3. Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) - All submissions
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Item The influences of attachment style and implicit person theories on employee coaching needs(2019) Van Steenderen, MargaretThe purpose of this research is to learn more about what effects employees when it comes to employee coaching, specifically if their attachment style and implicit person theory would affect their coaching willingness and needs, predominantly within a South African context. Employee coaching is one on one coaching by a manager with their employees. Theory and research have identified employee coaching as a potential key tool to drive development, employee satisfaction and improve performance. This research has drawn heavily on executive coaching literature with primary emphases on practical implementation and outcomes for the executive as coachee. Employee coaching literature places the manager as coach and the employee as coachee and therefore entails different dynamics. However, less is known about the dynamics and choices within the employee coaching relationship, such as, drivers of the employee’s desire to be coached and perceived needs within coaching. This thesis seeks to address these questions. This thesis chooses two psychologically derived major drivers of employee willingness to be coached and needs. The first antecedent is attachment theory which assesses the individual’s foundational personal style of relationship forming and interaction which is widely believed to be formed early in life. Attachment styles vary from secure to insecure with various classifications. Theoretically, therefore, since employee coaching involves a relationship including the potential for intimacy with an authority figure theory suggests the attachment styles could play an important role. Implicit person theory measures the extent to which a person believes people can change or be changed. Since coaching is a developmental process, the employee’s belief that he or she can change could be expected to again have an important effect on the employee’s willingness to be changed and the type of coaching desired. In order to address these research questions, a survey measuring attachment style, implicit person theory, coaching needs and coaching willingness was devised and distributed electronically with 441 respondents. Have established factor structure through reliability and confirmatory factor analyses, the main analyses employed correlations and structural equation modelling. Attachment theory and implicit person theory has some effect on employee coaching willingness and needs. These results are presented along with recommendations and future research questions.Item Team collaboration during the concept and viability stage of the development process(2018) Veldsman, DewaldThe purpose of the research is to study team collaboration during the concept and viability stage of the property development process. Most construction project teams comprise participants from different professions that combine to form temporary organisations aimed at achieving the common objective of delivering a project. Available tools can facilitate an environment, conducive to better collaboration and integration of people and processes, which ultimately contributes to better value for the producer. However, the implementation of these tools among the professional team in the Johannesburg context is not well understood.Item Knowledge translation methods of the Gauteng Provincial Government employee health and wellness programme(2017) Mtshengu, Vuyolwethu B RThe integration of new discoveries in health programmes has been an integral part of improving their implementation and outcomes. However, there is an information gap that tends to exist between policy developers, decision makers, researchers, and implementers. This often results in misunderstanding and inconsistencies from ‘what is implemented’ versus ‘what should be implemented’ due to differences in interpreting and using the knowledge available. Using a qualitative research approach, this study set out to explore how the Gauteng Provincial Government’s (GPG) Employee Health and Wellness Programme (EHWP) translates knowledge into implementation. It considers the different designated Knowledge Translation (KT) roles in the programme as well as the hindrances that exist in executing the identified KT methods. Data was collected through reviewing relevant documents to the programme in the public sector, conducting two focus groups with ten participants as well as five in-depth individual interviews, using semi-structured questionnaires. The participants represented ten Gauteng provincial departments and two national departments. The data was analysed using the thematic analysis approach to establish contrasting and correlating information in the emerging themes. The themes were compared to the Knowledge to Action (KTA) model, to assess the correlation with the existing KT frameworks in literature. The significant finding of the study indicated that the established GPG EHWP KT methods, have taken on the steps of the KTA model. However, they did not adopt its process sequence, nor did they have a specified clear path that was practised in the programme. This resulted in a knowledge gap, misinterpretation, and confusion at implementation level. Therefore, the programme may benefit from having a systematic framework, which will be able to guide KT, assess barriers, and clarify roles at each stage of implementation.Item The influence of coaching behaviours by managers on employee engagement(2017) Conidaris, CarynThis research was conducted to explore the influence of managerial coaching behaviours on employee engagement. Organisations need to retain engaged people who are productive and energetic to achieve the organisational success within an ever-changing environment. This might be enabled through the coaching behaviours of managers. While extensive research has been conducted on managerial coaching as a tool to support people to achieve performance, attain goals of the organisation, manage organisational transitions, and, achieve learning, research is limited on how managers can create engagement through utilising managerial coaching behaviours. Organisations need sustainable interventions that will positively impact the overall engagement of people. The manager is a crucial point of contact with people, and is able to create or destroy people’s engagement. This research has a constructivist or interpretivist approach and uses a case study methodology where five cases were analysed and cross-case analysed by interpreting the experiences of managers and two of their team members selected by extreme or purposive sampling on their engagement levels; in other words, one engaged and one disengaged person was interviewed per case as well as the manager. The findings established that engaged employees have a higher perception of their manager’s coaching behaviours than disengaged colleagues, and that all the managers were highly engaged yet varied in how they perceived their own coaching behaviours, and in turn, how they influence engagement. The managers’ use of a more empowering coaching style enhances engagement and their coaching behaviours influence fluctuating engagement levels, while a reflective practice within managerial coaching enables deeper understanding of perspectives, and in turn, engagement, but is not a common practice amongst managers. Engagement levels were also influenced by; coaching conversations which occur on a continuum from informal to formal; the manager’s coaching ability to create a sense of accountability and ownership; an agile or flexible managerial coaching approach in response to learning or business needs; and, the relationships and presence of the manager. The expertise of managers was valued irrespective of the perception of coaching behaviours or levels of employee engagement. Positive feedback and praise from the manager makes people feel recognised and significant, while the predominant managerial coaching behaviours falls within the performance coaching paradigm. Organisations need to develop the coaching behaviours of their managers to impact on the organisation’s and the individual’s performance, longer term development, skills acquisition, and wellbeing.Item The mediating effect of employee engagement on person-organisation-fit and turnover intention(2016-07-28) Lekhuleng, BabitsanangPast studies revealed that the existence of congruence between employees and their organisation produces more favourable attitudes and behaviours. This study sought to highlight the need for an intermediary link between person organisation fit and turnover intention, and to propose the integration of employee engagement as a potential mediating factor. The sample for this research consisted of 426 employees from diverse military units. Correlation and regression analyses were conducted to test the direct and mediating relationships between key variables. Four hypotheses were tested. Hypothesis 1 stated that there will be a significant negative relationship between P-O fit and turnover intention and it was statistically supported. Hypothesis 2 stated that there will be a significant negative relationship between employee engagement and turnover intention and it was also statistically supported. Hypothesis 3 stated that there will be a significant positive relationship between P-O fit and employee engagement, this hypothesis was also confirmed through a significant statistical result. Lastly, Hypothesis 4 stated that employee engagement will mediate the relationship between P-O fit and turnover intention. This hypothesis was supported through the finding that employee engagement partially mediated the relationship between P-O fit and turnover intention The results showed that employee engagement partially mediates the relationship between the person-organisation fit and turnover intention. This suggests that person-organisation fit (in terms of value and goal congruence) provides greater meaningfulness and psychological attachment, which then leads individuals to a higher level of employee engagement. So, in short, the study showed that individuals with a higher level of employee engagement would be less likely to leave their organisations.Item The role of implicit person theories and psychological capital in workplace thriving(2016) Levy, RonitThe aim of the current study was to investigate two possible mechanisms that might facilitate thriving in the workplace, namely implicit person theories and psychological capital. These variables were chosen because of their potential to operate in accordance with Barbara Fredrickson’s broaden and build hypothesis, with implicit person theories working to broaden thought-action repertoires, and psychological capital working to build personal resources. The study employed a quantitative, non-experimental, correlational, and cross sectional design. A sample of 226 working adults living in South Africa volunteered to participate in the study. They completed four online questionnaires: a demographic questionnaire; the Thriving at Work Scale; the Implicit Person Theories Scale; and the Psychological Capital Questionaire-24 (PCQ-24). To test the hypothesis that implicit person theories and psychological capital jointly facilitate the experience of workplace thriving, a series of correlations, regressions, and mediation analyses were conducted. The results indicated that psychological capital does indeed mediate the relationship between implicit person theories and workplace thriving.Item Personality traits, motivation and knowledge worker productivity(2016) Akure, Peace MajorieIn an economic environment where knowledge based-work is the strategic component of value creation and competitive advantage, knowledge workers have become the engine that drives sustainability and profitability. Knowledge workers are described as workers with high degrees of education, expertise and whose primary task is to create, distribute and apply knowledge. With the increasing demand and number of knowledge workers in the work force, the productivity of knowledge workers has become an imperative management task as well as a decisive economic factor. Despite the continuous stream of research on knowledge worker productivity, knowledge worker productivity continues to be one of the greatest challenges facing managers today. Knowledge worker productivity refers to ability of knowledge workers to effectively collect, create and use inherent knowledge to produce goods and services. Inherent knowledge is highly personal and cannot be separated from the person who holds it. Further, inherent knowledge is closely related to the technical skills that an individual has and are only known to the person who possesses those skills. If organisations wish to leverage this inherent knowledge to their competitive advantage, they need to know how to engage and stimulate the deepest parts of the human mind. However, no two individuals are the same. Personnel psychology literature has long stressed that meaningful differences exist between people. These individual differences influence individual work performance and behaviour. Although several studies have addressed the issue of personality predicting job performance, there is a lack of knowledge of the relationship between personality, motivation and knowledge worker productivity, specifically in the South African context. This study attempts to address this lack of knowledge through a quantitative study of the relationship between personality, motivation and knowledge worker productivity. The study investigated whether the intrinsic personalities of knowledge workers and motivation predict knowledge worker productivity. Although several studies have directly addressed the issue of personality predicting job performance, few studies have directly investigated whether motivation mediates the relationship between personality and specifically knowledge worker productivity. Consequently, there is limited evidence to support the arguments of the present study. The theoretical and practical implications for knowledge worker productivity are discussed.Item The role of the line manager as performance coach(2014-07-11) Govender, Barbara AnnThe effective practise of managers as coaches can have a positive impact on the performance and development of employees, and provide an organisation with a significant competitive edge. The implementation of manager-coaches in South African organisations is slowly gaining traction, and this study examines this approach in a large financial institution. The primary objective of this research was to identify the roles and skills needed by line managers to become successful performance coaches, as well as the key benefits to the organisation as a whole. Descriptive, qualitative methodology was selected to conduct this study. The population sample was drawn from a large financial services organisation, with approximately 45 000 employees across Africa. The research participants are all line managers working in different business areas, with varying years of experience. A research questionnaire was used to conduct face-to-face, semi structured interviews with respondents. Data collected was then transcribed and analysed by means of content and thematic analysis. The interviews confirmed that the line managers understood performance coaching as a process to address and close the performance gaps of their employees. Some managers equated performance coaching to performance management or mentoring. The manager-coaches identified their primary roles as: to enable performance, motivate and inspire, and provide support. The key skills required were highlighted as communication; listening; interpersonal skills; emotional intelligence; empathy; questioning skills, and goal setting. It emerged that good performers are coached less frequently than poor performers. Some managers have a set frequency such as monthly or weekly, whilst others use it as required, in line with their normal leadership style. This finding is considered to be very important to answer the research question: if managers were conducting performance coaching informally and in an ad hoc fashion, did they believe in the benefits and did they see this as a priority in developing their staff?