55

CHAPTER 3: Research Methodology

3.1 Introduction
This chapter provides a justification for the methodology and methods chosen for the
study. It provides an explanation of the choices made for testing the relationships in the
conceptual model, including the sampling, procedure, measures, and the analytical
approach.

3.2 Research Design

The vast majority of the literature on value congruence suggested a quantitative design.
In the context of this study, the use of a survey strategy was identified as suitable
because it enabled the efficient collection of data from eight different countries.
In addition, the aim of the study is quantitative in nature, as the study is required
to identify a number of correlations among different variables, to test causal hypotheses
or to report descriptive data. This also indicates the suitability of the survey strategy for
this study. Another rationale for choosing a survey strategy in the context of the
research aim is that participants are assumed to feel more comfortable when completing
a self-administered survey than they do when responding to interviewers in an open and
honest way (Bortz & Döring, 2006).

3.3 Participants
3.3.1 Population
The investigation took place in a multinational automotive supply company that
produces safety parts for the big five automobile manufactures and supplies products to
other well-known international automobile producers. The company employs 60,000
employees located in 26 different countries. The company has been a global leader in
the automotive supply industry for several years. It is organized according to different
independent global business units that report to centralized, functional Executive Vice
Presidents, or to the CEO, COO, or CFO. The company was highly suitable for this
study as it is a technically orientated organization that depends heavily on the
performance, skills, knowledge, and abilities of engineers or technicians. The study was
conducted in one of the globally organized autonomous business units with locations in
UK, China, Malaysia, Poland, The Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Spain, South-
 56

America (Brazil), North America (Winona, Livonia) and Mexico (Reynosa), and has
5000 employees. At the time when the study was conducted, the facilities in North
America and Mexico were not part of the newly structured organization; thus, they not
included in the investigation.

3.3.2 Sampling Strategy

Access to the organization was negotiated via the Vice President of the Business Unit
and the Vice President of Human Resources. A cross-cultural, stratified random
sampling technique was utilized. From the target population, employees working in
technical departments such as Research and Design, Quality, Program Management,
Manufacturing Engineering, Production, Maintenance, Logistics and Purchasing were
considered for this study. All technical employees were selected from the headcount list
that is recorded, stored and updated monthly by the Central Human Resource
Department of the selected Global Business Unit. The participants were chosen without
any restrictions regarding hierarchy, gender, age, education, length of service,
background, experience, race, religion, or nationality. The selected participants were
based in the UK, China, Poland, the Czech Republic, Germany, Italy and South
America, and had the ability to read, write, and speak English. Employees working in
Malaysia or Spain were not considered because of the small size of these facilities and
the lack of a sufficient sample size.

3.3.3 Sample and Response

The questionnaire was distributed to 452 technical professionals based in Germany,
China, Brazil, Poland, the Czech Republic, Italy, and the UK (n = 452). Of the sample,
305 employees responded to the questions and returned the survey (n = 305), yielding a
return rate of 67%. Eight questionnaires were incomplete and could not be used for the
data analysis. Hence, a data set of n = 297 yielding a response rate of 66% was used for
the investigation. The sample size of 452 technical professionals represented the entire
population. The response rate from each country is shown in Table 2.
 57

Table 2: Descriptive data questionnaire

Returned Complete
No Questionnaires
Loctions no Percent no Percent
distributed

Germany 120 44 37% 44 37%

China 132 103 78% 103 78%
Brazil 35 30 86% 30 86%
Poland 20 11 55% 11 55%
Czech 57 41 72% 41 72%
Italy 58 52 90% 52 90%
UK 30 24 80% 24 80%
Total 452 305 67% 305 67%

From Table 2, it can be seen that the response rate for each country differed. In
some locations, employees did not like to complete surveys. For instance, the lowest
response rate was obtained from the participants located in Germany where the
headquarters of the business was based. Participants expressed their concern about the
confidentiality of the survey. The Chinese employees chose to complete the surveys.
Local HR managers played an important role in increasing the response rate by
communicating with the participants.

Table 3: Participants’ demographic data by country

Location
Percent
Germany China Brazil Poland Czech Italy UK Total
total sample
Participants age group
20-30 1 37 4 1 11 1 0 55 18%
30-40 11 60 11 6 22 12 5 130 43%
40-50 21 4 11 0 4 13 8 65 21%
50-60 10 0 4 4 4 22 11 55 18%
Total 44 103 30 11 41 52 24 305
Percent 14% 34% 10% 4% 13% 17% 8%

Female age group

20-30 0 20 1 0 2 0 0 23 8%
30-40 1 18 0 0 7 0 2 28 9%
40-50 1 3 1 0 1 3 4 13 4%
50-60 2 0 0 1 2 3 1 9 3%
Total 4 41 2 1 12 6 7 73 24%
Percent 9% 40% 7% 9% 29% 12% 29% 24% 0%
Percent total sample 1.3% 13.4% 0.7% 0.3% 3.9% 2.0% 2.3%

Male age group

20-30 1 17 3 1 9 1 0 32 10%
30-40 11 44 11 6 15 12 3 102 33%
40-50 20 1 10 0 3 14 4 52 17%
50-60 8 0 4 3 2 19 10 46 15%
Total 40 62 28 10 29 46 17 232 76%
Total Sample 44 103 30 11 41 52 24 305
Percent 91% 60% 93% 91% 71% 88% 71% 76%
Percent toal sample 13% 20% 9% 3% 10% 15% 6%

Table 3 provides information about the demographic data of the sample

according to the location in which the participants were employed. From the data, it can
 58

be concluded that the business is dominated by males at 75% (n = 219) and has 25% (n
= 72) females, which is not surprising since the business operates in a technically
orientated industry and the participants were predominately chosen from non-
administrative departments. It is important to note that China reported the highest
female rate of 40% (n = 40) compared to the other countries. On the other hand, Brazil
reported the highest male rate of 93% (n = 30), whereas China showed the highest male
rate as a percentage of the total population with 21% (n = 60). It can be seen that the age
group 30-40 had the largest representation at 43 % (n = 125), of which 10% were
female and 33% male.

3.4 Data Collection, Access, and Ethics

Most of the data were collected in March 2012 when the questionnaires were distributed
to the participants. The covering letters attached to each questionnaire requested the
participants to complete the surveys by March 16, 2012. The month of March was
chosen as a good time to collect data in the business in which the survey was conducted
because all the employees were on duty at that time, which increased the response rate
for the research. The Chinese respondents had also returned from the traditional spring
festival, when nearly all the people take a long break to visit their families, the Brazilian
respondents had returned from the carnival and the Easter holidays had not started for
the European employees. In addition, no major business/customer events are usually
planned for March; such events could have prevented people from completing the
questionnaires. By March 26, all the questionnaires had been returned.
The questionnaire was designed in the English language. However, the survey
was conducted in the appropriate local language to avoid any potential misinterpretation
of the questions in the survey. An external professional translation institution was
consulted to translate the questionnaire from English into the relevant local language in
which the survey was conducted. The questionnaire was then back translated from the
local language into English by the local Human Resource Manager to ensure the
meaning of the translation would not lead to inaccurate answers from the participants.
Surprisingly, many items translated from English into local languages needed to be
corrected by the local Human Resource Manager, as the meaning of the translations
would have created conflicts with the codes of ethical conduct in some countries. A
different approach was applied to the questionnaires for the participants in China,
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Poland, and Germany. In these countries, the translation from English into the local
language was performed by internal employees with a professional level of English
skills and then back translated from English into the local language by an external
institution. Copies of the translated questionnaires were shipped via DHL to the
locations in which the participants were based. The local Human Resource Manager
informed the selected participants about the purpose of the survey, either individually or
during a group meeting, and distributed the printed pen-and-paper self-administered
questionnaires.
All the participants received the questionnaire in a similar order to ensure
consistency when analyzing the responses to draw conclusions from the research
results. The questionnaire was structured in such a way that similar questions were
posed to all participants in a similar order. The group of local Human Resource
Managers received a detailed briefing via telephone and by sharing documents online
prior to the distribution of the survey. In these briefings, the researcher shared the
purpose of the study, the process of data collection and the covering letters that were
attached to each questionnaire. A few participants complained about completing the
survey during their normal working hours at the expense of some business tasks they
needed to accomplish. Some refused to participate because they did not wish to support
any survey conducted in the company. The participants were asked to complete the
survey within a period of two weeks. Some people asked for the deadline to be extended
by another week, which was accepted. The surveys were shipped to the researcher’s
home address once the participants had completed the questionnaires. The return rate
was 67%.
“The biggest problem in conducting a science of human behavior is not selecting
the right sample size or making the right measurement. It’s doing those things
ethically…” (Bernard, 2000, p. 21). For this reason, the questionnaire and data
collection approach was reviewed and approved in line with the standards set for
doctoral work at the Leiden University's Campus, The Hague. All participants were
informed about the ethical principles of this study in advance via the covering letters
attached to each questionnaire. The covering letters explained the purpose of the study
and informed the participants that the survey was authorized by the Vice President of
the Business Unit and by the Vice President of Human Resources in the company.
Participation in this survey was purely voluntary and at the participants’ discretion. It
was also stated in the covering letters that there would be no negative implications if
 60

someone decided not to participate. The participants were then asked to return the
questionnaires anonymously to the local Human Resources Department. The
questionnaires were shipped to the researcher’s private address. The data were entered
onto a software program installed on the researcher’s private computer by a student who
was sitting alone in a private room.

3.5 Procedure and Measures

The questionnaire was divided into three parts:

Part I: Demographic data measured on a nominal scale;

Part II: A list of value statements measured on a five-point Likert scale and
Part III: Employee engagement, emotional exhaustion, affective commitment, and
productivity measured on a five-point bipolar rating scale.

Part I requested some demographic data and was designed to analyze data that
impacted on national cultural differences.

Part II included a list of organizational values as the dependent variables. The

participants were asked to assess a number of value statements (presented in rows) on a
five-point Likert scale, each of which they were asked to rate from three different
perspectives. In the first column, they were asked to rate the importance of a value from
their individual perspectives when making decisions or taking personal actions
themselves. In the next column, they were requested to rate the importance of this value
as they perceived it for the organization at the time at which the questionnaire was
completed. In the last column, they rated the importance of the value as perceived from
a supervisory perspective when supervisors were making decisions and taking actions.
The key to the scale used to rate the value items was 5 – Highly Important, 4 -
Moderately Important, 3 - Neither Important nor Unimportant, 2 - Moderately
Unimportant, 1 - Highly Unimportant.
The questions designed to collect the data on the two value constructs (value
congruence, and individual values) were based on a questionnaire developed by Nwadei
(2003). They designed the questionnaire to investigate the relationship between
perceived value congruence and employees’ commitment in a multinational company.
 61

This questionnaire consisted of 24 value items asking about principles in a decision-

making process or taking actions relevant for an organization; the principles included
Integrity, Honesty, Trust, Truth, Respect, Fairness, Accountability, Empowerment,
Loyalty, Service, Teamwork, Concern and Care, Openness, Innovation, Creativity,
Continuous Improvement, Growth, Flexibility, Profitability, Effectiveness, Diligence,
Results, Quality, Health & Safety and the Environment. The questionnaire developed by
Nwadei (2003) facilitated good research outcomes such as fleshing out the relationship
between value congruence and the three components of commitment, with regards to
different nations. The study done by Nwadei also examined value congruence grouped
into four dimensions to highlight the various effects of value dimensions not only on the
three commitment constructs, but also the impact of culture on the correlation, which
validated the choice of this type of questionnaire in the context of this study. In
particular, the questionnaire was used in a cross-cultural context and was, therefore,
beneficial for this investigation. In addition, Nwadei considered for his questionnaire
items that has been used to measure values relevant for organizational survival, core
values, and values appropriate for measuring value congruence. In support of this, the
elements that formed the instrument to measure value congruence were guiding
principles for an organization, as opposed to the value items defined by researchers such
as Rokeach (1973) or Schwartz and Bilsky (1997), which were related to guiding
principles for individuals’ lives. Thus, the instrument from Nwadei (2003) was deemed
appropriate for this international study. Another reason for using Nwadei’s
questionnaire was that the value items included a precise description of the business
goal for each value statement. This led to less room for subjective interpretation of the
value statements, which is an important factor when conducting a cross-cultural survey.
Nwadei validated this instrument through an initial study that preceded the main study
using two approaches: (a) The Cronbach’s alpha, which measured the internal
consistency of the 24 value items, and (b) a two weeks test-retest correlation, which
measured the stability of the instrument. A target alpha and test-retest coefficient of 0.7
was used for the instrument.
A number of work-related values were added based on the Job Diagnostic
Survey by Hackman and Oldham, (1975). The researchers designed their instrument to
determine the effect of skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, feedback
from the job itself, feedback from agents, and dealing with others on work outcomes
and motivation. Based on this and on the importance employees place on various
 62

aspects of work (Jing & Rounds, 2012), a positive association with the dependent
variables was expected. Furthermore, this instrument was used previously in many
studies and has received widespread acceptance (Maslach & Jackson, 1981; Meglino,
Ravlin, & Adkins, 1989).

Part III of the questionnaire contained three individual outcomes as the dependent
variables, namely Work Engagement, Emotional Exhaustion, Affective Commitment,
and one organizational outcome, Productivity.

Work Engagement: To test the hypothesis about the predictor of work engagement, the
17-item Work Engagement Scale developed by Schaufeli, Salanova, Roma, and Bakker
(2006) was chosen. The instrument is one of the most widely used and been applied in
various studies; therefore, it was considered appropriate for this investigation. The 17-
item Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES) consists of a three-factor model such as
vigor, dedication, and absorption. The items describe a feeling at work as well as a
passion for work leading to a positive association with performance. The participants
used the five-point scale to measure emotional exhaustion and assessed each item.
Therefore, the items were scored according to two dimensions: frequency (how often)
and intensity (how strongly). Frequency was measured using a five-point scale ranging
from 0 (never), 1 (a few times a year), 2 (a few times a month), 3 (a few times a week),
to 4 (every day). Intensity was measured using a five-point scale ranging from 0
(never), 1 (very mild), 2 (noticeable), 3 (major), to 4 (very strong). This two
dimensional measure showed how often participants invested energy in their work roles
and how strongly they felt they were engaged. The reason for using the five-point scale
in this study was to be consistent with the scale for measuring emotional exhaustion in
order to have a better comparison between the two constructs.

Emotional Exhaustion was measured using nine items taken from the Maslach Burnout
Inventory developed by Maslach and Jackson (1981). The entire Burnout Inventory
consists of 25 items divided into four subscales: emotional exhaustion, personal
accomplishment, depersonalization, and an optional scale, involvement. The
questionnaire was designed to assess the consequences of burnout syndrome on the
quality of service of staff in human service institutions (Maslach & Jackson, 1981).
However, since burnout has become a global epidemic that has affected employees in
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different professions, the questionnaire has been used for research in different industries
and countries (Maslach, Schaufeli & Leiter, 2001). At present the questionnaire is still
widely accepted and has been applied in numerous recent studies (Haines & Saba 2012;
Rubino, Volpone, & Avery, 2013; Thanacoody, Newman, & Fuchs, 2013; Tourigny,
Baba, Han, & Wang, 2013). For this study, the subscale “emotional exhaustion” was
deemed appropriate as the participants were in a similar situation to people working in
human service institutions or health care. The nine items from the subscale “emotional
exhaustion” were rated following the scale used by Maslach and Jackson (1981). The
items were used to measure two specific dimensions as proposed by Maslach and
Jackson: frequency (how often) and intensity (how strongly). Frequency was measured
using a five-point scale ranging from 0 (never) ,1 (a few times a year), 2 (a few times a
month), 3 (a few times a week), to 4 (every day). Intensity was measured using a five-
point scale ranging from 0 (never), 1 (very mild), 2 (noticeable), 3 (major), to 4 (very
strong).

Commitment was assessed using the subscale ‘affective commitment’ from the
questionnaire developed by Meyer and Allen (1997). According to Meyer and Allen
(1997), affective commitment refers to the desire of an employee to remain at the
company and to be aligned with the goals and strategy of the company. As the research
aimed to determine the impact of value congruence, it was necessary to determine why
employees had chosen to remain at a company. For to this reason, only affective
commitment was examined in the study and other forms of commitment were ignored.
The items were rated on a five-point Likert scale, from 1 (strongly disagree), 2
(disagree), 3 (neutral), 4 (agree), to 5 (strongly agree).

Productivity is the combination of organizational effectiveness and efficiency and can

easily be measured in a manufacturing facility by counting the parts produced in a
particular time compared to the industry standard time. There are some differences
between productivity and efficiency, as efficiency is the aspect of productivity that
helps the individual to achieve satisfaction while being productive. In support of this
theory, Hill, Jones and Schilling (2014) stated that higher productivity improves the
performance of individuals and has a direct influence on their values within the
organization, thus providing them with feeling of satisfaction. On the other hand,
productivity helps the employees to improve their behavior within the organization in
 64

order to achieve organizational and personal goals by reinforcing effective behavior and
actions (Walumbwa et al., 2011). For this study, productivity was measured individually
by using a self-constructed scale, as there no validated scale that assessed white-collar
productivity directly was available. The internal consistency of this scale was six, which
was quite satisfactory after the deletion of one item (see Appendix F). In total, four
items were added and were used to measure productivity on a five-point Likert Scale,
from 1 (strongly disagree), 2 (disagree), 3 (neutral), 4 (agree), to 5 (strongly agree). The
full questionnaire can be found in Appendix B.

3.6 Reliability Analysis

A reliability analysis was performed to test the consistency of the independent and
dependent scales for variables used in this research. In this study, scale constructed
based on the nine items that intended to measure the construct emotional exhaustion.
The Cronbach’s Alpha’ value for collected data is .85, which indicates good reliability.
The output of reliability test could not be increased by deleting one of the individual
items from the scale (See Appendix C). The Cronbach’s value of .85 for emotional
exhaustion intensity showed same value for the reliability of the nine items (see
Appendix D). The results of the reliability analysis of engagement frequency and
engagement intensity with 17 items gave high internal consistency of .93 (Cronbach’s
alpha) for the frequency of engagement (see Appendix E) and.92 for the intensity of
engagement (see Appendix F). With regard to the reliability output for affective
commitment, a Cronbach’ s α of .79 showed good internal consistency for the affective
commitment scale containing eight items. However, one item of the eight produced a
low item-rest, which indicates that this item does not measure the same construct like
other items. Due to this, it did not contribute well to reliability. Therefore, researcher
removed this item (see Appendix G). Productivity included five items that reported a
Cronbach’s α of .32, indicating low reliability of the items. One item correlated
negatively at -.12 with other items (apparently due to the vagueness of the question).
Thus, this item was deleted (see Appendix H). Internal consistency was tested for the
independent variables consisting of 31 items measuring the importance of
organizational values according to self-reported ratings. The overall reliability displayed
a Cronbach’s α of .94, which indicates that collected data is enough reliable to conclude
the results in this study (see Appendix I).
 65

In addition, confirmatory factor analysis was performed to evaluate the proposed

underlying dimensions of the six dependent variables, which were measured by the self-
reports on the total of 65 items. As Appendix I-2 illustrates, all indicators had
significant loadings on their respective factors, except from items AC61 and PR68 (see
Appendix B), which were excluded from the analysis. Moreover, to test the proposed
underlying dimensions of the dependent variables, a χ2 difference approach was
followed with four distinguishable measurement models. First, an unidimensional
model in which all items were seen as indicators of a single underlying factor was
tested. This model was then compared to a four-factor model in which no distinction
was made between emotional exhaustion resp. engagement frequency and intensity as
four latent factors. The single factor model was nested in this four-factor model. Using a
global model fit statistic (χ²) to compare the models it was confirmed that the
constrained single factor model showed a significantly worse fit to the data compared
with the four-factor model (Δχ²(2015)= 2359.0, p < .000). The four-factor model was
then compared to a six-factor model in which a distinction was made between emotional
exhaustion resp. engagement frequency and intensity as six latent factors. The chi-
square difference test was significant (Δχ²(2009)= 277.2, p < .000), pointing to the six-
factor structure as the best fitting model.

3.7 Analytical Approach

The analysis was structured in two stages. Stage 1, which is described in Chapter 4,
consisted of three steps to examine whether (a) Value congruence was associated with
work engagement, emotional exhaustion, affective commitment, and productivity, (b)
Individual value was associated with these outcome variables, and (c) Whether
individual values moderated the relationship between value congruence and work
engagement, emotional exhaustion, affective commitment and productivity. In stage 2,
discussed in Chapter 5, the analysis was repeated, but this time to examine whether
dimensions of value congruence and individual values were associated differently with
the outcome variables, as well as to explore which individual value dimension change
the direction of the relationship between a particular value congruence dimension and
the dependent variable.
For both stages, descriptive statistics mean/median/SD) were used to obtain an
understanding of the data. Exploring the data in the form of a descriptive data matrix is
 66

a common and recommended method for statistical analysis in the social sciences
(Bernard, 2000; Raab-Steiner & Benesch, 2008; Williams, Sweeney, & Anderson,
2009). Using “profile analysis” (Bernard, 2000, p. 422), the data were also explored per
national culture. Furthermore, a reliability analysis was employed to test the consistency
of the scales of the independent and dependent variables (constructs). In addition,
correlation analysis was used to explore (the strength of) the association among
variables, and to investigate whether these associations were significant.
To determine value congruence, the average of the absolute difference between
two entities of all 31 value items were taken. To be more precise, the participants were
asked to rate how important each statement was to themselves and secondly how
important that same statement was as perceived in the organization. The absolute
difference between the two scores reflects the amount of discrepancy. Thus, a low score
indicated a higher degree of value congruence, whereas a high score implied less
congruence. The respondents assessed the two entities using a five-point Likert scale
ranging from 1 (highly unimportant) to 5 (highly important). One entity reflected the
level of importance of a particular value statement for the individual, while the other
entity reflected the level of importance as perceived by the organization. Despite
criticisms of Cronbach (1953), Edwards (1993, 1994) and Finegan (2000), this method
was favored as it enabled a more detailed understanding of the discrepancies in more
detail. Second, a reliability test for the value instrument displayed a Cronbach’s α of
.94, which reduced the potential weakness. Moreover, despite earlier criticisms e.g.
Cronbach (1953), Edwards (1993, 1994), and Finegan (2000) recent research has
favored this approach. For example, Nwadei (2003) used the normative approach (e.g.,
difference scores) arguing that the ipsative technique (e.g., ranking) forces respondent
to rank values at the expense of another. In addition, he criticized approaches where
people been asked to assess directly the perceived congruence as respondents may not
know their own values, not to mention the values of an organization. In support of this,
Meglino and Ravlin (1998) assessed the application of difference scores in the
measurement of value congruence as essential.
Individual values were calculated by averaging the ratings of the items as
important for themselves. The same method was applied for the constructs of the
dependent variables, work engagement, emotional exhaustion (on two dimensions,
“frequency” and “intensity”), affective commitment, and productivity.
 67

The following sections provide a detailed overview of the statistical methods

used to test the hypotheses. Stage 1, Chapter 4 is dedicated to testing Hypotheses 1-4. In
other words, the chapter includes exploration about the strength of the effect of value
congruence and individual values on (a) work engagement, (b) emotional exhaustion
(both on “frequency” and “intensity”), (c) affective commitment, and (d) productivity.

Figure 3: Research Model 1 - value congruence, individual values predict outcome variables, moderated
by individual values

In addition, the chapter includes an analysis of the combined effect of value congruence
and individual values and the interaction effect (moderation) of individual values on the
relationship between value congruence and the six outcome variables mentioned above.
Figure 3 illustrates stage 1.
To support the aim of stage 1, correlation analysis was first used to investigate
whether there was a relationship among the variables and to investigate whether the
relationship was significant. In addition, linear multiple hierarchical regression analysis
was performed in three steps to measure the direction and strength of the relationship
between the outcome variables and to explore whether value congruence accounts for
variation in work engagement, emotional exhaustion, affective commitment, or
productivity. In the second step of the linear multiple hierarchical regression analysis
individual values were added to test whether value congruence is still related to the
 68

outcome variables. 1 In the third and final step of the linear multiple regression analysis,
the interaction term between value congruence and individual values were added to
determine whether, and to what extent, the effect of value congruence on the outcome
variables was moderated by individual values. In support of this, the central idea of the
thesis is to cast more light on the nature of the moderation (Field, 2014), because there
might be cases in which the moderator would increase the effect of the predictor on the
outcome, in which the moderator would decrease the effect, or in which the moderator
would reverse the relationship between the predictor and the outcome. Moreover, the
influence of the moderator on the relationship might or might be not be significant.
Therefore, a deeper investigation is suggested, which involves conducting a simple
slope analysis that examines the relationship between predictor variables and outcome
variables at low, mean and high values for the third (moderating) variable (Field, 2014).
To achieve this the tool PROCESS (Hayes, 2012) was used to detect a possible
moderation effect by providing estimated data for three different levels of values for the
moderator.
Stage 2, Chapter 5 is dedicated to testing Hypothesis 5-7 in order to investigate
value congruence and individual values multidimensionally. In other words, it explores
the strength of the different value dimensions related to the individual or organizational
outcomes. Furthermore, it discusses whether the effect of the value dimensions’
congruence on the outcome variables is moderated by or depends on the level of the
individual value dimensions.

1
As individual values are an integral part of value congruence, absence of collinearity was verified.
 69

Figure 4: Research Model 2 - value congruence, individual value dimensions predict outcome variables,
moderated by the individual value dimension

In stage 2 principal component analysis was used to compute value congruence

dimensions and individual value dimensions. Backward multiple regression analysis
was conducted to provide a stepwise elimination as a means to determine which of the
dimensions of individual values and value congruence were the strongest predictors of
the six outcome variables.
Once significant dimensions were established, two-step hierarchical regression
analysis was applied to test whether the effect of value congruence dimensions on
outcome variables was moderated by the level of individual value dimensions. As
mentioned earlier, a deeper investigation was proposed by conducting a simple slope
analysis to investigate the relationship between independent variables (value
congruence dimensions) and dependent variables (e.g., work engagement) at low, mean
and high values for the third (moderator) variable, the individual value dimension.
Noticeably, the effect of national culture was explored in both stages. In this
study, national culture is essentially a reflection of the location in which the participants
were based and performed their duties. In stage 1, the descriptive data, the correlation
analysis, and the linear multiple regression analysis were breaking down into different
national cultures to compare the mean value of the dependent and independent
variables, secondly to compare the relationship of the different national cultures
between value congruence, individual value and work engagement, emotional
exhaustion, affective commitment, or productivity. Furthermore, regression analysis
 70

was used to investigate in which nation the relationship between value congruence and
outcome variables changed by taking individual values into account, reflecting
Hypothesis 6. In stage 2, similar statistical methods were used to explore the cultural
effects for testing Hypothesis 10. In other words, descriptive data for value congruence
dimensions and individual value dimensions were computed to show the mean value of
the various countries. Correlation analysis was performed to analyze whether the
association of value congruence dimensions or individual value dimensions with work
engagement, emotional exhaustion, affective commitment, or productivity varies among
national cultures.

3.8 Summary
The findings in the existing literature suggested the adoption of a deductive approach
for the study. A survey strategy was selected in which a questionnaire was employed to
gather data from a multinational company. The company was considered suitable for
this study due to its inclusion of employees from different nations and across different
locations. Moreover, accessibility for the researcher also made the selection of this
company suitable to this study. The final number of respondents who participated in this
study was 305. For the analysis of data, various quantitative methods were used, such as
descriptive data analysis, correlation analysis, regression analysis with interaction
effects, and multiple regression analysis. To meet the research objectives, the analytical
process was conducted in two steps:

(a) To test the effects of different value concepts, such value congruence and individual
values, on emotional exhaustion, work engagement, affective commitment and
productivity, and to investigate the moderating role of individual values on these
relationships, and
(b) To explore the strength of different value dimensions on the outcome variables and
the moderating role of particular individual value dimensions on the relationship of
different value congruence dimensions and emotional exhaustion, work
engagement, affective commitment, or productivity.