Employee Empowerment and Organisational

Effectiveness

Introduction
In recent years there has been a considerable
interest in academic and business circles on the topic
of employee empowerment, which has become a
buzzword, and recent management trend in both the
public and private sector (Pitts, 2005). Employees
Empowerment has received a wide recognition as an
important subject in management circles, mainly,
because it is seen as one of the fundamental
elements
of
managerial
and
organizational
effectiveness that increases when power and control
are shared in organization (Ergeneli, et al., 2007).
Empowerment programs have been introduced in a
number of organizations in order to improve
productivity, increase customer satisfaction and
enhance competitive advantage (Hardy and LeibaO'Sullivan,1998). Thus, employees empowerment
has been hailed management technique which can
be applied universally across all organizations as
means of dealing with the needs of modern global
business (Demitriads, 2005).
Most of the empowerment literature reviewed
concludes that an empowered workforce will lead
their organisation to achieving a competitive
advantage, efficiency and above all leads to

organisational effectiveness. In other words, there is

a positive relationship between empowerment and
other organisational outcome variables and to name
one performance is one among the others. Studies
on empowerment have shown that it has a strong
correlation to employee performance in terms of
higher productivity, job satisfaction and reduction in
staff turnover in organisations (Ongori, H, 2007).
The review of the avalibale literature reveals that no
empirical research that i am aware of has been
conducted on the links between empowerment and
organisational effectiveness has been conducted in
Indian context.
In the light of this background, this study would
primarily aim at studying and understanding the link
between employee empowerment and organisational
effectivness in some selected organisations.
Organisational Effectiveness

Objectives of the Study

This study would be undertaken to investigate the
association if any between empowerment and
organisational effectiveness. It will focus on the
relationship of the four (4) independent variables of
empowerment
(Spreitzer,
1995)-meaning,
competence, self determination and impact-with

organisational effectiveness/ performance.

The specific objectives of the study would be:
a) To determine the relationship between meaning
and organisational effectiveness/performance in
Indian Context.
b)
To
determine
the
competence
and
effectiveness/performance
organisations.

relationship
between
organisational
in
the
sample

c) To determine the relationship between self

determination
and
organisational
effectiveness/performance
in
the
sample
organisations
d) To determine the relationship between Impact and
organisational effectiveness/performance in the
sample organisations.
e) To determine the overall relationship between
empowerment
and
organisational
effectiveness/performance
in
the
sample
organisations.
f) To examine the influence of empowerment on
organisational effectiveness/performance in the
sample organisations.
Measures
Employee Empowerment

Employee empowerment would be measured by a 12 item

scale developed and validated by

Spreitzer (1995). The

scale has 4 subscales: Meaning, Competence, Impact and

Self-Determination each of which has three items. The rating
scale ranged from 1, strongly disagree, to 7, strongly
agree. The measure is composed of four subscales designed
to reflect Thomas and Velthouses (1990) definition of
empowerment. An example item from each subscale is The
work I do is very important to me (meaning); I am
confident about my ability to do my job (competence); I
have significant autonomy in determining how I do my job
(self-determination); and My impact on what happens in my
department is large (impact).

The model is most extensively used by researchers

across globe.
The model has been used in both
manufacturing and service sectors. Hence we intend
to use the same model to investigate the relationship
between employee empowerment and organisational
effectiveness.
Spreitzer(1995) defines employees empowerment as
intrinsic task motivation manifested in a set of four
cognitions (meaning, competence, self determination
and impact) reflecting an individuals orientation to
his or her work role. In summary, they are defined as
follows:
Meaning is the value of work goals or purposes
judged by an individuals perception relative to his or

her own personal mission or expectations .

Self-determination is an individuals sense of
having choice in initiating and regulating actions.
Competence refers to self-efficacy specific to
work; that is, the individuals capability to perform
work activities with necessary skills and knowledge.
Impact is the degree to which a person can
influence strategic, administrative or operating
outcomes at work.
Organisational Effectiveness
To
measure
the
organisational
effectiveness
Denison's Model would be used. The model consists
of dimensions measuring subjective measures of
organisational
effectiveness,
which
includes
employee satisfaction, sales growth, new product
development,
ROI,
profitability
and
overall
organisational effcetiveness.
Sample