A study of the effect of public service motivation on job performance of public servants through job satisfaction and person-organization fit: the case of the people's committee of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Abstract

This study examines the effect of public service motivation on job performance through the mediating variable of job satisfaction and person-organization fit of public servants in the public organizations under the People's Committees of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. The objectives of this research were 1) to study the influence of public service motivation on the job performance of public servants; 2) to establish the mediation effect of job satisfaction and person-organization fit on the linkage of public service motivation with job performance; and 3) to develop and test a proposed model that would explain the relationships amongst the aspects of public service a including attraction to policymaking, public interest, compassion and self-sacrifice, job satisfaction, person-organization fit, and job performance, including task and contextual performance.

This study adopted a “mixed-method approach,” which used qualitative method to support quantitative method. First, the quantitative method was used to test the hypothesis of the proposed conceptual framework. The data collection was obtained through the use of self-administered questionnaires, which were distributed to public organizations under the People’s Committee of Ho Chi Minh City. The sample size of the study was 450 samples of public servants. The data analysis was implemented using SPSS in order to obtain the results of the descriptive analysis, the normality test, the multicollinearity test, reliability, and validity and factor analysis, and then a series of multiple regressions was used in order to identify the causal relationships of the three variables of PSM, job satisfaction, and person-organization fit with job performance. Additionally, the Sobel test was run in order to identify the mediation effect of job satisfaction and person-organization fit on the relationship between PSM and the job performance. Secondly, the qualitative methodology also was used to study the phenomenon of PSM and apply the obtained data to describe and confirm the data. Semi-structured interviews with open-ended question was used to conduct in-deep interviews with the eight respondents, who were selected from managers, supervisors, and a manager and director of the human resource office in public organizations. The findings of the research revealed that both direct and indirect (job satisfaction and P-O fit) public service motivation were significant predictors of the employee’s outcome variables of job performance integrating task and contextual performance at the individual level of analysis in the public sector.

This research contributes to the literature by theoretically providing a holistic framework to examine the effect of motivation in public service on employee job performance in the public sector, as the study attempts to integrate task and contextual performance for job performance measurement. Scholars in previous study have operationalized job performance by using self-reported performance with the assumption that individuals with higher PSM are more likely to perform better. Further, the contribution of two mediating variables of job satisfaction and P-O fit provide more robust empirical evidence of the relationship of PSM with job performance. It further contributes to the understanding and discussion of a significant means to improve the performance of public servants when public service motivation is seen as a potential and important factor for the better performance of employees' jobs in the public sector.