Job satisfaction and burnout among professionals in corporate sectors

Job satisfaction and burnout has become a persistent and pervading feature of various corporate sectors. In present scenario, workers are found to be burnt-out and exhausted very soon and the reason for being exhausted is that they are over burdened and highly competitive. The aim of the present study was to compare the level of job satisfaction and burnout in various corporate sector professionals. This cross sectional, analytical study was carried out at Lucknow. By purposive sampling technique 120 subjects were included from various corporate sectors that met the inclusion and exclusion criteria and gave consent for the study. They were evaluated on General Health Questionnaire 12, Job Satisfaction Index and Copenhagen Burnout Inventory. Analysis of assessment tool results showed there was no significant difference in the level of job satisfaction and the degree of burnout, but trend was found in the area of work burnout by multiple comparisons of all groups with Post Hoc Test by Bonferroni Method. The findings of the present study suggest that the level of job satisfaction and the degree of burnout were almost similar in various corporate sectors. However, findings suggest a trend towards higher work burnout in professionals in Multinational Corporation in comparison to the Professionals in Public Sector Corporation.


Introduction
Work has a central role in people's life since it occupies a lot of their time and also provides the financial basis of their lifestyles. Therefore it is important the employees' job environment should be appealing to them and improves their satisfaction with the job. Satisfaction at work influences various aspects of work such as efficiency, productivity, absenteeism, turnovers rates, intention to quit, and also the employees' well-being. [1][2] Job satisfaction can be viewed as the degree of an employee's affective orientation toward the work role occupied in the organization. 3 It is the extent to which people like (satisfaction) or dislike (dissatisfaction) their jobs. 4 In this age of liberalization and globalization all industries and organizations are trying to be competitive. Every effort is made to improve output and reduce input, so that profitability increases. There is constant pressure to achieve higher and higher targets. As a result employees have to spend more time in job related activities to the detriment of time spent with family or friends. This is probably the point when employees feel excessive job stress leading to irritability, dysphoria, and dissatisfaction with work, reduced work output and unhappiness of working in the organization. Persisting stress may lead to development of chronic negative emotions such as anger, anxiety or depression, which can eventually lead to psychological burnout. Once considered as an uncommon condition, burnout is now recognized as very common in some jobs which are very stressful.
Job burnout is a prolonged response to chronic emotional and interpersonal stressors on the job. 5 More specifically, it involves the chronic strain that results from an incongruence, or misfit, between the worker and the job. In the multidimensional model of the burnout phenomenon there are three key dimensions. These include exhaustion, feelings of cynicism and detachment from the job, and a sense of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment. Burnout differs from occupational stress in that it is specific to work that requires intense involvement. 6 Burnout is a state of physical, emotional fatigue, and it is caused by a long-term commitment to demanding situations. It has been described as a sense of helplessness and hopelessness, low energy levels, chronic tiredness, fatigue, and a feeling of being trapped. There are also evident negative feelings for self, work and life. 7 Job satisfaction and burnout has become a permanent and pervading feature of corporate sectors. In the present scenario, workers are found to be burnt-out and exhausted very soon and the reason for being exhausted is that they are over burdened and highly competitive.Burnout has been most prevalent among workers in the helping professions. Studies have shown that these individuals suffer from high stress levels and low job satisfaction. [8][9] Administrators also experience high stress and low job satisfaction. Studies report that 70% of the life stress of administrators was due to their jobs. 10 The financial sector in India has undergone tremendous changes in past two decades with increased competition, increased levels of deregulation, which has opened up the Indian financial banking system and has placed enormous pressure and has created stress in the bank employees. The age of globalisation has resulted in downsizing and restructuring practices affecting both the private and public sectors. Consequently job cuts and layoffs are becoming common even in the public sector. This great change in job security is expected to impact job satisfaction and burnout. There is a paucity of Indian studies in this area. In view of the foregoing the present study was undertaken to assess and compare the level of Job satisfaction and burnout among the professionals of various corporate sectors.

Sample
For the present study a total of 120 professionals working in various non-banking financial institutions (30 from Indian Multinational Corporation, 30 from Indian Family Owned Multinational Corporation, 30 from Private Sector Corporation and 30 from Public Sector Corporation) were included and the sample was drawn using purposive sampling technique.

Design
The present study was a cross-sectional organization based one.

Venue
The study was carried out on the population from various corporate sector organizations located in Lucknow city. A: Indian Multinational Corporation B. Indian family owned Multinational Corporation C. Private Sector Corporation D. Public Sector Corporation Inclusion Criteria Those professionals who are in these corporate sectors, subjects who gave consent to participate, subjects who scored below the cut-off point of GHQ 12, the age range between 20-50 years, subjects whose nature of Job is permanent.

Exclusion Criteria
Not willing to participate, subjects whose nature of Job is temporary, absence from his \ her duty for at least one month.

Tools Used
General Health Questionnaire -12(GHQ 12): Goldberg and William developed the General Health Questionnaire-12 in 1978. The 12 items questionnaire is used to see the general health as well as it is used to screen for psychiatric morbidity in healthy persons. The scale is extremely popular and used all over the world and translations are available in 38 languages. Reliability coefficients of the questionnaire have ranged from 0.78 to 0.95 in various studies. [11][12] Job Satisfaction Index Job Satisfaction Index provides an overall index of job satisfaction rather than measuring specific aspects. It consists of 18 items with five alternative responses i.e., strongly agree, agree, undecided, disagree and strongly disagree which are scored 1 to 5. The scale comprises of nine positive and nine negative items. The higher score on the scale implies higher job satisfaction while lower scores indicate lower job satisfaction. The scale has a high index of reliability and high coefficient of correlation of 0.87 and 0.97 respectively. 13 It has been widely used in Western countries as also in India to measure job satisfaction. 1 Copenhagen Burnout Inventory It was used to assess the degree of burnout. It consists of three sub scales: Personal burnout, which has 6 items, Work related burnout, consists of 7 items, Client related burn out consists of 6 items.
Clients can be patients, students, children, inmates or the kind of recipients. The inventory has very satisfactory reliability and validity. The CBI has been used in a number of countries and has been translated into eight languages. 14

Analysis of Data
The data obtained was analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences Version 20.0(SPSS-20.0). To find out the group differences of the clinical variables having categorical data the Chi-Square test was used. To compare the scores of the rating scales multiple comparisons of all groups with Post Hoc Test by Bonferroni Method was performed.

Results
The socio-demographic characteristics and work related characteristics of the corporate sector professionals included in the study are given in Table 1. There were no significant differences in these characteristics. The results of the psychological assessment are given in Table 2.

Discussion
The present study aims to assess and compare the level of Job satisfaction degree of Burnout (Personal, Work and Client) among the professionals of various corporate sectors. So far very few studies have tried to assess and finally compare the level of job satisfaction and degree of burnout among the professionals of various corporate sectors. The significance of this study also emerge from the fact that this is likely to lead to planning of an effective strategies, to enable these professionals to lead a better and an overall healthier life. One may expect that the knowledge gained will help in building an understanding sufficient to alleviate and ultimately prevent burnout. In the present study there was no significant difference in the level of Job Satisfaction in the four groups. However, job satisfaction was somewhat higher in Indian family owned multinational and public sector firms as compared to private sector and Indian multinational firms. This finding is in agreement with an earlier study which found that employees of public sector banks higher levels of stress and lower levels of job satisfaction when compared to employees of new generation private sector banks. [15][16][17] The result of present study reveals that there was trend found in Work Burnout by the multiple comparisons of all groups with Post Hoc Test by Bonferroni Method and there was no significant difference was found in the degree of burnout in other areas. The result supported findings are in agreement with the study in which the Job descriptive index was completed by 36 private sector employees and by 68 public sector employees and no significant difference was found in the level of job satisfaction between public and private sector employees. [18][19] Limitation The sample size of the study was small and hence the findings may not be generalized. Govt. Sector personnel's should have also been included for comparison. Due to paucity of time the study was carried out at only a single location.

Conclusion
The findings of the present study suggest that the level of job satisfaction the degree of burnout were almost similar in all groups. However, findings suggest a trend towards higher work burnout in Professionals in Multinational in comparison to the Professionals in public sector corporation.