A Study of Attitudes Toward Distributive and Procedural Aspects of the Grievance Procedure and Organizational Commitment

This study had five basic objectives. The first objective was to determine how teachers who are union members, and principals of public schools in the state of Wisconsin view four aspects of the grievance procedure--fairness, effectiveness, representation, and importance. The second objective was to determine the commitment levels of teachers who are union members and principals toward the school organization. The third objective was to determine if there is a correlation between the attitudes of union members toward the grievance procedure and commitment to the school organization. The fourth objective was to determine if perceptions of the process of the grievance procedure (procedural aspects) are more central to expressed attitude toward the grievance procedure than are perceptions of the outcomes (distributive aspects) in terms of satisfaction. The fifth objective was to examine which demographic variables, including gender, age, tenure, educational level, geographical area, union involvement and traditional versus consensus/win-win collective bargaining have an effect on attitude toward the grievance procedure and/or commitment levels of union members and principals toward the school organization. The methodology employed to achieve these objectives was a mail survey of teachers from nine public school districts who are members of the Wisconsin Education Association Council (WEAC) and principals of public schools from the entire state. This study, focusing specifically on the educational organization within the public sector, examined the grievance procedure of the collective bargaining process in order to improve labor relations and negotiations in public sector educational organizations. A significant outcome of this study is the identification of factors which have the potential of increasing the levels of commitment of teachers and principals of educational organizations. But perhaps the most valuable contribution of this study is that it provides insight into distributive and procedural elements which can be utilized for the development of alternative dispute resolution processes which specifically meet the needs of public sector organizations, and especially, educational organizations within the public sector