Title: New hires' job satisfaction time trajectory

Authors: Ralf Bebenroth; Jose O.L. Berengueres

Addresses: Research Institute for Economics and Business Administration, Kobe University, 657-8501 Kobe-shi, Nada-ku, Rokko-dai 2-1, Japan ' United Arab Emirates University (UAEU), P.O. Box 15551, Al-Ain, United Arab Emirates

Abstract: This study is aimed at quantifying the job satisfaction trajectory of new hires. The authors compared job satisfaction of 815 new hires to 1,925 non-new employees, asking all participating employees a simple daily question for ten months: 'how happy are you today at work?'. With a sample of 187.137 data points, we found a high heterogeneity in job satisfaction among employees from 12 different companies that participated in our study. On the tenets of acculturation theory and more fine-grained data, we support previous research that new hires started with a 27% higher job satisfaction compared to the non-new employees. The level of job satisfaction kept on decreasing (until 64th day), continuing at a slower pace, gradually bottoming out after eight months. The ratio of new hires' job satisfaction to non-new employees began an upward trend between the sixth and the seventh month (195th day).

Keywords: job satisfaction time trajectory; new hires; acculturation theory.

DOI: 10.1504/IJHRDM.2020.105110

International Journal of Human Resources Development and Management, 2020 Vol.20 No.1, pp.61 - 74

Accepted: 14 Jan 2019
Published online: 13 Feb 2020 *

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