The Impact on Performance Appraisal Justice on Employee Assurance in Organizational Work Environment in Ghana: The Mediating Protagonist of Job Satisfaction

^{Authors: 1}Isaac Kofi Yornu | ²Dr. David Ackah, PhD.

¹Lecturers, Procurement Department, Accra Technical University

²President, Institute of Project Management Professionals, Ghana

Email: ikyornu2000@gmail.com | drackah@ipmp.edu.gh

Abstract

This study investigates the causal effect of performance appraisal justice on job satisfaction and employee commitment in public and private sector health institutions in Ghana. The study collects both quantitative and qualitative data for the study using questionnaires and interview guide from supervisors (appraisers) and subordinates (appraisees) in public and private sector healthcare organisations in Ghana. 347 employees are sampled from three public and three private healthcare institutions. However, only 302 are usable for analysis, representing a response rate 87.03%. Out of this, 165 are from public and 136 from private sector health workers. Five respondents were also interviewed. Hierarchical linear regression and bootstrapping method of mediation analyses are to analyse the quantitative data while the qualitative data is analysed using thematic analysis. The study finds that: First, performance appraisal justice generally and specifically, procedural performance appraisal justice and interpersonal performance appraisal justice have a significant positive influence on employee job satisfaction. Second, procedural performance appraisal justice predicted job satisfaction differently among workers in Ghana’s public and private health sector workers in terms of pay satisfaction, and social and growth satisfaction. Similarly, interpersonal performance appraisal justice predicts job satisfaction differently by increasing social and growth satisfaction in the public sector while its contributions in the private sector to employees’ social and growth satisfaction is insignificant. However, distributive performance appraisal justice did not differently and significantly predict employee job satisfaction between the public sector and private sector in Ghana. Generally, however, since the general results suggested that procedural justice influences job satisfaction in the public sector more compared to the private sector. Third, increases in distributive performance appraisal justice will surprisingly lead to a reduction in employee affective commitment but will be associated with improvement in normative commitment. On the other hand, distributive performance appraisal justice did not have any significant influence on the normative commitment of employees. Similarly, interpersonal performance appraisal justice did not have a significant effect on employee commitment but likewise, procedural performance appraisal justice did not have significant effects on affective and continuance commitments but significantly predicted normative commitment. In general therefore, performance appraisal justice has a mixed influence on employee commitment. Fourth, distributive performance appraisal justice has predicted employee commitment in Ghana’s private healthcare sector but its influence on the commitment level of public healthcare workers is insignificant. Similarly, the effect of procedural performance appraisal justice on employee commitment is slightly different between the two sectors. However, the effect of interpersonal performance appraisal justice on employee commitment does not differ significantly between public health and private health sector workers as interpersonal performance appraisal justice did not predict employee commitment in both sectors. Fifth, employee job satisfaction generally has a significant positive effect on employee commitment. Sixth, job satisfaction, specifically, satisfaction with pay, social and growth and supervision mediated the relationship between performance appraisal justice and employee commitment. Finally, employees are more committed to their organisation and have higher job satisfaction experience in the public health sector compared to those operating in the private sector. Similarly, perceived fairness or justice in the practice of performance appraisals is higher in the public healthcare institutions compared to their counterparts in the private sector. The study concludes that when a performance appraisal demonstrates acceptable levels of fairness and equity in all of its aspects, it can trigger positive employee outcomes such as job satisfaction and commitment.

Keywords: Comparative Analysis, Performance Appraisal Justice, Employee Commitment, Employee Job Satisfaction