Employee satisfaction model: case of private institutions in Indian higher education

Most studies conduct surveys to determine the employee satisfaction level in organisations, and improvement strategies are suggested based on the attributes that show a low satisfaction level. It is not always right to make improvement plans based on these identified attributes. Sometimes these attributes include the low-quality attributes also. Low-quality attributes are items that are not crucial for employees' motivation and performance. Thus, this study adopts and applies importance-satisfaction model (Yang, 2003) to analyse the improvement areas based on both 'importance' and 'satisfaction' criteria. A questionnaire consisting of 53 items, under eight dimensions, was administered on 385 faculty of higher education institutions of India. Results highlight that fair and equal treatment, transparency in the organisation's policies and procedures, pension and security benefit, job security, fair and timely promotion systems, and opportunity for advancement are the high-quality attributes for faculty. Implications of these findings and scope for future research are discussed.