Investigate the Effect of Quality of Work-life on Construction Craft Workers� Job Satisfaction

Abstract

a shortage in skilled construction workers is the greatest challenge the U.S. construction industry facing in this era. This shortage would create a substantial risk to the competitiveness of the U.S. construction industry. Since the research in different disciplines identified job satisfaction as a major element that influenced employee�s performance and retention, this thesis investigates the relationship between job satisfaction and quality of work-life factors from construction craft workers� perception. The study used Quality of Work-Life questionnaire module (QWL) from the General Social Survey (GSS) as a source of data. The data were collected from the years 2002 to 2014. Thirty-four out of seventy-eight QWL items had significant (p < 0.05) correlation with the overall level of job satisfaction of construction craft workers. The underlying structure of these 34 items significantly correlated with job satisfaction was tested by using Exploratory Factor Analysis. Five latent factors were identified that had an influence on the underlying structure of these 34 items. These five factors were safety priory and organizational effectiveness, fair rewards system, resource adequacy, physical and mental health, and job tenure. Identification of the relative impact of these latent factors on construction craft workers� job satisfaction was the last step of the present study. This study helps companies in the construction industry create policies and practices inside their organizations that will lead to an increased job satisfaction of their employees by providing better QWL for them.