Creating Organizational Spirituality Mindset of Advertising Agencies in Thailand: Effects on Business Success through Intrinsic Work Satisfaction, Openness to Changefulness and Self Benevolence

Beginning of article

1. INTRODUCTION

Most previous studies on trust organizational spirituality have been conducted in Western countries, and the generalizability of these findings to the other parts of the world is questionable. For example, some researchers have reported that spirituality does not affect trust in organization in Western societies (Kilduff and Day, 1994). Whetstone (2001) found that spirituality has a positive effect on employee satisfaction in organization. One such variable is future orientation, which refers to the degree to which a culture encourages and rewards future-oriented behavior, such as planning and delaying gratification (House et al., 1999). This cultural variable is likely to affect management practices of the firms and employment relationships in the workplace.

A growing chorus of scholarly voices is arguing that spirituality is necessary in organizations for ethical behavior, for job satisfaction and employee commitment, and for productivity and competitive advantage. Increasingly, this point is being demonstrated and empirical studies designed to test this hypotheses further are being conceived and implemented even as this article is being written. Along with the spirituality in organizations theme in the chorus runs the spiritual leadership variation on the theme. Spirituality is a concept encountered with increasing frequency in the contemporary addiction literature.

The review of the existing major spiritual leadership theories states that the strength of these theories is in the "leadership" aspect of spiritual leadership (Fry, 2003; Sanders et al. 2002). It observes that there is a need for a "... more robust and sophisticated understanding of the 'spiritual' aspect of 'spiritual leadership'". They echo this concern and question whether the field truly has a deeper understanding of what spiritual leadership really means in practice. A number of insightful books have been authored on spiritual leadership, but they are based largely on a self report basis and lack grounding in theoretical frameworks. In terms of scholarly research, the terminology employed (e.g. vision, altruistic behaviors, loving relationships, etc.) certainly makes sense, but it is still not completely clear to us as to exactly what specific spiritual leadership attitudes and behaviors in practice are. For instance, precisely what do leaders do to create vision and exhibit altruistic behaviors and loving relationships from a spiritual perspective? What are specific examples of spiritual leadership that the field can use as a common framework or foundation to describe and understand spiritual leadership? What are the specific impacts of these spiritual leadership practices on followers or organizations?

The objectives of this study are: 1) to investigate the influence of organizational spirituality mindset (career obligation, success concentration, sense of ownership, and task perseverance) on intrinsic work satisfaction, openness to changefulness and self benevolence; 2) to examine the effect of on intrinsic work satisfaction, openness to changefulness and self benevolence on business success; 3) to investigate the effect of antecedents (morality judgment, subjective norms and virtue ethics) on the organizational spirituality mindset; and 4) to investigate the role of two moderators (perceived organizational support and organizational citizenship behavior). Furthermore, the research questions of this study are: 1) how do the four dimensions of organizational spirituality mindset (career obligation, success concentration, sense of ownership, and tasks perseverance) have an effect on intrinsic work satisfaction, openness to changefulness and self benevolence? 2) how do intrinsic work satisfaction, openness to changefulness and self benevolence have an effect on business success? 3) how do the three antecedents (morality judgment, subjective norms and virtue ethics) have an effect on the Organizational Spirituality Mindset? and 4) how do the perceived organizational support and organizational citizenship behavior play the moderator's role?

This research attempts to explore the relationships of the organizational spirituality mindset of advertising agencies in Thailand. Researcher expects different dimensions of perceived organizational spirituality mindset (i.e., career obligation, success concentration, sense of ownership, and task perseverance) Several hypotheses are developed and tested on data collected from 800 CEOs of advertising agencies in Thailand.

This research is outlined as follows. The first section reviews existing significant literature in the areas and stream of organizational spirituality mindset, the link between the concepts of intrinsic work satisfaction, openness to changefulness, and self benevolence to business success, and develops the key research hypotheses of those relationships. The second explicitly describes the details of research methods, including data collection, measurements, and statistics. The third gives the analysis results of the current study and corresponding discussion with some of the reasons and explanations. The final summarizes the findings of the study and points both theoretical and managerial contributions, and presents suggestions for future research and the limitations of the study.

2. THEORETICAL FOUNDATION

The conceptual model in Figure 1 utilizes three theories to explain research phenomenon. These theories include resource-based view of the firm, equity theory, and social exchange theory which explain, predict, and link all variables together. The resource-based view of the firm explains the organizational spirituality mindset that affects intrinsic work satisfaction, openness to changefulness, self benevolence, and business success. Because the resource-based-based view of the firm is presumed that resource and capability are an important of source of competitive advantage (Barney, 1991; Kaleka, 2002). The equity theory is the concept of fit between spirituality and organizational behavior for determining performance of firm (Chandler, 1962). The equity theory can be applied in the context of Organizational Spirituality Mindset which is the contingent variables which concerns perceived organizational support and organizational citizenship behavior. Furthermore, equity theory proposes that individuals who perceive themselves as either under-rewarded or over-rewarded will experience distress, and that this distress leads to efforts to restore equity within the relationship (Guerrero et al., 2007). In addition, social exchange theory is the theory used to explain the morality judgment, subjective norms, and virtue ethics that affect Organizational Spirituality Mindset. The social exchange theory is based on the idea that the quality of relationships among employees and between employees and the organization is rooted in the history of mutual exchanges between those entities (Cropanzano & Mitchell, 2005).

3. LITERATURE REVIEW AND HYPOTHESES DEVELOPMENT

The research model underlying the study is presented in Figure 1. This study attempts to conceptually link the relationship between antecedences, Organizational Spirituality Mindset, morality judgment, subjective norms, virtue ethics and business success via perceived organizational support and organizational citizenship behavior as moderators. The organizational spirituality mindset includes four dimensions, namely, career obligation, success concentration, sense of ownership, and task perseverance has an effect on intrinsic work satisfaction, openness to changefulness and self benevolence. Ultimately, intrinsic work satisfaction, openness to changefulness and self benevolence also affect business success. In this study, researcher proposes that organizational spirituality mindset and consequence have a significantly positive influence on business success, antecedence and organizational spirituality mindset has a significantly positive influence on business success. Thus, the research model shows that the relationships between the four dimensions of organizational spirituality mindset support to business success are shown as below.

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

3.1 Career Obligation

The concept of career is a quite useful tool to relate persons of organizational situations (Super, 1980). The career can be seen as the meeting-point of people and organizations. On the one hand, individual careers consist of work positions, activities, and development in one or more organizations during the course of their working lives (Dawson and Bartholomew, 2003). On the other hand, organizations offer various career opportunities and paths to their prospective and existing employees (Greene et al., 2001). A career-based conceptualization of competence and especially motivation should therefore be a promising possibility for highlighting the essentially relational character of competence and motivation. The career concept model was developed by Kaikati and Sullivan (2000) to understand and describe individual views and experience of careers. The basic premise of the model is that most of us develop varied concepts of what a career means to us. These concepts may be more or less conscious and they greatly influence our choice of career path and our experience at work. For example, while one person may view a career as one chosen "profession" for a lifetime, another may view a career as a climb upward on the corporate ladder. These different conceptions of careers can be expected to have important implications for how different persons view their work lives as well as their organization's leadership, organizational culture and strategic direction. Thus, the hypotheses are proposed as follows:

Hypothesis 1a: The stronger the firms' career obligation is, the more likely that firms will achieve greater intrinsic work satisfaction.

Hypothesis 1b: The stronger the firms' career obligation is, the more likely that firms will achieve greater openness to changefulness.

Hypothesis 1c: The stronger the firms' career obligation is, the more likely that firms will achieve greater self benevolence.

3.2 Success Concentration

Performance efficiency is reduced by distraction and enhanced by success concentration. Particularly in tasks performed under stressful circumstances, the focus of attention must be on the processes relevant for completing the task to achieve the best outcomes (Beal et al., 2005; Jones and Hardy, 1989). The focus on task-relevant information ensures that all resources available to the employee are used fully and in the most efficient manner possible (Rushall, 1995).

According to Miller and Grau (1998), under conditions of fatigue or excitement it takes more effort to concentrate on or to divide attention between various tasks elements or to solve a difficult problem. In such cases people's information processing capacity is less than optimal for the performance of a certain task. When employees are not in the state needed for optimal task performance, they will mobilize additional energy, known also as compensatory effort (Hartman, 2001). While people are generally able to regulate their activities efficiently such that they avoid performance decrements, when they are in a suboptimal state (as in case of fatigue), specific aspects of performance will deteriorate (Taris, 2006). For example, Mendez, (2005) found that bus drivers at the end of their working shift maintained the reaction time but not the quality of the reaction since they made more errors. Homans (1998) showed that whereas sleep deprivation (a possible precursor of high need for recovery) had no effect on primary task performance, it did influence secondary performance parameters (e.g., reaction time). Taken together, specific aspects of job performance are expected to deteriorate with diminished concentration. In the present study, we will focus on in-role performance which represents those officially required outcomes and behaviors that directly serve the goals of the organization (Motowildo and Van Scotter, 1994). Thus, the hypotheses are proposed as follows:

Hypothesis 2a: The stronger the firms' success concentration is, the more likely that firms will achieve greater intrinsic work satisfaction.

Hypothesis 2b: The stronger the firms' success concentration is, the more likely that firms will achieve greater openness to changefulness.

Hypothesis 2c: The stronger the firms' success concentration is, the more likely that firms will achieve greater self benevolence.

3.3 Sense of Ownership

The research literature offers several alternative theoretical perspectives in seeking to explain the relationship between employee ownership and attitudes. Klein (1987) reviewed the existing literature and identified three such perspectives. The extrinsic satisfaction model suggests that employee ownership increases organizational commitment, provided that employee ownership is financially rewarding to the employees. It is assumed that ownership is viewed by the employee as a financial investment, and that number and value of the shares they own are more important than ownership of the as such (French, 1987). In contrast, the intrinsic satisfaction model suggests that the very fact of ownership increases the employees' commitment to the company and their satisfaction with it. Positive outcomes are regarded as resulting from the employees' intrinsic feelings about ownership, rather than from factors in the organizational context or in the ownership plan itself. This model is thus sometimes described as the direct effects model of employee ownership (Klein, 1987). Finally, the instrumental satisfaction model suggests that it is not just the fact of ownership itself, but the associated increase in influence on company decision-making activities and the perceived control over work that affects employee attitudes and behavior. Empirical research seems to coincide much more closely with the …