Other Titles
Improvement in Job Satisfaction
Abstract
Session presented on Saturday, March 18, 2017: A nursing shortage is looming yet again and has been well documented in the literature. As a result, it is vital that we keep the nursing faculty we have and improve the job satisfaction of those faculty as much as possible. Studies show the cost of replacing an employee ranges from six months' salary to as much as twice their annual salary (Merhar, 2016). Higher education continues to struggle with having adequate funding and cannot afford the cost of turnover. In addition, the nursing shortage decreases the supply of qualified faculty making it imperative that faculty turnover be kept to a minimum. One way to directly improve retention rates is by improving job satisfaction (Derby-Davis, 2014). Research has shown that salary and compensation is only a small part of job satisfaction (Wang & Liesveld, 2015). Gutierrez, Candela, & Carver (2012) demonstrated that perceived organizational support had an impact on the job satisfaction of nursing faculty especially when associated with other factors. It is important to find and explore innovative ways that enhance organizational support to increase job satisfaction and facilitate retention. One innovative intervention that we utilized to improve job satisfaction and increase collaboration was cultivating an 'attitude of gratitude'. Gratitude is recognized as a positive emotion and is associated with empathy, increased self-esteem, and overall happiness (McCullough, Emmons, & Tsang, 2002). Grateful people have increased coping skills, more positive emotions, and deal with problems in a more direct way (Lin, 2015). Increased gratitude is also positively correlated with improved interactions and greater social support from coworkers (Lin, 2015; McCullough et al., 2002), which we hypothesized would improve job satisfaction. To assess if our intervention was successful a pre and post survey of faculty on perceived gratitude levels and job satisfaction was administered prior to the start and at the end of the project. We introduced the theme of 'Attitude of Gratitude' in the opening faculty meeting and continued gratitude discussion at each faculty meeting throughout the year. We provided a book on gratitude and offered optional lunch session gratitude collaboration groups twice each semester. We also established a social media group site related to this topic for people to share and interacted with faculty related to the topic through email, breakroom bulletin board, and mailboxes. Our ultimate goal in introducing gratitude interventions was to create a more collaborative and grateful environment that would ultimately lead to increased job satisfaction for faculty. Learning Objectives: 1. Understand how job satisfaction and personal well-being are impacted by the cultivation of gratitude. 2. Explain different methods for implementing gratitude tools and techniques to increase job satisfaction. 3. Strategize a process to manifest gratitude techniques in your workplace that will increase teamwork and a collaborative culture.
Sigma Membership
Nu Nu
Type
Presentation
Format Type
Text-based Document
Study Design/Type
N/A
Research Approach
N/A
Keywords:
Gratitude, Job satisfaction, Well-being
Recommended Citation
Stegen, Amy and Wankier, Jamie, "Generating Gratitude in the Workplace to Improve Job Satisfaction" (2017). Creating Healthy Work Environments Event Materials. 44.
https://www.sigmarepository.org/chwe/2017/presentations_2017/44
Conference Name
Creating Healthy Work Environments 2017
Conference Host
Sigma Theta Tau International
Conference Location
Indianapolis, Indiana, USA
Conference Year
2017
Rights Holder
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Review Type
Abstract Review Only: Reviewed by Event Host
Acquisition
Proxy-submission
Generating Gratitude in the Workplace to Improve Job Satisfaction
Indianapolis, Indiana, USA
Session presented on Saturday, March 18, 2017: A nursing shortage is looming yet again and has been well documented in the literature. As a result, it is vital that we keep the nursing faculty we have and improve the job satisfaction of those faculty as much as possible. Studies show the cost of replacing an employee ranges from six months' salary to as much as twice their annual salary (Merhar, 2016). Higher education continues to struggle with having adequate funding and cannot afford the cost of turnover. In addition, the nursing shortage decreases the supply of qualified faculty making it imperative that faculty turnover be kept to a minimum. One way to directly improve retention rates is by improving job satisfaction (Derby-Davis, 2014). Research has shown that salary and compensation is only a small part of job satisfaction (Wang & Liesveld, 2015). Gutierrez, Candela, & Carver (2012) demonstrated that perceived organizational support had an impact on the job satisfaction of nursing faculty especially when associated with other factors. It is important to find and explore innovative ways that enhance organizational support to increase job satisfaction and facilitate retention. One innovative intervention that we utilized to improve job satisfaction and increase collaboration was cultivating an 'attitude of gratitude'. Gratitude is recognized as a positive emotion and is associated with empathy, increased self-esteem, and overall happiness (McCullough, Emmons, & Tsang, 2002). Grateful people have increased coping skills, more positive emotions, and deal with problems in a more direct way (Lin, 2015). Increased gratitude is also positively correlated with improved interactions and greater social support from coworkers (Lin, 2015; McCullough et al., 2002), which we hypothesized would improve job satisfaction. To assess if our intervention was successful a pre and post survey of faculty on perceived gratitude levels and job satisfaction was administered prior to the start and at the end of the project. We introduced the theme of 'Attitude of Gratitude' in the opening faculty meeting and continued gratitude discussion at each faculty meeting throughout the year. We provided a book on gratitude and offered optional lunch session gratitude collaboration groups twice each semester. We also established a social media group site related to this topic for people to share and interacted with faculty related to the topic through email, breakroom bulletin board, and mailboxes. Our ultimate goal in introducing gratitude interventions was to create a more collaborative and grateful environment that would ultimately lead to increased job satisfaction for faculty. Learning Objectives: 1. Understand how job satisfaction and personal well-being are impacted by the cultivation of gratitude. 2. Explain different methods for implementing gratitude tools and techniques to increase job satisfaction. 3. Strategize a process to manifest gratitude techniques in your workplace that will increase teamwork and a collaborative culture.