 2005; Herrbach et al., 2004; William, 1982; Price, 1977; Tourangeau et al., 2010; Wagner, 2007) Problem Statement One example relating to the problem that there was a study implemented by Sean, (2003) evaluated organizational commitment in a DoD center involved in the maintenance, engineering, and logistics support of military aircraft and associated avionics The results of that study directly impacted the recruitment and retention of over 600 techinical knowledge workers at a major DoD facility, and potentially be exported to nine other DoD facilities with a total of over 8,000 technical knowledge workers Potential cost savings based on 10% reduction in voluntary turnover would equate to $4 million per year across the overall organization The state-owned enterprises in the Vietnamese construction sector in recent years faced with the big rate of technical staff reduction of 25% from 2005 to 2011 This reduction rate has created a significant impact on human resources that have more than 67% of staffs are older and low skills (Statistic, 2010) Many employees will retire at age 55 (for women) and 60 (for men) are becoming an extremely urgent problem Although demand for the technical employees increased, staff resignation rate was up to 13% per year over five years (Statistics, 2010) Besides the increase in demand for human resources with the technical level, there is a very small rate of investment for maintaining staff in state – woned enterprises, about 10% of turnover But the replacement cost of an engineer in Vietnam are generally expensive, especially the opportunity cost for the new engineers since he/she is employed and can does the job This investigation is appropriate to: (a) determine the relationship between job satisfaction and employee’s commitment with organizations; (b) identify the factors that most relevant to measure the motivation resources for staff and degree of commitment with the organization, and (c) evaluate the relationship between factors of individuals with the binding with the organization Basic researches Two factor theory of Herzberg (1964) describe the factors that led to the impetus of employee satisfaction and environmental factors which, if ignored can lead to dissatisfaction of workers These motivated factors include: (a) achievement, (b) recognition (c) work itself, (d) responsibility, and (e) advancement and growth opportunities These environmental factors include (a) supervision, (b) working conditions, (c) co-workers, (d) pay, (e) policies and procedures, and (f) job security Herzberg found that these factors comibined to influence worker organizational commitment Herzberg's work continuously contributes as proven by many recent studies that, the motivation and work environment affect the satisfaction or dissatisfaction with work (Emmert & Taher, 1992; Knoop, 1994; Tietan & Mye, 1998; Leach & Westbrook, 2000 and Beck, 2002; Sean, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004; Asad, 2005) Technical engineers in construction companies will be retired with the large number as they are going old, while the rate of turnover in these construction companies also high and threaten to the development of the organization The organization has responded slowly to changes in the labor force and had failed to forecast the demand for labor, as the problems were presented in the study by Herzberg (1964) to meet the expectations of the workers have knowledge of technology (Friel, 2002, Sean, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004; Asad, 2005; Abdullah & Ramay, 2011) Purposes of the Research The purposes of the empirical research are to determine the relationship between factors such as salary, benefits, job satisfaction, opportunites for promotion, training, relevance of the job, stress level, balance of work - life, relationship with colleagues, leadership style, the job stability, location, and the work of the wife/husband or other relatives, and the level of attachment to the organization for technical personnel in state enterprises under Vietnam's construction industry The dependent variable in this study is the degree of commitment to the organization Regression analysis is used to determine the linear relationship between the level of attachment to the organization and the independent variables selected studies The independent variables were selected based on the results of studies conducted related to the degree of attachment to the labor organization The independent variables, with the reference variable to help support in making conclusions, including: (a) salary (Maslow, 1954; Herzberg, 1964, 1966; Trinkle, 1994; Merrick, 1998; Hyde, 1999, Lockwood & Ansari, 1999; Tortola, 2001; Beck, 2002; DeMers, 2002; Opperman, 2002; Tamosaitis & Schwenker, 2002; Sean, 2003; Döckel, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004; Asad, 2005; Abdullah & Ramay, 2011; Mahal, 2012), (b) benefits (Maslow, 1954; Herzberg, 1964; DeMers, 2002; Sean, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004; Asad, 2005; Abdullah & Ramay, 2011); (c) job satisfaction (Maslow, 1954; Trinkle, 1994; Opperman, 2002; Sean, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004; Asad, 2005; Abdullah & Ramay, 2011; Nagar, 2012), (d) opportunities for promotion (Herzberg, 1964; Trinkle, 1994; Merrick, 1998; Lockwood & Ansari, Beck, 2002; Sean, 2003; Döckel, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004; Asad, 2005), (e) training (Lockwood & Ansari, 2002; Kinnear & Sutherland, 2000; Sean, 2003; Döckel, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004; Asad, 2005; Mahal, 2012); (f) the relevance of the job (Herzberg, 1964; Hage & Powers, 1992; Merrick, 1998; Beck, 2002; Sean, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004; Asad, 2005), (g) stress level (Lockwood & Ansari, 1999; DeMers, 2002; Sean, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004; Asad, 2005; Kirmizi & Deniz, 2009; Nagar, 2012), (h) balance of work - life (Merrick 1998; DeMers, 2002; Tamosaitis & Schwenker, 2002; Sean, 2003; Döckel, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004), (i) relationship with colleagues (Trinkle, 1994; Merrick, 1998; Lockwood & Ansari, 1999; Tortola, 2001; Abdullah & Ramay, 2011; Kirmizi & Deniz, 2009), (j) leadership style (Trinkle, 1994; Merrick, 1998; Lockwood & Ansari, 1999; Tamosaitis & Schwenker, 2002; Sean, 2003; Döckel, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004; Kirmizi & Deniz, 2009; Mahal, 2012) , (k) the Job stability (Tortola, 2001; Opperman, 2002; Tamosaitis & Schwenker, 2002; Sean, 2003; Yu-Ching, 2004; Kirmizi & Deniz, ... with training opportunities and organizational commitment? H5 – There is existing positive relationship between satisfaction with training and organizational commitment RQ6: Is there existing relationship... Problem Statement One example relating to the problem that there was a study implemented by Sean, (2003) evaluated organizational commitment in a DoD center involved in the maintenance, engineering,... (Statistics, 2010) Besides the increase in demand for human resources with the technical level, there is a very small rate of investment for maintaining staff in state – woned enterprises, about 10%