Environmental factors of job satisfaction: Case of small and medium enterprises in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Abstract

As part of this study, we propose to analyze the influence of national culture, the job market, labor law and unionization on-the-job satisfaction of SME employees in Kinshasa, in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Our survey questionnaire was administered to a sample of 92 SMEs from six different business sectors. These are specifically education, commerce, finance and banking, industry and the medical sector. The results of the bivariate analysis found an association between national culture and employee satisfaction. In particular, there is an association between the fact of having received facilities during hiring and job satisfaction. Indeed, employees who were hired thanks to recommendations or some kind of facility from their parents, friends or acquaintances are less satisfied than those who did not receive a facility when they were hired.

As for the correlation between job satisfaction and employment law, our results also discovered an association between regularity of leave and job satisfaction. Indeed, employees who take their holidays regularly are more satisfied than those who rarely or never take their holidays. Regarding the relationship between the job market and job satisfaction, by associating the dependent variable general job satisfaction with the quantitative variable unemployment time, the results of our analyzes revealed that unemployment time is not statistically associated with the dependent variable general job satisfaction.

Our results ultimately demonstrate the association between satisfaction and unionization. Indeed, unionized employees are more satisfied than non-unionized ones.

Keywords: Job satisfaction, National culture, Labor market, Labor law, Unionization.

JEL. Classification: K20, L32

Paper type: Empirical research