The measurement of worker relations: the development of a three-component scale

Abstract

DisclaimerThe University of Gloucestershire has obtained warranties from all depositors as to their title in the material deposited and as to their right to deposit such material.The University of Gloucestershire makes no representation or warranties of commercial utility, title, or fitness for a particular purpose or any other warranty, express or implied in respect of any material deposited.The University of Gloucestershire makes no representation that the use of the materials will not infringe any patent, copyright, trademark or other property or proprietary rights.The University of Gloucestershire accepts no liability for any infringement of intellectual property rights in any material deposited but will remove such material from public view pending investigation in the event of an allegation of any such infringement. PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR TEXT.This is a peer-reviewed, post-print (final draft post-refereeing) version of the following published document: We recommend you cite the published (post-print) version. BiggsThe URL for the published version is http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/LODJ-08-2012-0098 DisclaimerThe University of Gloucestershire has obtained warranties from all depositors as to their title in the material deposited and as to their right to deposit such material.The University of Gloucestershire makes no representation or warranties of commercial utility, title, or fitness for a particular purpose or any other warranty, express or implied in respect of any material deposited.The University of Gloucestershire makes no representation that the use of the materials will not infringe any patent, copyright, trademark or other property or proprietary rights.The University of Gloucestershire accepts no liability for any infringement of intellectual property rights in any material deposited but will remove such material from public view pending investigation in the event of an allegation of any such infringement.PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR TEXT. Design/methodology/approach A 20-item inventory was tested using data collected in a local authority (N=157) and led to the retention of nine items which were embodied in a scale for further evaluation. A second study using data using obtained in an Emergency Call Management Service (N=85) was used to further evaluate the factor structure of the scale and assess its predictive validity. A third study (N=70) provided further information on the measure. FindingsThe new nine item measure is a viable instrument with adequate reliability for assessing three levels of worker relations. In line with predictions, the three sub-scales (co-worker, supervisor and organisation) were positively correlated with job satisfaction and social relations. Practical implicationsThe new scale provides a freely available and parsimonious alternative to existing measures of worker relations. Originality/valueThe paper considers the component aspects of worker relations before defining, theorising and developing a general purpose short instrument capable of quantitatively measuring worker relatio...

Increase Employee Morale Through Transformational Leadership, Employee Relation, and Work Environment

“…The results of the validity test on the employee relations variable showed that 17 statement items had the value of r count> r table and 1 item statement had a value of r count <r table so that 1 item statement was invalid. Statement items for employee relations variables are taken from the article Gill & Meyer (2013) and Biggs (2013) with the following example "A harmonious culture of work communication exists within this organization". This can be said that 17 items statement about employee relations declared valid and 1 item statement declared invalid.…”

Development of a Work Climate Scale in Emergency Health Services

“…In further applications of the resulting short scale, we will check whether, as expected, the reliability coefficient maintains good reliability for coefficients in all the factors. To cover the second limitation (the use of one item as a criterion), we will use another scale as a criterion, specifically the scale proposed by Biggs et al ( 2016 ), which presents partial validity evidence (based on relationships with other variables).…”

“…Additionally, we will delve into validity based on relations to other variables that present convergent and discriminant evidence of the resultant scale following the multitrait-multimethod matrix proposed by Campbell and Fiske ( 1959 ). We will request completion of three different instruments from ~100 EHS workers: the scale we proposed; another scale with partial validity evidence to measure the work climate in EHS (the one proposed by Biggs et al, 2016 ); and the Safety Attitudes Questionnaire (Sexton et al, 2016 ), an instrument that measures safety climate, a construct similar to work climate although not exactly the same (work climate is considered wider). We expect to find high reliability coefficients in the three instruments, a high correlation between the two instruments that measure work climate in EHS (convergent evidence) and a low correlation (at least lower than that obtained in the convergent evidence study) between our instrument and the one that measures a different construct (discriminant evidence).…”

“…Some scales to measure work climate in EHS are already available in the literature (Davenport et al, 2007 ). However, such scales show poor psychometric properties and present only results about their reliability and, in some cases, validity evidence based on relations to other variables (Biggs et al, 2016 ). We also found proposals for scales that, in addition to reliability, provide data regarding validity evidence based on internal structure, such as the Safety Attitudes Questionnaire (Sexton et al, 2016 ) applied in different contexts (Patterson et al, 2010 ), but they do not provide data about validity evidence based on test content or relations to other variables.…”

The Use of Economic and Social Exchange Perspectives in Linking Salary Satisfaction, Work Relationship, and Employee Performance

“…This study proposes that salary satisfaction and work relationship may be the significant factors for enhancing individual performance (Biggs et al 2016;Gupta et al 2012). However, it has been little attempts to investigate the influences of salary satisfaction and work relationship on the performance dimensions as mentioned.…”