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NATIONAL ECONOMIC UNIVERSITYBACHELOR BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION IN ENGLISH- - -- - -GROUP ASSIGNMENTOrganizational BehaviorJOB SATISFACTION IN APPLEMembers: Phan Thi Minh Cham - 11180696Le Nguyen Han Anh - 11186034Duong Hoang Long - 11183032Do Le Duy Long - 11183022Tran Binh Minh - 11183380Vu Hoang ...

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NATIONAL ECONOMIC UNIVERSITY BACHELOR BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION IN ENGLISH - - -- - -

GROUP ASSIGNMENT Organizational Behavior

JOB SATISFACTION IN APPLE

Members: 11180696

Phan Thi Minh Cham Le Nguyen Han Anh 11186034 Duong Hoang Long - 11183032 Do Le Duy Long - 11183022 Tran Binh Minh - 11183380 Vu Hoang Mai - 11183273 Nguyen Thi Thu - 11184748 Le Duc Thanh - 11184478

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August, 2020

Table of Contents I.

Introduction...............................................................................................................2 1. Research introduction............................................................................................2 2. Overview about Apple............................................................................................2 3. Vision, Mission and Value Statement of Apple.....................................................2

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Job satisfaction in Apple........................................................................................2

1. Overview of job satisfaction..................................................................................2 2. Job satisfaction issue in Apple...............................................................................4 III.

Recommendation and suggestion..........................................................................5

1. Recommendation....................................................................................................5 2. Research limitation................................................................................................6 3. Suggestion for further research.............................................................................7 IV.

References............................................................................................................... 7

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I.

Introduction

1. Research introduction Organizational behavior problems always have a great impact on the overall performance of the organization. This research looks into the job satisfaction issue of Apple through 3 main ideas:  Job satisfaction in Apple: the state; problems and reasons.  Recommendations for job satisfaction problems  Limitations of the study and suggestion for further research.

2. Overview about Apple Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation that designs and manufactures consumer electronics and computer software products. Apple Computer Company was founded on April 1, 1976, by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak. At the end of August 2020, Apple’s stock market was nearly 2145 billion USD. The company's best - known hardware products include Macintosh computers, the iPod and the iPhone. Apple software includes the Mac OS X operating system, the iTunes media browser, the iLife suite of multimedia and creativity software, the iWork suite of productivity software, ...

3. Vision, Mission and Value Statement of Apple  The vision statement of Apple: "Apple is committed to bringing the best personal computing experience to students, educators, creative professionals, and consumers around the world through its innovative hardware, software, and internet offerings."  The mission statement of Apple: According to The Economist, Steve Jobs mission statement for Apple is: "To contribute to the world by making tools for the mind that advance humankind."  Value statement: The value statement of Apple is " Think Different."

4. Apple’s core value Some of the company’s core value that direct their strategies and products are:  We believe in simple, not complex  We believe that we need to own and control the primary technologies behind the products we make.  We don’t settle for anything less than excellence in every group in the company, and we have the self-honesty to admit when we’re wrong and the courage to change.

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 We participate only in markets where we can make a significant contribution.

5. Apple organizational structure Apple Inc.’s organizational structure contributes to effective and rapid innovation, which is a critical success factor of the business in the information technology, online services, and consumer electronics industries. The company’s structural characteristics maintain a traditional hierarchy, with some key elements from other types of organizational structure. Initially, Apple success is linked with Steve Jobs innovative thinking and leadership. Now, under Tim Cook’s leadership, Apple has made some small changes in its organizational structure to suit current global market and industry demands. Apple Inc. has a hierarchical organizational structure. In the past, everything went through Steve Jobs. Jobs made all the major strategic management decisions. However, under Tim Cook’s leadership, this hierarchy in Apple’s corporate structure has slightly changed. The company now has more collaboration among different parts of the organization, such as software teams and hardware teams. The structure now is less rigid

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II.

Job satisfaction in Apple

1. Overview of job satisfaction 1.1 Theory about job satisfaction These are a limited number of attitudes that form positive or negative evaluations employees hold about their work environments. These attitudes are closely connected, and they work collectively to dictate the level of workplace contentment. Much of the research has looked at three main attitudes:  Job satisfaction: A positive feeling about one’s job resulting from an evaluation of its characteristics.  Job involvement: The degree to which a person identifies with a job, actively participates in it, and considers performance important to self-worth.  Organizational commitment: The degree to which an employee identifies with a particular organization and its goals and wishes to maintain membership in the organization Nevertheless, other important attitudes that also have influence over job satisfaction include:  Psychological empowerment: Employees’ belief in the degree to which they affect their work environment, their competence, the meaningfulness of their job, and their perceived autonomy in their work.  Perceived organizational support (POS): The degree to which employees believe an organization values their contribution and cares about their well-being.  Power distance: The degree to which people in a country accept that power in institutions and organizations is distributed unequally.  Employee engagement: An individual’s involvement with, satisfaction with, and enthusiasm for the work he or she does. 1.2 How to measure job satisfaction There are two main ways to measure job satisfaction  The single global rating: it is a response to one question such as “All things considered, how satisfied are you with your job?” Respondents circle a number between 1 and 5 on a scale from “highly satisfied” to “highly dissatisfied.”  The summation of job facets: It identifies key elements in a job such as the type of work, skills needed, supervision, present pay, promotion opportunities, culture, and relationships with coworkers. Respondents rate these on a standardized scale, and researchers add the ratings to create an overall job satisfaction score. 1.3 Factor that have influence over job satisfaction  Job conditions: it refers to the working environment and all existing circumstances affecting labor in the workplace, including job hours, physical aspects, legal rights and responsibilities among which the intrinsic nature of the work itself, social interactions, and supervision—are important predictors of job satisfaction.

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 Personality: As important as job conditions are to job satisfaction, personality also plays an important role. People who have positive core self-evaluations (CSEs)—who believe in their inner worth and basic competence—are more satisfied with their jobs than people with negative CSEs  Payment: Salary is a fixed amount of money or compensation paid to an employee by an employer in return for work performed. It correlates with job satisfaction and overall happiness for many people, but the effect can be smaller once an individual reaches a standard level of comfortable living.  Corporate social responsibility: An organization’s self-regulated actions to benefit society or the environment beyond what is required by law. According to research, people who view their work as part of a higher purpose often realize higher job satisfaction. It means that employees would feel more content if their company can bring about positive influence for the community.

2. Job satisfaction issue in Apple Job satisfaction is undeniably an important factor for the sustainable development of human resources as well as organizational performance. To be specific, job satisfaction is related to several issues in the workplace, including job performance, organizational citizenship behavior, customer satisfaction, absenteeism, turnover, and workplace deviance. Firstly, employee satisfaction is closely related to productivity as it creates a pleasant atmosphere within the organization for staff to perform in a better and efficient manner. Secondly, satisfied workers tend to talk positively about the organization, help others, and contribute actively to the better of it. Thirdly, in the service industry where employees have to deal with customers most of their working time, satisfaction is positively related to customer outcomes. Fourthly, a negative relationship exists between satisfaction and absenteeism as dissatisfied employees are likely to miss work. Fifthly, the turnover rate does have a negative relation with satisfaction; however, it also depends on the alternative employment opportunities perceived by workers. Lastly, dissatisfaction in employees can lead to deviant behavior in the workplace which includes such behaviors as unionization attempts, substance abuse, stealing at work, undue socializing, and tardiness. In Apple’s case, Apple Company is quite good for giving the employee’s job satisfaction (Mollah et al., 2015). According to Apple retail chief Angela Ahrendts, Apple Stores employees stick with their jobs and had a retention rate of 81% in 2015. In terms of customer satisfaction, according to a Statista survey in 2017, half of U.S. consumers were very satisfied with Apple’s customer service, with a further 38 percent saying that they were rather satisfied. Only three percent of U.S. consumers who used Apple with their own accounts reported dissatisfaction with Apple’s customer service. However, the company employee absenteeism increases and higher turnover effects in the company (Mollah et al., 2015). The aforementioned research reveals some employee

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satisfaction areas found in Apple stores through the interview conducted in the research. Such problems relate to the balance wages according to the working load, sufficient salary, flexible working place, flexible working hours, flexible shifts, improvement of personal requirement, balance with life and work, improve the working environments, teamwork, respect, and good behavior get from the managements, give freedom to express the opinion, etc. Additionally, employee satisfaction is related to financial support like getting a bonus and intensive pension after retirement, getting safety from the company, etc. Environmental issues are also the factors of employee job satisfaction in Apple. For getting job satisfaction in the job place every organization needs to arrange comfortable and secure working environments. Age differences and gender differences in job satisfaction vary in the company. Generally, problems related to job satisfaction in Apple are mainly resulted from the 4 below factors:  Underpayment: Salary is very important for an employee. It’s among the primary causes that dictate the contentment of workers toward their jobs. And for such a demanding workload of Apple Company, a number of employees are reported to feel that their salary does not match their contribution. They believe that they are underpaid as other companies offer higher wages for the same position.  Inappropriate working schedule for sales employee: Apple sales employees have different working schedules reassigned weekly for them by the company. Some report that they find it hard to adjust accordingly to this unpredictable timetable. And they said that it is difficult for them to arrange time for their family.  Cultural differences: In the Apple company, there are workers coming from different cultures, ages, religions. Despite being an international cooperation with a good cross-culture management system which facilitates people to work smoothly together, misunderstandings and conflicts due to culture differences still happen in the workplace.  Work stress As a leading phone manufacturer, jobs at Apple are always demanding and stressful. They require employees to work around the clock to meet deadlines. Being forced to work restlessly, they are more likely to experience exhaustion.

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III.

Recommendation and suggestion 1. Recommendation  Salary consideration based on employee’s contribution: As aforementioned, underpayment is still a persistent problem with Apple. According to some research, they have pointed out that inappropriate salary can lead to many problems such as: reduced productivity, job dissatisfaction, and even employee resigns, therefore, Apple needs to reconsider their pay grade. They should consider a steady pay raise plan and suitable bonuses in order to meet employees’ needs and heighten their satisfaction. However, incentives through money should be done carefully to avoid backlash. Furthermore, the effect of incentives in cash is less significant once an individual reaches a standard level of comfortable living. Along with salary, benefits are also an important factor. Unlike incentives by money, Apple can consider giving out benefits/gifts that bear sentimental value to employees. For example: thank you letter from executives, certificate of best staff of the month, ... This will make employees feel more appreciated and motivated.  Implement a fixed work schedule for sales employee: The working schedule of sales employees is mentioned above as a thorny problem. Specifically, sales employees feel that their personal lives are affected by the unpredictable timetable assigned to them by the company. According to some research, the work-life imbalance is the major factor that leads to the decline of productivity as well as resentment and lower motivation. So, it is crucial to let employees be able to invest their time for personal needs along with work. Therefore, Apple needs to come up with a better timetable assigning practice for employees. Furthermore, they can consider increasing employees’ paid leave, holiday entitlement as a way to help them recharge their batteries.  Promote the function of the worker union: Promoting a work union within Apple corporation can be a good way to increase job satisfaction. The union acts as the voice of the whole employees to convey their demand to the employers. In most cases, the voice of an individual can be insignificant, and sometimes he/she might bear the risk of being discriminated against when making complaints individually. But the union as a whole could communicate effectively the desire of workers to employers. Also, by involving in a worker's union, the employees will feel that they have a say in how Apple operates. This eventually increases their job engagement, bringing about higher productivity.  Show recognition and support:

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Workers at Apple can be sometimes mentally fatigued as their jobs are very demanding. So, it’s a good idea to raise their mood by establishing a good practice of showing appreciation and recognition for employees. Workers at Apple would be very motivated to have a boss who praises them for their good work. Furthermore, it's also encouraging to give timely support to those in need is a good way to motivate employees.  Promote cross-culture understanding: In the Apple company, there is a diverse workforce coming from different cultures, ages, religions. These people work collectively to create one of the most powerful brands in the world. And as a well-established international cooperation, it has a good cross-culture management system that facilitates people to work smoothly together. Specifically, they have a clear policy that all employees must be trained about different cultures, and the people of Apple must respect each other's differences. Generally, Apple workers collaborate with each other well, but it's reported that sometimes misunderstanding and conflict still occur in the workplace. So, for that reason, we believe that cross-culture training activities should be further fortified, strengthen to tackle this problem. Moreover, Apple can consider establishing events where one can freely express their own culture to the rest of the company. This will help to boost mutual understanding while strengthening the bond among employees.

2. Research limitation This research contains certain limitations that need improving in the future. They are:  The research couldn’t reach the people of Apple. We couldn't conduct a direct survey with employees at Apple company, leading to a lack of sufficient, realistic, and up-to-date information.  Information found online can be limited, incorrect, and misleading compared to authentic sources of information collected on respondent surveys, limiting the scope for analysis.  The research only addresses job satisfaction at Apple corporation as a whole, there might be a difference among various sectors (for example: manufacturing, product development sectors) of the corporation.  Since the time available for investigation is limited, the findings were conducted only for a short period of time, the results and conclusion may not fully address the problem.  Writers on the internet can have different perceptions about job satisfaction and motivation due to their cultural differences and personalities, therefore, their work may contain possible biases which can lead to this research’s inaccurate results as we use these papers to back up ours.

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3. Suggestion for further research  Surveys can be included in future research to gain a deeper knowledge of the problem.  The next research can extend the scope of study by looking into the satisfaction of employees different in responsibilities, authority in various sectors of Apple, for example, manufacturing and product development sectors, ...  Future research can develop comprehensive research models and hypotheses to draw a more reliable conclusion about employees’ behavior.  In future research, in-depth interviews can be used to address the problem at a profound level of the problem.

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IV.

References

Mollah, A. (2015). A critical analysis of employee job satisfaction: A case study of Apple UK. European Journal of Business and Management. 7 (7). How Apple's retail chief views her store workers, Lance Whitney, posted on Jan. 28, 2016 10:21 a.m. PT, accessed on August 29, 2020, available at: https://www.cnet.com. Apple Inc.’s Organizational Structure & Its Characteristics (An Analysis), Pauline Meyer, updated on February 14, 2019, accessed on August 24, 2020, available at: http://panmore.com. Apple mission and vision statement analysis, accessed on August 24, 2020, available at: https://mission-statement.com/apple/. Apple Mission, Vision & Values, accessed on August 24, 2020, available at : https://www.comparably.com/companies/apple/mission. Robbins, S. P., & Judge, T. A. (2001). Organizational behavior (Vol. 9). New Jersey: Prentice Hall.

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