TRIDENT UNIVERSITY
Module 1 Case Assignment
MGT 501: Management and Organizational Behavior
Dr. August 17, 2011

ABSTRACT Has anyone ever really been satisfied with their chosen job, career choice, and an anticipated promotion or being bored with certain levels of achievement? It is difficult dealing with employee’s attitude and wondering if he or she is or is not satisfied on the job and also wondering if his or her level of motivation toward success is being achieved to produce at the level the company needs to succeed. These areas are studied in what is called the three gaps between HR practice and the scientific research in the area of employee attitudes in general and the most focal is employee attitude in particular what promotes job satisfaction.
I will attempt to explain the three gaps described in HR practices according to the article by Lise M. Saari titled “Employee Attitudes and Job Satisfaction” are the causes of employee’s attitudes, the results of positive or negative job satisfaction, and how to measure and influence employee attitudes. This paper will also explain how and to which extent research on job satisfaction resolves each of the three gaps, and I will use at least two examples to show where do the gaps still exist and how future research on job satisfaction can help to close these gaps?
GAP ONE: ATTITUDES The dispositional influence correlates to Maslow’s theory of an individual needs. Other than the principles needs of a human, food, water, shelter, and spiritual needs, a person needs to fulfill other outside need and advocates of job enrichment have argued that most work tasks fail to challenge individuals adequately or fulfill their desires for growth and stimulation resulting in work dissatisfaction and unproductive behavior. The dispositional approach uses measures from as early as adolescence to predict one’s