Department of Industrial Psychology

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Browsing Department of Industrial Psychology by browse.metadata.advisor "Bailey, Lisa"

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    Experimental design evaluating the impact of a wellbeing initiative on blue-collar employee engagement, burnout and psychological capital
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2022-12) Nel, Ashleigh; Bailey, Lisa; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences. Dept. of Industrial Psychology.
    ENGLISH SUMMARY: Businesses have been successful in reaching their economic objectives and realising new innovations that have contributed to the modernisation and sophistication of society. However, the prioritisation of economic growth has developed alongside poverty, and prosperity alongside environmental damage. Additionally, there is a global paradigm shift from traditional capitalist business practice to responsible global capitalism. This has increased pressure on organisations to be strategic partners in achieving real socio-economic change and not purely economic growth. The implication of this is that businesses have begun identifying the priority needs and challenges of the surrounding disadvantaged communities, from which some of their employees derive, in order to contribute to alleviating their socio-economic challenges. This is based on the premise that when the home environment of the employee is supportive and conducive to health and wellbeing, performance and engagement at work will increase. Furthermore, employee work engagement is on a global decline, costing organisations significantly in terms of low productivity, high absenteeism, less innovation, poor customer service, and high recruitment and training costs. This has led to an urgent need for research into a broader based model that addresses the less traditional factors hampering employee work engagement and perpetuating burnout. The South African workforce is facing multiple challenges, two of which include poverty and low work engagement contributed to by a lack of physical and psychological resources. To date, the wellbeing of employees has been managed through short-term Employee Assistance Programmes or health programmes that have lacked in the impact of empowering employees with the tools they require to take ownership of the challenges they are facing. This study aimed to investigate the impact that a multi-dimensional blue-collar employee wellbeing initiative would have on blue-collar employees’ psychological capital, work engagement and burnout. The model of ethical, proactive business practice that this thesis proposes is unique and cuts across multiple disciplines and fields of research, contributing to its necessity of investigation and validation. This research addresses increasing employee work engagement through a multi-dimensional wellness initiative, in the context of the global trend of responsible global capitalism and the unique political, economic and social context of South Africa. Research was conducted within a retail company using the mixed model repeated measures and analysis of variance research methodology on two sample groups: the control sample group that received no exposure to the multi-dimensional wellbeing initiative, and the experimental sample group which was exposed to the multi-dimensional internal wellbeing initiative, Love My Journey. The change in employee work engagement, burnout and psychological capital was measured through the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES), Compound PsyCap Scale (CPC-12 Scale) and the Copenhagen Burnout Inventory (CBI). It was hypothesised that the multi-dimensional wellbeing initiative would have a positive impact on the experimental group’s wellbeing. This null hypothesis (hypothesis 1) could not be rejected. This was the primary outcome of the study. It was further hypothesised that this positive impact on psychological capital would have a positive impact on work engagement and a negative impact on burnout. Additionally, there was no significant difference between the levels of work engagement or burnout of the control group and experimental group, therefore the null hypothesis for hypothesis 2 and hypothesis 3 could not be rejected. The limitations of the study are discussed, recommendations are presented for further research and preactical managerial implications are discussed.
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    Exploring psychological safety, supportive leadership behaviour and voice behaviour on employee engagement in the South African mining sector
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2023-03) Tiyisela, Manganyi; Bailey, Lisa; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences. Dept. of Industrial Psychology.
    ENGLISH SUMMARY: Research in psychological safety has grown exponentially in recent years. The growing reliance on teamwork and collaboration makes psychological safety an important topic in the contemporary working environment where organisations are consistently dependent on work groups to deliver business results. Despite the importance of psychological safety, we know little about how it affects voice behaviour and employee engagement. Limited research has earnestly focused on this topic in the South African context, specifically in the mining environment. Therefore, this disparity in understanding serves as a void in practice. The main aim of this study was to investigate whether psychological safety facilitates the contribution of voice behaviour and employee engagement. Furthermore, the research aimed to investigate the impact that supportive leadership behaviour has on psychological safety, voice behaviour and employee engagement. The research study was quantitative in nature in which an ex post facto correlational design was utilised. A diamond mining company based in South Africa participated in the research to which a self-administered survey with a total of 34 questions was distributed. Participation in the research was voluntary and no incentives were offered, in total 163 employees completed the survey. The findings reveal that psychological safety has a significant positive relationship with voice behaviour and employee engagement. In addition, voice behaviour has a positive relationship with employee engagement. Moreover, supportive leadership behaviour has a significant positive relationship with psychological safety and employee engagement. The findings also revealed that voice behaviour mediates the relationship between psychological safety and employee engagement, whilst psychological safety mediates the relationship between supportive leadership behaviour and employee voice behaviour. Finally, the study found that psychological safety does not mediate the relationship between supportive leadership behaviour and employee engagement. The outcomes of the study imply that the leader plays a pivotal role in driving important organisational outcomes such as employee engagement, creating a climate of psychological safety as well as enhancing employee voice in the work context.
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    An investigation into factors impacting first-generation students’ intention to terminate their undergraduate studies
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2023-03) Vergottini, Danielle; Bailey, Lisa; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences. Dept. of Industrial Psychology.
    ENGLISH SUMMARY: In South Africa, the abilities of educated professionals are highly sought after because they provide organisations with a competitive edge and foster knowledge that is receptive to a variety of social objectives. University graduates who are well-educated play a significant part in the national system because they possess the information and abilities that support worldwide expansion and progress. When students finish their degrees, they can benefit from things like improved income, personal growth, better job possibilities, worldwide opportunities, more credibility, self-differentiation, and professional progress. The fact that South Africa is not meeting its graduation objectives, which can be linked to dropout or discontinuation of studies, means that the country's citizens are now only receiving a very small portion of these advantages. South African tertiary institutions are investing considerably in enhancing higher education by decreasing the alarmingly high dropout rate. Nevertheless, their efforts appear to be futile due to ineffective or misdirected measures. The retention of students, particularly first-generation students, is jeopardized owing to a variety of specific challenges. Various studies have focused on student dropout rates at undergraduate level, but few have focused on first-generation student dropout. Moreover, there is a gap in extant literature regarding the factors that impact first-generation students’ intention to leave university. Therefore, the aim of the study was to investigate the impact of person-environment fit among first-generation students in a South African tertiary institution (i.e. Stellenbosch University) and to understand and address the most salient factors that contribute to first-generation students’ intention to terminate their undergraduate studies (i.e. intention to quit). The study therefore investigated a structural model outlining various factors influencing intention to quit among first-generation students, with a specific focus on person-environment fit and the importance thereof. The study further investigated the inclusion of additional variables, i.e. access to career counselling, socio-economic status, and academic preparedness, that may potentially explain additional variance in intention to quit among first generation students. Through understanding how these variables influence first-generation students’ perceptions of higher education initiatives and how these student perceptions are causally related to intention to quit, higher education institutions will be in the prime position to effectively address the issue regarding the high dropout rate. A quantitative research approach, more specifically, an ex post facto correlation research design, was followed in order to find support for a structural model of first-generation students’ intention to quit, which was developed through a thorough review of the literature. Data was collected using a self-administered online questionnaire from 188 undergraduate firstgeneration students from the Economic and Management Sciences Faculty at Stellenbosch University. The collected data was analysed using a variety of techniques, including item analysis, correlation analysis, exploratory factor analysis, and partial least squares structural equation modelling. Ten hypotheses were tested and support was found for one of the ten hypotheses. The results of the study indicated that there is a statistically significant relationship between academic preparedness and intention to quit, meaning that as first-generation students’ academic preparedness increases, their intention to quit will decrease. However, the results further showed that person-environment fit, access to career counselling, and socio-economic status have no influence on first-generation students’ intention to quit. Furthermore, no support was found for the relationships between access to career counselling and person-environment fit, socio-economic status and access to career counselling and socio-economic status and academic preparedness. Contrary to what literature indicated, no support was found for the three mediating relationships in the study: (1) Person-environment fit mediates the relationship between access to career counselling and intention to quit; (2) Access to career counselling mediates the relationship between (low) socio-economic status and person-environment fit; (3) Academic preparedness mediates the relationship between (low) socio-economic status and intention to quit. However, these findings still allow for interventions to be tailored to firstgeneration students to assist and support not only first-generation students themselves, but South African tertiary institutions at large, to ultimately lower the alarmingly high dropout rate. The information can therefore be used to understand and influence student retention, specifically pertaining to academic preparedness.