Publication

Abstract : The IT (information technology) industry has been a prominent contributor to the Indian economy over the last two decades. As a result it has been able to absorb a significant part of the talent coming out of the country's educational institutions. But in recent times, many new avenues are opening up for the best talent. As a result the employee attrition rate is quite high in the IT sector these days. The objective of this paper is to examine the role that Herzberg's motivational and hygiene factors play in ensuring job satisfaction of the employees in this sector. Herzberg's theory of workplace motivation has been one of the most validated theories of motivation in the western world. But, it has been found to operate with some differences in different countries, especially Asia, because of cultural differences. For example, see Sithiphand, 1978; Hauff, 2014. Attempts have been made to understand the workplace motivation of employees in the Indian IT sector. But there have been hardly any effort to understand the way the factors pointed out by Herzberg affect job satisfaction of employees in the Indian IT industry. In this study we examined the role of these two sets of factors in the Indian IT industry. Data was collected from 153 IT industry employees. It was found that contrary to what is predicted by the theory, the hygiene factors play a stronger role in predicting job satisfaction of the Indian IT sector employees. The implications of this finding are discussed in the paper.