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Feeling valued at work? A qualitative study of
corporate training consultants
Marian White
PhD student, Birkbeck College, University of London, UK, in association with
Brathay, the people development experts
Kate Mackenzie-Davey
Lecturer in Organizational Pyschology, Birkbeck College, University of London,
London, UK
Introduction
Issues relating to job satisfaction have been a
major focus of research in recent years,
based on a hypothesized correlation with job
performance. Knowing whether employees
feel satisfied with their lot is very different,
however, from knowing what makes them so.
This paper reports on an attempt to fill this
gap by asking the question: ``What makes
employees feel valued by their employer?''
and is based on a study conducted at Brathay,
an educational charitable trust. It involved
discussions among three sample groups:
1 Training consultants operating in
Brathay ± the corporate sample.
2 Associate training consultants working
with Brathay to support both its youth
and corporate work ± the associate
sample.
3 Training consultants operating in a
commercial organization ± the
commercial sample.
Brathay's status as an educational trust
tends to emphasise its character as a highly
values-driven organization, which may make
its response to the research question
atypical. The inclusion of consultants from a
different environment may offer a useful
contrast. The study consisted of data
gathered from three focus groups conducted
with these three sample populations. While
the limited scope of the study prevents
widespread generalization, the findings do
offer food for thought to organizational
leaders seeking to create happy, productive
workers.
What is ``feeling valued''?
The question ``What makes employees feel
valued by their employer?'' appears to be one
that has seldom, if ever, been asked by
researchers. I therefore offer the following
definition of what the term ``feeling valued'',
as I have used it in this study, is intended to
capture:
A positive affective response arising from
confirmation, within a congruent set of
criteria, of an individual's possession of the
qualities on which worth or desirability
depends.
Clearly, this definition focuses on the ``how''
of feeling valued: what is it like for someone
when they are in that state? Underpinning
this ± and the focus of this study ± is the
``what'' of feeling valued, i.e. what are the
factors or events that generate such a state?
In analysing the data from the focus groups, I
have attempted to draw out some themes and
to group them into clusters, both for ease of
review and because they seem to hold
together in sharing some common features.
Fairness
The first of these clusters I have designated
``fairness'' since it deals with employees'
perceptions of justice in relation to
organizational processes that affect them.
The aspects of this cluster seem to constitute
the basic building blocks of human and
organizational relations. Employees of
Brathay, as a charitable trust, appear to show
a heightened importance for ethical, values-
driven considerations, over and above purely
commercial ones, in work-related decisions.
This emphasis on ethical values may result
in fairness being of greater importance to
them than to other sample groups.
Environment
The second cluster I have termed
``environment'' as a means of capturing a
number of diverse aspects of the context
within which individuals work. In some
respects this is the least satisfactory of the
Section 1: Practitioner papers
The Emerald Research Register for this journal is available at
http://www.emeraldinsight.com/researchregister
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
http://www.emeraldinsight.com/1362-0436.htm
[ 228 ]
Career Development
International
8/5 [2003] 228-234
#MCB UP Limited
[ISSN 1362-0436]
[DOI10.1108/13620430310497395]
Keywords
Self-esteem,
Motivation (psychology),
Employee relations, Consultants
Abstract
Examines what makes employees
feel valued by their employer,
through a survey of training
consultants operating at Brathay,
an educational charitable trust,
associate training consultants
working with Brathay to support
both its youth and corporate work,
and training consultants operating
in a commercial organization.
Clusters responses under the
headings of fairness, environment
and inclusion. Suggests
differences that may exist
between the different types of
employees sampled, and their
needs/expectations in terms of
feeling valued by their employer.
clusters, in that it contains a wide range of
differing aspects. Loosely, however, they
have the common theme of being ``one way''
between the organization and the individual:
something the organization does or gives to
the employee. They also relate mainly to the
organization's response to the employee as
an individual, rather than to wider
organizational issues.
Inclusion
The third cluster I have designated
``inclusion'', since it relates to aspects of the
relationship between the organization (or
employer) and the individual (or employee).
It concerns the impact on individual
employees of the organization's efforts to
make them a part of itself in a meaningful
and personal fashion. It is a characteristic of
the aspects of this cluster that there is an
element of reciprocity: for example, values
are shared, and the organization listens to
the views of the employee and also
communicates with them on issues that
affect them.
Results of the study
A number of themes emerged from the focus-
group discussions, with key words including
trust, recognition, feedback, personal
development and rewards. These and other
themes are shown in Figure 1.
Fairness themes
The issue of fairness as a contributor to
feeling valued appears in the data mostly in
relation to remuneration and personal
development opportunities.
For some, fairness is about transparency on
the part of the organization, which they see
as enabling them to make informed choices
about their own actions and to expect certain
outcomes. For example:
... they [targets and rewards] need to be fitted
together in a way that is coherent. So that
there is transparency of communication
about how different people are contributing
in different ways and what is valued and what
isn't.
For the associate sample, the main issue is
around whether they are asked to take on a
particular piece of work or not.
Transparency is then important to the
construction they put on why they are or are
not asked to do it, and the effect of this
decision on their self-esteem. In the absence
of transparency, they are likely to draw
negative conclusions if a piece of work is
allocated elsewhere. For example:
It's kind of like if there isn't transparency
there then I tend to make up stories about
why somebody else got it ± or why I haven't
got it, usually ± rather than knowing. And
those stories aren't very useful for me, so I
normally don't feel valued because I've
created something that doesn't make me feel
good.
For others, transparency alone is
insufficient, and they want to understand
how a particular decision has been made.
There are two elements to this apparent in
the data. First there are issues of procedural
justice, i.e. that the mechanisms through
which decisions are arrived at are seen to be
fair. Second, there are issues of consistency,
i.e. that the mechanisms that exist are seen to
be applied consistently across a range of
situations and people. The importance of this
Figure 1
Feeling valued ± the factors
[ 229 ]
Marian White and
Kate Mackenzie-Davey
Feeling valued at work?
A qualitative study of
corporate training consultants
Career Development
International
8/5 [2003] 228-234
aspect of feeling valued is often expressed
through its absence, with related expressions
of negative affect.
To be considered procedurally just, the
system has to be aligned with what the
individual feels to be fair: it is insufficient for
it merely to be systematic. The employee will
feel valued by its application only if the
values expressed by the organization are
shared by the employee. Once again, this is
most usually commented on when it is
absent, for example:
... however this [feedback] sometimes feels a
little empty as being one of the last employees
I earn less than others who I perceive are no
better than me but have either been in
training longer or been with [the
organization] longer.
This also reflects the need expressed by
participants for distributive justice ± i.e. that
the outcomes that result from whatever
systems exist are perceived as fair and
consistent. This was usually expressed with
regard to remuneration (although also in
respect of personal development
opportunities) and relates to relative rather
than absolute rewards. More generally, the
impact on individuals of the outcomes of
distributive justice emerge as an important
motivator. As one participant says:
So it's the policy decisions that they make
about my future as an employee which are
valuable to me. Because if I think they have
my interests at heart, then I will, you know,
give them everything.
So, fairness emerges as a key underpinning
to employees' feeling valued by their
employer. It is the mechanisms of fairness,
and their application, through which
individuals can make judgements about their
relative standing in relation to their peers. It
also serves as a measure of the extent to
which the organization's values and
standards are aligned with their own, again a
suggested prerequisite to feeling valued.
Environment themes
Although the elements within the
environment cluster are diverse, they are
clearly inter-linked in their effects on feeling
valued, as expressed in the participant data.
For example, pay is important both in its own
right (as a measure of value) and as an
expression of recognition. Similarly,
feedback and recognition are often received
together, as two sides of the same coin, and
are equally important in generating a sense
of feeling valued. Feedback itself serves both
as a form of recognition and an opportunity
for personal development. Nonetheless, it is
possible to unpick the various strands of this
cluster and catalogue the occurrence of each
element within the data.
1 Pay and recognition
Pay appears to be perceived as a hygiene
factor (Herzberg, 1968) rather than a
motivator: that is, employees feel devalued
when it is deficient rather than valued when
it is present. The issue of pay relates closely
to that of recognition. Overall, personal
recognition of an individual's contribution
seems to be more important to feeling valued
than pay. In Herzberg's terms this is a
positive motivator, and seems far more of an
issue for participants than financial rewards
± and far more directly related to how they
feel. For example:
... there have been two or three occasions
when somebody has come to me and
earmarked me for something: so it's like my
skills have been recognized and they've been
thinking about the most appropriate person
for the job and I've been identified as such.
And that's made me feel really valued.
In seeking recognition, participants are
clearly seeing this as separate from financial
reward and as relating to their individual
contribution to the organization. For
example:
... [it's] that personal recognition, that word
of thanks, that comment that I've done well,
that pat on the back, that doesn't take much to
do but actually goes a long way to making you
feel valued.
In the same vein are the comments about
feedback, and its positive effect in terms of
making people feel valued:
... for example, when [an individual] came up
to me and said ... ``I'd like to give you
feedback. Thanks very much for the [positive
comments about our work] you passed on to
us from a certain client''. So those kind of
things make me feel valued.
2 Personal development
Providing opportunities for personal
development is seen as a way in which the
organization values the individual and an
indication of its willingness to ``take a risk''
on somebody's ability to learn something
new. Some participants expressed
enthusiasm for the number and variety of
opportunities presented to them, for example:
... the personal development, the growth, the
opportunity for that is one of my [value
factors] ...
3 Trust and support
Trust and organizational support also give
people a feeling of being valued, by giving
them a sense that the organization values
and supports what they do. The trust issue
taps into people's feelings of recognition for
[ 230 ]
Marian White and
Kate Mackenzie-Davey
Feeling valued at work?
A qualitative study of
corporate training consultants
Career Development
International
8/5 [2003] 228-234
their contribution as an individual, for
example:
... a sense of being trusted to do good work,
rather than being monitored, supervised and
all that kind of stuff. You have a lot of freedom
to deliver in the way you decide you want to
do it.
Organizational support makes it easier for
employees to do a good job:
If the systems work, I feel valued. And maybe
I notice it more when they don't work and I
don't feel valued. It's kind of ``well, they don't
care about me because they don't care about
the job I'm doing''.
The kind of support being referred to here is
practical, such as booking systems for
equipment, availability of technical staff to
support outdoor activities, and smooth
handling of course administration.
4 Organizational reputation and leadership
Within this cluster two final areas are
mentioned: organizational reputation and
inspirational leadership. Although both are
incidental to the main themes of the
discussions that took place, they shed an
interesting light on some of the other
elements in the cluster. The value of
organizational reputation was clearly that of
being valued by association:
There was something for me about if they
took me on, then an organization with a good
reputation taking me on said something
about my skills being recognized. And me
contributing to the reputation.
Inspirational leadership seems to link back
to transparency and the individual being able
to see their role in the context of the wider
whole:
... it's that having the structure and the
vision and the ``this is where we are going,
this is how the organization is structured to
get there, this is your part in the
organization, this is how you contribute
to it ...''
This cluster is therefore composed of a
number of very personal aspects of feeling
valued. It deals with the employee as an
individual and how that individual feels
treated by the organization in its daily
operations. By incorporating such elements
as trust and inspirational leadership,
participants are also giving an indication of
the importance of a positive organizational
climate in which these ``one-to-one''
encounters can take place.
Inclusion themes
The expressed wish for inclusion is
particularly evident from the associate
sample, although clearly important to the
corporate sample as well. This wish appears
to be underpinned by the desire for shared
values between employer and employee, in
preference to a commercial-exchange
relationship based purely on pay for
performance. For example:
... how I view my work is tied up so much
with my personal values, and I think in
Brathay, then that's particularly true. That
it's like a major part of my life. And like, as
everybody has said, we make some personal
investment in what we're doing.
1 Shared values
In all of the focus groups, a sense of shared
values between employer and employee is
seen as important. This is about employers
respecting their employees' values, as well as
employees feeling able to buy into those
values held by the organization. For example,
it was favourably commented on that:
... it is a charitable organization and not just
producing profit for shareholders ...
The organization was also seen as supporting
their values, such that:
... the values fitted with how I wanted to
work.
It is this shared framework for
understanding ``what is of value'' that
underpins the ability of the organization to
make an employee feel valued. So:
... it is an organization where people do
express values: personal values and corporate
values ... and because those values are
similar to my personal value system then that
makes me feel valued.
2 Communication and voice
Communication and voice then emerge from
the data as basic building blocks of inclusion.
They are important in terms of the
organization informing the employee about
issues that may affect them, and the
employee feeling that they are listened to
when they raise issues of their own. The two
are closely linked in participants' minds. For
example, one participant refers to:
... an organization that talks to you and
listens to your responses, and then you see
them taking action as a result of those
responses.
Seeing action being taken appears to be a
necessary part of feeling listened to, i.e. it
needs to be instrumental and not just value
expressive, if it is to impart a sense of feeling
valued to the individual.
The need for an organization to
communicate with its employees links
closely to transparency: there is an element
of having information freely available, and of
being included in the communication loop.
This is seen as particularly important by
associates, who are not based on the Brathay
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Marian White and
Kate Mackenzie-Davey
Feeling valued at work?
A qualitative study of
corporate training consultants
Career Development
International
8/5 [2003] 228-234
site but do want to feel part of the
organization. One participant expresses it as:
... it's keeping us informed without having to
be here sort of looking for that information
ourselves. Feeling that the information is
coming at us rather than us going looking
for it.
3 Decision making and participation
For many participants, inclusion is about
more than two-way communication: it is
about being able to take an active role in the
running of the organization. This may be in
terms of being involved in decisions that
affect them as individuals, or it may be at the
level of participation in wider organizational
issues. Comments in this area range from:
``... feeling involved in an appropriate level of
decision-making of things that are going to
affect me and affect the clients'' to being
invited to the launch of an Associates'
Charter and viewing that as an: ``...invitation
to contribute and to bring up quite
contentious things''.
Employees also viewed participation as being
about giving something back to the
organization: this was the case even for
associates, who expressed a willingness to
run staff training workshops and to do more
than ``just carry on delivering courses''.
Implicit in references to employee
participation, at whatever level, is the
expectation that the organization will be
open to reflecting on its own practice to learn
from it ± i.e. that it will be open to feedback.
One participant sums up this approach by
outlining his experience with another
organization:
... what the organization did was invited
everybody who was involved in delivering
that piece of work to a review. So other
opinions about how it went and what they
could learn from it and how they could
improve working with that kind of big client
... I felt really involved, and that my opinion
counted.
The inclusion cluster is therefore about the
desire for a two-way relationship between the
organization and the employee: about the
employee being seen as an equal with
something to contribute beyond mere
services rendered, and with an interest in
organizational issues beyond the bare
minimum required to do the job.
Comparison of themes across sample
groups
Although the themes emerging from the data
are broadly similar across all three sample
groups, there are some variations in emphasis.
1 Inclusion
For example, inclusion is clearly more
important than the other factors for the
associate sample group, when compared to
the other two sample groups. Comments
related to this theme were raised more often
and were more closely linked to feelings of
being valued.
This is perhaps understandable given that
the employees in the other samples are
included as a matter of fact. That is, they are
physically present within the organization
and therefore have more opportunities to
communicate and participate in the normal
course of events.
A difference arises however in employees'
feelings about the importance of inclusion.
Brathay's corporate trainers viewed it as
important to them, however this was not the
case for trainers in the commercial
organization, judging by the limited number
of mentions it received. Their main concern
within this cluster was that the organization
should recognize their need for work-life
balance, and appreciate the toll their work
and travel commitments had on their
families. Arguably, this could be interpreted
as a plea for shared values around these
issues.
2 Environment
Themes within the environment cluster
appear to be common to all sample groups,
and important to all participants. Key themes
here are that personal recognition is at least
as important as pay in generating a sense of
feeling valued. Also that opportunities for
personal development are seen as a
significant contributor to feeling valued.
There appears to be a link between
opportunities for growth and elements
beyond the scope of the study, such as
intrinsic motivation and self-esteem.
3 Fairness
Fairness seems to be of most importance to
participants from the corporate sample, with
both procedural and distributive justice
being raised as important. They want to
understand the processes underpinning the
decisions being made, as well as feeling
valued by the outcomes. Their desire for fair
dealing extends beyond matters that directly
affect them. The associate sample view
themselves as ``price takers'' but value the
transparency that enables them to make
informed choices. Not surprisingly, they are
less concerned with justice around wider
organizational issues, since they are largely
unaffected by it. However, their perceptions
of organizational justice may spill over into
their view of organizational reputation.
Fairness is rarely raised as an issue by the
sample group from the commercial training
organization. Although distributive justice is
mentioned, participants take the view that if
[ 232 ]
Marian White and
Kate Mackenzie-Davey
Feeling valued at work?
A qualitative study of
corporate training consultants
Career Development
International
8/5 [2003] 228-234
pay rates are unsatisfactory they will simply
sell their services elsewhere. They seem
happy with a commercial-exchange system,
in which they can resort to the market to
resolve any dissatisfaction that arises. They
do not appear to view it as the responsibility
of the employing organization to remedy
their dissatisfaction.
Discussion
Variations between sample groups
The observed variations between sample
groups suggest differences which may exist
between the different types of employees
sampled, and their needs/expectations in
terms of feeling valued by their employer.
While all three sample groups generated data
in all three clusters, variations in both
volume and content appear significant and
suggest ``unique'' concerns for the various
groups. The first observation to be made in
this respect is the heightened significance of
fairness for the corporate sample. This group
comprises individuals who have made a
lifestyle choice in moving to Cumbria and a
values-based choice in working for an
educational trust. They could certainly earn
more money elsewhere and could also hold
positions of greater seniority within larger
organizations, if their only driver was that of
career success and if all they sought from an
employer was a satisfactory commercial
exchange. One can therefore hypothesize that
fairness, as an element of feeling valued by
one's employer, is ``unique'' to this
population ± i.e. we would not expect it to be
replicated as a major source of feeling valued
for employees in general. This is supported
by the very limited references to fairness
made by the commercial sample in the
present study.
A second observation is the heightened
significance of inclusion for the associate
sample compared with the other two groups.
The associate population consists of similar
people to the corporate sample ± i.e. they
have made similar lifestyle and values-based
decisions. However, they do not have the
same ``built in'' relationship with their
employer that an employee experiences. We
can therefore hypothesize that feeling valued
through an inclusive relationship with the
employing organization will be ``uniquely''
significant to this population, and will not be
replicated for other employee groups. It is
unclear whether it would be replicated for
contingent workers of different types and/or
in commercial organizations.
What can be theorized about feeling
valued?
The above observations suggest a third,
namely that the environment cluster is the
only one of the three to be of similar
importance to all three sample groups. One
can therefore propose the hypothesis that the
environment cluster is the true domain of
feeling valued. Also that the inclusion and
fairness clusters constitute ``big picture''
beliefs that may or may not be satisfied in the
work environment. Those who see
employment as a commercial exchange seem
not to consider satisfaction of these wider
beliefs as necessary to feeling valued at a
personal level by their employer.
Such concerns seem more prominent (and
to affect their sense of feeling personally
valued to a greater extent) for those people
who are more ``idealistic'' in their views of
employment, and for whom work is a more
integral part of themselves as individuals.
This brings us back to the definition of
feeling valued proposed at the outset which
focused on the confirmation of an
individual's possession of the qualities on
which worth depends. The elements of the
environment cluster ± feedback, recognition,
pay, development opportunities, and so on ±
clearly fulfil this definition at a very personal
level. They provide the required
confirmation in relation to a particular set of
qualities. Even feedback, which often relates
to a failure to demonstrate a given quality,
transmits an implicit belief held by the giver,
in the individual's ability to develop the
quality in future; otherwise, why give the
feedback?
It can also be seen that the requirement for
a congruent set of criteria within which
worth can be established, which is also
proposed by the definition, is met by the
element of shared values contained in the
inclusion cluster, as well as by the inclusion
and fairness clusters themselves. On the
basis of these observations, it is possible to
propose the following model (Figure 2). It
illustrates how feeling valued by one's
employer, underpinned by shared values,
leads to a positive, affective response from
the individual.
The ``how''
In the proposed model, shared values
between the employer and employee
constitute the congruent set of criteria
within which worth is to be established.
Issues of inclusion and fairness may form
part of these shared values for some groups,
although for most employees they are likely
to fall outside the scope of what is required to
make them feel valued by their employer. I
[ 233 ]
Marian White and
Kate Mackenzie-Davey
Feeling valued at work?
A qualitative study of
corporate training consultants
Career Development
International
8/5 [2003] 228-234
have described shared values as the ``how'' of
feeling valued in that they are a necessary
precursor to the creation of the ``positive
affective response'' which is feeling valued
itself.
The ``what''
The elements of the environment cluster then
form the ``what'' of feeling valued. That is, the
confirmation by their employer ± through
feedback, recognition, pay, development
opportunities, and so on ± of the individual's
possession of those qualities on which worth
depends. The shared values provide the
benchmark which ensures that what is
recognized by the employer is congruent
with that for which the employee wishes to
be recognized. The result is the positive
affective response that constitutes the sense
of being valued.
Existing theory
The question then arises as to where this
model sits in relation to existing theory. The
most important links are clearly those with
the literature on values and, in particular,
``values as criterion'' (Finegan, 2000). In
addition, the type of values under
consideration in the model may be said to be
closer to moral considerations than mere
preferences (Dose, 1997), although not
exclusively so. The model also confirms the
importance of the notion of ethical
congruence proposed by Viswesvaran and
Deshpande (1996) and suggests an extension
to cover preferences. If we take the data as
showing that employees do, broadly
speaking, feel valued by their employer then
the model can also be seen as supporting
Barnett and Schubert's (2002) proposal of a
``covenantal relationship'' between the two.
This consists of a belief by the employee that
there is a mutual commitment to shared
values and to the welfare of the other party in
the relationship.
How important is feeling valued?
As a final question in the data-gathering
phase of the study, participants were asked to
say how important it was to them to feel
valued by their employer. Of the seven
participants who offered a ``mark out of ten'',
the average score was over eight. For the
remainder, a sample of comments gives a
flavour of the importance of feeling valued to
individual employees:
It is very important as this then raises your
self-esteem and I believe enhances
performance. As with most things having
confidence in your ability and the assurance
that your employer has confidence enable you
to stretch yourself more ...
Incredibly important that assuming I bring
some talent/skills to my job/employer that
they recognise/develop and reward me
against those ...
Very ± I want to make a contribution to the
organization and I would like that
contribution to be valued.
I've worked for someone who did not value
me ± it was a most demoralising experience. It
is critical that I feel valued by (my employer).
One participant said that feeling valued
outweighed monetary compensation in
importance. For all participants the day-to-
day working environment, as it relates to
their own sense of worth, seems to prompt a
strong affective reaction. This alone makes
feeling valued a topic worthy of further
research. Still more deserving of attention is
the potential for a correlation between
feeling valued and job performance, since
this represents the strongest reason why
employers should care whether their
employees feel valued at work.
References
Barnett, T. and Schubert, E. (2002), ``Perceptions
of the ethical work climate and covenantal
relationships'', Journal of Business Ethics,
Vol. 36 No. 3, pp. 279-90.
Dose, J.J. (1997), ``Work values: an integrative
framework and illustrative application to
organizational socialization'', Journal of
Occupational and Organizational Psychology,
Vol. 70, pp. 219-40.
Finegan, J.E. (2000), ``The impact of person and
organizational values on organizational
commitment'', Journal of Occupational and
Organizational Psychology, Vol. 73 No. 2,
pp. 149-69.
Herzberg, F. (1968), ``One more time, how do you
motivate employees?'', Harvard Business
Review, January-February, pp. 53-62.
Visvesvaran, C. and Deshpande, S.P. (1996),
``Ethics, success and job satisfaction: a test of
dissonance theory in India'', Journal of
Business Ethics, Vol. 15, pp. 1065-9.
Figure 2
The proposed model
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Kate Mackenzie-Davey
Feeling valued at work?
A qualitative study of
corporate training consultants
Career Development
International
8/5 [2003] 228-234
