QWL AND ORGANISATION PERFORMANCE

QWL AND ORGANISATIONAL PERFORMANCE
CHAPTER ONE
1.0 INTRODUCTION
1.1 Context of the Problem
As the work culture changes drastically in the recent years, the traditional concept of work to fulfill humans’ basic needs are also facing out. The basic needs are continued to diversify and change according to the evolution of the work system and standards of living of a workforce. Thus a definition by Suttle, (1997) on the QWL as the degree to which work are able to satisfy important personal basic needs through their experience in the organization is no longer relevant.
Hackman and Oldhams, (1980) further highlight the constructs of QWL in relation to the interaction between work environment and personal needs. The work environment that is able to fulfill employees’ personal needs is considered to provide a positive interaction effect, which will lead to an excellent QWL. They emphasized the personal needs are satisfied when rewards from the organization, such as compensation, promotion, recognition and development meet their expectations. Parallel to this definition, Lawler, (1982) defines QWL in terms of job characteristics and work conditions. He highlights that the core dimension of the entire QWL in the organization is to improve employees’ well-being and productivity. The most common interaction that relates to improvement of employees’ well-being and productivity is the design of the job. Job design that is able to provide higher employee satisfaction is expected to be more productive. However, he accepted the fact that QWL is complex, because it comprises physical and mental well being of employees.

Later definition by Beukema, (1987) describes QWL as the degree to which employees are able to shape their jobs actively, in accordance with their options, interests and needs. It is the degree of power an organization gives to its employees to design their work. However, this definition differs from the former which stresses on the organization that designs the job to meet employees’ interest. In the same vein Heskett et al, (1997) define QWL as the feelings that employees have towards their jobs, colleagues and organizations that ignite a chain leading to the organizations’ growth and profitability. This definition provides an insight that the satisfying work environment is considered to provide better QWL.
Proceeding to previous definitions, Lau et al, (2001) operationalised QWL as the favourable working environment that supports and promotes satisfaction by providing employees with rewards, job security and career growth opportunities. The recent definition by Serey, (2006) on QWL is quite conclusive and best meet the contemporary work environment. The definition is related to meaningful and satisfying work. It includes (i) an opportunity to exercise one’s talents and capacities, to face challenges and situations that require independent initiative and self-direction; (ii) an activity thought to be worthwhile by the individuals involved; (iii) an activity in which one understands the role the individual plays in the achievement of some overall goals; and (iv) a sense of taking pride in what one is doing and in doing it well. This issue of meaningful and satisfying work is often merged with discussions of job satisfaction, and believed to be more favourable to QWL. With respect to this definition, the QWL and organization performance will be studied.

1.2 Statement of the Problem
The period from the mid 1990s saw the context of globalization and increasingly sophisticated technology, restructuring of organizations and non-permanent work in most advanced industrialized societies towards flexible workforces. The consequences of this changing workplace are the anxieties and other problems that accompany feelings of job insecurity. Many workers are spending more time in the workplace in response to job insecurity, workplace demands, perceived career needs, financial pressures, and so forth. Without job security, employees are less committed to their organizations and may feel freer to move to other jobs. The rise in working hours has been greatest among members of dual-earner and especially professional dual-career families, and time pressures from work are particularly intense during the life-cycle stage including the childrearing years which suggest pressurized family lives. In addition, boundaries between work and non-work time have become more blurred as organizations becomes increasingly virtual and more people work at or from home for all or part of the week using information and communication technologies (Lewis & Cooper, 1999).
In reality, it is mainly the employee who must take responsibility for managing multiple demands.
The question is why is there concern for QWL? Firstly, newly acquired economic maturity appears to be one of the principal causes of the increased concern for improving the QWL. The new awareness is generally attributed to the heightened aspirations of workers with regard to their working life, aspirations which in turn have been affected by improved living standards and higher educational levels of the workforce in general (Hartenstein & Huddleston, 1984). Secondly, many of the current problems are not the result of deteriorating social and working conditions, but, rather, a consequence of heightened worker expectations and aspirations. Moreover, a number of aspects traditionally considered to be important are gradually giving way to new concerns (Hartenstein & Huddleston, 1994). Thirdly, new problems affecting the QWL fall into several categories. Some have surfaced as a result of new technological and social developments and others represent changing and accelerating concerns with regard to their compatibility. To this end, the effect of the Nigerian quality of work-life and organizational performance will be studied.

Dependent Variables Independent Variables
Researcher’s Framework using Cummings and Worley’s Model of QWL

1.3 Purpose of the Study
The purpose of this study exercise can be stated as follows
1. To understand the concept of quality of work life and how it affect business performance.
2. To identify the measures of quality of work life and how they affect organisations productivity
3. To determine the extent to which quality of work life affect business performance in the selected industry of study
4. To find out the importance of quality of work life in the organisation.
5. To determine the extent to which the quality of work life affects employees’ motivation.

1.4 Research Questions In view of the objectives of the study, an attempt will be made to address the following research question: what is the interactive relationship between the eight facets of quality of work-life namely: adequate and fair compensation, safe and healthy working condition, opportunity to use and develop human capability, opportunity for career growth, social integration in the workforce, constitutionalism in work organization, work and quality of life and social relevance with the measures of organizational performance namely: market share, return on investment and growth? More specifically, an attempt will be made to address the following research questions:
i. What is the relationship between adequate and fair compensation and market share? ii. What is the relationship between adequate and fair compensation and return on investment? iii. What is the relationship between safe and healthy working condition and market share? iv. What is the relationship between safe and healthy working condition and return on investment?
v. What is the relationship between opportunity to use and develop human capability and market share? vi. What is the relationship between opportunity to use and develop human capability and return on investment? vii. What is the relationship between opportunity for career growth and the organization’s market share? viii. What is the relationship between opportunity for career growth and the organization’s return on investment? ix. What is the relationship between social integration in the workforce and the organization’s market share?
x. What is the relationship between social integration in the workforce and the organization’s return on investment? xi. What is the relationship between constitutionalism in work organization and the organization’s market share? xii. What is the relationship between constitutionalism in the work organization and the organization’s return on investment? xiii. What is the relationship between work and quality of life and the organization’s market share? xiv. What is the relationship between work and quality of life and the organization’s return on investment? xv. What is the relationship between social relevance of work and the organization’s market share? xvi. What is the relationship between social relevance of work and the organization’s return on investment?
1.5 Research Hypotheses
In testing for the significance relationship for the facets above, the questions will be hypothesized as follow:
Ho1: There is no relationship between adequate and fair compensation and market share.
Ho2: There is no relationship between adequate and fair compensation and return on investment.
Ho3: There is no relationship between safe and healthy working condition and market share.
Ho4: There is no relationship between safe and healthy working condition and return on investment.
Ho5: There is no relationship between opportunity to use and develop human capability and market share.
Ho6: There is no relationship between opportunity to use and develop human capability and return on investment.
Ho7: There is no relationship between opportunity for career growth and the organization’s market share.
Ho8: There is no relationship between career growth and the organization’s return on investment.
Ho9: There is no relationship between social integration in the workforce and the organization’s market share.
Ho10: There is no relationship between social integration in the workforce and the organization’s return on investment.
Ho11: There is no relationship between constitutionalism in the work organization and the organization’s market share.
Ho12: There is no relationship between constitutionalism in the work organization and the organization’s return on investment.
Ho13: There is no relationship between work and quality of life and the organization’s market share.
Ho14: There is no relationship between work and quality of life and the organization’s return on investment.
Ho15: There is no relationship between social relevance of work and the organization’s market share.
Ho16: There is no relationship between social relevance of work and the organization’s return on investment.

1.6 Significance of the Study
This study would be carried out with the view of adding to the wealth of literatures on quality of work life and organizational performance.
The findings of this study on the facets that has significance relationship with the organizational performance will be of immense benefits to policy makers, business executives, researchers and all those who want to remain afloat in today’s hyper-competitive business environments.
The study will enhance the researcher’s knowledge on the concept quality of work life and organizational performance.
It will help employers in adequately developing their human resources to boost their organizational performance.
It will help employees to understand their rights as workers and how to survive in the Nigerian organization. Etc.

1.7 Limitation of the Study
Anything that is beyond the ability of the researcher to control, that may affect the internal validity of the study can be seen as the limitation of the study. While the scope here, will cover the industry, area of domicile and unit of analysis.
This study is supposed to cover all the catering companies in the South-South geo-political region of Nigeria. The intended scope however, could not be attained due to cost of collecting the data.
The survey therefore, will be limited to the catering companies operating within Rivers State. Other limitations include;
Lack of time, as the period allocated for the research is very short;
Lack of finance, as the research is highly capital intensive;
Sensitivity of sample elements, data supplied by some respondents is bias
Literature review, some of the sources of the materials used are not of standard and their contributions cannot be verified for authentication; and
Attitude of management, the researcher encountered difficulty in getting access to the organization in distributing survey instrument.

1.8 Definition of terms
Quality: The word quality means the standard of something it is compared with other things like it.
Work: is the job that a person does especially in order to earn money. It could also be describe as task or duties that a person carry out in order to earn a living.
Life: is a period of somebody’s life when they are in a particular situation or job.
Business performance:

1.9 Organisation of the study
Chapter one of the study contains the context of the problem, Statement of the problem, Purpose of the study, Research question, Hypothesis, The conceptual model, Significant of the study, Limitation of the study, Definition of terms, organisation of the study and the references.
Chapter two which is the review of literature contains Introduction on quality of work life, Measure of quality of work life, Strategies for improving quality of work life, Career and quality of work life, and Career dimensions.
Chapter three of this study contains the research methodology which was discussed under the following subheading, research design, sampling procedure, data collections method, operationalmeasure4 of variables, data analysis technique, test of validity and reliability.
Chapter four contains the presentation of data and analysis of data; while chapter five features the discussion of result, conclusion and recommendations on the study.

References
Beukema, L., 1987. “Kwaliteit Van De Arbeidstijdverkorting [Quality of reduction of working hours]. Groningen: Karstapel”. In: Suzanne, E.J. Arts, Ada Kerkstra, Jouke Van Der Zee, and Huda Huyer Abu Saad, (eds.) (2001). Quality of Working Life and Workload in Home Help Services: A Review of the Literature and a Proposal for a Research Model. Scandinavian Journal of Caring Society, 15, pp. 12-24.

Greenhaus, J.H. and P.J. Beutell, 1999. Sources of conflict between work and family roles. Acad. Manag. Rev., 10: 76-88.

Hackman, J.R., and G.R., Oldham, 1980. Work Redesign. Reading, M.A: Addison-Wesley.

Hartenstein, B.A. and Huddleston, S. 1984. Rational versus gender role expectations for work family conflict. J. Appl. Psychol., 76: 560-68.

Heskett, J.L., Sasser, W.E., Jr and L.A., Schlesinger, 1997. “The service profit chain”. New York: The Free Press.

Kossek, C. and Ozeki, I. 1999. Work-family conflict in the dual-career family. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 51: 51-75.
Lau, T., Y.H., Wong, K.F., Chan, and M., Law,
“Information Technology and the Work Environment-Does it Change the Way People Interact at Work”. Human Systems Management, 20(3), pp. 267-280.

Lawler E. E., LLL, 1982. “Strategies for Improving the Quality of Work Life”. American Psychologist, 37, pp. 486-693.

Lewis, S. 1997. “An International Perspective on Work-Family Issues” In: S. Parasuraman and J.H. Greenhaus eds Integrating Work and Family: Challenges and Choices for a Changing World. Westport, CN: Quorum Books.

Lockwood, W.F., 2005. Managing Human Resources: Productivity, Quality of Work Life, Profits.

Serey, T.T., 2006. “Choosing a Robust Quality of Work Life”. Business Forum, 27(2), pp. 7-10.

Suttle, J.L., 1997. “Improving Life at Work: Problem and Prospects”. In H.R. Hackman and J.L Suttle eds Improving Life at Work: Behavioural Science approaches to organizational change (pp. 1-29). Santa Barbara, CA: Goodyear.

CHAPTER TWO

2.0 REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

2.1 INTRODUCTION TO QUALITY OF WORK LIFE (QWL)

To have a good understanding of the concept “Quality of Work Life”
(QWL), one must look into the evolutionary stages of the concept. Even if the expression of “Quality of Work Life” is relatively new, the reality it encompasses is not of recent origin.
For more than two decades a sizable volume of literature has been developed on Quality of Work Life. In Nigeria, scholars as well as practitioners of Human Resources Management and Industrial Relation have studied its various aspects and developed a few case studies. However, no comprehensive attempt has been made so far in Nigeria, to objectively measure the Quality of Work Life in those specific contexts.

Walton (2000) attributes the evolution of Quality of Work Life to various phases in history. Legislations enacted in early twentieth century to protect employees from job-injury and to eliminate hazardous working conditions, followed by the unionization movement in the 1930’s and 1940’s were the initial steps in this direction. Emphasis was given to job security, due process at the work place and economic gains for the worker. The 1950’s and the 1960’s saw the development of different theories by psychologists proposing a positive relationship between morale and productivity that improved human relations. Attempts at reform to acquire equal employment opportunity and job enrichment schemes also were introduced. Finally in the 1970’s the idea of Quality of Work Life was conceived which according to Walton, is broader than these earlier developments and is something that must include ‘the values that were at the heart of these earlier reform movements and human needs and aspirations’.
Keith (2002) observes that, historically the concept of Quality of
Work Life had originally included only the issues of wages, working hours, and working conditions. However, the concept has now been expanded to include such factors as the extent of workers’ involvement in the job, their levels of satisfaction with various aspects in the work environment, their perceived job competence, accomplishment on the job etc.
According to Keith (2002), Quality of Work Life refers to “the favourableness or unfavourableness of a job environment for people”. The basic purpose in this regard is to develop jobs aiming at Human Resource Development as well as production enhancement.
Andries (2002) in his study stated that the core of the Quality of Work Life concept is the value of treating the worker as a human being and emphasizing changes in the socio-technical system of thorough improvement, in physical and psychological working environment, design and redesign of work practices, hierarchical structure and the production process brought with the active involvement of workers in decision making. In the words of Kumar and Tripati (1993), Quality of Work Life is a philosophy of management that believes co-operative relationship between employees and managers and also believes that every employee has the ability and right to offer his intelligence and useful inputs into decisions at various levels in the organizations. Quality of Work Life is a process to involve employee at every level of the organizations in the decision making about their work and workplace. It refers to the intended outcomes of practicing above philosophy and process with improvements in working condition, working environment, working climate or work culture. The process brings ultimate benefit to individual employee as well as to the organizations through individual development and increasing quality and productivity respectively.
As explained by Kumar and Tripathy (1993), there are several approaches for achieving Quality of Work Life in organizations, namely job design, workers’ participation, welfare and quality circles. Quality Circles are one of the ways of involving employees at the bottom level of the organization in decisions affecting work and work related problems. A Quality Circle is essentially a small group of employees who meet voluntarily on regular basis to identify, analyze and find solutions to quality problems and other issues in their work-environment. The employees in a Quality Circle can range from four to twelve. The Quality Circles occupy a vital and far more specific role for aiming and achieving Quality of Work Life of workers in organizations.
However, Singh (1983) states that, Quality of Work Life is not based on any theory. It is concerned with overall climate of work place. Reduced supervision, increased self-regulation and self-management are pillars of Quality of Work Life.
American Society of Training and Development (1979) presented Quality of Work Life as a process of work organizations, which enables its members at all levels to participate actively and efficiently in shaping the organizations environment, methods and outcomes. It is a value based process, which is aimed towards meeting the twin goals of enhanced effectiveness of organizations, and improved quality of life at work for employees.
Cohen and Rosenthal (1980) describes Quality of Work Life as an intentionally designed effort to bring out increased labour management, and cooperation to jointly solve the problem of improving organizational performance and employee satisfaction.
In the opinion of Jain (1991), Quality of Work Life represents a blending of motivational factors of work, socio-technical system etc. which are of very real concerns for human values in today’s society with an awareness that all individuals devote the greater part of their mature lives to the work, spending time, energy and physical and mental resources to this endeavor.
Moreover, it recognizes that, work is the chief determinant of an individual’s freedom, growth and self respect as well as his or her standard of living.
Quality of Work Life denotes the experienced “goodness” of working in the organizational settings.
One of the principal problems with the term is that Quality of Work Life is not a single or a specific notion. It consists of a whole parcel of terms and notions, all of which really belong under the working life umbrella which are namely; (1) Industrial effectiveness, (2) Human resource development, (3) Organizational effectiveness, (4) Work restructure, (5) Job enrichment, (6) Socio-technical systems, (7) Working humanization, (8) Group work concept,
(9) Labour management cooperation, (10) Working together; worker’s involvement, worker’s participation, and (11) Co-operative work structure.
Each of these in varying degrees of inadequacies identifies a part of the large whole that Quality of Work Life seeks to identify. Quality of Work Life is a common concern, not only to improve life at work, but also life outside work. After all, the two cannot be linked.
Quality of Work Life concept enumerated by Boisvert and Theriault (1974) is as structured below:

Global Role of work in one’s life QWL Restricted Job & organization’s physical environment Participation in decision making Job Job Content
Fig.2.0 Quality of Work-Life
One can notice from the figure widely divergent views of Quality of
Work Life varying from the global view of the role of work in one’s life to as narrow concern as job content.
To improve the Quality of Work Life, the work satisfaction of employees is to be considered as a motivational strategy. The improvement in the Quality of Work Life is sought to be achieved through re-organizational and re-structuring of job content. Quality of Work Life scheme involves changes in values, norms, systems, styles processes and structures in the organizational process. The main thrust is in optimizing the job satisfaction available to employees. In the total system of Quality of Work Life, the process of bringing desired change itself is very important. It has been proved that participative process where the employees concerned are involved in bringing the change brings more effective results.
In the views of Johnston (1993), Quality of Work Life is more than simply a concept, means or an end. It embodies the following inter-related sets of ideas:
a) Ideas dealing with a body of knowledge, concepts, experiences related to the nature, meaning, and structure of work;
b) Ideas dealing with the nature and process of introducing and managing organization change; and
c) Ideas dealing with outcomes of results of the change process.
The concept of Quality of Work Life views work as a process of interaction and joint problem solving by working people-managers, supervisors, and workers.
2.2 BUSINESS PERFORMANCE
According to Ngerobo (2000:45) business performance involves the area of business intelligence which ensures the monitoring and managing of an organization’s performance against the laid down objectives of the company.
Ngerobo, (2000:45), identify the key performance indicators as revenue, return on investment, overhead and operational cost. Whenever the key performance indicators are in favorable state, it depicts efficiency while any form of adverse state shows inefficiency in performance.
Business performance itself can be measured in three buckets (Hugh, 2002).
(i) Customer loyalty; being the degree to which the organization stakeholders think the company is relevant to their needs. Clients judge the relevance of products or services by buying them, employees by working hard, shareholders by buying and holding shares, and so on.
(ii) Efficiency; being how well the organization uses its resources (financial, human, physical, information)
(iii) Market share; being how viable the organization is not only in the short (the next quarters’ results) but also in the long term (how long has the company remained profitable? Has the company shown an ability to make good long-term investments?)
These measures of business performance are affected by the organization’s motivation and capacity, and by its interaction with the external environment.

2.3 CRITERIA FOR MEASURING QUALITY OF WORK LIFE
The selected constructs of QWL that is used in this paper are derived from the Cummings and Worley’s model (Cummings and Worley, 1997) who have used the dimensions widely in their QWL studies. These factors are believed to be appropriate and reliable in the context of Nigeria generally and Rivers State specifically because some of the factors were used separately by researchers in Japan (Fujigaki et al, 1993), Singapore (Lau et al., 2001) and Malaysia (Rethinam et al 2004). The dimensions of QWL selected are Adequate and Fair Compensation, Safety and Healthy Working Condition, Opportunity to use and Develop Human Capability, Opportunity for Career Growth, Social Integration in the Workforce, Constitutionalism in Work Organization, Work and Quality of Life and Social Relevance of Work. The following section discusses each of the constructs of QWL from the perspectives of catering professionals.
Walton (1974) also identified the eight dimensions, which make up the quality of working life framework which will be discussed in details in the section.

1. Adequate and Fair Compensation
Motivation experts believe that money is still an important motive, which makes people work on the job. However, people also want to see fairness and adequacy in their pay rewards. Equal pay for equal work and pay that is linked to responsibility, skill, performance and individual accomplishment are viewed with great importance. Pay must also be competitive with the external labor market and should be responsive to prevailing practices and changing economic conditions.
Walton (1975) mentioned dissatisfaction with working life as a problem which affects almost all workers at one time or another, regardless of position or status. The frustration, boredom, and anger common to employees disenchanted with their work life can be costly to both individual and organization.” Thus, QWL stimulates the employee job satisfaction (Ruzevicius 2007) and is essential for improving organizational and operational productivity (Sink & Tuttle 1989). QWL programs can improve employee morale and organizational effectiveness (Hanlon & Gladstein 1984). According to (Lewis et al 2001) “Adequate and fair compensation, Pay, benefits, supervisory style - these extrinsic determinants of QWL play a major role for job satisfaction.”

2. Safe and Healthy working condition
An organization must create working conditions that are physically and psychologically safe for its workers. The emergence of ergonomics in the 1950s has significantly improved equipment design and plant layout to enhance the physical as well as psychological comfort and safety of the workers.
Safe and Healthy Working Condition of QWL refer to physical and psychological aspects of an individual in any working environment. Asakura and Fujigaki (1993) examined the direct and indirect effect of computerization on workers health and well-being. Their results were similar to the study of Iacovides et al, (2003) that higher job demand leads to higher strain work environment, hence; it affects their health and well being. An unstrained work environment ensures good health and psychological conditions which enable the employees to perform job and non-work related functions without inhibitions. Thus, it leads to a stress free work environment providing comfortable work life.
There are many definitions of stress as it is deemed as a subjective phenomenon of QWL. Chan et al. (2000) define stress as a response to the perceived relationship between the demands on individuals and the ability to adjust to their work environment. Carayon et al, (2001) revealed that stress arises in the process of interaction between a person and the work environment that threatens the individual’s physical, psychological and physiological homeostasis. Physical illness and psychological disorders increase when pressure at work increases. Stress causes problems to the muscular system and circulation thus, increasing the risk of myocardial infarction which is well documented in psychosomatic studies. They further reported that employees who has been exposed over two years in high strain work environment is associated with higher systolic blood pressure. The nature of catering professions reflect a similar situation that continuously demanding and monotonous work environment that affects the brains resulting in exhaustion and decreasing in some of catering professionals’ cognitive abilities.
Depression and anxiety are also another form of stress that contributes towards the deterioration of health. Employees develop various symptoms of stress that can harm job performance, health and even threaten the ability to cope with the environment. In the past few decades, impressive developments of information technologies have taken place in workplace. Apart from the positive effects of catering there are also potential adverse effects that must not be overlooked. Korunka et al. (1997) Jobs in catering work environment have become a critical factor because they involve a new set of stressors that are also physically demanding.

3. Opportunity to use and Develop Human Capability
Development of its workers involves training, skill developments, recognition, and promotion. Work assignments should be made challenging enough to expand skills, abilities, and knowledge. They should create a positive effect on self-esteem, autonomy, involvement and motivation.
There was a strong consensus that employees would need to continuously enhance their skill sets in order to remain employable in the industry associated with greater task variety, task discretion and skill development opportunities foster the competency development among the workforce (Javernpaa and Eloranthay, 2001). There are types of work, which are intrinsically interesting and provide opportunities for competency development. The nature of catering related jobs are expected to stimulate growth in skills and knowledge. This is seen as an important aspect of competency development that enhances QWL. Therefore competency development is operationalized as the nature of the job that provides opportunities and stimulates growth in skills and knowledge either for career or organizational development.
Career development opportunity will provide essential training that will help the individual employees to equip with the new skills to spearhead in their career. Most contemporary organizations do not limit themselves to just training an employee for a job, but they go beyond to furnish them with a support system that encourages workplace learning. Learning opportunities and skill discretion have also proven to have a positive effect on job satisfaction and reduced job stress that will lead to better QWL. The opportunity to develop and the use of skills is associated with learning mechanisms. This applies especially when the job requires employees to deploy cognitive skills. With respect to learning, greater autonomy on job enhances the acquisition and utilization of knowledge whilst greater participation is held to promote cognitive growth via increased knowledge transfer among employees (Scully et al, 1995).
Such a job environment expands knowledge base, leads to a better understanding of how the job is related to other organizational practices and a greater ability to solve problems. In such a situation, employees gain the cognitive and behavioural repertoire to predict, control or cope with uncertain demands thus reducing the likelihood of poor QWL. In contrast, high job demands with inadequate control reduce the ability and opportunities to develop new skills and knowledge and thus enforce negative attitudes and anxiety which deteriorate QWL.

4. Opportunity for Career Growth
There must be employment, which provides for continual growth and job & income security. Opportunities for training and advancement should be considered.
Career Growth refers to opportunities employees may receive, such as increased responsibilities, challenging assignments, and learning experiences which foster career development and growth. (Davenport, 1993; Joseph, 1992; Milliman, 1992) agreed that opportunities for career growth involve either structural advancement or content advancement. Structural advancement reflects, hierarchical advancement while, content advancement, reflects increased responsibilities and challenges that is offered within one’s current job.

5. Social Integration in the Work Organization
The work environment should provide opportunities for preserving an employee’s personal identity and self-esteem through freedom from prejudice, a sense of community interpersonal openness and the absence of stratification in the organization.

QWL has direct impact on human outcomes and it significantly reduces absenteeism, minor accidents, grievances, and quits (Havlovic 1991). It is found that employee turnover can be minimized with better QWL (Newaz, Ali & Akhter 2007). Thus it can be said that QWL can develop jobs and working conditions that are excellent for people as well as for the economic health of the organization (Kanagalakshmi & Devei 2003). In fact, individual‟s quality of working life directly influences the quality of life value (Ruzevicius 2007) as the factors of QWL could be defined as physical and psychological results of the work which affect the employee (Arts, Kerksta & Zee 2001).

6. Constitutionalism in Work Organization
There should be the right to personal privacy, free speech and equitable treatment, in the workplace.
Based on the previous studies, organization policy and management style found to have influence on work performance. Organization policy and management style that put so much pressure on their employees are not encouraged as it can create negative acceptation of the policy among the employees. It can lessen the motivation, increase turnover possibility and resulting the employee opting for other organization as their new employer. This is indeed demonstrated by a study by Keiningham et al. (2006) where they noted that among the aspects expected by employee in their organization policy are fair organization policies and systematic management style.

7. Work and Quality of Life
A person’s work should not overbalance his life. Ideally, work schedules, career demands and travel requirements should not take up too much of his leisure and family life.
According to Loscocco and Roschelle (1991), the most common assessment of QWL is the individual attitudes. This is because individual work attitudes are important indicators of QWL. The ways that people respond to their jobs have consequences for their personal happiness and the effectiveness of their work organizations (Rose et al 2006).

8 Social Relevance of Work
The standing of an organization in society can influence an employee’s value of his work and career. The workers perceive the organization to be socially responsible in its products, waste disposal, marketing techniques, employment practices and so forth.
A major component of QWL, which is important for both the employees and the employers, is the relationship between work and home life. In an increasing competitive environment, it is difficult to separate home and work life. Employees today are more likely to express a strong desire to have a harmonious balance among career, family life and leisure activities. This has been suggested at the international level the need for national policies in many countries. An ILO convention that was adopted in 1981, states that it is necessary for organizations to help employees to balance their work and non-work demands (Lewis, 1997).
Individual and family life is another important driver for employee work performance and this is proved through studies accomplished by Mazerolle et al. (2008); Mulvaney et al. (2006) and Ezra and Deckman (1996). In their studies, it can be seen that stable individual and family life will produce higher work performance among employee. Unstable individual and family life were found to cause unstable emotions thus bring negative impact to the work performance. Personal health and well being were found to have influence on employees work performance. Piqueras (2006) in his study focused on the significant relationship between this aspect and employee work performance. It cannot be denied that aspects such as personal health, stress, personal problems, physical fitness and personal happiness are important for employee. Vanhala and
Tuomi (2006) in their study have found association between work performance and personal well being, human resource management and work satisfaction.

2.4. VARIABLES OF QWL VERSUS BUSINESS PERFORMANCE
[
1. Adequate and fair compensation and market share
Adequate and fair compensation has a great tendency of affecting employee’s motivation which has a direct effect on productivity and ability to attract new customers and retain existing ones which will affect sales which also directly affect market share.
2. Adequate and fair compensation and return on investment
Employee’s motivation has being proven by different scholars to have influence on sales performance of an organisation. Increase in sales volume will result in higher return on capital invested; it’s generally accepted by scholars that worker remuneration affects motivation, hence adequate and fair compensation will either positively or negatively affect return on investment
3. Safe and healthy working condition and market share

4. Safe and healthy working condition and return on investment

5. Immediate opportunity to use and develop human capacity and market share

6. Immediate opportunity to use and develop human capacity and return on investment

7. Opportunity for continued growth and security and market share
8. Opportunity for continued growth and security and return on investment

9. Social integration in the work organization and market share

10. Social integration in the work organization and return on invest

11. Constitutionalism in the work organization and market share

12 constitutionalisms in the work organization and return on investment

13. Work and total life space and market share

14. Work and total life space and return on investment

15. Social relevance of work and market share

16. Social relevance of work and return on investment

2.5. STUDIES RELATED TO QUALITY OF WORK-LIFE
In this part an extensive review is made on the Quality of Work Life of each category of occupants associated with their professions.
Ganguli and Joseph (1976) studied Quality of Working Life among young workers in Air India with special reference to life and job satisfaction issues. Findings indicate that, of the various physical and psychological working conditions, pride in organization, job earned community respect, reasonable working hours, etc. are some variables positively correlated with job satisfaction than friendship with colleagues, good work location, physical strain, variety of skills and risks of injury. Data also indicate that strong family ties and rural background are more positively correlated with life and job satisfaction. Expectation and aspiration of young workers also found affecting the quality of working life.
The unauthorized absenteeism rates in two large textile factories at
Isfahan in Iran was compared by Kavoussi et al. (1978). The working conditions in the study factory were unsatisfactory, unlike the control factory. Findings show significantly higher absenteeism rates in the study factory. In view of the widespread consequences of such absenteeism, it is recommended that closer attention be paid for improving the quality of working life.
National Seminar on improving the quality of working life (1982) was convened to enquire into the direction of Quality of Work Life activities in India and prepare an action plan for implementing the Quality of Work Life concepts. The recommendation from the National seminar published in the Journal of Productivity (1982) states that at the enterprise level, improvement of quality of work life should be through the co-operative endeavor between management and unions. The conference pointed out that the Government could help in improving Quality of Work Life through legislation, executive policy and action through its entrepreneurial role in the public sector. It recommended the need for engaging and involving shop-floor level staff in the management and policy decisions for improvement in Quality of Work Life.
Based on his various studies and wide experiences, Mehta (1982) indicated that work does not occupy a central place in the life space of the Indian worker. According to him, in the present context, where hard economic factors like monetary compensations, fringe benefits and work amenities are dominant, nature and design of jobs may not be a significant factor in the current ethos. It did not show a clear linkage between job satisfaction and a general sense of life satisfaction. One important finding of this research is that the younger entrance to work organization and younger employees showed greater work-related dissatisfaction tended to decrease with increasing age of employees.
In an endeavor to analyze the conceptual aspect of improving quality of life in working environment and the experiments done in Rashtriya Chemicals and Fertilizers Ltd, Sanyal and Singh (1982) ascertained that the term improving the quality of working life is basically concerned with improving the work satisfaction of employees as an effective corporate motivational strategy.
It is sought to be achieved through re-orientation and restructuring of job content.
With an interest in Job Satisfaction, within the work setting, Lynch and Verdin (1983) studied the Job Satisfaction differences among library units and among occupational groups within libraries. The relationships of sex, age and tenure to the Job Satisfaction of library employees also were explored. The results suggests that the chief satisfying factors were achievement and recognition, and the chief dissatisfying factors were Institutional Policy and Administration, Supervision and interpersonal relationships. The reference librarians working in academic libraries were more satisfied than catalog librarian. No significant differences were found between Age and Job Satisfaction or between Tenure and Job Satisfaction. Satisfaction tended to increase with Experience, Mobility, with Seniority of the post and with Managerial level.
An explorative study has been made by Nitish (1984) to develop various criteria for a good work life and life generally and sets forth some organizational methods by which these can be achieved at the level of organizational unit, the country and the world. He has identified some dimensions of Quality of Work Life in respect of organizational form, hierarchy and staffing pattern, work group size, internal network and communication concern for quality, concern for people, ideals and values etc.
According to him lesser the managers and supervisors level is in an organization, the better would be the Quality of Work Life.
Jain 1991, made an attempt to identify the potential dimensions of Quality of Work Life in the sample unit for all hierarchical levels in a large private industry and to study the quality of Work Life at various hierarchical levels for understanding different effect of Quality of Work Life dimensions.
Studying the hierarchical effects in viewing the Quality of Working Life and the effect of Quality of Working Life on Group Behaviour were the twin goals taken for the study. The investigation was concentrated on; the administration, shipping, sales, carpentry, security, plant, painting and stores departments of the industry. The population studied had strength of 644 employees spread over the eight departments in the industry. A questionnaire (QWL Scale) developed by the investigator was used to collect data on ‘QWL’. The scale includes eight basic major factors (1) Adequate Income and Fair Compensation, (2) Safe and Healthy Working Conditions, (3) Immediate Opportunities to use human capacities, (4) opportunity for Continued Growth and Security, (5) Social Integration in the work organization, (6) Constitutionalism in work organization, (7) Work and Total Life Space, and (8) Social Relevance of Working Life. The data were collected through questionnaire from five strata of the employees, namely Executives, Supervisors, Skilled Workers, Semiskilled workers and Unskilled workers across the eight departments. The questionnaire was administered individually and instructions, which were very simple, were conveyed to the individuals verbally with assurance of keeping the anonymity of the name and the information furnished. The responses were obtained on seven point dimensions i.e. Strongly Disagree, Disagree, Slightly Disagree, Neither Agree Nor Disagree, Slightly Agree, Agree, and Strongly Agree. On the hierarchical effects of QWL, it was found that there were differences at various hierarchical levels of the organization in perceiving their working life. Higher levels were found to have better perception regarding their working life than workers level on all the sub factors of QWL and overall QWL. On the effect of QWL on group behavior, it was observed that some QWL factors were positively contributing towards group cohesiveness. For instance, in the shipping department, maximum number of significant correlations was observed between QWL factors and Group Cohesiveness, which has been ascribed to the functional peculiarities of this group. Painting, store and security departments on the other hand failed to show such significant relationship. Based on these findings the investigator states that the Quality of Work Life factors get moderated by functional peculiarities of any work group and have differential effects on Group Cohesiveness.

2.6 OTHER CRITERIA FOR MEASURING QWL
According to Balu (2001), Quality of Work Life encompasses various aspects relating to (1) Working Environment and (2) Employee Motivation.
Employee Motivation consists of (i) Proper Communication at Shop-level, (ii) Employee Facilities, (iii) Employee Performance Recognition, (iv) Employee Participation with team spirit, (v) Development and Job redesign and Job enrichment, (vi) Dynamic HRD factors, and (vii) Status of family. These aspects are summed up as below.
(1) Quality of Working Environment
Quality of work environment is an essential element for quality of work life. The management can normally ensure such an environment in the following way: Continuous, committed and concerted housekeeping, safety provisions and promotion, welfare amenities upkeep and environment, and occupational health and medical services. Safety culture is an essential element in the quality of work life. The environmental factors like sanitation, drinking water, rest shelters, ventilation, lighting facilities etc. do affect the quality of work life. These factors require continuous improvements.
(2) Motivational Factors
Employee motivation is the main activity for Human Resource Development thrust on quality of work life. The factors relating to employee motivation are: -
Proper Communication at shop level
The main object of Human Resource Development philosophy is respect for the dignity of the worker as a human being and motivates his enormous potential for contribution and growth. Human resource development efforts have therefore to gain the confidence of the worker that he is seen as a member who is important to the organization. Proper communication plays a pivotal role to achieve results in this priority area. Besides the traditional methods of information sharing through house journals, notice boards, shop campaigns, etc., novelty can be experienced for orienting shop communication in tune with the process of work.
(ii) Employee facilities
Grievance redressal is a must for an organization. Grievance handling has advanced from a formalistic system to a predictive culture. Moving close with the workers and shop grievance enquiries reveal the problems of the workers not only at the workplace but also beyond its periphery. Canteen facilities have become a must today. Canteen facilities form an important factor in determining the estimation of worker on the company’s care for him. Generally the co-operative stores are set up to enable the workers to acquire experience in the process of management autonomy. All these efforts are made with the desire to keep the worker constructively engaged in the work place. Provision of catering services to the shop floor and mobile van services to scattered places are efforts to extend satisfaction levels of employees. Home counseling is also undertaken to positively correlate the living habits with work attitudes.
(iii) Employee Performance Recognition
Recognition of employee’s performance increases the morale of them and stimulates an urge to excel at the work place, spreading cheer to the families and enhancing the social status of the employee. Sometimes photographs of good performers are displayed and also at felicitation functions publicity in house journals, letters of appreciation- all these increase the morale of the individual and team efforts to boost the quality of work.
(iv) Employee Participation with Team-spirit
To maximize enrichment of quality of work life, the management has to generate team spirit and a sense of involvement among the workers. For instance the activities like celebration of the anniversary of the commissioning the department, by involving all the staff give a sense of togetherness among them. Formation of participative group like quality circles enable the committed work teams, voluntarily take up improvements in their area of work.
(v) Development and Job Enrichment
Job satisfaction increases work efficiency and hence they are indispensable elements of work-life. Initially the Human resource development aims to develop the knowledge and skills of the worker to keep pace. Human resource development attention on shop training activities and multi-skill development have positively shaped the attitudes and competencies of the workforce and improved the possibilities to optimize their utilization.
Formulation, propagation and adherence to standard operating practices on specific work positions, imparting shop based training through unit training centers, multi-trade training and induction orientation for fresh recruits, identification of the skill needs of the existing employees in the revised job combinations and enrichment of their knowledge/competencies through on-the job training are the various activities in this regard.
(vi) QWL and HRD Efforts
Evolving dynamic HRD strategies also boost the Quality of Work Life of the employees. Human resource development philosophy strongly believes that the workers involved in the process of work are the best qualified to bring about improvements in their area of work. Every worker has creative abilities, which can be tapped through managerial encouragement and support. From this angle the suggestion scheme has emerged as a dynamic Human Resource Development mechanism. While the attraction of awards for the suggestions is an offshoot of the scheme, the satisfaction potential inherent in the implementation of the worker’s own ideas of improvement provides the drive and impetus to the improvement efforts in the shop-floor.
(vii) QWL and Increasing the Status of the family
The family of the employees may not have a proper understanding of the work place in which the employee spends a major portion of the day and earns living. Hence the family members may not know his pressures of work, day to-day stresses and strains, the nature of his responsibility and the implications of his job accountability. He goes from home everyday not merely to earn their livelihood but to play a meaningful role as a strong link in the human chain of the company. Thus, he lives in between two worlds, that is, his sphere of activities at the work-place and a different world at home. Human Resource Development takes care of the responsibility of unifying these two worlds. The interactions of managers with the family members and the warmth of hospitality create a climate of homeliness in the shop floor. This practice has brought the families closer to the company and enabled them to develop right attitudes to the working life of the employees.

2.7 POPULAR QWL PROGRAMMES
There are innovations and implementations of various schemes to have good working conditions and congenial work environment to the workers and the organizations for high productivity, service efficiency, effectiveness etc. to attain an improved Quality of Work Life. Bhatia and Singh (2000) have established some popular QWL
Bohlander (2000) has identified the following common problems of implementing QWL programmes.
a) Managerial Attitudes and
b) Union Influence.
(a) Managerial Attitudes
The philosophy of Quality of Work Life is based on the belief in worker participation. This implies that management must be prepared and willing to allow its employees some say or influence on decisions about conditions or processes which affect their work tasks and environment. Traditional managers may perceive this phenomenon as a challenge to their rights to control and to make decisions, which influence worker’s work and environment. They may not be willing to delegate decision-making to the rank and file level. Managers generally believe that employees are inherently lazy, lack responsibility, and require close supervision, are likely to resist any attempt towards QWL pogrammes. Such managers will set objectives for subordinates and will limit employee participation.
A change in managerial attitudes at all levels is important in order that any QWL programme be successful.
(b) Union Influence
Labour unions can impose significantly on the success and failure of QWL programmes. Union leaders often believe that Quality of Work Life projects are management’s tools to improve productivity or to speed up work performance in order to extract more work from workers without corresponding compensation.

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CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
3.0 Introduction
In this chapter, the methodology adopted in this study will be discussed. It includes research design, the method of data collection, identification of the population, sample size, sampling procedures, method of data analysis, and operational measures of variables.
3.1 Research Design
(Saunders et al, 1997) point out that “A research design or strategy is a general plan of how to go about answering the research questions. It contains the clear objectives, derived from the research questions and specify the sources of data collection" Research design also means the structuring of investigation aimed at identifying variables and their relationships to one another. This is used for the purpose of obtaining data to enable the researcher test hypotheses or answer research questions. It is an outline or a scheme that serves as a useful guide to the researcher in his efforts to generate data for his study (Asika, 1991).
For the purpose of this study, the questionnaire method has been adopted as the research design and the exploratory research design has been employed which is geared towards the collection of data for hypotheses testing. Causal design was also employed to test the relationships between the variables in the hypotheses formulated for the purpose of this study.

3.2 Population of the Study
According to (Asika: 1991). “The population is a census of all the elements or subjects of interest and may be finite or infinite” “The full set of cases from which the sample is taken is called the population” (Saunders et al: 1997). The population in this study consists of both the off-shore and on-shore worker of West-Africa Catering services limited in Rivers and Delta State. The population of employees is said to be 1000 based on interview conducted with management for there branches in Port Harcourt and Delta State.

3.3 Sampling Procedure and Sampling Size
Sampling techniques provide a range of methods that enables the researcher to reduce the amount of data the researcher needs to collect by considering only data from a subgroup rather than all possible cases (Saunders et al: 1997). Thus, this study would be based on sample size derived using the Yaro Yamen’s formula (Baridam, 2001:96) on the West-Africa Catering Services in Rivers and Delta State as given below: n= Where n = sample size sought e = level of significance N = population size n = n = n = 285
The sample size for the research is therefore calculated as 285.

3.4 Data Collection Methods
Two methods of data collection are adopted in this study.
i. Primary Sources -Structured Questionnaire
A well-structured questionnaire was prepared and would be administered to the West Africa Catering Nigeria Limited. There were thirty-five (35) questions in all, which were subdivided into different facets of quality of work-life.
Each part consists of questions with five different options. These were very dissatisfied, dissatisfied, neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, satisfied and very satisfied. The calibrations were as follows: very dissatisfied = 5, dissatisfied = 4, neither satisfied nor dissatisfied = 3, satisfied = 2 and very satisfied = 1. ii. Secondary Sources
This aspect involves the collection of secondary data from magazines, journals and textbooks, e-books and online articles. Sources of secondary data would be fully acknowledged in the references.

3.5 Operational Measures of Variables
The researcher would employ the qualitative scale for measures of variables because, the questionnaire would be design in ordinal scale for the all part of the questionnaire, in order to classify observation into category and ranking respectively.
3.6 Data Analysis Techniques
Data obtained from the questionnaire would be analyzed through the use of simple percentages, tables and averages.
Spearman Rank Correlation Coefficient would be used in analyzing the research hypotheses because, “it indicate the degree of effectiveness in predicting one-ranked variable based on another ranked variable” Baridam, (2001).
The formula for spearman rank correlation order is given below as: rs = 1 - 6∑ d2 N3-N
Where rs = Spearman Rank Order Correlation ∑d2 = Sum of the Squared Differences in the ranking of the Subject on the two variables. N = Number of subjects being ranked.
The researcher strongly believes that the methods employed will sufficiently portray the observations and justify the generalizations made from the investigation.

REFERENCES
Asika, N (1991) Research Methodology in the Behavioral Sciences, Lagos: Longman Nigeria Plc.

Baridam, D.M. (2001) Research methods in Administrative Sciences: Port Harcourt: sherbrooke Associates.
Saunders, M. Lewis, P. and Thornhill, A. (1997) Research Methods for Business Students: Pitman, London.

RESEARCH QUESTIONNAIRE
APPENDIX
Department of Management Science Faculty of Management Sciences University of Port Harcourt Date:………………
QUESTIONNAIRE
LETTER OF INTRODUCTION
Dear Sir/Madam, I am a master in Business Administrative student of the above department conducting a study on quality of work-life and business performance.
The study is solely for academic purpose. Kindly provide answers as you deem fit. You are assured of utmost confidentiality for every information provided.

Yours faithfully,

Abu Ismaila Ibrahim

References: Greenhaus, J.H. and P.J. Beutell, 1999. Sources of conflict between work and family roles. Acad. Manag. Rev., 10: 76-88. Hackman, J.R., and G.R., Oldham, 1980. Work Redesign. Reading, M.A: Addison-Wesley. Hartenstein, B.A. and Huddleston, S. 1984. Rational versus gender role expectations for work family conflict. J. Appl. Psychol., 76: 560-68. Heskett, J.L., Sasser, W.E., Jr and L.A., Schlesinger, 1997. “The service profit chain”. New York: The Free Press. Kossek, C. and Ozeki, I. 1999. Work-family conflict in the dual-career family. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 51: 51-75. Lawler E. E., LLL, 1982. “Strategies for Improving the Quality of Work Life”. American Psychologist, 37, pp. 486-693. Lewis, S. 1997. “An International Perspective on Work-Family Issues” In: S. Parasuraman and J.H. Greenhaus eds Integrating Work and Family: Challenges and Choices for a Changing World. Westport, CN: Quorum Books. Lockwood, W.F., 2005. Managing Human Resources: Productivity, Quality of Work Life, Profits. Serey, T.T., 2006. “Choosing a Robust Quality of Work Life”. Business Forum, 27(2), pp. 7-10. Suttle, J.L., 1997. “Improving Life at Work: Problem and Prospects”. In H.R. Hackman and J.L Suttle eds Improving Life at Work: Behavioural Science approaches to organizational change (pp. 1-29). Santa Barbara, CA: Goodyear. Keith (2002) observes that, historically the concept of Quality of Work Life had originally included only the issues of wages, working hours, and working conditions According to Keith (2002), Quality of Work Life refers to “the favourableness or unfavourableness of a job environment for people”. The basic purpose in this regard is to develop jobs aiming at Human Resource Development as well as production enhancement. However, Singh (1983) states that, Quality of Work Life is not based on any theory. It is concerned with overall climate of work place. Reduced supervision, increased self-regulation and self-management are pillars of Quality of Work Life. Cohen and Rosenthal (1980) describes Quality of Work Life as an intentionally designed effort to bring out increased labour management, and cooperation to jointly solve the problem of improving organizational performance and employee satisfaction. Quality of Work Life concept enumerated by Boisvert and Theriault (1974) is as structured below: Global Role of work in one’s life 2.2 BUSINESS PERFORMANCE According to Ngerobo (2000:45) business performance involves the area of business intelligence which ensures the monitoring and managing of an organization’s performance against the laid down objectives of the company. Business performance itself can be measured in three buckets (Hugh, 2002). 2.3 CRITERIA FOR MEASURING QUALITY OF WORK LIFE The selected constructs of QWL that is used in this paper are derived from the Cummings and Worley’s model (Cummings and Worley, 1997) who have used the dimensions widely in their QWL studies Walton (1974) also identified the eight dimensions, which make up the quality of working life framework which will be discussed in details in the section.