Job satisfaction and intention to quit the job

Negative psychosocial work conditions may influence the motivation of employees to adhere to their job.

To elucidate the perception of psychosocial work conditions among Danish hospital employees who would quit their job if economically possible and those who would not.

A cross-sectional questionnaire study of hospital employees. The questionnaire gave information on elements of the psychosocial work environment (job demands, job influence, job support, management quality, exposure to bullying), general health status, sick-leave during the preceding year, life style (leisure time physical activity, alcohol intake and smoking habits), age, sex and profession.

There were 1809 participants with a response rate of 65%. About a quarter (26%) reported that they would quit their job if economically possible; this rose to 40% among the 17% who considered their health mediocre or bad. In a final logistic regression model, six factors were identified as independently associated with the wish to quit or not: self-assessed health status, meaningfulness of the job, quality of collaboration among colleagues, age, trustworthiness of closest superior(s) and exposure to bullying. Based on these factors it was possible to identify groups with fewer than 15% wishing to quit, and similarly, groups where 50% or more would quit if this was economically possible.

Psychosocial work conditions, in particular meaningfulness of the job, were independently associated with intention to quit the job if economically possible and relevant within different job categories.