Job insecurity

Besides operational energy use, corporate decisions have an impact throughout society. One reason that per capita energy consumption in North America is much higher than in the rest of the world was the decision of corporate leaders to expand and relocate away from city centers and to major beltway loops in the suburbs. This necessitated more trucking and a workforce reliant on the private automobile instead of mass transit. In an era of tremendous job insecurity, even the most energy-conserving person... 

Job insecurity also exists at small companies. At a small pharmaceutical or biotechnology company that is still working to develop its first product, having adequate cash on hand to meet periodic expenses (cash flow) can be a serious problem. The jobs of computational chemists at such company can be in jeopardy if available cash must be devoted to meet current expenses instead of being used for a long-term project such as drug discovery. 

Low Tolerance to Change Based on job insecurity or lack of organizational stability. 

In a work situation, the subject not only reacts to the specific requirements of the task on a cognitive level, but also to other demands, such as the emotional (e.g., daily hassles, job insecurity) or physical aspects (e.g., noise) of the environment... 

Fear. Fear, including job insecurity, fear of blame, and fear of punishment was seen to be a barrier to learning and change. Fear was frequently described in the sessions. It is important to make a distinction here. There can be fear of a person or persons, and there can be fear of the economic uncertainties confronting the company. In this case the anployees were concerned that the company s economic performance might be weak, leading to plant closures and layoffs. These fears were reahstic, as the company had already engaged in some layoffs. 

High levels of job satis ction are generalty only achieved when the basic needs of security and salary are satisfied. There are occupations where salaries are low but job satis ction is high, but the norm is the reverse. Low salaries and job insecurity can be a source of stress fiictors, which have a detrimental effect on overall job satisfiiction. High salaries and job security alone nuty not be enou to produce high job satisfection. Other more conq>lex emotional fiictors are required for high levels of job satisfiiction. 

Create a safe, stable, predictable work environment—Unless they are pathological, people suffer ethical lapses out of confusion, fear, and insecurity, not out of evil. When workers are afraid of punishment or dismissal if schedules aren t met, work tends to become sloppy. When R D vice-presidents fear their jobs are in jeopardy, they might manipulate the information going to corporate management so that their organization will look good. 

A staff member is feeling insecure about a job that has been assigned to him. He is highly competent, and this manager knows that this employee has the skills to successfully complete the task. The deadline for completion is near. This manager would ... 

This popular but ineffective approach to injury prevention is based on the intuitive notion of "accident proneness." The strategy is to identify aspects of accident proneness among job applicants and then screen out people with critical levels of certain characteristics. Accident proneness characteristics targeted for measurement and screening have included anxiety, distractibility, tension, insecurity, beliefs about injury control, general expectancies about personal control of life events, social adjustment, reliability, impulsivity, sensation seeking, boredom susceptibility, and self-reported alcohol use. 

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