Value Orientation of Employees and Its Impact on Performance

Abstract

Value Orientation is gaining attention of management thinkers due to its inevitable role in employees performance. Management literature conceptually supports the role played by values in grooming the work performance. There have been a lot of conceptual researches which relate to value orientation and its impact on performance at workplace. These studies are moreover conceptual in nature and not so conclusive. Therefore, the present study was conducted to address the literature gap by proposing and validating a comprehensive framework of value congruence among employees. Education sector plays a significant role for the growth of a society. Value orientation of education sector employees has direct influence on the young generation. Therefore, to empirically explore and validate the relationship of value orientation on employee performance, this study was conducted on education (higher education) sector employees. This study presents a comprehensive framework of precursors and outcomes of value orientation at workplace. The framework is derived from extensive literature review. It includes two constructs - religiosity and spirituality as the precursors of value orientation of employees. It includes creativity, ability to take initiative, to excel and innovate as the important performance outcomes. These performance outcomes have been drawn from the Performance Based Appraisal System (PBAS) of University Grants Commission. These performance outcomes are not only applicable to education sector employees but also relevant for employees in general. newlineA sample of 240 higher education employees was drawn from Agra region to validate the framework using standard scales. The findings of the study report that there are five prominent values (religious, social, democratic, knowledge and family prestige values) which have a direct impact on employees performance. This study identifies various useful insights for academic institutions, policy makers in particular and business organizations in general. It underscores the role of religiosity, spirituality and value orientation of employees for their performance outcomes. It has strong managerial implications for hiring, career planning, succession planning, compensation and reward management systems in organizations. It also highlights the role of leadership for creating value based organization culture. newline newline