Employee empowerment, equality plans and job satisfaction: an empirical analysis of the demand-control model
Journal of Participation and Employee Ownership
ISSN: 2514-7641
Article publication date: 29 May 2023
Issue publication date: 6 June 2023
Abstract
Purpose
The paper investigates the effects of individual employees' empowerment on different forms of job satisfaction in British workplaces while controlling for the presence of job demands and whether these effects depend on the presence of an equality plan in the workplace. The demand-control model that the authors test proposes that imbalances between the demands placed on employees and the control they have in their job negatively affect employee well-being and health. Control may also be strengthened, and demands mitigated, by effective equality policies. This study looks at nine forms of job satisfaction and examines the individual effects of job demands, job control, the interaction of control and demands and their joint effects with equality plans.
Design/methodology/approach
The study uses matched employee–employer British data from the 2011 Workplace Employment Relations Survey (WERS). The authors conduct principal component analysis (PCA) and logit estimations and estimate a recursive simultaneous bivariate probit model.
Findings
Employee empowerment, or job control, is a key predictor of job satisfaction, and job demands are negatively associated with various aspects of job satisfaction. The presence of equality plans strengthens the positive effects of job control and mitigates the detrimental effects of job demands. Consistent with the demand-control model, employees are more likely to be satisfied in low strain jobs (jobs with low demands and high control) than in high strain jobs (jobs with high demands and low control). Employees in passive jobs (jobs with low demand and low control) on the other hand are less likely to be satisfied with achievement and influence than employees in low strain job.
Originality/value
Much of the empirical literature has focused on collective empowerment practices and none has tested the demand-control model. This paper adds to the literature on employee empowerment practices with a focus on individualised job control and the way its effects interact with equality plans. In the process, the authors provide novel and rigorous empirical evidence on an extended version of the demand-control model.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors acknowledge UK's Department of Trade and Industry, Economic and Social Research Council, Policy Studies Institute, and Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service as the originators of the 2011 WERS data and UK Data Archive who supplied the data. This paper benefited greatly from the exceptionally helpful comments of Luisa Zanchi and Sandy Tubeuf in the initial stages of this research, the two referees, participants at the 1st, 2nd and 3rd White Rose Doctoral Centre Economics Conferences, participants at the 17th and 21st conferences of International Association for the Economics of Participation (IAFEP), seminar participants at the Institute for Futures Studies (Stockholm) as well as the 13th European Association for Comparative Economic Studies (EACES) biennial conference.
Citation
Ibukun, T. and Pérotin, V. (2023), "Employee empowerment, equality plans and job satisfaction: an empirical analysis of the demand-control model", Journal of Participation and Employee Ownership, Vol. 6 No. 1, pp. 51-95. https://doi.org/10.1108/JPEO-10-2022-0014
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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