In an effort to address a variety of concerns related to both employee productivity and satisfaction (Colarelli, Dean, & Konstans, 1987), organizations are introducing new forms of work design and other similar management initiatives (Van Yperen & Hagedoorn, 2003). While such strategies are designed to simultaneously enhance employees’ intrinsic motivation and enable them to develop the skills necessary to meet job demands (Van Yperen & Hagedoorn, 2003), it is important to be aware that some job design strategies could lead to high levels of role-related job strain and thus lead to negative health-related outcomes, which, in turn, lead to lower productivity (Parker & Sprigg, 1999). Prior research examining how individuals deal with role-related stress suggests that individuals in different job situations may respond differently to role variables (Abdel-Halim, 1981).
The purpose of the current study is to examine how performance feedback and job autonomy influence intrinsic motivation and perceived performance among employees facing role ambiguity, and focuses attention on how different interventions might interact to achieve different outcomes. These contextual variables were measured using data collected by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM). The unit of analysis is the individual federal government employee responding to the 2012 Federal Human Capital Survey (FHCS).
The analysis of survey data (n=275,874) found that high levels of both feedback and autonomy resulted in elevated levels of perceived performance. We found that performance feedback is the most effective means of enhancing performance regardless of role ambiguity and job autonomy, and that as role ambiguity increases enhancing job autonomy may lead to elevated levels of performance, but only when performance feedback is high. On the other hand, high levels of feedback and autonomy served to amplify the dysfunctional effect of role ambiguity on intrinsic motivation (i.e., overstimulation effect) among employees facing high role ambiguity. That is, high feedback and high autonomy are both limited in their ability to prevent employees facing high role ambiguity from becoming less intrinsically motivated.
The present study examined theoretical hypotheses that have remained largely untested in the field of public administration. The replication and extension of previous studies in the public sector contributes to the generalizability and applicability of findings. Moreover, the present study contributes to public management theory and practice by examining the joint effects of three work-related variables (i.e., role ambiguity, performance feedback, and job autonomy) on job outcomes of federal government employees. One managerial implication of the findings of this study is that when introducing work redesign interventions (i.e., feedback and autonomy) for the purpose of enhancing intrinsic motivation and/or performance, careful attention should be given to how such strategies are combined.