Religion and Spirituality in the Workplace: A Quantitative Evaluation of Job Satisfaction and Organizational Commitment
Religion and Spirituality in the Workplace: A Quantitative Evaluation of Job Satisfaction and Organizational Commitment
Debra J. Dean | 2017
Abstract
Religion and spirituality were once considered taboo topics in the workplace; however, practitioners and scholars have been finding evidence of positive benefits to the triple bottom line—people, profit, and planet. Benefits include improvement in employee health, reduction of employee stress, more job involvement, increased job satisfaction, higher levels of organizational commitment, less organizational frustration, more organizational identification, and enhanced work unit performance. The first large-scale empirical study of religion and spirituality in the workplace revealed the urgency for organizations to “learn how to harness the whole person and the immense spiritual energy that is at the core of everyone . . . [or] they will not be able to produce world class products and service” (Mitroff & Denton, 1999, p. 84). Responding to the call to explore the two main instruments used to empirically test spirituality at work and contribute to the three most promising theoretical approaches to date, according to Benefiel, Fry, and Geigle (2014), this research used a quantitative, cross-sectional, field-based study to examine the relationships of religion and spirituality in the workplace to work outcomes of job satisfaction and organizational commitment. The instruments used to measure six dimensions of workplace spirituality included the Spiritual Leadership Scale and the Spirituality at Work Scale. The Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire short-form and Organizational Commitment Questionnaire evaluated work outcomes of job satisfaction and organizational commitment. Additionally, the Religious Commitment Index and demographic questions examined the control variables of age, education, gender, income, meditation experience, religion, and years of work experience. The findings of this research indicate that altruistic love is worthy of attention with regard to job satisfaction and organizational commitment. In addition to altruistic love, sense of community and meaningful work were significantly predictive of job satisfaction; however, altruistic love clearly stood out as the most important variable.