A comparative study of the relationships between compensation satisfaction, its antecedents, and motivation in public and private leisure service organizations

Purpose. The purposes of this study were: (1) to examine the construct of compensation satisfaction in leisure service professionals; (2) to investigate the influence of antecedent variables both individually and collectively on overall compensation satisfaction and on each of its dimensions respectively; (3) to explore the relationship between compensation satisfaction and job motivation; and, (4) to compare these relationships in public and private leisure service professionals.Method. A nationwide survey of randomly selected mid-level managers in public and private leisure service organizations was conducted. The sample consisted of 667 public managers and 307 private managers. A questionnaire consisting of seven sections was developed for data collection.Results. Major findings of this study were: (1) Dimensionality of the compensation satisfaction construct as proposed by Heneman and Schwab (1985) was confirmed in both public and private samples. (2) Survey respondents were moderately satisfied with their compensation. Although the public managers received significantly higher salaries than the private managers, no significant difference was found in pay level satisfaction and overall compensation satisfaction. (3) The relationships between the antecedent variables and compensation satisfaction were quite different in the two samples of managers. For the public managers, educational level, gender, benefit coverage, benefit cost to employee, and organizational size had no effect on overall compensation satisfaction, nor the four dimensions of compensation satisfaction. The best predictors of compensation satisfaction were current salary, perceived compensation equity, percentage of pay raise, orientation toward pay raises, and age. (4) For the private managers, educational level, percentage of last pay raise, benefit coverage, benefit cost to employee, and organizational size had no effect on compensation satisfaction. The best predictors of compensation satisfaction were current salary, perceived compensation equity, and tenure. (5) No relationship existed between motivation to work and compensation satisfaction. Neither public nor private leisure service managers' motivation to work was affected by compensation satisfaction. Implications of these findings and limitations of this investigation were also discussed.U of I OnlyETDs are only available to UIUC Users without author permissio