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This is to certify that the
dissertation entitled
THE I‘v’TPACT OF‘ SATISFACTION AND DISSATISFACTICN
ON PERCEPTION OF REPORTER. PLRFORB'EANOEZ AI‘CD
DECISION ORIEI‘ITAI‘IOT‘I Al'fLONG CITY EDITORS AI‘
DAILY NEZ‘.’SPAPERS
presented by

Charles Roy St. Cyr

has been accepted towards fulfillment
of the requirements for

Ph . D . degree in “Na F i s ife d j 3

./{¢’» 22.,

Major professor

Dme May 6, 2002

MS U is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Institution 0- 12771

 

PLACE IN RETURN BOX to remove this checkout from your record.
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6/01 c;lClRC/DateDue.p65-p. 15

 

THE IMPACT OF SATISFACTION AND DISSATISFACTION ON PERCEPTION
OF REPORTER PERFORMANCE AND DECISION ORIENTATION AMONG
CITY EDITORS AT DAILY NEWSPAPERS

By

Chades Roy St. Cyr

A DISSERTATION

Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN MASS MEDIA

College of Communication Arts and Sciences

2002

ABSTRACT
THE IMPACT OF SATISFACTION AND DISSATISFACTION ON PERCEPTION
OF REPORTER PERFORMANCE AND DECISION ORIENTATION AMONG
CITY EDITORS AT DAILY NEWSPAPERS
By

Charles Roy St. Cyr

The central research question in this exploratory study is: What is the
leadership orientation of newsroom managers at daily newspapers in the United
States. and what explains and predicts that leadership orientation?

A national mail sample survey of 301 city editors at daily newspapers
nationwide was conducted to examine leadership orientation as a dependent
variable. City editors were selected as the population of interest because they
are directly responsible for local news reporters.

Motivation-hygiene theory was employed to identify independent
variables. The independent variables are a City editor’s self-satisfaction with
intrinsic job rewards, a city editor’s dissatisfaction with newsroom working
conditions, a city editor’s perception of goal-attainment by reporters, a City
editor's perception of what senior newsroom managers expect of reporters, and a
City editor's perception of reporter journalistic performance. Span of control is
included as a control variable.

Confinnatory factor analysis was employed to test the validity of multiple
measures for all variables. Cronbach's alpha was calculated to test the reliability

of the multiple measures for each variable. Ordinary least squares

linear regression equations were employed to test 12 hypotheses and a
leadership orientation model. A multiple regression path analysis was conducted
to identify unanticipated associations among the variables. Data analysis also
incorporated partial correlation and comparison of daily newspapers categorized
by circulation.

The study found that city editors tend to be slightly more than moderately
self-satisfied in their job but moderately dissatisfied with working conditions in
their newsrooms.

The City editors surveyed also indicated that they do not see themselves
as effective leaders who are responsible for motivating subordinates to associate
attainment of organization goals with self-satisfaction on the job. Instead, the city
editors said they tend to see themselves as benevolent authoritarian decision-
makers whO manage local news departments, solve problems, and correct
deficiencies.

The only variable found to have a substantive and significant impact on
city editor decision-making orientation is city editor perception of reporter
journalistic performance (Beta = .27, p = .005).

And the only variable found to have a substantive and significant Impact
on city editor perception of reporter journalistic performance is how the city
editors said they perceive the expectations senior newsroom managers have for

reporter performance (Beta = .46, p = .001).

Copyright by
Charles Roy St. Cyr
2002

This Dissertation ls Dedicated To My Wife, Ae Nam, And My Daughter,
Adrienne

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Many individuals contributed in profound ways to my commitment to
doctoral studies and my determination to successfully complete this doctoral
dissertation. My wife and best friend, Ae Nam St. Cyr, and my daughter and
inspiration, Adrienne, endured many years of financial hardship, emotional
distance, and physical separation with patient love and enduring
encouragement. Their sacrifices were as great or greater than mine. This
dissertation is as much an expression of their dedication as mine.

No person contributed more to my higher education than Professor
Stephen Lacy, director of the Michigan State University School of Journalism.
Professor Lacy, the chairman of my dissertation committee, consistently
encouraged me to “just do the work” as my confidence, energy, stamina, and
comprehension ebbed and flowed over the years. He set high standards,
emphasized rigor in the application of quantitative methods, never missed an
opportunity to instruct, and routinely made himself available for consultation
despite an excruciatingly demanding schedule of his own. My stubborn
ignorance, lack of academic discipline, and numerous other personal
shortcomings did not deter him.

More importantly, Professor Lacy insisted that I think, think, and think
again. He taught me how to respect the research effort of others and how to
use research findings to generate ideas of my own. His passion for research is

a professional example for any doctoral student to emulate. Working with him

vi

on research projects was an invaluable education in the challenges, demands,
and rewards of competent scholarship.

The opportunity to participate in the Mass Media PhD Program at MSU
was made possible by Professor Stan Soffin, former director of the MSU
School of Journalism. Professor Soffin encouraged me, provided financial and
personal support, and often offered guidance. His passion for undergraduate
education and public service was inspirational.

Professor Todd Simon, a former faculty member in the MSU School of
Journalism, understood the concerns of an experienced newspaper editor
trying to function successfully as a doctoral student at late mid-life. He was
indefatigable in his support, encouragement, and wisdom. His humor helped
relieve the pressure of doctoral study, and his coffee made long nights in the
office more palatable.

Each member of my dissertation committee also contributed
substantially to my doctoral student experience. Professor Charles Salmon of
the MSU Department of Advertising enhanced my appreciation of the joy of
intellectual discovery. Professor Nora Rifon, also of the MSU Department of
Advertising, demonstrated the value of challenging assumptions and provided
invaluable guidance in theory assessment. And Professor Sue Carter of the
MSU School of Journalism carefully critiqued my work and graciously corrected
me when my focus or comprehension went awry.

Only i am responsible, however, for all shortcomings associated with
this dissertation.

vii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION ................................................................................. 1
Central Research Question ............................................................ 5
Supplemental Research Questions .................................................. 7

CHAPTER I

LITERATURE REVIEW ....................................................................... 9
Management Perspective ............................................................... 9
Theories X, Y, and Z .................................................................... 19
Contingency Theory............... 21
Path-Goal Theory ........................................................................ 23
Motivation-Hygiene Theory ............................................................ 25
Descriptive Research .................................................................... 33
Critique of Descriptive Research ..................................................... 4O
Theory-based Research ................................................................ 42
Critique of Theory-based Research ................................................. 43

CHAPTER 2

LEADERSHIP ORIENTATION MODEL ................................................. 46

Motivation-Hygiene Assumptions ................................................... 46
Self-satisfaction ......................................................................... 49
Working Conditions .................................................................... 50
Goal Attainment by Reporters ....................................................... 51
What Superiors Expect of Reporters .............................................. 52
Reporter Journalistic Performance ................................................ 53
Leadership Orientation ................................................................ 54

CHAPTER 3

HYPOTHESES ................................................................................ 60

Variable Relationships ................................................................. 60
Self-satisfaction .......................................................................... 60
Working Conditions .................................................................... 61
Goal Attainment by Reporters ........................................................ 62
What Superiors Expect of Reporters ............................................... 63
Leadership Orientation ................................................................ 64

CHAPTER 4

METHOD ........................................................................................ 68
Sample Survey ............................................................................ 68
Population ................................................................................. 69
Questionnaire ............................................................................ 71
Questionnaire Pretest .................................................................. 72
Survey Distribution ...................................................................... 73

viii

Survey Response Rate ................................................................ 74

Confinnatory Factor Analysis ......................................................... 74
Skewness and Kurtosis ................................................................ 77
Factor Loading Criteria ................................................................ 78
Principal Factors Analysis ............................................................. 78
Orthogonal Rotation .................................................................... 79
Reliability ................................................................................... 80
Self-satisfaction .......................................................................... 80
Working Conditions ..................................................................... 85
Overall Job Satisfaction ................................................................ 87
Goal Attainment by Reporters ........................................................ 89
Reporter Journalistic Performance .................................................. 92
What Superiors Expect of Reporters... ...94
Leadership Orientation ................................................................. 96
Reconsideration of the Conceptual Model ...................................... 100
Multiple Regression ................................................................... 103
Multi-collinearity ......................................................................... 105
2 Scores .................................................................................. 107
Path Analysis ........................................................................... 107
Hypotheses Testing Criteria ......................................................... 109
Comparison by Newspaper Size ................................................... 109
CHAPTER 5
DATA ANALYSIS ............................................................................ 1 1 1
Demographics .......................................................................... 111
Test of Hypotheses ................................................................... 112
Summary of Hypotheses Testing ................................................. 129
Path Analysis ........................................................................... 130
Comparison by Newspaper Size .................................................. 133
CHAPTER 6
DISCUSSION ................................................................................. 137
City Editor Stereotypes ............................................................... 137
Decision-making Orientation ........................................................ 139
Leadership Orientation ............................................................... 143
Goal Attainment by Reporters ...................................................... 145
Reporter Journalistic Performance ................................................ 146
What Superiors Expect of Reporters .............................................. 149
Working Conditions ................................................................... 152
Self-satisfaction ......................................................................... 154
Motivation-Hygiene Theory .......................................................... 156
CHAPTER 7
CONCLUSION ................................................................................ 158
Overview .................................................................................. 158
Research Implications ................................................................. 159

ix

APPENDIX A: Survey Questionnaire ................................................. 168

APPENDIX B: First-wave Cover Letter174

APPENDIX C: Reminder Post Card ................................................ 175
APPENDIX D: Second-wave Cover Letter .......................................... 176
BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................ 178

Table 1:
Table 2:
Table 3:

Table 4:

Table 5:

Table 6:

Table 7:

Table 8:

Table 9:

LIST OF TABLES

Factor Analysis With Orthogonal Rotation ........................ 81-82
Correlation Coefficients for Independent Variables .............. 106

Regression Analysis of Manager Self-satisfaction
On the Job With Manager Dissatisfaction
Nth Working Conditions and Manager Span
Of Control as Independent Variables ........................ 113

Regression Analysis of Manager Dissatisfaction
With Working Conditions With Manager
Self-satisfaction on the Job and Manager
Span of Control as Independent Variables. .. . .. ....1 14

Regression Analysis of Manager Perception
Of Reporter Journalistic Performance
With Manager Self-satisfaction on the Job,
Manager Dissatisfaction With Working Conditions,
Manager Perception of What Senior Newsroom
Managers Expect of Reporters, And Manager
Span of Control as Independent Variables ................ 116

Regression Analysis of Manager Perception
Of Reporter Journalistic Performance With
Manager Self-satisfaction on the Job,
Manager Dissatisfaction With Working
Conditions, and Manager Span of Control
As Independent Variables ...................................... 1 17

Regression Analysis of Manager Perception
Of Reporter Journalistic Performance
With Manager Self-satisfaction on the Job
And Manager Span of Control as
Independent Variables ........................................... 1 18

Regression Analysis of Manager Perception
Of Reporter Journalistic Performance
With Manager Dissatisfaction With
Working Conditions and Manager Span
Of Control as Independent Variables ........................ 120

Regression Analysis of Manager Perception
xi

Table 10:

Table 11:

Table 12:

Table 13:

Table 14:

Table 15:

Of Reporter Journalistic Performance

Vlfith Manager Perception of What

Senior Newsroom Managers Expect

Of Reporters and Manager Span of Control

As Independent Variables ...................................... 122

Regression Analysis of Manager Decision-Making
Orientation With Manager Self-satisfaction
On The Job, Manager Dissatisfaction With
Working Conditions, Manager Perception of
Reporter Journalistic Performance, Manager
Perception of What Senior Newsroom Managers
Expect of Reporters, and Manager Span of Control
As Independent Variables ....................................... 125

Regression Analysis of Manager Decision-Making
Orientation With Manager Self-satisfaction
On The Job, Manager Dissatisfaction With
Working Conditions, Manager Perception of
What Senior Newsroom Managers Expect of
Reporters, and Manager Span of Control as
Independent Variables ........................................... 126

Regression Analysis of Manager Decision-Making
Orientation With Manager Self-satisfaction
On The Job and Manager Span of Control
As Independent Variables ....................................... 127

Regression Analysis of Manager Decision-Making
Orientation With Manager Dissatisfaction With
Working Conditions and Manager Span of Control
As Independent Variables ...................................... 129

Regression Analysis of Manager Perception of What
Senior Newsroom Managers Expect of Reporters
With Manager Self-satisfaction on the Job,
Manager Dissatisfaction With Working Conditions,
And Manager Span of Control as
Independent Variables ........................................... 131

Difference-of-Means Test for all Variables
In the Modified Leadership Orientation
Model Without Span Of Control
As a Control Variable ............................................. 134

xii

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1: Leadership Orientation Model46

Figure 2: Modified Leadership Orientation Model ............................. 100
Figure 3: Hypothesized Relationships ........................................... 112
Figure 4: Supported Hypotheses .................................................. 130
Figure 5: Path Analysis Diagram ................................................... 132

xiii

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

Leader Behavior Description Questionnaire, Form XII ..................... LBDQ-XII

xiv

INTRODUCTION

Mass communication researchers have found that job satisfaction among
daily newspaper reporters in the United States plummeted to its lowest level in
more than 20 years during the 19903.1 Two researchers found in a national
sample survey that only 27 percent of reporters said they were very satisfied with
their jobs compared to 40 percent in 1982-1983 and 49 percent in 1971.2 The
decline in reporter job satisfaction, the researchers said, was disproportionately
high compared to most other professions.

The decline was so severe that some management and mass media
scholars expressed concern that the status of reporting as an attractive and
rewarding profession would be permanently diminished if the downward trend
continued.3 "In any occupation where levels of satisfaction are low and are
declining, the question of what affects job satisfaction, and, more importantly,
how those factors affecting job satisfaction can be managed to improve
satisfaction, is crucial."

Mass communication researchers have found that reporters who say they
are satisfied tend to be 40 or younger. These reporters tend to perceive that they

have sufficient autonomy, communication with managers is adequate, their

 

‘ David H Weaver and G Cleveland Wilhoit, The American Journalist in the 1990s u. 3. News

People at the End of an Era, (Mahwah, N. J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates; 1996), 111.
2Weaver and lMIhoit, The American Joumalist in the 19905: U. S News People at the End of an

Era, 99-121.

3 Trevor R. Brown in Weaver and Wilhoit, The American Journalist in the 19903: U. S. News

People at the End of an Era, 243-246, and Fiona McQuarrie, “Professional Mystique and

Journalists’ Dissatisfaction, Newspaper Research Journal Vol. 20 No. 3 (Summer 1999): 20-28.
‘McQuarrie, 'Professional Mystique and Joumalists’ Dissatisfaction," 27.

1

newspaper informs the public as effectively as human and financial resources
allow, managers value reporter independence and initiative, colleagues and
supervisors are competent and supportive, and job stability, salary, and working
conditions are acceptable.5

Conversely, reporters who say they derive little satisfaction from their jobs
tend to be 40 or older. Experienced reporters tend to associate low job
satisfaction with lack of autonomy.

Other variables experienced reporters tend to associate with low job
satisfaction are frequent negative critiques by managers, policies and practices
that undermine journalistic norms, organization goals that override journalistic
principles, management exclusion of reporters from the determination of
newsroom goals, and reporter perceptions that financial and human resources at
their newspaper are inadequate to produce or sustain high quality journalism.“

Additional variables mass communication researchers have found
reporters tend to associate with low job satisfaction include low salary, lack of
professional or personal recognition, lack of professional advancement, limited
opportunity for personal growth, and reporter perceptions that newsroom

managers are not competent.

 

‘ McQuarrie, “Professional Mystique and Joumalists’ Dissatisfaction,” 27.

5 Weaver and IMIhoit, The American Journalist in the 1990s: u. 8. News People at the End or an
Era, 99-121, and Doug Underwood, When MBAs Rule the Newsroom, (New York: Columbia
University Press; 1993).

° Weaver and Wilhoit, The American Journalist in the 1990s: U. S. News People at the End of an
Era, 105-121; Keith Stamm and Underwood, “The Relationship of Job Satisfaction to Newsroom
Policy Changes,” Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly Vol. 70 No. 3 (Autumn 1993):
528-541; Underwood, When MBAs Rule the Newsroom; Ted Pease, “Newsroom 2000: Not my
kid! Journalists Iary of industry’s future,” Newspaper Research Journal Vol. 13 Nos. 1 and 2
(Winter/Spring 1992): 34-53; and Pease, “Blaming the Boss: Newsroom Professionals See

2

Of special interest in this dissertation is mass communication researchers
have found that reporters frequently associate low job satisfaction with what they
characterize as inept, inconsistent, incompetent, or ineffective leadership in their
newsroom.7 Business management literature emphasizes that effective
leadership is absolutely essential if employees are to be satisfied with their jobs
and if organization goals are to be achieved.8

An effective leader is defined in business management literature as a
person who consistently motivates employees to equate attainment of
organization goals with self-motivation and self-satisfaction in their work.9
Effective leadership is achieved through a complex and dynamic process of
social interaction and is a broader concept than efficient management, which is
limited to the exercise of formal authority.10

Business management literature assumes organizations thrive with
effective leadership but struggle to attain goals without it even when the

organization is managed effectively.'1 As a result, in business management

 

Managers as Public Enemy No. 1,” Newspaper Research Journal Vol. 12 No. 2 (Spring: 1991 ): 2-
21.
’ Underwood, When MBAs Rule the Newsroom; Pease, “Newsroom 2000: Not my kid! Journalists
leery of industry's future,” 34—53; and Pease, “Blaming the Boss: Newsroom Professionals See
Managers as Public Enemy No. 1,” 2-21.
' Chester I. Barnard, The Functions of the Executive, (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University
Press; 1954).
° Frederick Herzberg, Bernard Mausner, and Barbara BIocIi<Snydennaii, Motivation to Work,
(New York: lMley 8 Sons; 1959), and Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: To be Efficient and to be
Human (2nd ed.), (Homewood, lll.: Dow Jones—Irwin; 1982).
‘° Robert Kreitner, Management (3rd ed.), (Boston: Houghton Mifflin; 1986); 461-482; Wendell L.
French, Human Resource Management, (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co.; 1986), 90-93; and Ralph
M. Stogdill and Alvin E. Coons (eds), Leader Behavior: Its Description and Measurement,
(Columbus, Ohio: The Ohio State University College of Administrative Science; 1957).

‘ Kreitner, Management (3rd ed.).

3

literature a manager’s most difficult, meaningful, and important task is to be
effective as a leader.

Some mass communication researchers contend that the precipitous
decline in reporter job satisfaction indicates that newsroom managers at daily
newspapers are ineffective leaders, especially under conditions of uncertainty
associated with organization change.12

If job satisfaction declined among employees in other industrial
organizations as much as it apparently has declined among reporters at daily
newspapers in the United States, managers in those organizations would be
compelled to take corrective action to improve leadership, business management
literature emphasizes, because ineffective leadership is associated with
organization dysfunction.

Business management literature emphasizes that a persistent decline in
employee job satisfaction should stimulate competent managers to perceive a
serious problem for the organization that requires conective leadership. In
business management literature, if an organization fails to conect deficient
leadership, organization problems intensify and multiply. It allowed to faster for a
long time, ineffective leadership may cause an organization to fail in the
marketplace.13

Some mass media scholars argue that the decline in reporter job

satisfaction reflects attempts by daily newspapers to innovate in reaction to

 

‘2 Pease, “Blaming the Boss: Newsroom Professionals See Managers as Public Enemy No. 1,” 2-
21.
‘3 Kreitner, Management (3rd ed).

4

changing market conditions in the United States in the 1990s.“ From that
perspective, the more new ideas challenge journalistic traditions, the more
reporters who value well-established norms are likely to express low job
satisfaction and be critical of newsroom management.

Business management literature emphasizes that effective leadership is
most difficult to sustain and is most important to achieve when employees resent
or resist change.15 As the rate or complexity of change increases, resistance is
likely to increase unless managers develop effective leadership styles.

Mass communication researchers have devoted little attention to whether
or how city editors at daily newspapers lead and why. This dissertation seeks to
make a contribution to the mass communication and media management
research literature by examining what might explain and predict the leadership
orientation of city editors.

Leadership traditionally has been studied as an independent variable, but
in this exploratory study the leadership orientation of newsroom managers is the

dependent variable.“ The central research question is: What is the leadership

 

1‘ Kevin G. Bamhurst and Diana Mutz, “American Journalism and the Decline in Event-Centered
Reporting,” Journal of Communication Vol. 47 No. 4 (Autumn 1997): 27-53; Robert H. Giles,
"Change shapes trends in newspaper management,” Newspaper Research Journal Vol. 14 No. 2
(Spring 1993): 32-39; Sharon H. Polansky and Douglas W.W. Hughes, “Managerial Innovation in
Newspaper Organizations,’ Newspaper Research Journal Vol. 8 No. 1 (Fall 1986): 1-12; and
Stamm and Underwood, “The Relationship of Job Satisfaction to Newsroom Policy Changes,"
528-541.

‘5 Herbert Kaufman, The Limits of Organization Change, (University, Ala.: The University of
Alabama Press; 1971).

“ Donald T. Campbell, Leadership and its Effects Upon the Group, (Columbus, Ohio: The Ohio
State University Bureau of Business Research; 1956); Ellis L. Scott, Leadership and Perceptions
of Organization, (Columbus, Ohio: The Ohio State University Bureau of Business Research;
1956); Stogdill, Scott and William E. Jaynes, Leadership and Role Expectations, (Columbus,
Ohio: The Ohio State University Bureau of Business Research; 1956); and Stogdill, Leadership

5

orientation of city editors at daily newspapers in the United States, and what
explains and predicts that leadership orientation?

City editors were selected as the population of interest because they are
the newsroom managers most directly responsible for leading news reporters,
and they seldom have been studied by mass communication researchers. When
reporters criticize leadership in their newsrooms, it is probable that city editors
are among the newsroom managers whose leadership is perceived to be
ineffective.

Motivation-hygiene theory was employed to identify independent variables
that might be associated with the leadership orientation of city editors.

The theory, among the most controversial in business management
literature, has received scant attention in mass communication research. The
theory distinguishes between variables associated with employee self-
satisfaction derived from intrinsic rewards associated with a job and variables in
the work environment associated with employee dissatisfaction with working
conditions.17

Motivation-hygiene theory was integrated into this study to test its
explanatory and predictive power. The theory also was used to construct a
leadership orientation model that serves as the conceptual foundation for the

hypotheses tested in this study.

 

and Structures of Personal Interaction, (Columbus, Ohio: The Ohio State University Bureau of
Business Research; 1957).

‘7 Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: To be Efiicient and to be Human, and Ardyth B. Sohn, Jan
LeBIanc Wicks, Stephen Lacy and George Sylvie et. al., Media Management: A Casebook
Approach (2" ed.) (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates; 1999), 57451.

6

The model presents a city editor's perception of reporter journalistic
performance as a dependent variable associated with the city editor’s self-
satisfaction, the city editor’s dissatisfaction with working conditions, the city
editor’s perception of what senior newsroom managers expect of reporters, and
the city editor’s perception of goals reporters are expected to achieve.

Perception of reporter journalistic performance, in turn, is presented as an
independent variable associated with a city editor’s leadership orientation. The
City editor’s span of control is included as a control variable.

From the central research question and the leadership orientation model
additional research questions are posed that serve to refine the testing of
hypotheses. Those questions are:

1) What is the relationship between a city editors dissatisfaction with
working conditions and the manager’s self-satisfaction with intrinsic rewards
associated with the city editor’s job?

2) What is the relationship between a City editor’s self-satisfaction and the
city editor's perception of reporter journalistic performance?

3) What is the relationship between a city editor’s dissatisfaction with
working conditions and the city editor’s perception of reporter journalistic
performance?

4) What is the relationship between a city editor’s perception of the goals
reporters are expected to achieve and the City editor’s perception of reporter

journalistic performance?

5) What is the relationship between a city editor’s perception of what the
city editor’s boss expects of reporters and the City editor’s perception of reporter
journalistic performance?

6) And, what is the relationship between a city editor’s perception of

reporter journalistic performance and the city editor’s leadership orientation?

Chapter 1

LITERATURE REVIEW

Management Perspective

Business management literature tends to be descriptive, prescriptive, and
normative. The conceptual focus typically is how managers can or should vary
their approach toward employees to achieve a goal or goals. In business
management literature, effective leadership of human resources is presented as
the most vital ingredient in managerial success.18

If employees are effectively motivated, business management literature
emphasizes, employees will associate achievement of organization goals with
personal success. Employee commitment to goal attainment is especially
important when organizations innovate.19

Newspaper management literature emphasizes that the Information Age
has fostered profound challenges for and permanent change in the daily
newspaper industry.20 Many newspaper owners emphasized in the 1990s that
the daily newspaper must reinvent itself to assure its long-term viability as
competition for advertising revenue has intensified, reader preferences have
diversified, and electronic sources of information have proliferated.

Moreover, daily newspaper circulation in metropolitan markets tended to

be static or in decline during the decade, and the gap between household

 

‘° French, Human Resource Management, 7.
‘° Kaufman, The Limits of Organization Change, 68-90.

9

penetration and population growth continued to widen.21 Market pressures
threatened high profit margins, and cost control alone was insufficient to offset
revenue loss.22 As a result, daily newspapers in the United States must adapt,
and adaptation necessitates change.23

Newspaper management literature suggests newsroom procedures,
processes, and policies must be re-engineered, and even how news is defined,
reported, packaged, and presented must be redefined.24 Newsroom policies, in
turn, may be associated less with a newspaper’s journalistic values and more
with the newspaper’s business goals.

Newsroom managers at daily newspapers traditionally have been
characterized as power-focused, risk-averse, turf-conscious, and tradition-bound,
but they are under increased pressure to be flexible, creative innovators who
lead reporters to embrace change.25 One consequence is newspaper
management has become more complex, and effective leadership may have
become more difficult to achieve.”5

Under the total newspaper concept, developed by the lntemational

Newspaper Marketing Association, all departments, including the newsroom,

 

2° Robert G. Picard and Jeffrey H. Brody, The Newspaper Publishing Industry, (Boston: Allyn 8.
Bacon; 1997), 137.

2‘ Conrad C. Fink, Strategic Newspaper Management, (New York: Random House; 1988), 185.
2’ Picard and Brody, The Newspaper Publishing Industry, 43, and F ink, Strategic Newspaper
Management, 124.

2' Giles, Newsroom Management: A Guide To Theory and Practice, (Detroit: Media Management
Books, Inc.; 1988); Giles, “Change shapes trends in newspaper management,’ 32-39; John M.
Levine and Daniel B. Wackman, Managing Media Organizations, (New York: Longman; 1988);
and Jim Vlfillis, Surviving in the Newspaper Business: Newspaper Management in Turbulent
Times, (New York: Praeger; 1988).

2‘ Herbert Zeltner, Guide to Media Management, (Lincolnwood, lll.: NTC Business Books; 1995).
'5 Stanley Walker, City Editor, (New York: Frederick A. Stokes Co.; 1934), and Giles, “Change
shapes trends in newspaper management," 32-39.

10

integrate their efforts to more effectively service advertisers and readers.
Customer sensitivity is the performance criterion, and advertisers are perceived
to be the most desired customers.27

Senior newsroom managers try under the total newspaper concept to
accommodate marketing strategies in reporter production of news and feature
stories. One outcome is newsroom managers may tend to exercise news
judgment based more on their perceptions of what advertisers and readers want
and less on what reporters think is important.28 Although the objective remains
delivery of an aggregated audience to advertisers, the Change in emphasis may
increase uncertainty among reporters as to what constitutes public service and
quality journalism.29

Traditional concepts of independent journalists serving the information
needs of a diverse, civic—minded, self-goveming citizenry are not fully integrated
into the total newspaper concept. Instead, the concept assumes reporters must
strive to achieve organization goals determined by managers at their
newspapers. The concept minimizes the semi-independent, professional status
of reporters and emphasizes their role as employees who are expected to be
responsive to management. One result has been a call by some professional
journalists and mass communication scholars for a return to strong journalistic

values to restore news credibility?o

 

2‘ Sohn, Wicks, Lacy, and Sylvia at. al., Media Manegernent: A Casebook Approach (2nd ed.).
2’ Willis, Surviving in the Newspaper Business: Newspaper Management in Turbulent Times, 9,
and Levine and Wackman, Managing Media Organizations, 62-70.
2' Underwood, When MBAs Rule the Newsroom.
3' Fink, Strategic Newspaper Management, 136.
3° Giles, “Change shapes trends in newspaper management,” 33.

1 1

Marketing the daily newspaper can have the effect of circumscribing the
range of independent judgment newsroom managers allow reporters to
exercise.31 Managerial control determines who will work in a newsroom and
influences what reporters are asked to report about, how reporters are expected
to angle or develop stories, and what is emphasized as meaningful news?"Z
Unless leadership is effective, marketing the news can create tension or conflict
between managerial control and the creative independence and journalistic
values of reporters.33

Newspaper management literature emphasizes that reactive, situational
decision-making is the norm in most newsrooms.34 Newsroom managers tend to
react to problems. As situations and problems vary, a newsroom manager tends
to react to correct short-temi deficiencies. Situational decision-making thus may
be associated with reporter perceptions that the leadership they experience is
arbitrary or inconsistent.

Business management literature emphasizes, however, that effective
leadership is pro-active. Leaders actively seek to build constructive relations
between themselves and subordinates to minimize the likelihood that

organization problems will occur. Effective leadership is achieved through

 

3‘ James Ettema and D. Charles Whitney (eds. ), Individuals in Mass Media Organizations:
Creativity and Constraint," (Beverly Hills, Ca.: Sage Publications; 1982).

32Peter Dreier, "Newsroom Democracy and Media Monopoly: The Dilemma of Workplace Reform
Among Professional Journalists," The Insurgent Sociologist Vol. 8 Nos. 2 8r 3 (Fall 1978). 70-86.

3"Sharon H. Polansky and Douglas W. W Hughes, “Managerial Innovation in Newspmer
Organizations," Newspaper Research Journal Vol. 8 No. 1 (Fall 1986):1-12.

“Sohn, Wicks, Lacy, and Sylvia et. al., Media Management: A Casebook Approach (2nd ed. ), 1-

26.
12

reliance upon social influence, which is a function of positive social interaction.
Effective leadership thus is a broader concept than decision-making.

For leadership to be effective, according to business management
literature, managers must be aware of how important their social influence is in
their organization and how their social behavior affects employees. And, as with
attainment of any organization goal, management’s effort to achieve leadership
effectiveness must be actively and consistently sustained?5

Newspaper management literature presumes a formal hierarchy of
authority in which the owner, executive editor, and managing editor develop and
implement the editorial mission of the newsroom.” The editorial mission includes
how and why financial and human resources are allocated, organization of the
staff, news policies, operational practices, and standards of performance.”7

Mass communication scholars have described newsroom authority as a
system of command and control not unlike the military or a bureaucracy. "In a
newspaper company, power is centralized at the top. Information (about
company strategies and objectives) and authority flow downward.”8

Final authority for budgets or spending rests with the newspaper owner. If
the newspaper is owned by a chain or group, as are 80 percent of daily
newspapers in the United States, corporate executives finalize budgets after the

chief executive at each newspaper proposes a budget. As the budget year

 

3" Barnard, The Functions of the Executive.
3‘ Giles, Newsroom Management, 137-144.
37 Leo Bogart, "The Management of Mass Media," in W. Phillips Davidson and Frederick T.C. Yu,
Mass Communication Research: Major Issues and Future Directions (New York: Praeger; 1974),
143.
3‘ Giles, Media Management, A Guide to Theory and Practice, 1.

1 3

unfolds, newsroom spending is adjusted as revenue and costs vary. Corporate
budget controls facilitate achievement of profit goals?9

Newsroom operations adhere to a staff-line configuration. Control is
graduated down in levels. News departments are directly supervised by low-level
managers, such as city editors, who are accountable to senior newsroom
managers. The staff-line organization ensures senior managers control
newsrooms even as some degree of freedom of operation is allowed within each
department. Each department head also is constrained by the editorial mission,
the allocated human and financial resources, and the policies and expectations
of senior managers.‘0

In a daily newspaper newsroom, senior managers are free to accept,
reject, or modify operational decisions, including news decisions. Department
heads may recommend changes in practices, processes, or policies, but senior
managers decide. Those decisions structure newsrooms, guide processes,
formalize procedures, and establish a newsroom culture. Senior managers also
have final authority over the hiring, firing, reassignment, demotion, and promotion
of low-level managers.‘1

Traits senior managers tend to seek in reporters are ambition, curiosity,
competitiveness, aggressiveness, initiative, creativity, and intelligence. However,

sociability, an ability to learn from criticism, and a willingness to accept direction

 

3" Levine and Wackman, Managing Media Organizations, 145-183.

”Herbert Lee Williams, Newspaper Organization and Management, (Ames, Iowa: Iowa State
University Press, 1978), and John W. C. Johnstone, "Organization Constraints on Newswork, "
J10umalism Quarterly Vol. 53 No. 1 (Spring 1976): 5—13.

“For an overview and general discussion of variables associated with the scope of authority held
by senior newsroom managers, see Giles, Media Management.

14

have become more valued as senior managers increasingly emphasize control of
and cooperation among newsroom employees.“2

Senior managers tend to bypass their newspaper’s human resources or
personnel department when they make newsroom employment, promotion, or
demotion decisions.‘3 For outside applicants, past performance and who makes
a recommendation are most influential.“ For people already in the newsroom,
performance and loyalty to senior managers or the newspaper tend to be
determinative.“

When senior newsroom managers emphasize the human relations skills of
such low-level managers as city editors, they tend to mean not how effectively
the managers motivate reporters to associate attainment of organization goals
with self-satisfaction on the job, but rather how well the managers control
reporters and desk editors to compel efficient achievement of organization
goals.“

When they decide who will become a low-level manager, senior
newsroom managers tend to value reporting, writing, or copy editing experience.
The individual is expected to fit role expectations and follow directions. The

individual also is expected to be creative, have a strong news sense, be highly

 

‘2 Willis, Surviving in the Newspaper Business, and Giles, "Change shapes trends in newspaper
management."
‘3 Levine and Wackman, Managing Media Organizations, 83.
"" Edward J. Trayes, "Hiring and Promotion Practices: A Survey of 52 APME Dailies," Joumalism
Quarterly Vol. 53 No. 3 (Autumn 1976): 540-544.
"5 Giles, Newsroom Management, 559-575.
‘° Giles, Newsroom Management, 11-12.
1 5

motivated, demonstrate a deep commitment to the newspaper, and be able to
produce consistent and frequent results.47

Senior newsroom managers at daily newspapers in the United States tend
to be decisive. They delegate only limited authority to subordinate managers in
order to retain a high degree of operational control. They also tend to be flexible
in solving problems, are able to command respect or attention, are highly
motivated to achieve professional success, can plan and organize well,
demonstrate judgment their superiors perceive to be competent, have high stress
tolerance, and are tenacious in enforcing goal attainment.“

Business management literature stresses that the ability to motivate
human resources effectively is an essential skill for managers in any
organization. However, the list of skills managers in daily newspaper newsrooms
tend to share suggests that knowledge of how to enhance the self-satisfaction of
employees or how to motivate employees to associate attainment of organization
goals with personal success is not a precondition to be a senior or lower-level
newsroom manager at a daily newspaper in the United States.

Newsroom goals originate in the wants of senior managers, the perceived
needs and wants of readers and advertisers, and an assessment of the strengths
and weaknesses of the newsroom.49 As needs are identified, senior managers

make decisions, set goals, and organize or reorganize human and financial

 

‘7 Giles, Newsroom Management, 11.
"' Sohn, Christine Ogan, and John Polich, Newspaper Leadership, (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.:
Prentice Hall; 1986), 20.
“ Levine and Wackman, Managing Media Organizations, 96.
1 6

resources. In a newsroom, management effectiveness thus tends to be equated
with efficiency and control.50

Control also is achieved by applying negative reinforcement to extinguish
undesired behavior. In newsroom management literature, negative reinforcement
is assumed to be more efficient than positive reinforcement. Managers tend to
apply negative reinforcement, such as critiques or criticism of a reporter, because
negative reinforcement produces immediate results. Positive reinforcement, such
as praise or supportive human resource management, tends to be perceived as
inefficient because a consistent schedule of rewards may be required over a long
time that may or may not produce the desired effect.51

In media management literature, goal attainment is facilitated when an
employee is uncertain about how the employee is perceived by superiors. To
foster insecurity or uncertainty, newspaper management literature suggests a
manager should withhold information or praise. Newspaper management
literature assumes an insecure reporter, for example, will be motivated by a
desire to please.52 By manipulating the desire to please, senior managers
assume they increase their efficiency in goal attainment and enhance their
organization control.

Moreover, in communication with subordinates, managers hold the
balance of power by virtue of their formal authority or status in the newsroom.

The person who holds power in a situation may use a hard strategy in social

 

’° Fink, Strategic Newspaper Management, 91
5‘ Giles, Newsroom Management, 32.
5’ Giles, Newsroom Management, 32.
1 7

interaction. Typically, manager-reporter interaction begins with a manager’s
reasonable attempts to direct a reporter, or what is called soft strategies for
superior-subordinate relations. But if there is persistent reluctance or resistance,
the manager is likely to become aggressive, a common hard strategy in daily
newspaper newsrooms.53

Newspaper management literature suggests that newsroom managers
value hard strategies. The press of time, volume of daily decisions, production
demands, complexity of newsroom integration, risk of error associated with
fiequent exercise of judgment, risk of reprimand or criticism by superiors, and the
possibility of demotion or dismissal have been cited to explain hard strategies.
But a more precise explanation is a manager’s exercise of power, defined as the
production of effects intended by the manager, is a critical element in newsroom
social interaction.“

In addition, newspaper management literature suggests a newsroom
manager will favor hard, power-based strategies because the manager perceives
that they serve the manager’s self-interest. If a manager's perception of success
depends on the performance of a newsroom, a newsroom department, or the
achievement of specific goals, the manager may adopt power-based strategies
with the perception that they save time, compel goal implementation, and protect

the manager against criticism by superiors."5

 

’3 Levine and Wackman, Managing Media Organizations, 197-199.
5‘ Giles, Newsroom Management, 199-200.
’5 Giles, Newsroom Management, 200.

‘l 8

Reliance on hard strategies may be especially frequent, newspaper
management literature suggests, if the newspaper owner rewards a senior
manager's performance with bonuses tied to attainment of specific goals under a
system of management by objectives in which only senior managers participate.
The more important the goal or financial reward to the senior newsroom
manager, the harder the strategy in social interaction with employees.56

Newspaper corporations and other daily newspaper owners, business
management literature suggests, may be differentiated by the extent to which
leadership goals are emphasized under the system of management by objectives
for senior newsroom managers. Business management literature emphasizes
that effective leadership is of such vital importance to the success of any
business or industrial organization that it should be a key performance measure
for any manager whose ability to attain goals requires the cooperation of

subordinates.

Theories X, Y, and Z

Ever since the Hawthorne studies, begun in 1924 in a Western Electric
Co. factory near Chicago, first demonstrated that supportive leadership can
improve subordinate job satisfaction, advocates of human resource management
have assumed managers should strive to achieve organization goals through a

leadership orientation that supports subordinates.

 

5‘ Giles, Newsroom Management, 200.
1 9

The human resource approach assumes that if a manager leads with
sensitive concern for the needs and wants of subordinates, goal attainment is
likely to increase. If human resources are led insensitively, subordinate job
satisfaction is likely to decrease.57

In the 1950s, Chester Barnard championed the idea that effective
leadership is necessary for successful management. Barnard argued that
organizations are cooperative systems that integrate the voluntary efforts of
diverse individuals.

Although senior managers initiate goals, Barnard said, goal attainment
depends on the willingness of individuals at lower levels to comply.“ Subordinate
cOOperation is a function of leadership, and effective leadership is a function of
how well managers use the social influence process to motivate individuals to
associate personal and professional success with attainment of organization
goals.

In 1960, Douglas McGregor postulated two approaches for categorizing
managers based on their leadership. A Theory X manager presumes that
subordinates require close supervision and that subordinates prefer directive
leadership that minimizes their need to exercise independent judgment. Theory Y
managers assume subordinates will be self-directed and value autonomy if they

associate personal success with attainment of organization goals. Theory Y

 

57 French, Human Resource Management, 5-19.
5‘ Barnard, The Functions of the Executive.
20

managers assume goal attainment is most likely to be achieved through
supportive leadership.“’9

William Ouchi introduced Theory Z in 1981. A Theory 2 manager strives to
achieve consensus through subordinate participation in setting goals. Consensus
is assumed to increase employee commitment to goal attainment. Theory 2
managers blur the distinction between manager and subordinate, and they use
the concept of family to encourage cooperation.60

Theory Z managers also assume subordinates who are effectively
motivated will equate personal and professional success with organization goal
attainment. Under Theory Z assumptions, both managers and employees derive
intrinsic rewards or personal or self-satisfaction on the job from making positive

contributions to company success.

Contingency Theory

Contingency theory postulates that the leadership of a manager depends
on the degree to which the situation gives the manager control and influence,
and the manager’s motivation -- whether self-esteem depends primarily on
accomplishing a task or having supportive relationships.61 In contingency theory,

a manager is either task motivated or relationship motivated but not both.

 

5‘ Douglas Mchgor, "Theory x and Theory Y," in D. s. Pugh (ed), Organization Theory,
(Baltimore, Md.: Penguin Books; 1971), 305-323.
Vlfilliam G. Ouichi, Theory 2: How American Business Can Meet the Japanese Challenge,
(Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley; 1981).
Fred E. F iedler and Martin M. Chemers, Leadership and Eflective Management, (Glenview, Ill.:
Scotts, Foresman; 1974).
21

Contingency theory assumes that effective leadership is an interactive
process mitigated by several variables. Among the mitigating variables are
ambiguity in organization goals, goals that conflict, or ambiguity in the
expectations of senior managers. How averse to risk a manager may be, how
fearful of failure or reprimand, and how dependent on a superior for
advancement also may mitigate leadership.62

Other mitigating variables are the rate of turnover among subordinates
and superiors, the personalities of subordinates, time constraints, ambiguity as to
whom the manager is accountable, the manager’s personality, the personalities
of other managers, the frequency of social interaction, and the degree of
cooperation and collaboration expected among managers.

Additional mitigating variables include management philosophy,
organization policies, the culture of an organization, the degree of trust between
subordinates and managers, the nature of department goals, and the degree to
which department goals are or are not in conflict with the goals of other
departments.‘53

Within those constraints, contingency theory postulates that the
motivational strength to lead is determined by how a manager perceives the
probability of success in goal attainment. Contingency theory presumes,

however, that managers weigh their leadership orientation not in terms of what

 

a Vlmlis, Surviving in the Newspaper Business: Newspaper Management in Turbulent Times;
Dreier, "Newsroom Democracy and Media Monopoly: The Dilemma of Workplace Reform Among
Professional Journalists"; Bogart, "The Management of Mass Media", 143-169; and Lee
Sigelman, "Reporting the News: An Organization Analysis," American Joumal of Sociology Vol.
79 No. 1 (July 1973): 132-151.

22

subordinates want or need to achieve a high level of personal or self-satisfaction
on the job but rather in terms of rewards the managers personally value.

Thus, under contingency theory assumptions, a manager’s leadership
orientation is most likely to be based only on the manager’s perception of the
likelihood that the results the manager wants will be achieved and the personal

rewards the manager seeks will be obtained.64

Path-Goal Theory
Path-goal theory, a derivative of contingency theory, assumes leaders

can enhance subordinate motivation and subordinate job satisfaction by clarifying
goals, linking subordinate rewards to goal attainment, and explaining to
subordinates how they can achieve goals and the rewards they value. Effective
leaders clarify paths to goal attainment, reduce roadblocks and pitfalls, and
increase opportunities for subordinate job satisfaction.“

Under path-goal assumptions, directive leadership is telling people what to
do and how to do it. Supportive leadership is being friendly with subordinates

while trying to improve their well-being. Participatory leadership is consulting with

 

‘3 Robert Tannenbaum and Warren H. Schmidt, "How to Choose a Leadership Pattern," Harvard
Business Review Vol. 36 No. 2 (March-April 1958): 95-101.

French, Human Resource Management, 120.
‘5 Robert J. House and Terence P. Mitchell, "A Path-Goal Theory of Leadership," Journal of
Contemporary Business 3 (Autumn 1974): 85, and House and Gary Dessler, "The Path—Goal
Theory of Leadership: Some Post Hoc and A Priori Tests" in James G. Hunt and Lars L. Larson
(eds), Contingency Approaches to Leadership, (Carbondale, Ill.: Southern Illinois University
Press; 1974), 29-61.

23

subordinates and weighing their views before making decisions. And
achievement-oriented leadership is insisting upon attainment of difficult goals.“5

Path-goal theory postulates several contingency relationships. A directive
leader is assumed to positively affect the satisfaction of subordinates who work
on ambiguous tasks but negatively affect the satisfaction of subordinates who
work on clearly defined tasks. Supportive leaders are assumed to positively
affect the satisfaction of subordinates who work on dissatisfying, stressful, or
frustrating tasks. Participatory leaders are assumed to positively affect the
satisfaction of subordinates who are ego-involved with non-repetitive tasks. And
achievement-oriented leaders are assumed to positively affect the confidence of
subordinates when tasks are ambiguous and non-repetitive.‘57

Under path-goal assumptions, the leadership effectiveness of a manager
is associated with subordinate job satisfaction. The more effective the manager is
as a leader, the more satisfied employees will be with their jobs.“

The theory postulates that, to be effective, a manager will vary how the
manager leads as human resources, tasks, and situations vary. Path-goal theory
assumes leadership depends on how individual subordinates vary as well as how
group dynamics vary. One manager thus may have different leadership
orientations in social interaction with individual subordinates and yet other

leadership approaches for a group.

 

'5 Alan C. Filley, House, and Steven Kerr, Managerial Process and Organization Behavior,
(Glenview, "L: Scott, Forseman; 1976).
Kreitner, Management (3rd ed.), 470.
" Kreitner, Management (3rd ed), 477.
24

Path-goal theory also differentiates between initiating tasks and being

supportive. The theory assumes each contributes to effective leadership.

Motivation-Hygiene Theory

Motivation-hygiene theory, developed by industrial psychologist Frederick
Herzberg and colleagues in 1959 and refined in 1982, incorporates the path-goal
assumption that a manager’s foremost responsibility is to lead effectively.69 The
theory also assumes a manager will vary leadership as organization goals and
situations vary.

However, unlike path-goal theory, which presumes a manager’s
leadership is a function of the manager’s perception of subordinate wants and
needs, motivation-hygiene theory assumes a manager’s leadership is a function
of the manager’s needs and wants.70

Motivation-hygiene theory postulates that managers identify their needs
and wants based on their perceptions of themselves, their roles, subordinates,
superiors, and the work environment.

In motivation-hygiene theory, a manager’s leadership is a function of the

goals a manager seeks to attain, the intrinsic rewards the manager values, and

 

°° Herzberg, Mausner and Snydennan, The Motivation to Work, and Herzberg, The Managerial
Choice: to be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed.)
7° Herzberg, "One More Time: How Do You Motivate EmployeesT, Harvard Business Review
(January-February 1968): 53-62.

25

conditions in the work environment that adversely affect the manager or increase
the manager’s dissatisfaction.71

Motivation-hygiene theory has been described as one of the most
controversial theories in business and media management literature because it
assumes human beings, including managers, have a dual nature that is
expressed in organization behavior." By dual nature, the theory postulates that
employees, including managers, actively seek pleasure or personal happiness
and at the same time actively seek to avoid pain or unhappiness on the job.

Happiness and unhappiness are defined in motivation-hygiene theory as
distinct emotional states associated with clearly differentiated variables."
Happiness or self-satisfaction on the job is conceptualized as a function of
intrinsic rewards that motivate. Unhappiness or dissatisfaction on the job is
conceptualized as a function of negative conditions in a work environment that
produce adverse psychological effects.

Based on the dual-nature assumption, self-satisfaction derived from a job
and dissatisfaction with working conditions are conceptualized as different
continuums. Each is assumed to be associated with different measures. The
number of measures associated with self-satisfaction on the job is limited, but a
limitless number of measures are assumed to be associated with dissatisfaction

with working conditions.

 

7‘ Herzberg, Mausner and Snydennan, The Motivation to Work, Herzberg, The Managerial
Choice: to be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed.), and Herzberg, "One More Time: How Do You
Motivate Employees?".
nHerzberg, The Managerial Choice: to be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed ), 49
73Herzberg, The Managerial Choice. to be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed. ), 84.
26

n:

as

The core assumption of motivation-hygiene theory is dissatisfaction with
working conditions must be low to moderate before self-satisfaction derived from
intrinsic rewards associated with a job can be moderate to high."

The opposite of self-satisfaction in motivation-hygiene theory is no self-
satisfaction; the opposite of dissatisfaction is no dissatisfaction. The theory posits
that the self-satisfaction continuum is of a higher order than the dissatisfaction
continuum. The premise is an individual’s subjective happiness is of a higher
order than the individual’s unhappiness with conditions in the work
environment.75

To effectively lead and motivate employees under motivation-hygiene
assumptions, a manager must structure a job to maximize intrinsic rewards while
also minimizing sources of dissatisfaction in the work environment. If a manager
only maintains positive or at least neutral conditions in the work environment, the
most the manager can expect to achieve under motivation-hygiene assumptions
is diminished employee dissatisfaction in the short term.76

Under motivation-hygiene assumptions, diminished dissatisfaction is
necessary for self-satisfaction to occur, but diminished dissatisfaction is
insufficient to personally satisfy employees or motivate them to associate
attainment of organization goals with self-satisfaction on the job. In motivation-

hygiene theory, employees are likely to experience little self-satisfaction if their

 

;‘ Sohn, \Mcks, Lacy, and Sylvia et. al., Media Menagement: A Casebook Approach (2nd ed. ),
951.
’7: Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: to be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed.), 283.

Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: to be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed.), 280-281.

27

work offers few positive intrinsic rewards. And employees are likely to be very
dissatisfied if working conditions are poor.77

Motivation-hygiene theory also differentiates between management and
leadership. Effective management is defined as maintenance of a work
environment that minimizes the dissatisfaction of employees.78 The theory
asserts that managers in industrial organizations tend to wrongly assume that if
they improve working conditions, they will improve employee motivation to attain
organization goals. The theory posits that positive working conditions can only
minimize employee dissatisfaction. Hygiene, in other words, does not motivate.

Effective leadership is defined as a manager's use of social influence
achieved through social interaction to motivate employees to associate self-
satisfaction with attainment of organization goals.79 Effective leadership,
therefore, is associated in motivation-hygiene theory with the self-satisfaction of
employees.

Herzberg argues that for managers to be effective leaders, it is essential
that they comprehend that effective management and effective leadership are
different concepts.80 Effective leadership is assumed to be a much broader
concept than efficient management. Moreover, to lead effectively, managers
must distinguish between what satisfies and dissatisfies employees.m

Managers are assumed to be self-motivated in motivation-hygiene theory

because they tend to associate intrinsic rewards derived from their organization

 

’7 Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: to be Efiicient and to be Human (2nd ed), 84-101.
7’ Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: to be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed.), 94-93.
7‘ French, Human Resource Management, 90-93.

28

:\

‘rwumb‘uwl

role with their self-satisfaction.82 The leadership of a manager thus functions to
satisfy the manager.

Motivation-hygiene theory posits two associations: As positive intrinsic
rewards increase, a manager’s self-satisfaction on the job increases; and as
positive intrinsic rewards decrease, a manager‘s self-satisfaction decreases.

However, the theory postulates that the probability of high self-satisfaction
is low if hygiene variables in the work environment are perceived to be negative.
In motivation-hygiene theory, if working conditions are positive, a manager’s
dissatisfaction is reduced. If hygiene variables are negative, dissatisfaction
increases and self-satisfaction is inhibited, which produces unhappiness in a
manager.”

Based on hygiene assumptions, the theory posits two associations: As
negative conditions in the work environment decrease, a manager’s
dissatisfaction decreases; and as negative hygiene conditions increase, a
manager’s dissatisfaction increases.

Motivation-hygiene researchers have found that a manager’s self-
satisfaction is associated with only seven intrinsic rewards. Those intrinsic
rewards are the manager’s relative degree of professional achievement, the
degree of recognition for job performance, how interesting the work is, the

degree of responsibility a manager wants to assume, opportunity for

 

°° Herzberg, Mausner and Bloch-Snyderman, Motivation to Work , 115.

‘1 Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: to be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed. ), 53-57.
‘2 Herzberg, Mausner and Snyderrnan, The Motivation to Work.

'3 Herzberg, Mausner and Snyderrnan, The Motivation to Work.

29

advancement within the manager’s organization, opportunity for personal growth,
and degree of autonomy.‘34

The variables motivation-hygiene researchers have found to be
associated with a manager’s dissatisfaction with working conditions are
employee performance, organization goals, and the performance expectations of
senior managers. Other variables associated with dissatisfaction are incompetent
senior managers, ambiguity in organization policies, inadequate financial
resources, insufficient or inept human resources, the frequency with which senior
managers overturn a manager’s decisions, inadequate salary, lack of job
security, and limited authority."5

Motivation-hygiene theory as originally conceptualized places salary in the
job dissatisfaction continuum. The theory was developed from qualitative content
analysis of on-site responses to surveys in which blue-collar workers,
professionals, and other white-collar employees were asked to remember their
most happy and most unhappy work experiences. Based on the frequency of
variables mentioned in the responses, Herzberg and his colleagues found most
respondents associated salary with job dissatisfaction and did not associate
salary with intrinsic rewards.86

In effect, salary was found to not be a source of motivation to work - a
finding that has been criticized as inconsistent with what motivates individuals,

including managers, to have jobs or to seek new ones.

 

"" Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: to be Efiicient and to be Human (2nd ed.), 71.
‘5 Herzberg, Mausner and Snydennan, The Motivation to Work, and Herzberg, The Managerial
Choice: to be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed.)

30

Some research, however, did associate salary with self- satisfaction
derived from a job, which prompted Herzberg to refine motivation-hygiene theory
in the 1980s to include salary as possibly a weak motivator associated with self-
satisfaction.

Herzberg suggested, however, that the ubiquity of salary in a work
environment may confound results when motivation-hygiene theory is applied.
Herzberg found that when salary is associated with self-satisfaction on the job,
the association is weak relative to other intrinsic rewards. When salary is
associated with dissatisfaction with working conditions, the association is
stronger than when salary is associated with self-satisfaction. And when salary is
associated with dissatisfaction, other hygiene measures, such as the
performance expectations of senior newsroom managers or organization goals,
account for more variance in dissatisfaction than does salary.87

By specifying that only a few intrinsic rewards explain and predict self-
satisfaction, motivation-hygiene theory suggests the probability is low that most
employees in an industrial organization will be highly satisfied because their work
rarely incorporates all the rewards associated with self-satisfaction derived from
a job.

Conversely, motivation-hygiene theory posits that negative hygiene
conditions associated with dissatisfaction are limitless. Each hygiene variable is

assumed to be independent of all other hygiene variables, and all hygiene

 

'3 Herzberg, Mausner and BIoch-Snyderman, Motivation to Work, 354.
’7 Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: To be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed.), 277-290.

31

variables are assumed to be relatively equal in their possible association with
dissatisfaction.

Because managers tend to focus on keeping hygiene conditions from
becoming extremely negative, motivation-hygiene theory assumes high levels of
dissatisfaction among employees are unlikely in most industrial organizations.

Motivation-hygiene theory suggests that if a manager emphasizes
improved working conditions with the expectation that employees will be more
self-satisfied and thus more likely to associate attainment of organization goals
with personal satisfaction on the job, the manager’s dissatisfaction will likely
increase because subordinate satisfaction will likely remain unaffected.

As employee motivation remains relatively invariant, the manager is likely
to experience increased dissatisfaction and goal attainment is likely to fall below
the manager’s expectations. As a manager's dissatisfaction with subordinate
performance increases, the likelihood of directive leadership increases.

It goals are attained, a manager’s dissatisfaction is likely to decrease. If
goals are not attained, a manager’s dissatisfaction is likely to increase. As a
manager increasingly experiences dissatisfaction, the manager’s ability to
experience high self-satisfaction on the job may be inhibited.

Under such conditions, the manager may tend to perceive subordinates
negatively, viewing them as impediments to the manager’s ability to experience
self-satisfaction derived from the intrinsic rewards associated with the manager’s

job.

32

Descriptive Research

Little research has been conducted that examines the motivation to work
of managers in daily newspaper newsrooms, but two pioneering participant
observation studies found that reporter job satisfaction is associated with the
intrinsic rewards of news work - the perception that serving the public is a
socially beneficial mission or calling.“

A third participant observation study found that reporters generally accept
newsroom routines and practices, and through a socialization process they
conform to expectations to please superiors.89

A study in the 19605 found that reporters at newspapers with daily
Circulation above 50,000 were significantly less satisfied with their managers and
jobs than reporters at smaller newspapers.90 A benchmark national probability
sample of 1,313 journalists found in 1971 that reporters who work for large daily
newspapers were less satisfied with their jobs than reporters at small
newspapers.91

However, studies conducted in the 1980s did not find that reporter job

satisfaction is associated with newspaper size.92

 

'° Charles E. Swanson, "Midcity Daily: The News Staff And Its Relation to Control," Journalism
Quarterly Vol. 26 (1949): 20-28; and Warren Breed, "Social Control in the Newsroom: A
Functional Analysis," Social Forces Vol. 33 (October 1954-May 1955): 326-335.
3 Breed, The Newspaperman, News and Society, (New York: Arno Press; 1980).
°° Merrill Samuelson, "A Standardized Test to Measure Job Satisfaction in the Newsroom,"
Joumalism Quarterly Vol. 39 No. 3 (Summer 1962): 285-291.
’1 Johnstone, Edward J. Slawski, and Vlfilliam W. Bowman, The News People: A Sociological
Portrait of American Journalists and Their Work, (Urbana, "I: University of Illinois Press; 1976).
9“ Weaver and Wilhoit, The American Journalist: A Portrait of u. 8. News People and Their Work,
(Bloomington, In.: Indiana University Press, 1986).

33

The frequency of positive comments by managers was a predictor of
reporter job satisfaction except for those who worked at medium-sized daily
newspapers in the 19805. At smaller newspapers, job satisfaction was
associated with reporter perceptions that their newspaper did as good a job as it
can.

In the 19905, however, reporter perceptions that their newspaper
effectively informed the public and the frequency of positive comments from
managers were significant predictors of reporter job satisfaction regardless of
newspaper Size."3

Mass communication researchers have found that autonomy, defined as
the degree of freedom to conduct work in accord with one’s own discretion, tends
to be a reliable predictor of job satisfaction among reporters regardless of
newspaper size."4

Another reliable predictor is the perception that the newspaper does as
good a job as financial and human resources allow.”

One sample survey of daily newspaper reporters found that among the
independent variables that contributed to negative perceptions among journalists
was ineffective newsroom managers.“5 Newsroom managers were singled out for
inadequate peOple skills, arbitrary and authoritarian leadership, lack of
management training and skills, ineffective and inconsistent communication,

pressure tactics, and insensitivity.

 

’3 Sohn, Wicks, Lacy, Sylvie at. al., Media Management: A Casebook Approach (2nd ed.), 59.
°‘ Sohn, Wicks, Lacy, Sylvie et. al., Media Management: A Casebook Approach (2nd ed), 60.

34

One mass communication researcher found in a random national sample
of 200 daily newspapers that newsroom managers have more autonomy than
reporters.97 Differences in the degree of autonomy among senior managers at
Chain and independent newspapers were insignificant, and both groups of
managers tended to express job satisfaction.

Researchers also have found that managers at newspapers owned by
groups are more likely to have had management training than their counterparts
at independent dailies.”

Newspaper managers can be distinguished on the basis of their need for
power and achievement, a study based on thematic apperception tests found."9
Executive editors and managing editors were found to have a high need for
power, a moderate need for achievement, and a low need for affiliation. Mid-level
managers were found to have a lower need for power, a higher need for
achievement, and a higher need for affiliation than senior managers. And low-
level managers were found to be high in need for affiliation, average in need for
achievement, and low in need for power.

Those findings were consistent with other research that used thematic

apperception tests in a study of newspaper publishers and general managers.‘°°

 

‘5 Sohn, Wicks, Lacy, Sylvie et. al., Media Management: A Casebook Approach (2nd ed.),, 59-
60.
9" Pease, "Newsroom 2000: Not my kidl Journalists leery of industry’s future," 34-53.
’7 David Demers, "Effect of Corporate Structure on Autonomy of Top Editors at US. Dailies,"
Journalism Quarterly Vol. 70 No. 3 (Autumn 1993): 499-508.
9° Demers, "Effect of Corporate Structure on Autonomy of Top Editors at US. Dailies," 499.
“ Leonard H. Chusmir, “Profile of Motivational Needs of Individuals in the Newspaper Industry,"
Newspaper Research Joumal Vol. 5 No. 1 (Fall 1983): 33-41.
‘°° Sohn and Chusmir, "The Motivational Perspectives of Newspaper Managers," Journalism
Quarterly Vol. 62 No. 2 (Summer 1985): 296-303.

35

A survey of 126 California newspapers found that senior newsroom
managers tend to have more confidence in their journalistic skills than their

“’1 Most managing editors surveyed said they

managerial or leadership ability.
had difficulty deciding how to motivate subordinates. Most managing editors
surveyed also said they struggle to decide how to delegate authority and how to
allocate human and financial resources.

Another survey of 208 managing editors also found most lacked formal
management training.102

A participant observation study at an elite daily newspaper found that
senior managers have difficulty achieving teamwork because mid-level managers
strive to shield themselves from interference with their areas of responsibility.‘°3

Those findings were consistent with a survey of 86 newspapers in Ohio
which found that managers tend to protect themselves from criticism even when
senior managers emphasize cooperation among managers as an organization
goal.‘°‘

Newsroom goals were cited in a survey as contributing to decreased job
satisfaction among 429 newsroom staff members at 12 daily newspapers in

Washington, Oregon, and California. In the survey, researchers found that if

senior managers were perceived as placing less value on journalism and more

 

‘°‘ David Bennett, "Editors as Managers: Their Perceived Need for Specialized Training,"
Newspaper Research Journal Vol. 6 No. 4 (Summer 1985): 2436.
"’2 Edward J. Trayes, "Managing Editors and Their Newsrooms: A Survey of 208 APME
Members," Joumelism Quarterly Vol. 55 No. 4 (Winter 1979): 744-749; 898
"’3 Chris Argyris, Behind the Front Page, (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass; 1974).
‘°" George Sylvie, "Departmental influence on Interdepartmental Cooperation in Daily
Newspapers," Joumelism & Mass Communication Quarterly Vol. 73 No. 1 (Spring 1996): 230-
241.

36

ne

an

hi:

Of

on business goals, reporter job satisfaction tended to decrease. If the quality of
the newspaper was perceived as improving, reporter job satisfaction tended to
increase.105

Management goals also were associated with diminished reporter job
satisfaction in a national survey of 1,328 daily newspaper joumalists.”6

In a participant observation study at two newspapers in the Southeast,
one researcher found managers exert significant control over reporters.”7 The
study found managers determine the structure of roles and who will fill those
roles. Managers also determine what will be covered, what will not, who will
cover the story, how it will be played and displayed, and what the story finally will
say.

A survey of 187 mid-level managers at 13 newspapers in the Northwest
found that pagination is not associated with low job satisfaction among
newsroom employees.108 Other researchers have found that journalism awards
are not associated with reporter job satisfaction.109

In a third study, 75 percent of 317 managing editors surveyed said a
history of winning prizes was not very important when they evaluated a reporter

or made a decision to hire or promote a reporter. The managing editors said how

 

"’5 Stamm and Underwood, “The Relationship of Job Satisfaction to Newsroom Policy Changes,"
528-541.

‘°‘ Pease, "Blaming the Boss: Newsroom Professionals See Managers as Public Enemy No. 1,"
2-21.

“’7 Sigelman, "Reporting the News: An Organization Analysis," 132-151.

I“ Stamm, Underwood and Anthony Giffard, "How Pagination Affects Job Satisfaction of Editors,"
Joumelism 8. Mass Communication Quarterly Vol. 72 No. 4 (Winter 1995): 851-862.

1°“ Randal A. Beam, Sharon Dunwoody, and Gerald M. Kosicki, "The Relationship of Prize-
winning to Prestige and Job Satisfaction," Joumelism Quarterly Vol. 63 No. 4 (Winter 19%): 693-

699.
37

well a reporter performs routinely on day-to-day assignments influenced their
evaluation of the reporter more than the reporter’s ability to win journalism
awards.“°

A study of 17 Ohio daily newspapers found that 90 percent of joumalists
surveyed experienced job-related stress.111 Stress, the researcher found, is
associated with the demands and criticisms of managers. The most common
technique reporters use to cope with stress, the researcher found, is to complain,
especially about managers and the quality of leadership in the newsroom.

In a secondary analysis of US. Bureau of Labor Statistics data as well as
data from two studies by the Institute for Journalism Education and Northwestem
University, one researcher found that job mobility among journalists tends to be
associated with lack of skills among managers.112 The independent variable most
associated with reporter dissatisfaction was inadequate human resources that
resulted in overwork.

Another survey of 1,328 newspaper journalists found that inept newsroom
leadership was the strongest predictor of loss of newsroom talent.113

Other studies, however, have associated reporter satisfaction with degree

or level of professionalism.114

 

"° David C. Coulson, "Editors’ Attitudes and Behavior Toward Journalism Awards," Joumelism
Quarterly Vol. 66 No. 1 (Spring 1959): 143-147.

"‘ Fredric F. Endres, "Stress in the Newsroom at Ohio Dailies," Newspaper Research Journal
Vol. 10 NO. 1 (Fall 1988): 1-14.

"2 Marty Tharp, "Turnover and Mobility at Small Daily Newspapers," Newspaper Research
Journal Vol. 12 No. 1 (iMnter1991): 76-90.

"3 Peace, "Blaming the Boss: Newsroom Professionals See Managers as Public Enemy No. 1,"
2-21.

I“ Jack M. McLeod and Searle E. Hawley Jr., "Professionalization Among Newsmen," Joumelism
Quarterly Vol. 41 No. 4 (Autumn 1964): 529-538; 577.

38

In a national sample of journalists in Canada, a researcher found that
reporters experience less satisfaction when their newspaper stresses routine
coverage that is cost effective rather than in-depth coverage that informs
thoroughly on important trends or issues. The study found that if a reporter has a
high degree of commitment to professionalism, a decline in satisfaction is likely
when constraints imposed by newspaper managers diminish the intrinsic rewards
associated with socially responsible news work."5

Researchers also have found that as the size and prestige of a daily
newspaper increase, the degree of reporter commitment to professionalism tends
to increase.116

Other researchers have found, however, that commitment to
professionalism may be associated more with individual values than newspaper
size or prestige.117

Researchers also have found that loyalty to their employer may be low
among reporters compared to newsroom managers, whose loyalty to the daily

newspaper that employs them tends to be high."°

 

"5 George Pollard, "Job Satisfaction Among Newsworkers: The Influence of Professionalism,
Perceptions of Organization Structure, and Social Attributes," Joumelism & Mass Communication
Quarterly Vol. 72 No. 3 (Autumn 1995): 682-697.
1“ Beam, "Joumelism Professionalism as an Organization-Level Concept," Joumelism
Monographs No. 121 (June 1990): 1-43.
"7 Beam, "The Impact of Group Ownership Variables on Organization Professionalism at Daily
Newspapers," Joumelism Quarterly Vol. 70 No. 4 (Winter 1993): 907-918.
"3 Lee B. Becker, ldowu A. Sobowale and Robin E. Cobbey, "Reporters and Their Professional
and Organization Commitment," Joumelism Quarterly Vol. 56 No. 4 (Wlnter 1979): 753-763.

39

Critique of Descriptive Research

Descriptive mass communication research literature is notable for a lack of
daily newspaper newsroom management and leadership studies. No study could
be identified that examined city editors, the newsroom managers most directly
accountable for local news coverage.

Except for one study that examined the self-perceptions of managing
editors, no descriptive research could be identified that specifically examined
variables that may be associated with a newsroom manager’s self-satisfaction or
dissatisfaction, how a manager’s self-satisfaction or dissatisfaction may be
associated with the manager’s perception of subordinate performance, and how
perception of subordinate performance may be associated with a manager’s
leadership orientation.

A second deficiency in the descriptive literature is manager perceptions
generally have been ignored in studies that examine reporter job satisfaction. By
relying only on the perceptions of reporters, descriptive research may incorporate
a bias in favor of reporter perceptions.

This deficiency is substantive because leadership involves the social
influence process. To be social, an influence process requires either direct or
indirect social interaction between managers and subordinates, or both. Social
interaction, in turn, is a function of the organization environment and the
perceptions of all the individuals who interact in that setting. It is thus insufficient

to examine self-satisfaction, dissatisfaction, and leadership orientation only fiom

4O

the perspective of reporters. The perceptions of newsroom managers require
examination as well.

A third deficiency is no descriptive research could be identified in the mass
communication literature that examined whether a relationship exists between
the leadership orientation of managers at daily newspapers in the United States
and their perception of reporter journalistic performance.

A fourth deficiency is the abundance of bivariate associations among
variables in descriptive research has tended to confound rather than clarify how
newsroom managers are inclined to lead and why. Descriptive research offers
many possible independent variables, possible intervening variables, and
probable associations. Relationships among the variables have tended, however,
to be unreliable and even contradictory.

Moreover, by assuming self-satisfaction and dissatisfaction are divergent
points on only one continuum, descriptive research tends to associate what in
motivation-hygiene theory are distinctly different continuums with the same
independent variables. Because the same variables are associated with both
self-satisfaction and dissatisfaction in descriptive studies, correlations tend to be

weak and inconsistent.

Nor does descriptive research attempt to explain or predict under what
conditions a variable may be associated with self-satisfaction on the job and
under what conditions the same variable may be associated with dissatisfaction

with working conditions.

41

Theory-based Research

No empirical studies could be identified in the mass communication
research literature that examine managers in daily newspaper newsrooms from
the perspective of any motivation theory that incorporates human resource
management or leadership assumptions.

However, in a survey of 344 local television news anchors, reporters,
producers, and assignment editors in the Midwest that applied path-goal theory,
researchers found a positive association between task behavior and perception
of how considerate a manager is. The most important variable for predicting
reporter job satisfaction was the relationship behavior of television news
directors."°

A related study found that local television station managers who were
relationship-oriented were effective in achieving newsroom goals.”o And
television reporters were most satisfied with their jobs when they negotiated
news department goals and goal priorities with their news directors, the
researcher found.

Those findings were consistent with a third study that found that as the

management style at television stations moves from authoritarian to consultative

 

"9 Angela Powers and Stephen Lacy, "A Model of Job Satisfaction in Local Television
Newsrooms," in Lacy, Sohn and Giles (eds), Readings in Media Management (Columbia, 8.0.:
Media Management and Economics Division of the Association for Education in Joumelism and
Mass Communication; 1992): 5-20.

"2" Angela Powers, "The Effect of Leadership Behavior on Job Satisfaction and Goal Agreement
and Attainment in Local TV News," Joumelism Quarterly Vol. 68 No. 4 (Winter 1991): 772-780.

42

to participatory, personnel stability, employee job satisfaction, and productivity
increase.121

In a motivation-hygiene survey of newspaper reporters who recently had
graduated from a college or university, a researcher found self-satisfaction is
associated with positive intrinsic variables while dissatisfaction is associated with
negative hygiene variables.122 Growth on the job was the variable most strongly
associated with reporter self-satisfaction, and inept managers were most strongly
associated with reporter dissatisfaction, the researcher concluded.

In another motivation-hygiene survey based on a random sample of 350
women writers, reporters, and editors, another researcher found that intrinsic and
extrinsic variables explained differentiation in self-satisfaction and dissatisfaction
among managers and subordinates.123 Insufficient intrinsic rewards explained
why almost 70 percent of the reporters and writers surveyed expressed low self-
satisfaction, and sufficient intrinsic rewards explained why 75 percent of

managers expressed substantial self-satisfaction.

Critique of Theory-based Research
The most substantial criticism of theory-based mass communication
research that examines media managers is that practically no research is

available on manager self-satisfaction, dissatisfaction, perception of reporter

 

121 R. C. Adams and Marjorie J. Fish, "TV News Diredor Perceptions of Station Management
Séyle," Joumelism Quarterly Vol. 64 No. 1 (Spring 1987): 154-162; 276.
1 Harold C. Shaver, "Job Satisfaction and Dissatisfaction Among Joumelism Graduates,"
Joumelism Quarterly Vol. 55 No. 1 (Spring 1978): 54-61; 108.
1” Grace H. Barrett, "Job Satisfaction Among Newspaperwomen," Joumelism Quarterly Vol. 61
No. 3 (Autumn 1984): 593-599.

43

performance, and leadership orientation at daily newspapers in the United States
that is based on theory. Moreover, no theory-based empirical research that
incorporates human resource assumptions could be identified that specifically
examined newsroom managers at daily newspapers in the United States.

The two motivation-hygiene studies identified in the mass communication
research literature affirm the potential utility of motivation-hygiene theory in
research that examines self-satisfaction on the job and dissatisfaction with
working conditions. However, the two studies were confined to beginning
reporters or to women who work either as heads of lifestyle departments or as
staff members in such departments.

In addition, both studies were published before full and detailed explication
of variable relationships, including detailed presentation of data analysis based
on inferential statistics, became a research publication norm. The interpretation
of research results provided by the authors of both studies was highly subjective
and not fully explicated. Detailed, explicit data analysis is lacking in both
published motivation-hygiene studies.

As yet, no motivation-hygiene study has specifically examined city editors
- the newsroom managers local news reporters are likely to interact with most
frequently. This deficiency in the theory-based literature is substantive because
local news reporters have been the population studied most by descriptive
researchers interested in reporter job satisfaction and dissatisfaction.

If, as mass communication research suggests, reporters at daily

newspapers in the United States increasingly tend to not be satisfied with their

44

leaders, what explains and predicts a newsroom leadership orientation that is

viewed so negatively by subordinates?

45

Leadership Orientation Model

Manager
Self-satisfaction
On the Job

I

I

 

Manager
Dissatisfaction
With Working
Conditions

Motivation-Hygiene Assumptions

/

Chapter 2

LEADERSHIP ORIENTATION

Figure 1

Manager
Perception

Of Goal Attainment
By Reporters

Manager
Perception
Of Reporter
Journalistic
Performance

l

Manager
Perception
Of What

Senior Newsroom

Managers Expect

Of Reporters

Manager
Leadership

/ Orientation

Manager
Span of
Control

The non-recursive, linear, leadership orientation model, above, that is to

be tested in this study includes the leadership orientation of newsroom

managers, such as city editors, at daily newspapers as a dependent variable.

The under-specified model incorporates motivation-hygiene assumptions in the

46

identification of possible independent variables and how they may be associated
with how city editors may perceive their leadership orientation.

The independent variables in the model are a City editor’s perception of
reporter journalistic performance, a city editor’s perception of goal attainment by
reporters, a city editor’s perception of how the city editor’s superior in newsroom
management expects reporters to perform, a city editor’s self-satisfaction derived
from intrinsic rewards associated with the city editor’s job, and a city editor’s
dissatisfaction with working conditions.

A City editor’s leadership orientation is presented in the model as a
function of a city editor’s perception of reporter journalistic performance with span
of control, defined as the number of subordinates for whom a city editor is directly
responsible, as a control variable. The model assumes that as a city editor’s
perception of reporter journalistic performance varies, the city editor’s leadership
orientation is likely to vary.

Perception of reporter joumalistic performance is presented in the model
as a function of a city editor’s perception of goal attainment by reporters, a city
editor’s perception of how the city editor's superior in newsroom management
expects reporters to perform, the city editor’s self-satisfaction on the job, and the
city editor's dissatisfaction with working conditions.

Consistent with motivation-hygiene theory, the model assumes that as a
city editor’s perception of positive intrinsic rewards derived from the city editor’s

job increases, the city editor’s self-satisfaction increases. Conversely, as a city

47

editor increasingly perceives negative conditions in the work environment, the
city editor’s dissatisfaction with hygiene variables increases.

Because reporters are external variables in a city editor’s work
environment, the model assumes a city editor’s perception of reporter journalistic
performance may be associated more with a city editor’s dissatisfaction with
working conditions than with a city editor’s self-satisfaction.

Leadership orientation, defined as a manager’s predisposition to exert
social influence to effectively motivate subordinates to attain organization goals,
is assumed in the model to reflect what the city editor wants and needs more
than what the city editor may perceive to be the wants and needs of
subordinates.

Consistent with motivation-hygiene theory, leadership orientation is
assumed in the model to be more a function of what decreases a city editor’s
dissatisfaction with conditions in the work environment than what increases a city
editor's self-satisfaction.

As in motivation-hygiene theory, the model assumes a city editor’s self-
satisfaction is a one-dimensional continuum, ranging from low, or not satisfied, to
high, or very satisfied. Dissatisfaction associated with extrinsic or hygiene
variables is assumed in the model to reflect a second dimension, ranging from
low, or very dissatisfied, to high, or not dissatisfied.

Motivation-hygiene theory suggests positive associations among extrinsic
or hygiene variables in a work environment are a precondition for a manager to

be able to experience self-satisfaction with intrinsic rewards associated with the

48

manager’s organization role. The theory assumes, in other words, that a
manager’s dissatisfaction must be moderate to low before the manager’s self-
satisfaction can be moderate to high.

Under motivation-hygiene assumptions, any individual employed in an
industrial organization, including a manager, concomitantly perceives both some
degree of self-satisfaction derived from intrinsic rewards associated with a job
and some degree of dissatisfaction with at least some conditions in the work
environment, including subordinate performance.

This study examines, in part, how both dimensions may be associated
with each other, and how both may be associated with how City editors perceive

reporter journalistic performance.

Manager Self-satisfaction on the Job

The leadership orientation model, consistent with management literature,
assumes managers seek to ensure their success, strive to prosper within their
organization, and may tend to associate effective performance and personal
success with organization goal attainment more than subordinates, such as
reporters, may tend to do. The model assumes the reporters upon whom a
manager relies to attain organization goals may be perceived by the manager as
assets who enhance a manager’s performance, liabilities that may inhibit the
effectiveness of a manager’s performance, or both.

Motivation-hygiene researchers have found several measures are reliable

indicators of the self-satisfaction managers in industrial organizations derive from

49

intrinsic rewards associated with their work. Those motivation measures are
incorporated in the national survey used in this study. The measures are: 1) the
degree of professional achievement; 2) the amount of recognition from superiors
for effective performance; 3) how interesting the manager’s work is; 4) the
degree of responsibility the manager aspires to have; 5) opportunity for
advancement; 6) extent of personal growth; and 7) degree of autonomy.”‘

Mass communication researchers have found degree of autonomy to be
an especially reliable predictor of satisfaction among journalists regardless of

their specific role in a newsroom or the size of their newspaper.125

Manager Dissatisfaction Vifith Working Conditions

Motivation-hygiene theory posits that dissatisfaction with working
conditions can inhibit a manager’s self-satisfaction derived from intrinsic rewards.
If working conditions are negative, the theory posits that those conditions must
be at least minimized or rendered positive if a manager is to experience
moderate to high self-satisfaction with intrinsic rewards associated with the
manager's job.

Manager dissatisfaction with working conditions incorporates measures
that motivation-hygiene researchers have found tend to be reliable indicators of
dissatisfaction. Those measures are: 1) the overall competence of senior

managers; 2) clarity of company policies; 3) adequacy of human resources; 4)

 

‘2" Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: to be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed.), 71 .
‘2’ Lori A. Bergen and Weaver, "Job Satisfaction of Daily Newspaper Journalists and
Organization Size," Newspaper Research Journal Vol. 9 No. 2 (Winter 1988); 1-13.

50

adequacy of financial resources; 5) the frequency with which superiors override a
manager’s decisions; 6) salary; 7) job security; and 8) the adequacy of a

manager’s authority.126

Manager Perception of Goal Attainment by Reporters

The goals a manager is responsible for attaining on behalf of the
organization are incorporated into the manager’s role, the manager’s perception
of what the manager is expected to do, the manager’s perception of how goal-
related tasks can best be accomplished, and the manager‘s perception of how
the manager’s performance is likely to be perceived by senior managers.

However, as management literature suggests, goals are attained only
through the cooperation of subordinates. Under motivation-hygiene assumptions,
a newsroom manager will seek to ensure that subordinates attain goals.
However, as attainment of goals varies, the manager may perceive unrealized
goals as negative hygiene conditions associated with the manager’s
dissatisfaction with working conditions. As a manager’s perception of goal
attainment varies, the manager’s leadership orientation is likely to vary.

Based on newspaper industry trends identified in media management
literature, the measures selected as possible indicators of how city editors may
perceive reporter attainment of goals are: 1) how frequently reporters produce
human-interest feature stories; 2) how frequently reporters enterprise informative

hard-news stories; 3) how routinely reporters provide information for Charts and

 

‘3 Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: to be Efficient and to be Human (2nd ed.), 84-97.
51

graphics; 4) how often reporters humanize news stories; and 5) how often

reporters write about positive aspects of the community served by their

newspaper.127

Manager Perception of What Superiors Expect of Reporters

Senior managers define the range of behavior considered acceptable
among subordinates, including low-level managers such as city editors. Senior
managers prescribe and proscribe leadership behavior they consider desirable or
undesirable in the newsroom.”8 And senior managers define the strategic goals
which subordinate managers may incorporate into operational or tactical

situations in which they may try to lead.

The more a city editor’s perception of what reporters should be doing
varies from what the city editor perceives to be the reporter performance
expectations of senior newsroom managers, the greater the likelihood of
d i sagreement. The greater the disagreement, the greater the likelihood of
conflict. The more conflict, the less cooperation in social interaction among Iow-

Ievel and senior managers and the more at risk a low-level manager may be of
|ack of advancement at the newspaper.129 To minimize conflict with senior
r\ewsroom managers, a city editor may incorporate what senior managers expect

0f reporters into how the city editor perceives the journalistic performance of

reporters.

k

127 Bogart, "How U.S. Newspaper Content is Changing," Joumal of Communication Vol. 35 No. 2
(Spring 1985); 82-90, and Bamhurst and Mutz, "American Joumelism and the Decline in Event-

Centered Reporting," 27-53.
52

 

The survey used in this study will measure how City editors perceive what
senior newsroom managers expect from reporters. The measures are: 1)
reporters do all they can to meet the performance expectations of the city editor’s
boss; 2) reporters are expected to always react positively to new procedures
i ntroduced by senior managers; 3) reporters are expected to always react
positively when senior managers introduce new ideas to improve news coverage;
and 4) reporters are expected to try to give readers the kind of journalism senior

newsroom managers say readers want.

If, as media management literature suggests, low-level managers such as
city editors hold their positions because of purposeful selection by senior
managers, then it is not improbable that low-level managers may tend to reflect

the views of their superiors. However, as one researcher found in a participation
observation study of an elite daily newspaper, it is also probable that low-level
managers may distort the views of their superiors and in the process come to

hold more extreme views than senior managers do.‘3°

Manager Perception of Reporter Joumelistic Performance

How city editors perceive the journalistic performance of reporters is
assumed to vary in this study. The measures for the perception of reporter

iOumalistic performance variable incorporate the conventional media

k

:2" Barnard, The Functions of the Executive, 259.
a Argyris, Behind the Front Page.

"3° Argyris, Behind the Front Page.
53

 

management perspective as to what a city editor is likely to expect from
reporters.

The measures share face validity and are consistent with common
journalistic values and newsroom practices. The measures are: 1) to be first with
the news; 2) to be as productive as possible; 3) to demonstrate self-initiative; 4)
to report thoroughly; 5) to write skillfully; and 6) to cooperate with editors.

Standards of performance based on the journalistic norms associated with
each measure tend to be so deeply engrained in the training of journalists that
their manifestation in a newsroom sets a minimal foundation for organization
practices. Performance standards for reporters based on common, minimal

journalistic standards are so generally accepted in the newspaper industry that
mass communication researchers traditionally have measured media

performance by analyzing deviation from the standardized norms reflected in the

measures.
The measures, though not directly associated with motivation-hygiene

theory, can be assumed to Share face validity based on common usage in

Du blished mass communication research.

Manager Leadership Orientation
Leadership orientation is the dependent variable of interest in the model to

be tested. The model assumes a city editor’s leadership orientation is a function
of the city editor’s perception of reporters’ journalistic performance with span of
control as a control variable. How a city editor perceives the journalistic

54

 

performance of reporters is presented in the model as being a function of goals
to be attained by reporters, the performance expectations senior managers have
for reporters, the city editor's self-satisfaction, and the city editor’s dissatisfaction
with working conditions.

A city editor in the model can be a rigidly authoritarian leader.131 Rigidly
authoritarian leadership is telling people what to do and how to do it, typically
without asking people what they think. Rigidly authoritarian leaders tend not to
ask subordinates how tasks can be best accomplished or goals attained. Rigidly
authoritarian leaders tend to equate task accomplishment with goal attainment.
Rigidly authoritarian leadership thus tends to be positively associated with
manager efficiency but negatively associated with subordinate satisfaction.132

A benevolent authoritarian leader may incorporate consideration behavior
i :1 social interaction with subordinates but remains authoritarian. A benevolent
a uthoritarian leader may be an efficient manager, but the manager’s leadership
effectiveness is likely to be low because subordinates do not perceive the
manager to be supportive of them. Benevolent authoritarian leaders may achieve
Wa rrnth in social interaction with subordinates but not total trust. They are task
Oriented. They tend to emphasize their self-satisfaction and take little, if any,

action to enhance the satisfaction of subordinates.‘33 Wnen goals are attained,

‘

‘31 Variation in leadership styles and their probable consequences is discussed in Leslie W. Rue
and Lloyd L. Byars, Management: Theory and Application (3rd ed), (Homewood, lll.: Irwin;

1 9%), 393.
1:12 For a thorough discussion of the concepts of efficiency and effectiveness, see Bemerd, The

functions of the Executive, 19.
33 Rue and Byers, Management: Theory and Application, 393.
55

the dissatisfaction of the manager is likely to be diminished but the self-
satisfaction of subordinates is likely to have been adversely affected.

A democratic leader tends to equate leadership effectiveness with
managerial effectiveness. Democratic leadership tends to emphasize
consideration of the wants, needs, and expectations of subordinates. A
democratic leader solicits subordinate opinions about tasks and goals before the
leader makes a decisionm A manager who is a democratic leader is likely to

have a positive effect on reporter self-satisfaction.
However, a democratic leader retains decision-making authority. Whether

a democratic leader consults or directs may be associated with time and
situation. The less time to make a decision or attain a goal, the less democratic
the leader may be. The more ambiguous the situation, the more directive the
democratic leader is likely to be. The democratic leader thus tends to achieve
moderate effectiveness but tends to be inefficient and tends to be perceived as
u n predictable. ‘ 35
A manager also may be predisposed toward a participatory style of
leadership. The participatory leader solicits the ideas of subordinates and uses
them. Subordinates contribute to decisions and are involved in setting goals. The
participatory leader enhances effectiveness without neglecting efficiency.”6

However, participatory leadership is not likely when newsroom structure is

13" Kreitner, Management (3rd ed,), 463.
3" Wctor H. Vroom and Philip W. Yetton, Leadership and Decision-Making (Pittsburgh: University

Of Pittsburgh Press; 1973), 16.

13‘ French, Human Resource Management, 53—55.
56

 

complex, role differentiation is highly specialized, the hierarchy of authority is
rigid, and time to weigh goals or task alternatives is limited.

A leadership orientation is a predisposition, a tendency, or an identifiable
perceptual pattern that may influence behavior.137 Leadership orientation is
assumed in this study to range across a continuum, with a rigidly authoritarian
leadership orientation representing one end point and a fully participatory
leadership orientation representing the opposite end point.

Descriptive mass communication researchers found in a case study that
actual leadership behavior in newsrooms at daily newspapers tends to be
democratic, benevolent authoritarian, or both.‘” The researchers examined
leadership as an independent variable and focused their observation on how

desk editors interact with reporters when news stories are discussed. In this
study, leadership orientation is a dependent variable, and the population of
interest in city editors who manage local news departments.

The measures for how city editors perceive their leadership orientation are
Consistent with each of the styles of leadership identified in media and business
management literature as well as leadership studies. The measures are: 1) the
extent to which reporters are encouraged to develop their own ideas; 2) the

extent to which supervising desk editors are encouraged to explain editing
Changes to reporters; 3) the extent to which the city editor is sensitive about the

personal feelings of reporters; 4) the extent to which the city editor tells reporters

F

‘37 French, Human Resource Management, 91.
‘3' Cecilia Gaziano and David Coulson, “Effect of Newsroom Management Styles on Journalists:
A Case Study," Joumelism Quarterly Vol. 65 No. 4 (Vlfinter 1988); 869-880.

57

what to do; 5) how often the city editor compliments reporters for good work; 6)
how often the city editor criticizes reporters for deficient performance; 7) the
extent to which the city editor solicits reporter opinions before making a decision;
and 8) the frequency with which the city editor incorporates reporter ideas into
goals to be attained.

The leadership orientation measures were developed after consideration
of the internal consistency of the Leader Behavior Description Questionnaire,
Form XII (LBDQ-XII). The LBDQ-Xll questionnaire is considered to be among the
most reliable instruments for examining subordinate perception of actual leader
behavior and is often used in scholarly research because of its internal

c=onsistency.“”9

The LBDQ-Xll was not wholly appropriate for this study, however. First,

the LBDQ-Xll questions measure subordinate perception of observed leader
behavior when the purpose of this study is to examine the perceptions city
editors in daily newspaper newsrooms in the United States have of themselves,
su parlors, and subordinates. Second, rewording the LBDQ—Xll questions to
accommodate a motivation-hygiene perspective would undermine the integrity of
the LBDQ—Xll questionnaire items and adversely affect their reliability. And third,

the LBDQ-XII utilizes more measures than can be effectively incorporated in a

mail survey without raising a substantial risk of a low survey response rate.

 

'3 Angela Powers, "The Effect of Leadership Behavior on Job Satisfaction, Goal Agreement and
Goal Attainment in Local Television News: A Survey," (Michigan State University Doctoral

Dissertation: 1990); 4344.
58

The measures incorporated in the LBDQ-Xll were useful, however, as
guidelines for developing questions to measure how city editors may perceive
their leadership orientation. The LBDQ-Xll, for example, asks subordinates if
their boss puts staff suggestions into operation. In this study, city editors are
asked the extent to which they solicit reporter opinions before they make a
decision and whether subordinates contribute to setting goals. The LBDQ-XII
asks subordinates if their boss decides what will be done and how. The mailed
survey used in this study asks city editors if they often tell subordinates what to
do and how to do it.

Although variation in question wording is modest, both the validity and

reliability of the selected LBDQ—XII measures could be adversely affected by the

changes made in this study.

59

 

Chapter 3

HYPOTHESES

Variable Relationships
The dependent variable of interest in this study is City editor leadership

orientation, with span of control as a control variable. The independent variables
are a City editor’s perception of reporter journalistic performance, a city editor’s

perception of goal attainment by reporters, a city editor’s perception of how the
manager’s boss expects reporters to perform, a city editor’s self-satisfaction
derived from intrinsic rewards associated with the city editor’s job, and a city
editor’s dissatisfaction with working conditions.

The hypotheses to be tested were conceptualized after consideration of

business and media management literature as well as motivation-hygiene theory

and its potential usefulness in explanation and prediction of a city editor’s self-

satisfaction, dissatisfaction, and leadership orientation.

Manager Self-satisfaction on the Job
H1: As a city editors dissatisfaction with working conditions increases, the

city editor’s self-satisfaction decreases.
Hypothesis one attempts to associate a city editor’s dissatisfaction with
Working conditions with the city editor’s self-satisfaction with intrinsic rewards

associated with the city editor’s job. The hypothesis tests whether dissatisfaction

60

with working conditions must be moderate to low before self-satisfaction can be
moderate to high, the core axiom of motivation-hygiene theory.

H2: As a city editor’s self-satisfaction increases, the City editor’s

perception of the journalistic performance of reporters will tend to be

increasingly positive.

Hypothesis two attempts to associate the self-satisfaction of a city editor
with whether that city editor perceives the journalistic performance of reporters
positively. The hypothetical relationship is consistent with the assumptions of
motivation-hygiene theory and the leadership orientation model.

Consistent with management literature, hypothesis two assumes the
reporters upon whom a city editor relies to attain organization goals may be
perceived by the city editor as assets who enhance the city editor’s self-
satisfaction, liabilities who may inhibit the city editor’s ability to experience

intrinsic rewards associated with the city editor’s job, or both.

Manager Dissatisfaction With Working Conditions

H3: As a city editor’s dissatisfaction with working conditions increases, the

city editor‘s perception of the journalistic performance of reporters will tend

to be increasingly negative.

Hypothesis three attempts to predict how a city editor’s dissatisfaction with
nevvsroom working conditions may be associated with how that city editor
perceives the journalistic performance of reporters. The hypothetical relationship

‘3 consistent with motivation-hygiene theory and the model tested in this study.

61

Hypothesis three assumes a city editor who is dissatisfied with working
conditions will tend to perceive such extrinsic variables as the journalistic
performance of reporters negatively. As dissatisfaction increases, motivation-

hygiene theory suggests dissatisfaction with variables in a work environment

associated with dissatisfaction increases.

Manager Perception of Goal Attainment by Reporters

H4: As a city editors perception of goal attainment becomes increasingly

negative, the City editor’s perception of the journalistic performance of

reporters will tend to be increasingly negative.

Hypothesis four attempts to associate a city editor’s perception of reporter
attainment of goals with a city editor’s perception of the journalistic performance
of reporters.

The core assumptions of media management literature are goal
attainment is a reliable indicator of the success of a manager, and goal
attainment is a function of the willingness of subordinates to comply with goals
developed by managers.

Motivation-hygiene researchers, however, have found that both goals and
goal attainment are associated with the dissatisfaction of managers.

Motivation-hygiene research also has found that low-level managers may
disapprove of some goals senior managers expect them to attain yet also be

dissatisfied with how subordinates attain those same goals.

62

Hypothesis four proposes to test motivation-hygiene assumptions and
research findings in the context of how a low-level newsroom manager - a city

editor -— may perceive goal attainment by reporters.

Manager Perception of What Superiors Expect of Reporters
H5: As a city editor’s perception of how well reporters do what the city
editor thinks senior newsroom managers expect of reporters becomes
increasingly negative, the city editor’s perception of the joumalistic
performance of reporters will tend to be increasingly negative.

Hypothesis five attempts to predict an association between a city editor's

perception of the performance expectations of the city editor’s superior and the
city editor’s perception of the journalistic performance of reporters. The
hypothetical relationship is consistent with motivation-hygiene theory and the
leadership orientation model.

Media management literature presumes higher-level managers set
expectations which lower-level managers attempt to satisfy. And motivation-
hygiene researchers have found that the performance expectations of senior
managers may be a source of dissatisfaction for low-level managers. Hypothesis
five attempts to substantiate those research findings.

Hypothesis five assumes what senior managers expect of reporters is
associated with how dissatisfied city editors may be with the performance of
reporters. In a hierarchical newsroom management structure, media

management literature suggests low-level managers are likely to conform to the

eXpectations of senior managers.
63

Conformity is probable even if the low-level manager does not agree with
the performance expectations of the manager’s superior. The performance
expectations of a senior manager thus may be associated with a city editor’s

dissatisfaction.

Manager Leadership Orientation

H6: As a city editor’s perception of the journalistic performance of

reporters becomes increasingly negative, the manager’s leadership

orientation will tend to be increasingly authoritarian.

Motivation-hygiene theory suggests that if a low-level manager perceives
variables in the work environment, such as the journalistic performance of
reporters, to be negative, the manager is likely to experience some degree of
dissatisfaction and will perceive that corrective action is required. To minimize
dissatisfaction, the manager will likely favor authoritarian leadership because the
manager will tend to perceive that such a leadership orientation increases the
Ii kelihood of efficient correction of conditions in the work environment.

Hypothesis six attempts to associate a city editor’s negative appraisal of
the journalistic performance of reporters and the likelihood that the city editor will
be predisposed toward authoritarian leadership.

H7: As a City editor’s self-satisfaction associated with the city editor’s job

increases, the City editor’s leadership orientation will tend to be less

authoritarian.

Motivation-hygiene theory suggests that if self -satisfaction tends to be
moderate to high, then a low-level manager is likely to perceive external or
hygiene conditions to be positive or at minimum neutral. If a city editor perceives
hygiene conditions favorably, then the city editor may tend to view favorably
those reporters who make positive contributions to the newsroom work
environment.

If a city editor perceives reporters as making positive contributions to
hygiene maintenance, then a less authoritarian leadership orientation is probable
because the city editor will tend to perceive little or no negative hygiene to
correct With little, if any, hygiene to correct, a city editor may be predisposed

toward a less authoritarian leadership orientation because the city editor

perceives such a leadership orientation as having a positive association with

reporter performance.
The hypothetical relationship is consistent with motivation-hygiene theory

and the leadership orientation model.

H8: As a city editor’s dissatisfaction with conditions in the work

environment decreases, the city editor’s leadership orientation will tend to

be less authoritarian.
Motivation-hygiene theory suggests that if hygiene variables are perceived

t0 be positive. a low-level manager is likely to perceive no external or hygiene

00nditions to correct. Hypothesis eight assumes that if a city editor is not

dissatisfied, then a less authoritarian leadership orientation is increasingly likely

65

because the city editor will associate less authoritarian leadership with self-
satisfaction.

If dissatisfaction is moderate to low, then a city editor is likely to perceive
self-satisfaction to be moderate to high. If a city editor is self-satisfied, then it may
be likely that the city editor associates positive intrinsic rewards with effective
leadership of subordinates. As a city editor’s preference for a less authoritarian
leadership orientation increases, positive social interaction between the city
editor and reporters is likely to increase.

The hypothetical relationship is consistent with motivation-hygiene theory

and the leadership orientation model.

H9: As a city editor’s dissatisfaction with working conditions increases,
the city editor’s leadership orientation will tend to be increasingly
authoritarian.

Hypothesis nine assumes the leadership orientation of a city editor may be
affected by the city editor's dissatisfaction with extrinsic variables. If a city editor
is dissatisfied, then the city editor is likely to perceive that certain hygiene
variables, including the journalistic performance of reporters, are in a negative
condition and need to be corrected.

Hypothesis nine suggests that a dissatisfied city editor will tend to be
increasingly authoritarian in leadership orientation because the city editor will
tend to perceive authoritarian leadership as the quickest way to correct

deficiencies or solve problems. A low-level manager may perceive an

authoritarian leadership orientation to be an efficient means to minimize the
manager’s dissatisfaction with conditions in the newsroom work environment.

In motivation-hygiene theory, a manager is motivated to minimize
dissatisfaction because a manager’s dissatisfaction must be moderate to low
before a manager’s self-satisfaction can be moderate to high. And self-
satisfaction is assumed to be the primary goal of all individuals employed in an
industrial organization, including managers.

The hypothetical relationship is consistent with motivation-hygiene theory

and the leadership orientation model.

67

Chapter 4

METHOD
Sample Survey

The research method employed in this study is a national sample survey
of city editors responsible for local news production at daily newspapers in the
United States.“° The survey method was selected because it facilitates

acquisition of large amounts of data about the perceptions of individual

respondents in a large and clearly identified population. This study is ooncemed
with what explains and predicts the leadership orientation of city editors at daily
newspapers of varied size in varied markets. A national sample survey thus is

compatible with the scope of the research project.

Surveys can be effectively employed to identify and differentiate the
perceptions of a large number of respondents without being unduly intrusive.
Respondent cooperation with a mail survey is voluntary and respondent
anonymity is respected. Moreover, if the sample is truly random, multivariate

inferential statistics can be employed to facilitate data analysis and to guide the

development of generalizations.

If the random sample is truly representative of the larger population under
Study and if the survey response rate is 50 percent or more, then generalizations

r’flay be interpreted as having application to the population as a whole. If the

\

“o The discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of the survey method throughout this
Chapter is based on Earl Babble, Survey Research Methods (2“ ed.), (Belmont, Calif:

68

response rate is less than 50 percent, inferences can be made, but
generalizations should be limited to the sample as selected.

The survey method has limitations, however.

First, causal inferences can not be made. All survey measures are post
hoc and associations among variables are not differentiated by time order.

Second, generalizations derived from the survey reflect the perceptions of
respondents at only one point in time. Perceptions, however, are likely to change
as individuals and their circumstances vary over time. Researchers have found
that the perceptions of employees in industrial organizations may be especially
volatile when employee satisfaction or dissatisfaction is examined.141

Third, survey research limited to perceptions may have an individualist
and subjectivist bias that detracts from valid and reliable explanation and
prediction of human behavior, especially when individuals participate in complex

social interaction.

Population

This study was conceptualized as a modest step toward making a
research contribution in an important aspect of media management -newsroom
leadership. In descriptive mass communication research literature, inept
newsroom leadership frequently is cited as being associated with low reporter job

satisfaction.

 

Wadsworth Publishing Co.; 1990) and Fred N. Kerlinger, Foundations of Behavioral Research (3"
ed.), (Orlando, Fla.: Harcourt Brace Jovanovlch; 1986).
“‘ Stogdill and Coons (eds), Leader Behavior: Its Description and Measurement, 56-57.

69

Newsroom leadership has been characterized in descriptive mass
communication research as arbitrary, inept, inconsistent, and incompetent.
However, descriptive researchers have tended to associate inadequate
leadership with newsroom management in the broadest sense, leaving
unexamined specifically which managers at what levels within the structure of
newsroom authority tend to be perceived by reporters as incompetent leaders.

The lack of specificity in the descriptive research literature makes
selection of the appropriate newsroom population to study problematic. Because
leadership is defined as use of the social influence process to motivate
subordinates to associate organization goal attainment with self-satisfaction on
the job, managers at low levels in the structure of newsroom authority are likely
to be a relevant population because social proximity increases the likelihood of

social interaction, and social interaction is described in human relations
management literature as a precondition for leadership.

In addition, studies of reporter job satisfaction have tended to focus on
reporters who cover local news.

If local news reporters tend to associate ineffective leadership with how
they are led by managers directly responsible for local news production, than city
editors are the appropriate population to examine because city editors have
Operational responsibility for organization goals in the daily production of local
news.

City editors thus are most directly accountable for the daily performance of

local news reporters.

70

A city editor also is responsible for attempting to ensure that reporters act
in accord with organization goals. In addition, the city editor collaborates with
other managers and represents local news reporters to senior managers.142

The role of the city editor thus incorporates management responsibilities
and expectations that satisfy the multivariate assumptions incorporated into the

leadership orientation model and the hypotheses to be tested in this study.

Questionnaire

Editor & Publisher Yearbook 1998 was used as the sampling frame for this
study. Daily newspapers in the United States were randomly selected. A sample
of 301 daily newspapers with a city editor was selected, and the names of the
newsroom managers as well as the addresses of their newspapers were
recorded on a mailing list.

The questionnaire employed in this study used 39 questions with seven-
point, Likert-type scales. On the seven-point scale, one represents strongly
disagree and seven represents strongly agree. Not sure was recorded as a four.
If a datum was missing on a completed survey, the average response among all
respondents for that Likert-type question was substituted.

Thirty-nine Likert-type scaled responses were employed because scales
generate data that approximate interval data that fit the assumptions of inferential
statistics. The scaled responses have numerically consistent intervals but have

no true zero point. The meaning survey respondents may associate with the

 

“2 Giles, Newsroom Management, 842.
71

difference, for example, between a one and a two on a seven-point, Likert-type
scale can not be ascertained by the researcher. Despite this limitation, such data
often have been used with parametric statistics.143

Nine additional questions sought demographic or other professional data.
And respondents were encouraged to use space available on the last page of the
questionnaire to contribute personal comments or observations they believed to

be relevant or useful.

Questionnaire Pretest

One pretest was conducted to ascertain if respondents found the survey
questions to be clear, understandable, and answerable. The objective was to
utilize the pretest to refine the questionnaire.

For the pretest, 24 daily newspapers not included in the random sample
were purposefully selected. Each of the 24 newspapers had a city editor who
was not included in the sample survey.

Twenty-four pretest questionnaires were mailed on May 15, 1999, with a
cover letter that explained the research project and a stamped, self-addressed
return envelope. A follow-up letter that encouraged the city editors to cOOperate
was mailed approximately two weeks later. On June 15, 1999, a cover letter,
questionnaire, and stamped, self-addressed retum envelope were mailed to non-

respondents.

 

“3 For example, see Weaver and Wilhoit, The American Joumelist in the 1990s.- U. 3. News
People at the End ofan Era.
72

Only eight newsroom managers returned pretest questionnaires. Based
on their comments, the wording of two survey questions was modified to improve

clarity.

Survey Distribution

The first wave of survey mailings to the 301 city editors selected at
random was sent out on July 15, 1999. The first-wave mailing included a survey
questionnaire and a cover letter that explained the research project and solicited
the cooperation of the city editors. The first-wave mailing also included a self-
addressed and stamped return envelope.

Returned surveys were recorded and tracked by using a number code for
each questionnaire distributed. Respondent confidentiality was protected, and all
city editors in the random sample were thanked for their cooperation.

On August 1, 1999, two weeks after the first mailing, a second letter was
sent to all non-respondents to remind them of the survey and to ask that they
comdete and return the questionnaire.

A second wave of mailings that included a questionnaire color-coded to
identify the instrument as having been distributed in a second wave, a cover
letter, and a stamped return envelope was distributed on August 15, 1999, to all
city editors who did not respond to the first-wave mailing.

The first completed questionnaire was received on July 21, 1999, and the

last completed questionnaire was returned on October 31, 1999.

73

Survey Response Rate

Of the 301 questionnaires that were mailed, 152 were returned for an
actual response rate of 50.5 percent.

Twelve returned questionnaires could not be redistributed, however,
because the individual selected in the random sample no longer was employed
by the newspaper, and five returned questionnaires had to be dropped from the
study because the respondents no longer were city editors when they completed
the questionnaire.

The 12 daily newspapers were contacted to determine if a new city editor
had been selected to replace the departed individual to whom the questionnaire
originally had been mailed. If the newspaper had a new city editor, a
questionnaire with cover letter was mailed to that individual. None of the three
questionnaires distributed in this manner was returned.

Of the 284 questionnaires actually distributed, 147 were completed and

returned, which generated an effective response rate of 52 percent.

Confirmatory Factor Analysis

Before a theoretic model is tested, the measurement model that underlies
it should be tested.”

Each of the 39 Likert-type scaled questions included in the survey
instrument used in this study constitutes an attempt to measure a higher-order

concept or latent variable. Of special concern is whether valid and reliable

74

multiple measures have been employed that can be demonstrated to be accurate
indicators of each variable.“5

The under-specified leadership orientation model and the hypotheses to
be tested presume that each variable is best characterized by multiple indicators.
lf several measures are specified, and if those measures are logically
interrelated, then multiple measures are likely to provide a more comprehensive
and precise assessment of a variable than a single-item measure can.

Conversely, the use of too many measures may introduce redundancy
that confounds interpretation of data. Or employment of too many measures may
have the effect of masking the influence of a genuinely valid measure or
measures. And inadvertent exclusion of relevant measures or incorporation of ill-
specified measures may diminish the influence of othenlvise well-specified
measures.

In mass communication research, confirmatory factor analysis can be
employed as an inferential statistical method when the validity of multiple
measures is to be tested. By identifying measures that are associated with each
other and load on only one variable, confirmatory factor analysis clarifies
relationships between indicators.

In this study, confirmatory factor analysis is especially useful because the

measures incorporated into the mailed survey are exploratory, and they are

 

1“ The discussion of confirmatory factor analysis in this chapter relies primarily on Kerlinger,
Foundations of Behavioral Research (3"I ed. ), 569-595.
“5 The evaluation of validity in this chapter is adapted from Edward G. Carmines and Richard A.
Zeller, Reliability and Validty Assessment, (Newbury Park: Sage Publications; 1979).

75

derived from three diverse bodies of literature - motivation-hygiene theory,
media or business management, and leadership studies.

Motivation-hygiene theory contributed measures of self-satisfaction and
dissatisfaction with conditions in the work environment.

Dissatisfaction is treated in this study as one continuum, with one on a
seven-point Likert-type scale representing very dissatisfied and seven indicating
not dissatisfied. The mean for dissatisfaction with working conditions is 4.5,
which indicates dissatisfaction tends to be moderate among the city editors
surveyed.

Self-satisfaction also is treated as one continuum, with one on a seven-
point Likert-type scale representing not satisfied and seven indicating very
satisfied. The mean for self-satisfaction among the city editors sun/eyed is 5.3,
which indicates survey respondents tend to be slightly more than moderately
self-satisfied in their job.

The theory also suggested as relevant variables city editor perception of
goal attainment by reporters, city editor perception of reporter journalistic
performance, and city editor perception of the performance expectations senior
newsroom managers have for reporters, but the theory offers little guidance as to
what measures are valid indicators for each of those variables.

The measures incorporated into the questionnaire for perception of goal
attainment by reporters, perception of reporter journalistic performance, and

perception of the performance expectations of superiors were derived primarily

76

from non-theoretical media management and business management literature
which tends to be descriptive, prescriptive, and normative.

And measures for leadership orientation were derived primarily from
descriptive mass communication research and leadership studies as well as the
LBDQ—Xll leadership behavior questionnaire. Those studies also tend to examine
leadership as an independent variable.

The distinctive research consideration in this study is it attempts to
examine the leadership orientation of city editors at daily newspapers in the
United States as a dependent variable. Studies that examine newsroom
leadership as a dependent variable are non-existent in the mass communication

research literature.

Skewness and Kurtosis

Confirmatory factor analysis assumes that the data collected for each
measure is distributed normally. If data distribution is normal, the value reported
for skewness equals zero.

No measure was found to have skewness in excess of +1.3 or -1.3, and
the standard error of skewness for each measure is .20, which suggests that the
skewness of each of the multiple measures for each variable in the study is
insufficient to reject the assumption that the data is distributed within an

acceptably normal range.146

 

“° Barbara G. Tabachnick and Linda 5. Fidell, Using Multivariate Statistics, (New York: Harper 3.
Row; 1983), 77-79.
77

As for kurtosis, no measure was found to exceed +2.0 or -2.0, and the
standard error of kurtosis for each measure is .40. Although there is more
kurtosis among the measures in this study than skewness, the extent of kurtosis

also is insufficient to reject the normality assumption.

Factor Loading Criteria

ln factor analysis, the relationship between each indicator and the variable
it measures is expressed as a correlation or factor loading. In mass
communication research literature, the minimum acceptable factor loading
commonly employed is .30.

Because this study is exploratory and because numerous measures are
premised on assumptions derived, in part, from untested business and media
management literature, the minimum acceptable factor loading was raised to .40.

The .40 factor loading criterion was selected because it imposes a higher
threshold for acceptance of multiple measures as valid indicators of a variable.
The higher threshold allows for more rigorous validity assessment than normally
is expected in social science research.

If a measure fails to satisfy the .40 criterion, the measure will not be

retained in this study.

Principal Factors Analysis
Principal factors was selected as the appropriate factor analytic method. In

the principal factors approach, only the variance that is common to or shared by

78

measures is analyzed.“7 The method lists measures in terms of the size of their
loading on the variable with which they are most closely associated. If a measure
loads on more than one variable, the size of the factor loadings

guides interpretation of the validity of the measure.

Measures that are well-integrated conceptually should load only on one
variable. In this study, if a measure loads on more than one variable, the
measure will be interpreted as being most logically consistent with the higher
factor loading. If a measure has approximately equal factor loadings on two or

more variables, the measure will be dropped from the study.“‘3

Orthogonal Rotation

The 39 Likert-type scaled measures included in the questionnaire were
subjected to orthogonal or 90-degree rotation to augment assignment of meaning
to and interpretation of the relationship between measures and variables.
Orthogonal rotation facilitates validity assessment by augmenting associations
through maximization and minimization of factor loadings.

The orthogonal or 90-degree rotation procedure facilitates clarification of
relationships between measures and latent variables. It thus is especially useful
in an exploratory study when little research exists from which measures already
demonstrated to be valid and reliable indicators of a concept or latent variable

can be drawn.

 

“7 Kerlinger, Foundations of Behavioral Research (3rd ed.), 576-582.
1" Kerlinger, Foundations of Behavioral Research (3rd ed.), 576-582, and Carmines and Zeller,
Refiability and Valid‘ty Assessment, 59-70.

79

A disadvantage of orthogonal rotation, however, is the procedure may
have the effect of forcing variables to appear to be independent of each other

when they actually are not.

Reliability

When multiple indicators of a variable are employed, the reliability or
intemal consistency of the multiple measures can be estimated by employing the
statistic Cronbach’s alpha.

In the calculation of Cronbach’s alpha, a standardized correlation
coefficient is generated that varies between 0 and +1.0. The nearer the
coefficient is to +1.0, the greater the reliability or intemal consistency of the
multiple measures employed as indicators of a variable.

A Cronbach's alpha of .80 or greater is acceptable in social science

research and will be employed as the reliability criterion in this study.149

Manager Self-satisfaction on the Job

As presented in Table 1, confirmatory factor analysis with orthogonal
rotation in nine iterations identified five measures derived from motivation-
hygiene theory as valid indicators of self-satisfaction with intrinsic rewards the
city editors surveyed said they derive from their job. Those measures are

enjoyment of the responsibility associated with the job, how interesting the job is

 

“9 The evaluation of reliability in this study is adapted from Carmines and Zeller, Reliability and
Validity Assessment, 37-51 .
80

perceived to be, perception of personal growth, perception of professional

achievement, and salary.

Table 1

Factor Analysis With Orthogonal Rotation

 

Factor 1:
Satis-
faction

Factor 2:
Dlssatls-
faction

Factor 3:
Reporters

Factor 4:
Superior

Factor 5:
Decide

Factor 6:
Edit

 

Achieve

.57109

.44975

 

Chance to
Advance

.50931

 

Autonomy

.68651

 

Personal
Growth

.56363

.48332

 

Interesting
Work

.73280

 

Positive
Support

.64104

 

Enjoy
Being
In Charge

.76006

 

Authority

.81176

 

Clarity of
Policies

.50946

 

Financial
Resources

.55309

 

Human
Resources

.52687

 

Salary

.46567

 

Job
Security

.56942

 

How
Superiors
Perform

.62998

 

Decisions
Supported

.72406

 

Cooperate
With
Editors

.53611

 

First With
News

.49496

 

Reporter

Initiative

.71205

 

Produce
More News

 

 

 

 

.5923?

 

 

 

 

81

 

Table 1 (Continued)

Factor Analysis With Orthogonal Rotation

 

Factor 1:
Satis-
faction

Factor 2:
Dissatis-
faction

Factor 3:
Reporters

Factor 4:
Superior

Factor 5:
Decide

Factor 6:
Edit

 

Thorough
Reporti'm;

.68223

 

Skillful
VWfluEL

.65692

 

Features

.66092

 

Graphics

.58575

 

Hard
News

.58303

 

Humanize
Stories

.6943?

 

Positive
News

.45170

 

Do What
Superior
Wants

.59640

.54416

 

Support
New

ideas

.70761

 

Accept
Procedure
Changes

.63269

 

News
Readers
Want

.47896

.49295

 

Advice
From

Reporters

.61816

 

Reporter

Opinions

.65506

 

Story
Changes

.51097

 

Reporter
Feelings

.46263

 

Generate
Ideas

.43792

 

Criticize

.46526

 

Tell What
To Do

.48446

 

 

Satisfied
Overall

 

.61533

 

.57687

 

 

 

 

 

82

 

in its original formulation, motivation-hygiene theory was controversial
because Herzberg and his colleagues argued that salary is not a motivator and
thus can not be a measure of self-satisfaction. Herzberg-insisted that salary only
can be associated with dissatisfaction with working conditions.

However, confirmatory factor analysis found that among the city editors
surveyed salary is a valid measure of self-satisfaction (factor loading = .47) and
is not a measure of dissatisfaction with working conditions.

Salary did not load as an indicator of city editor dissatisfaction with
working conditions. It should be noted that the factor loading for salary is the
smallest among the five valid measures of self-satisfaction. Salary, in other
words, was found to be the least influential of the five valid measures of city
editor self-satisfaction.

That finding, though contrary to motivation-hygiene theory as originally
conceptualized, is consistent with refinements Herzberg and his colleagues
introduced in motivation-hygiene theory in the 1980s. In refined motivation-
hygiene theory, salary is integrated as a weak motivator associated with self-
satisfaction on the job.

Herzberg has suggested that the ubiquity of salary in a work environment
may confound results when motivation-hygiene theory is applied. Herzberg
found, however, that when salary is associated with self-satisfaction, the
association tends to be weak relative to other measures of intrinsic rewards

associated with a job.‘5°

 

‘5“ Herzberg, The Managerial Choice: to be Efficient and to be Human (2" ed.), 275-290.
83

Herzberg’s conclusion that salary is at best a weak indicator of self-
satisfaction on the job is consistent with how the city editors surveyed in this
study said they perceive their self-satisfaction.

How much a city editor enjoys the responsibility associated with the job
was found to be the strongest indicator of self-satisfaction (factor loading = .76),
followed by how interesting the work is perceived to be (factor loading = .73).
Both measures loaded exclusively on the self-satisfaction of the city editors
surveyed.

However, the perception of personal growth measure loaded on both self-
satisfaction (factor loading = .56) and dissatisfaction with working conditions
(factor loading = .48). The professional achievement measure also loaded on
both self-satisfaction (factor loading = .57) and dissatisfaction with working
conditions (factor loading = .45).

Because both professional achievement and personal growth shared
larger factor loadings with self-satisfaction than with dissatisfaction with working
conditions, both measures were retained in this study as valid indicators of city
editor self-satisfaction.

lf salary is included as one of the five valid measures of self-satisfaction,
Cronbach’s alpha is .76. If salary is excluded, Cronbach’s alpha is .82.

Although salary is a valid and reliable measure of self-satisfaction as
expressed by the city editors surveyed, salary will not be retained in this study as

an indicator of that variable. The reason is Cronbach’s alpha demonstrates that

four valid measures of city editor self-satisfaction are more reliable than five

indicators.

Manager Dissatisfaction With Working Conditions

Eight measures of dissatisfaction with working conditions derived from
motivation-hygiene theory initially were incorporated into this study. Those
measures are how well senior managers do their jobs, the clarity of policies, the
adequacy of human resources, the adequacy of financial resources, the extent to
which superiors support the decisions of subordinate managers, salary, job
security, and whether a city editor has sufficient management authority to do the
job well.

As previously discussed, salary was found to be a valid measure not of
city editor dissatisfaction with working conditions but of self-satisfaction on the
job.

With salary excluded as an indicator of dissatisfaction, confirmatory factor
analysis with orthogonal rotation found that among the city editors surveyed 12
measures are associated with dissatisfaction with working conditions. Two of the
12 indicators, however, are perception of professional achievement and
perception of personal growth, both of which had larger factor loadings as
measures of self-satisfaction and thus will be excluded as measures of
dissatisfaction in this study.

Of the 10 remaining measures, confirmatory factor analysis found that

among the city editors surveyed the strongest valid indicators of dissatisfaction

85

with working conditions are their perception of limitations on the amount of
authority associated with their job (factor loading = .81) and their perception of
how routinely their superior in newsroom management supports or fails to
support their decisions (factor loading = .72).

Limited job autonomy (factor loading = .69) and insufficient positive
reinforcement from superiors (factor loading = .64) were found to be the next
most influential indicators of city editor dissatisfaction, followed by whether the
city editors surveyed said they think senior managers do their jobs well (factor
loading = .63).

The remaining valid indicators of dissatisfaction expressed by the city
editors surveyed are job security (factor loading = .57), adequacy of financial
resources (factor loading = .55), adequacy of human resources (factor loading =
.53), advancement opportunity within newsroom management at their daily
newspaper (factor loading = .51), and lack of clarity in newsroom policies (factor
loading = .51).

Motivation-hygiene theory posits that autonomy, frequency of positive
reinforcement from superiors, and advancement opportunity are important
measures of self-satisfaction. Herzberg and his colleagues argue that each of the
three is necessary before any employee of an industrial organization can
experience a high level of self-satisfaction derived from intrinsic rewards
associated with a job.

That the city editors surveyed said they associate all three indicators with

dissatisfaction with working conditions in their newsrooms suggests city editors at

86

daily newspapers in the United States perceive that their opportunity to
experience greater self-satisfaction on the job is inhibited by newsroom or
organization constraints, including their position within the hierarchy of newsroom
management.

However, limited autonomy and insufficient positive reinforcement from
newsroom superiors appear to have more influence on how the city editors
surveyed said they perceive their dissatisfaction with working conditions than
lack of advancement opportunity at their daily newspaper.

Cronbach’s alpha for the 10 valid measures of city editor dissatisfaction
with working conditions in their newsrooms is .87, which indicates the measures

are reliable.

Overall Job Satisfaction

One global or overall job satisfaction measure used in descriptive mass
communication research - “All things considered, I am satisfied with my job' -
was incorporated into this study. The measure is a modified version of a question
developed by Weaver and Wilhoit - ”All things considered, would you say you
are satisfied with your job?” - that descriptive mass communication researchers
have tended to use in reporter job satisfaction studies.151

In motivation-hygiene theory, self-satisfaction can be associated only with

intrinsic rewards derived from a job. Dissatisfaction can be associated only with

 

‘5‘ See, for example, Weaver and Wilhoit, The American Joumelist in the 1990s: us. News
People at the End of an Era, or Stamm and Underwood, “The Relationship of Job Satisfaction to
Newsroom Policy Changes,” 528-541.

87

external conditions in a work environment. And job satisfaction is a different
concept or latent variable than either self-satisfaction or dissatisfaction.

In motivation-hygiene theory, job satisfaction is associated exclusively with
satisfaction derived from specific work-related tasks. A substantive deficiency of
motivation-hygiene theory, however, is specific multiple measures of job
satisfaction derived from work-related tasks are not elaborated. That deficiency
compelled the use of a modified global job satisfaction measure in this study.

Confirmatory factor analysis with orthogonal rotation found in this study
that the global job satisfaction measure shares almost equal common variance
with both city editor self-satisfaction (factor loading = .62) and city editor
dissatisfaction with working conditions (factor loading = .58).

The finding suggests survey respondents may have incorporated their
perceptions of self-satisfaction derived from intrinsic rewards associated with a
job, perceptions of dissatisfaction with conditions in the newsroom work
environment at their daily newspapers, and even possibly perceptions of job
tasks into their responses.

The global job satisfaction indicator, in other words, may have elicited
responses from the city editors surveyed that blur distinctions between sources
of self-satisfaction, perception of job tasks, and dissatisfaction with working
conditions even though neither dissatisfaction nor job tasks is mentioned in the

language of the measure.

88

Consistent with the guidelines incorporated into this study for evaluation of
the validity of indicators that load on more than one variable, the global job

satisfaction measure will be excluded from this study.

Manager Perception of Goal Attainment by Reporters

Five measures of city editor perception of organization goal attainment by
reporters initially were included in this study. The goal-attainment measures are
news feature production, hard news production, development of information for
charts and graphics, humanization of news, and coverage of positive aspects of
the community served by the newspaper. The measures were derived from
media management literature.

Confirmatory factor analysis with orthogonal rotation found, however, that
city editor perception of organization goal attainment by reporters could not be
isolated as an independent concept or latent variable.

Four of the five measures of goal attainment by reporters instead were
found to be valid indicators of city editor perception of reporter journalistic
performance, and the fifth measure loaded on city editor perception of the
performance expectations senior newsroom managers have for reporters.

The four goal-attainment measures that loaded exclusively on city editor
perception of the journalistic performance of reporters were humanization of hard
news stories (factor loading = .69), production of interesting news features (factor
loading = .66), enterprising information for charts and graphics (factor loading =
.59), and production of informative hard news stories (factor loading = .58).

89

The fifth measure, which loaded exclusively on city editor perception of the
expectations senior newsroom managers have of reporter journalistic
performance, is coverage of positive aspects of the community served by the
daily newspaper (factor loading = .45).

It is possible that the goal-attainment measures in this study failed to load
as indicators of an independent variable because they are ill-specified. What
constitutes a newsroom goal or goals in the context of daily news production
remains a largely unexplored dimension of newspaper management in the mass
communication research literature.

The measures that are employed are consistent, however, with research
that has attempted to address business and marketing strategies associated with
daily newspaper production, design, and story presentation.

Motivation-hygiene theory, other than to posit that organization goals can
only be a source of dissatisfaction, offers little guidance as to what constitutes a
goal in an organization or how a manager’s perception of goal attainment can be
measured.

However, media and business management literature identify goal-driven
decision-making by managers, defined as the allocation of scarce resources to
achieve goals under conditions of uncertainty or risk, as perhaps the most
essential component of organization activity.152

That goal-attainment by reporters failed to stand as an independent

variable in the perceptions of the city editors surveyed suggests low-level

 

‘52 Sohn, \Mcks, Lacy, Sylvie at. al., Media Management: A Casebook Approach (2" ed.) 15.
90

newsroom managers at daily newspapers in the United States routinely integrate
their perceptions of organization goal-attainment into how they evaluate the
journalistic performance of reporters.

The finding that the city editors surveyed said they incorporate goal-
attainment into how they perceive reporter journalistic performance also suggests
that traditional journalistic standards, such as skilled writing, thorough reporting,
aggressive hard news coverage, and consistent self-initiative, are necessary but
not sufficient to explain and predict how newsroom managers such as city editors
perceive how well local news reporters perform as journalists.

The city editors surveyed also indicated that humanization of news stories
and production of interesting news features are more influential indicators of city
editor perception of goal-attainment by local news reporters than is production of
informative hard news stories - a traditional measure of reporter journalistic
performance.

Such a finding is consistent with mass communication research that has
attempted to associate changes in news values and performance expectations
for journalists with business and marketing goals at daily newspapers in the
United States.153

The finding also is consistent with research that suggests a trend in daily

newspaper production is increased reliance on news features that personify

 

"’3 Underwood, When MBAs Rule the Newsroom.
91

abstract social themes and diminished reliance on traditional government or
institutional news coverage.154

Moreover, researchers have found that reporters are most satisfied with
their jobs when business and marketing goals do not override traditional

standards of journalistic excellence.155

Manager Perception of Reporter Journalistic Performance

Six measures of city editor perception of reporter journalistic performance
initially were incorporated into this study. The measures are how routinely
reporters are first with the news, whether reporters are as productive as they can
be, whether reporters consistently demonstrate self-initiative, whether reporters
are thorough, whether reporters write skillfully, and whether reporters cooperate
well with their editors. The measures were adapted from newspaper
management literature.

Confirmatory factor analysis with orthogonal rotation found that five of the
six measures loaded on city editor perception of reporter journalistic
performance. Those measures are reporters consistently demonstrate self-
initiative (factor loading = .71), reporters are thorough (factor loading = .68),
writing is skillful (factor loading = .66), reporters are as productive as they can be
(factor loading = .60), and reporters supervised by the city editors surveyed

usually are first to report the news (factor loading = .49).

 

15‘ Bamhurst and Mutz, “American Journalism and the Decline in Event-Centered Reporting," 27-
53.
‘55 Underwood, When MBAs Rule the Newsroom.

92

The five measures were retained as valid indicators of how city editors
perceive reporter journalistic performance.

The remaining original measure - reporters usually cooperate well with
their editors - loaded instead on city editor perception of what senior newsroom
managers expect of reporters (factor loading = .54). That measure was retained
in this study as an indicator of how city editors said they perceive what senior
newsroom managers expect of reporters.

Confirmatory factor analysis with orthogonal rotation found that a sixth
valid measure of city editor perception of reporter journalistic performance is the
extent or degree to which reporters try to satisfy the performance expectations of
senior newsroom managers (factor loading = .60). That measure, however, also
loaded on city editor perception of what senior newsroom managers expect of
reporters (factor loading = .54).

Consistent with the guidelines for inclusion of a measure as a valid
indicator of a concept or latent variable in this study, the measure was retained
as a measure of city editor perception of reporter journalistic performance.

In addition, one measure initially conceptualized as an indicator of how
city editors perceive their leadership orientation loaded instead on city editor
perception of reporter journalistic performance. That measure is the degree or
extent to which the city editors surveyed said they encourage their reporters to
develop their own story ideas (factor loading = .44).

Another measure, whether reporters do their best to give readers the kind

of journalism senior managers say readers want, initially was conceptualized as

93

an indicator of how city editors perceive what senior managers expect of
reporters, but the measure loaded instead on both city editor perception of how
senior managers expect reporters to perform (factor loading = .49) and city editor
perception of reporter journalistic performance (factor loading = .48).

Consistent with the guidelines incorporated in this study, the measure was
eliminated from this study.

If the seven measures of city editor perception of reporter journalistic
performance that confirmatory factor analysis found to be valid are evaluated for
reliability, Cronbach’s alpha is .81.

When the four measures of city editor perception of goal-attainment by
reporters are included as valid indicators of city editor perception of reporter
journalistic performance, Cronbach’s alpha is .87, which indicates 11 measures
are valid and reliable indicators of city editor perception of reporter journalistic

performance.

Manager Perception of Viniat Superiors Expect of Reporters

Four measures initially were selected from media management literature
as possible indicators of how a city editor may perceive how senior newsroom
managers expect reporters to perform. Those measures are whether reporters
do all they can to meet the performance expectations of senior managers,
whether reporters always react positively when new newsroom procedures are

introduced, whether reporters always react positively when ideas to change how

news is covered are introduced, and whether reporters do their best to give
readers the kind of journalism senior newsroom managers say readers want.

As previously discussed, confirmatory factor analysis with orthogonal
rotation found that whether reporters do all they can to meet the performance
expectations of senior newsroom managers is a valid and reliable indicator not of
how city editors perceive what senior newsroom managers expect of reporters
but of how the city editors surveyed said they perceive reporter journalistic
performance.

Confirmatory factor analysis with orthogonal rotation found that
consistently positive reporter reaction to new ideas for news coverage (factor
loading = .71) and consistently positive reporter reaction to new newsroom
procedures (factor loading = .63) are the most valid indicators of how city editors
perceive what senior newsroom managers expect of reporters.

Another measure, whether reporters do their best to give readers the kind
of joumalism senior managers say readers want, was found to be associated
with both how city editors perceive what senior managers expect of reporters
(factor loading = .49) and how city editors expect reporters to perform as
journalists (factor loading = .48).

Consistent with the guidelines in this study, the measure was not retained
as a valid indicator of either concept or latent variable.

A third measure found to be associated with how the city editors surveyed
said they perceive what their superiors in newsroom management expect of

reporters is senior newsroom managers expect reporters to always cooperate

95

with their editors (factor loading = .54). The measure initially was conceptualized
as an indicator of city editor perception of reporter journalistic performance, but
the indicator loaded exclusively on city editor perception of the performance
expectations senior newsroom managers have for reporters.

Confirmatory factor analysis also found that a valid indicator of how city
editors perceive what senior managers expect of reporters is senior managers
expect reporters to achieve management’s goals for coverage of positive aspects
of the community served by the newspaper (factor loading = .45). Coverage of
positive aspects of the community initially was incorporated in this study as a
possible indicator of city editor perception of goal attainment by reporters.

Cmnbach's alpha is .83 for the four valid measures of city editor
perception of what senior newsroom managers expect of reporters, which

indicates the multiple indicators are reliable.

Manager Leadership Orientation

The eight measures selected for manager perception of leadership
orientation were developed alter consideration of leadership studies, descriptive
mass communication research. and the internal consistency of the LBDQ-Xll.

The measures of leadership orientation incorporated into this study are:
reporters are encouraged to develop their own ideas, desk editors are
encouraged to tell reporters why they change stories, attempts are made to be
sensitive about reporter feelings, reporters often are told what to do, reporters

are complimented when they do a good job, reporters are criticized when they

96

make mistakes, reporter opinions routinely are solicited before the city editor
makes a decision, and reporter advice always is incorporated into goals.

Although the eight measures were selected as indicators of a leadership
orientation that was expected to range along a continuum or single dimension
from a fully participatory leadership style to one that is extremely or rigidly
authoritarian, confirmatory factor analysis with orthogonal rotation found that
leadership orientation did not stand as an independent concept or latent
dependent variable.

Instead. the eight measures bifurcated into two possible dependent
variables. The first dependent variable can be best characterized as the
orientation the city editors said they have toward making management decisions
that incorporate newsroom goals. The second dependent variable can be best
characterized as the orientation the city editors said they have toward their role
as editors.

Consistent with business management literature, four measures were
found to be valid indicators of the decision-making orientation expressed by the
city editors surveyed. Those measures are whether reporter opinions usually are
solicited before a decision is made (factor loading = .66), whether reporter advice
always is incorporated into goals (factor loading = .62), whether desk editors tell
reporters why changes are made in stories (factor loading = .51), and whether
the city editor tries to be sensitive about the personal feelings of reporters (factor

loading = .46).

97

Both business management literature and leadership research assert that
it is common in business organizations for managers to mistakenly equate
efficiency in making decisions with effective leadership. Proponents of the human
resource approach to management argue that decision-making is a different
concept than leadership. Effective leadership, they argue, is a more complex
concept of a higher order than decision-making.156

A fifth measure - the degree or extent to which the city editors said they
encourage their reporters to develop their own story ideas - initially was
conceptualized as a measure of how city editors perceive their leadership
orientation. However, the measure loaded instead on city editor perception of
reporter journalistic performance.

Cronbach’s alpha is .67 for the four valid measures of the dependent
variable decision-making orientation, which suggests the indicators are under-
specified and thus not as reliable as is normally expected in social science
research.

However, an alpha of .67 is not unreasonable for measurement of a
dependent variable that had not been anticipated. The four measures of
decision-making orientation are valid and share sufficient intemal consistency to
be retained in this study.

The second possible dependent variable that emerged in confirmatory
factor analysis is the orientation the city editors surveyed said they have toward

their role as editor. The editing orientation variable is comprised of only two

 

‘53 Fink, Strategic Newspaper Management, 16-30.
98

measures -— how frequently the city editors tell reporters what to do and how to
do it (factor loading = .48) and how routinely the city editors said they criticize
reporters when they make mistakes (factor loading = .47).

The two editing orientation measures reflect what journalism textbooks
describe as a typical editor-reporter or superior-subordinate relationship in
newsrooms at daily newspapers.157

Identification of city editor editing orientation as a possible dependent
variable suggests that social interaction between city editors and local news
reporters may be differentiated based on how a city editor makes decisions that
involve organization goals and how a city editor directs or corrects reporters or
sub-editors when news is reported and written.

Human resource management and leadership literature emphasize that if
a manager is to effectively motivate subordinates to associate organization goal-
attainment with self-satisfaction on the job, the manager needs to engage in
positive social interaction with subordinates. The two valid indicators of city editor
editing orientation suggest, however, that the city editors surveyed are likely to
engage in social interaction with local news reporters more from a critical or
negative editing perspective than from a perspective that emphasizes positive
reinforcement and subordinate support.

Cronbach’s alpha is only .45 for the two measures of editing orientation,
which means the indicators are under-specified and lack sufficient internal

consistency or reliability to satisfy social science norms. The two measures of

 

'57 Giles, Newsroom Management.
99

city editor editing orientation thus are unreliable, which means editing orientation

will be excluded as a possible dependent variable in this study.

Reconsideration of the Conceptual Model

Use of confirmatory factor analysis to test the measurement model in this
study generated outcomes that alter the conceptual model. As indicated in Figure
2, confirmatory factor analysis found that goal attainment by reporters is not an
independent variable in the perceptions expressed by the city editors surveyed.

Figure 2
Modified Leadership Orientation Model

 

Manager
Self-satisfaction
On the Job
/ Manager
Decision-
Making
Manager Orientation
\““ farception
Of Reporter
Journalistic
Performance
Manager
Span of
Control
Manager Manager
Dissatisfaction Perception
With Working Of Vifiiat
Conditions Senior Newsroom
Managers Expect
Of Reporters

As Figure 2 indicates, goal-attainment by reporters must be eliminated as

an independent variable and decision-making orientation must be substituted for
100

the dependent variable leadership orientation. Span of control, however, is
retained as a control variable.

The hypothetic-deductive structure of this study also must be modified to
accommodate the emergence of an unanticipated dependent variable. The
decision-making orientation dependent variable, however, is compatible with
motivation-hygiene theory and with media management literature. The additional
hypotheses are:

H10: As a city editor's perception of the journalistic performance of

reporters becomes increasingly negative, the city editor’s decision-making

orientation will tend to be increasingly authoritarian.

Motivation-hygiene theory suggests that if a low-level manager such as a
city editor perceives variables in the work environment, such as the journalistic
performance of reporters, to be negative, the city editor is likely to experience
some degree of dissatisfaction and will perceive that corrective action is required.

To reduce dissatisfaction, the city editor will likely favor an authoritarian
decision-making orientation because the city editor will tend to perceive that such
an orientation increases the likelihood of efficient conectlon of conditions in the
work environment.

Hypothesis 10 attempts to associate a city editor’s negative appraisal of
the journalistic performance of reporters and the likelihood that the city editor will

be predisposed to favor authoritarian decision-making.

101

H11: As a city editor’s satisfaction with intrinsic rewards associated with
the city editor’s job increases, the city editors decision-making orientation
will tend to be less authoritarian.

Motivation-hygiene theory suggests that if self-satisfaction tends to be
moderate to high, then a manager is likely to perceive external or hygiene
conditions to be positive or at minimum neutral.

If a city editor perceives hygiene conditions positively, then the city editor
may tend to view reporters positively because they are perceived as making
positive contributions to working conditions in the newsroom. If a city editor
perceives reporters as making positive contributions to working conditions, then a
less authoritarian decision-making orientation is possible because the city editor
will tend to perceive little or no negative hygiene to correct.

With little, if any, hygiene to correct, a city editor may be predisposed
toward a less authoritarian decision-making orientation because the city editor
perceives that such an orientation has a positive association with reporter
performance.

H12: As a city editor’s dissatisfaction with working conditions increases,

the city editor's decision-making orientation will tend to be increasingly

authoritarian.

Hypothesis 12 assumes the decision-making orientation of a city editor
may be affected by the city editor’s dissatisfaction with extrinsic variables in the

newsroom work environment.

102

If a city editor is dissatisfied, then the city editor is likely to perceive that
certain hygiene variables, including the journalistic performance of reporters, are
in a negative condition and need to be corrected. Dissatisfaction, in other words,
is associated with hygiene maintenance.

Hypothesis 12 also suggests that a dissatisfied city editor will tend to be
authoritarian in decision-making orientation because the city editor will tend to
perceive an authoritarian decision-making orientation to be an efficient means to
minimize the city editor‘s dissatisfaction.

By acting to improve hygiene conditions in the newsroom, city editors may

reduce their dissatisfaction and increase their self-satisfaction as well.

Multiple Regression

To test the modified leadership orientation conceptual model and the
hypotheses in this study, multiple regression will be employed as the appropriate
multivariate statistical method.158 In multiple regression, a dependent variable is
assumed to be a function of one or more independent variables. Variation in the
dependent variable thus is explained or predicted by variation in one or more
independent variables.

In multiple regression, the influence of two or more independent variables
on a dependent variable is assumed to be additive. The additive principle means

the combined influence of each independent variable is assumed to be

 

‘5’ The approach to ordinary least squares linear regression employed in this dissertation is
guided primarily by the discussion of regression analysis in Tabachnick and F idell, Using
Multivariate Statistics, 86-145.

1 03

cumulative and can be expressed in an algebraic equation. In that equation, the
relative influence of each independent variable is expressed as a standardized
regression coefficient or Beta weight, which normally falls within a range of -1.0
to +1.0.

Span of control will be included as a control variable in the multiple
regression equations employed in this study because the social interaction of a
newsroom manager, such as a city editor, is assumed in media management
literature to be a function, in part, of how many subordinates the manager can
direct efficiently and effectively.‘59

Multiple regression generates a statistic, multiple R, which is the highest
possible correlation between a least-squares linear composite of the independent
variables and dependent variable in the equation.‘°°

A second statistic, R square or the coefficient of determination, provides a
reliable estimate of how much variance in the dependent variable can be
attributed to the independent variables in the equation.

A third statistic, adjusted R square, modifies the variance estimate to
account for standard error.

The proportion of variance in the dependent variable not explained in the
equation can be assumed to be associated with other variables not in the

equation and to error.

 

‘5’ Giles, Newsroom Management, 11-12.
‘°° Kerlinger, Foundations of Behavioral Research (3" ed), 537.
1 04

For standardized regression coefficients or Beta weights to be accepted
as unbiased linear estimates of population parameters, however, certain
assumptions should be addressed.

First, the response structure for each Likert-type scale question in the
questionnaire employed in this study assumes linearity and incorporates data
that approximate interval scales, which satisfies two key assumptions of multiple
regression analysis.

Second, the relationship between a dependent variable and the
independent variable or variables that explain and predict it also is assumed to
be linear in this study.

Third, multiple regression also assumes that measurement error is absent,
residuals for all variables are distributed normally, and perfect multi-collinearity

does not exist in the data.

Multi-collinearity

Multi-collinearity refers to the overlap in explained variance in a dependent
variable by highly interrelated or correlated independent variables.161 If two
independent variables are highly correlated, one independent variable will
explain essentially the same variation in the dependent variable in multiple
regression as the other independent variable.

To test for multi-collinearity, Pearson product moment correlation

coefficients were obtained for all independent variables.

 

‘8‘ Hubert M. Blalock Jr., Social Statistics (2" ed). (New York McGraw-Hill. 1972). 457 and 464-
1 05

Table 2
Correlation Coefficients for Independent Variables

Self-satisfaction Dissatisfaction Superior Reporters

Self-satisfaction 1 .0 .56 .23 .26
(p= .001) (p= .005) (p= .001)

Dissatisfaction .56 1 .0 .41 .36
(p= .001) (p= .001) (p= .001)

Superior .23 .41 1.0 .53
(p= .005) (p= .001) (p= .001)

Reporters .26 36 .53 1.0

(p= .001) (ppm) (p= .001)

N = 147
p = two-tailed significance

The Pearson correlation coefficient (r) is a standard measure of the
degree of association or co—variation between two variables. When standardized,
the correlation coefficient ranges from -1.0 to +1.0. The greater the absolute
value of the coefficient, the stronger the linear association.

A correlation coefficient of .90 or greater indicates perfect multi-
collinearity.

As the Pearson product moment correlation coefficients in Table 2
indicate, all independent variables in this study are positively associated.
Correlation coefficients range from a low of .23 to a high of .56.

The correlation coefficients represent modest to moderate co-variation

among all independent variables. However, no correlation coefficient approaches

106

or exceeds .90, which demonstrates that perfect multi-collinearity among

independent variables is absent in this study.

Z Scores

The data obtained from the city editors surveyed also were converted to z
scores to control for outliers. Outliers are cases with such extreme values on a
variable or variables that they unduly influence the size of correlation coefficients,
the average value for a group, or the variability of scores within a group."32

A z score is a standardized standard deviation score that normally ranges
from -3.0 to +3.0.

Conversion to z scores brings data distribution within three standard
deviations of the mean, which approximates a normal distribution and effectively
controls for outlying data points.163

Based on 2 scores, two cases were identified as outliers and were

eliminated from this study. Elimination of the two outliers reduced the total

number of cases in this study to 145.

Path Analysis
All hypotheses tested in this study are conceptualized in terms of a
modified leadership orientation model that assumes explanation and prediction

are a function of multiple independent variables.

 

“9 Tabachnick and Fidell, Using Multivariate Statistics, 72-73.
“9 Kerlinger, Foundations of Behavioral Research (3m ed.), 180-185.
107

However, the modified leadership orientation model is under-specified,
which suggests it is possible, even probable, that not all relationships among
relevant variables in this study were accounted for when the model was
conceptualized and the hypotheses developed.

In particular, unanticipated direct and indirect impacts may exist among
the relevant variables. Consequently, multiple regression will be applied to
develop a path analysis of possible relationships among all relevant variables.‘°‘

In path analysis, all variables to the left of or on the same plane as a
dependent variable can be incorporated into a multiple regression equation. Both
relationships among variables specified in a conceptual model and possible
unspecified relationships thus can be examined.

Both direct and indirect influences of multiple independent variables on a
dependent variable are reflected in path coefficients, which are standardized
Beta weights.

In this study, a path diagram will be constructed that employs path
coefficients to visualize both direct and indirect influences among multiple
independent variables and the dependent variable.

Span of control will be retained as a control variable in path analysis. In
addition, relationships among variables identified in the path diagram obtained
will be compared to the relationships as conceptualized in the modified

leadership orientation model.

 

1“ Kerlinger, Foundations of Behavioral Research (3" ad), 5134555.
108

Hypotheses Testing Criteria

It is assumed in this study that multiple regression should be employed to
test each hypothesis. However, a hypothesized relationship should have a
standardized Beta weight greater than or equal to +20 or -.20 before the
relationship can be interpreted as substantive.

In addition, the acceptable level of statistical significance for each
hypothesized relationship will be p is greater than or equal to .05. At the .05 level
of statistical significance, it can be asserted that the likelihood that the Beta
weights obtained are unbiased linear estimates of population parameters is 95
chances out of 100.

In other words, with p greater than or equal to .05, the probability that the
Beta weights were obtained by chance is only five out of 100, or the likelihood

that the results obtained could be duplicated in a replication study is 95 percent.

Comparison by Newspaper Size

If circulation size is an indicator of newsroom social complexity, then the
perceptions of the city editors surveyed possibly may also be differentiated by the
size of their newspapers. The difference-of-means test will be applied to compare
the independent and dependent variables of interest in this study based on
circulation as an indicator of size.

A small daily newspaper is defined in this study as having a circulation up
to 25,000, a medium-sized daily has a circulation of 25,001 to 50,000, and a

large daily newspaper is defined as having circulation of 50,001 or more.

109

According to Editor & Publisher Yearbook 1998, 70 percent of all daily
newspapers in the United States have circulation up to 25,000, 14 percent have
circulation between 25,001 and 50,000, and 16 percent have circulation of
50,001 or more.

Among the survey respondents, 42 percent (N = 62) are from small daily
newspapers, 32 percent (N = 47) from medium-sized dailies, and 26 percent (N =
38) from large daily newspapers. In this study, small daily newspapers in the
United States are under-represented, and medium-sized and large dailies are
over-represented.

Categorization based on newspaper circulation is possible because the
sample of city editors surveyed was drawn at random. Because the total sample
is random, all cases were selected independently of each other. Sub-samples
thus can be treated as though they were selected independently, which satisfies

the key assumption of the difference-of-meanstest.165

 

"'5 Blalock Jr., Social Statistics (2" ed.), 177-198.

110

Chapter 5

DATA ANALYSIS

Demographics

Of the 147 city editors surveyed, 90 percent indicated that they would
characterize themselves as benevolently authoritarian in their decision-making
orientation.

Among the survey respondents, 54 percent said they had had some
management training, but a comparable number, 46 percent, said they had not.
Sixty-eight percent said they either wanted management training or needed
more. However, nearly one-third, 32 percent, expressed no interest in receiving
formal management training.

The mean for total years of experience as a newsroom manager is 10.4
among the city editors surveyed, with a minimum of eight months and a
maximum of 33 years. The mean number of years of newsroom management
experience survey respondents said they had at their current newspaper is 7.3
years.

The city editors said the mean number of reporters they are responsible
for is 13.6, and the mean number of sub-editors or desk editors they supervise is
2.8. The number of reporters for whom the city editors said they are responsible
range from a minimum of two to a maximum of 100, while the number of sub-

editors supervised range from a minimum of none to a maximum of 20.

111

 

 

editor

up 34

 

 

Test 0

 

The mean age for all survey respondents is 42.3 years. The youngest city
editor who responded to the survey is 26 years old; the oldest is 61.

Men comprise 66 percent of the city editors surveyed, and women make

 

 

 
 
  

 

 

 

up 34 percent.
Figure 3
Hypothesized Relationships
Manager Manager
Self-satisfaction H11(+) _; Decision-
On the\Job Making
’ lientation
\ H12(+) 1*
H2(+) H10(+)
Manager Manager
Perception Span of
H1 (+) Of Reporter Control
Journalistic
Perfqlqriance
H3(+) H5(+)
Manager ./
Dissatisfaction
With Working Manager
Conditions Perception of
What Senior
Newsroom
Managers
Expect of
Reporters
Test of Hypotheses

H1: As a city editor's dissatisfaction with working conditions increases, the

city editor's self-satisfaction decreases.

112

Hypothesis one associates a city editor’s dissatisfaction with working
mnditions with the city editor’s self-satisfaction with intrinsic rewards associated
with the city editor's job.

Table 3

Manager Self-satisfaction on the Job

Regression Standard Error Beta TValue Statistical
Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability

Manager
Dissatisfaction .520 .065 .55 7.97 .001
With Working
Conditions
Manager
Span of .094 .065 .10 1.45 .150
Control
Multiple R = .56, R square = .32, Adjusted R square = .31, DF = 2, 143
Partial Correlation Coefficient = .55
F = 33.55, Significance of F = .001
N = 145

The data in Table 3 show a Beta weight of .55 for the impact of city editor
dissatisfaction with working conditions on city editor self-satisfaction. The
relationship is statistically significant at the .001 level.

The positive Beta weight is consistent with motivation-hygiene theory.
The self-satisfaction continuum assumes movement from no satisfaction to
satisfaction is in a positive direction, and movement from dissatisfaction to no
dissatisfaction also is in a positive direction. Thus, as dissatisfaction increases,

self-satisfaction decreases.

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The entire regression equation is statistically significant at the .001 level.
And the adjusted R square is .31, which indicates dissatisfaction with working
conditions explains 31 percent of the variance in city editor self-satisfaction.

Based on motivation-hygiene assumptions and the criteria in this study for
testing a hypothesis, it can be asserted that the data support hypothesis one.

However, to test the motivation-hygiene assumption that self-satisfaction
can only be a function of dissatisfaction with working conditions, the relationship
between the two variables was reversed and tested.

Table 4
Manager Dissatisfaction With Working Conditions

Regression Standard Error Beta TValue Statistical

Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability
Manager
Self-satisfaction .590 .074 .56 7.97 .001
On The Job
Manager
Spanof -.016 .070 -.02 -.223 .824
Control

Multiple R = .56, R square = .31, Adjusted R square = .30, DF = 2, 143
Partial Correlation Coefficient = .55
F = 32.07, Significance of F = .001
N = 145
The data in Table 4 show a Beta weight of .56 for the impact of city editor
self-satisfaction on city editor dissatisfaction with working conditions. The

relationship is statistically significant at the .001 level.

114

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The entire regression equation also is statistically significant at the .001
level. The adjusted R square equals .30, which indicates city editor self-
satisfaction explains 30 percent of the variance in city editor dissatisfaction.

The data in Tables 3 and 4 suggest that for the city editors surveyed self-
satisfaction on the job is a function of dissatisfaction with working conditions as
motivation-hygiene theory predicts, but dissatisfaction with working conditions
also is a function of self-satisfaction on the job.

The Beta weights obtained indicate that the influence of both variables on
each other is mutual and substantive, and the relationship is statistically
significant at the .001 level.

H2: As a city editor’s self-satisfaction increases, the city editor’s
perception of the journalistic performance of reporters will tend to be
increasingly positive.

Hypothesis two associates a city editor’s positive perception of the

journalistic performance of reporters with that city editor's self-satisfaction.

The data in Table 5 indicate that, consistent with the conceptual model in
this study, city editor perception of how senior newsroom managers expect
reporters to perform, city editor dissatisfaction with working conditions, and city
editor self-satisfaction influence how the city editors surveyed said they perceive
reporter journalistic performance.

However, only senior manager performance expectations for reporters has
a substantive impact on how the city editors surveyed said they perceive the

journalistic performance of reporters (Beta =.46, p =.001).

115

Table 5
Manager Perception of Reporter Journalistic Performance

Regression Standard Error Beta TValue Statistical
Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability

Manager
Self-Satisfaction .083 .090 .08 .91 8 .360
On the Job

Manager

Dissatisfaction .123 .091 .12 1 .36 .177
With Working

Conditions

Manager
Perception of
What Senior

Newsroom .496 .083 .46 6.00 .001
Managers

Expect of
Reporters
Manager
Span of .005 .070 .01 .077 .940
Control
Multiple R = .553, R square = .306, Adjusted R square = .286, DF = 4, 141
F = 15.44, Significance of F = .001
N = 145

City editor self-satisfaction (Beta =.08, p =.36) and city editor
dissatisfaction with working conditions (Beta =.12, p =.18) were found to have
negligible influence on how the city editors surveyed said they perceive how well
reporters perform as journalists. The influence of city editor dissatisfaction is
greater, however, than the influence of city editor self-satisfaction.

The entire regression equation is statistically significant at the .001 level.

The adjusted R square of .286 indicates the combined influence of the three
116

independent variables explains 29 percent of the variance in how the city editors
surveyed said they perceive the journalistic performance of reporters.

Table 6
Manager Perception of Reporter Journalistic Performance

Regression Standard Error Beta TValue Statistical
Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability

Manager
Self-satisfaction 091 .100 .090 .910 .364
On the Job
Manager
Dissatisfaction .320 .094 .320 3.38 .001
With Working
Conditions
Manager
Span of .013 .079 .013 .170 .865
Control
Multiple R = .373, R square = .14, Adjusted R square = .121 , DF = 3, 142
F = 7.641, Significance of F = .001
N = 145

As the data in Table 6 indicate, if city editor perception of what senior
newsroom managers expect of reporters is excluded from the multiple regression
equation, the influence of city editor dissatisfaction with working conditions on
city editor perception of the journalistic performance of reporters is both
substantive (Beta =.32) and statistically significant (p =.001).

However, the influence of city editor self-satisfaction on city editor
perception of reporter journalistic performance remains relatively unchanged

compared to the results obtained in Table 5 (Beta =.09, p =.364).

117

 

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The entire regression equation is statistically significant at the .001 level.
The adjusted R square of .121 indicates, however, that city editor self-satisfaction
and city editor dissatisfaction with working conditions together explain only 12
percent of the variance in how survey respondents said they perceive the
journalistic performance of reporters.

As Table 7 demonstrates, however, if only the impact of city editor self-
satisfaction on city editor perception of the journalistic performance of reporters is
examined, with span of control as a control variable, the impact of city editor self-
satisfaction becomes substantive (Beta = .26) and statistically significant (p =
.002).

Table 7
Manager Perception of Reporter Journalistic Performance

Regression Standard Error Beta T Value Statistical

Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability
Manager
Self-satisfaction .280 .086 .26 3.23 .002
On The Job
Manager
Span of .008 .081 .01 .104 .920
Control

Multiple R = .264, R square = .07, Adjusted R square = .06, DF = 2, 143
Partial Correlation Coefficient = .25
F = 5.360, Significance of F = .005
N = 145

The entire regression equation is statistically significant at the .002 level.
However, the adjusted R square of .06 indicates self-satisfaction derived from
intrinsic rewards associated with the job of city editor explains only 6 percent of

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the variance in how the city editors surveyed said they perceive reporter
journalistic performance.

Although city editor perception of reporter journalistic performance was
found to be a positive function of city editor self-satisfaction, the impact of city
editor self-satisfaction on city editor perception of reporter journalistic
performance is neither substantive nor statistically significant.

The data are insufficient to support hypothesis two.

H3: As a city editor’s dissatisfaction with working conditions increases, the
city editor's perception of the journalistic performance of reporters will tend to be
increasingly negative.

Hypothesis three associates city editor dissatisfaction with working
conditions with perception of the journalistic performance of reporters.

As mentioned in discussion of hypothesis two, city editor perception of
how senior newsroom managers expect reporters to perform is the most
influential predictor of how the city editors surveyed said they perceive reporter

journalistic performance, followed by city editor dissatisfaction with working
conditions and city editor self-satisfaction.

When all three independent variables are considered together in a multiple
regression equation, however, only the influence of senior manager performance
expectations for reporters is substantive and statistically significant.

lf city editor perception of what senior newsroom managers expect of

reporters is excluded from the equation, the influence of city editor dissatisfaction

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with working conditions on city editor perception of the journalistic performance of
reporters emerges as both substantive and statistically significant.

Table 8
Manager Perception of Reporter Journalistic Performance

Regression Standard Error Beta TValue Statistical
Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability

Manager
Dissatisfaction .363 .077 .363 4.67 .001
With Working
Conditions
Manager
Span of .023 .077 .023 .292 .771
Control
Multiple R = .364, R square = .13, Adjusted R square = .12, DF = 2, 143
Partial Correlation Coefficient = .35
F = 11.06, Significance of F = .001
N = 145

As the data in Table 8 indicate, the influence of city editor dissatisfaction
on city editor perception of reporter journalistic performance increases (Beta
=.36, p =.001) when city editor self-satisfaction and city editor perception of what
senior newsroom managers expect of reporters are excluded from the multiple
regression equation.

The entire regression equation is statistically significant at the .001 level.
However, the adjusted R square of .12 indicates city editor dissatisfaction with
working conditions explains only 12 percent of the variance in how the city

editors surveyed said they perceive reporter journalistic performance.

120

Although the influence of city editor dissatisfaction is substantive and
significant when considered as a solitary predictor of city editor perception of
reporter journalistic performance, the impact of city editor dissatisfaction
becomes negligible when included as one of three independent variables that
have an impact on how city editors perceive how well reporters perform as
journalists.

The data are insufficient to support hypothesis three.

H4: As a city editor’s perception of goal attainment becomes increasingly

negative, the city editor’s perception of the journalistic performance of

reporters will tend to be increasingly negative.

Hypothesis four associates a city editor’s perception of reporter attainment
of goals with a city editor’s perception of the journalistic performance of reporters.

Confirmatory factor analysis eliminated manager perception of reporter
attainment of goals as an independent variable in this study.

Hypothesis four could not be tested.

H5: As a city editor's perception of how well reporters do what the city

editor thinks senior newsroom managers expect of reporters becomes

increasingly negative, the city editor’s perception of the journalistic
performance of reporters will tend to be increasingly negative.

Hypothesis five predicts an association between a city editor's perception
of the performance expectations of the city editor's newsroom superior and the

city editor’s own perception of the journalistic performance of reporters.

121

As mentioned in the discussion of hypothesis two, city editor perception of
how senior newsroom managers expect reporters to perform was found to be the
strongest of three predictors of how the city editors surveyed said they perceive
how reporters perform as journalists.

Table 9
Manager Perception of Reporter Joumelistic Performance

Regression Standard Enor Beta TValue Statistical
Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability

Manager

Perception of

What Senior

Newsroom .563 .076 .526 7.39 .001
Manager

Expects of
Reporters
Manager
Span of .021 .071 .021 .297 .767
Control
Multiple R = .53, R square = .28, Adjusted R square = .27, DF = 2, 143
Partial Correlation Coefficient = .53
F = 27.48, Significance of F = .001
N = 145

With city editor self-satisfaction and dissatisfaction excluded from the
multiple regression equation, the data in Table 9 show a Beta weight of .53 for
the impact of city editor perception of what senior newsroom managers expect of
reporters on city editor perception of the journalistic performance of reporters.
This relationship is statistically significant at the .001 level.

The entire regression equation is statistically significant at the .001 level.

The adjusted R square of .27 indicates city editor perception of the performance
122

expectations senior newsroom managers have for reporters explains 27 percent
of the variance in how the city editors surveyed said they perceive reporter
journalistic performance.

Exclusion of city editor self-satisfaction and dissatisfaction from the
multiple regression equation has only a marginal influence on the Beta weight,
which increases to .53 from .46. And statistical significance remains unchanged.

Multiple regression demonstrates that city editor self-satisfaction and
dissatisfaction with working conditions only slightly diminish the influence of city
editor perception of what senior newsroom managers expect of reporters on city
editor perception of how reporters perform as journalists.

Hypothesis five is supported by the data.

H6: As a city editor’s perception of the journalistic performance of

reporters becomes increasingly negative, the manager’s leadership

orientation will tend to be increasingly authoritarian.

Hypothesis six attempts to associate a city editor's negative appraisal of
the journalistic performance of reporters and the likelihood that the city editor will
be predisposed toward authoritarian leadership.

However, confirmatory factor analysis eliminated leadership orientation as
a dependent variable in this study.

Hypothesis six could not be tested.

H7: As a city editor’s self-satisfaction associated with the city editor's job

increases, the city editor's leadership orientation will tend to be less

authoritarian.

123

With leadership orientation eliminated as a dependent variable, hypothesis
seven could not be tested.

H8: As a city editor’s dissatisfaction with conditions in the work

environment decreases, the city editor's leadership orientation will tend to

be less authoritarian.

It was not possible to test hypothesis eight because confirmatory factor
analysis eliminated leadership orientation as a dependent variable.

H9: As a city editor’s dissatisfaction with working conditions increases,
the city editor’s leadership orientation will tend to be increasingly
authoritarian.

Because leadership orientation was eliminated as a dependent variable in
this study, hypothesis nine could not be tested.

H10: As a city editor's perception of the journalistic performance of

reporters becomes increasingly negative, the city editor’s orientation

toward decision-making will tend to be increasingly authoritarian.

Hypothesis 10 associates a city editor’s appraisal of the journalistic
performance of reporters and the likelihood that the city editor will be
predisposed to favor authoritarian decision-making.

The data in Table 10 show a Beta weight of .27 for the impact of city editor
perception of the journalistic performance of reporters on city editor decision-
making orientation. The relationship is statistically significant at the .005 level.

The entire regression equation is statistically significant at the .001 level.

However, the adjusted R square is .10, which indicates the combined influence of

124

the five variables in the multiple regression equation explains only 10 percent of
the variance in city editor decision-making orientation.

Table 10
Manager Decision-Making Orientation

Regression Standard Error Beta TValue Statistical
Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability

Manager
Self-satisfaction .086 .01 0 .09 .910 .364
On the Job

Manager

Dissatisfaction -. 170 .010 -. 18 -1.76 .080
\Mth Working

Conditions

Manager

Perception of

What Senior

Newsroom .159 .098 .16 1.62 .108
Managers

Expect of
Reporters

Manager

Perception of

Reporter .259 .090 .27 2.88 .005
Journalistic

Performance

Manager

Span of .078 .074 .08 1.05 .296
Control

Multiple R = .366, R square = .133, Adjusted R square = .102, DF = 5, 140
F = 4.26, Significance of F = .001
N = 145
It should be noted that in Table 10 city editor dissatisfaction with working

conditions approaches but fails to achieve a substantive and significant impact

125

on city editor decision-making orientation (Beta = -. 18, p :08) as does city editor
perception of how senior newsroom managers expect reporters to perform (Beta
=. 16, p =.11)

Table 1 1

Manager Decision-Making Orientation

Regression Standard Error Beta TValue Statistical
Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability

Manager
Self-satisfaction .107 .097 .1 1 1 . 10 .270
On the Job

Manager

Dissatisfaction -. 140 .010 -. 14 -1.39 .168
With Working

Conditions

Manager

Perception of

What Senior

Newsroom .281 .091 .27 3.08 .003
Managers

Expect of

Reporters

Manager
Span of .077 .076 .08 1.01 .314
Control
Multiple R = .286, R square = .082, Adjusted R square = .055, DF = 4, 141
F = 3.09, Significance of F = .018
N = 145
The data in Table 11 indicate that if how city editors perceive the
journalistic performance of reporters is excluded from the multiple regression

equation, then how the city editors said they perceive what senior newsroom

126

managers expect of reporters is the only other substantive and significant
predictor of city editor decision-making orientation (Beta =.27, p =.003).

The entire regression equation is statistically significant at the .02 level.
But the adjusted R square is only .055, which indicates the combined influence of
the independent variables in the multiple regression equation, with city editor
perception of the journalistic performance of reporters excluded, explains only
5.5 percent of the variance in city editor decision-making orientation.

Hypothesis 10 is supported by the data.

H1 1: As a city editor's satisfaction with intrinsic rewards associated with

the city editor’s job increases, the city editor's decision-making orientation

will tend to be less authoritarian.

Table 12
Manager Decision-Making Orientation

Regression Standard Error Beta TValue Statistical

Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability
Manager
Self-satisfaction .091 .083 .093 1.10 .272
On the Job
Manager
Span of .079 .078 .085 1.02 .311
Control

Multiple R = .134, R square = .018, Adjusted R square = .004, DF = 2, 143
F = 1.29, Significance of F = .278
N = 145

127

Hypothesis 11 predicts an association between how the city editors
surveyed said they perceive their decision-making orientation and their self-
satisfaction.

The data in Table 12 show a Beta weight of .09 for the impact of city editor
self-satisfaction on the job on city editor decision-making orientation. The
relationship is not statistically significant.

The entire regression equation also is not statistically significant. The
adjusted R square is .004, which indicates city editor self-satisfaction explains no
meaningful variance in city editor decision-making orientation.

The data are insufficient to support hypothesis 11.

H12: As a city editor's dissatisfaction with working conditions increases,

the city editor's decision-making orientation will tend to be increasingly

authoritarian.

Hypothesis 12 suggests that a dissatisfied city editor will tend to be
authoritarian in decision-making orientation because the city editor will tend to
perceive an authoritarian decision-making orientation to be an efficient means to
minimize the city editor’s dissatisfaction.

The data in Table 13 show a Beta weight of .02 for the impact of city editor
dissatisfaction with working conditions on city editor decision-making orientation.
The relationship is not statistically significant.

The entire regression equation also is not statistically significant. The
adjusted R square is -.004, which indicates city editor dissatisfaction explains no

variance in city editor decision-making orientation.

128

The data are insufficient to support hypothesis 12.
Table 13

Manager Decision-Making Orientation

Regression Standard Error Beta TValue Statistical
Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability

Manager
Dissatisfaction .018 .078 .019 .233 .816

With Working
Conditions

Manager
Span of .090 .078 .097 1.67 .246
Control
Multiple R = .100, R square = .010, Adjusted R square = -.004, DF = 2, 143
F = .724, Significance of F = .487
N = 145
Summary of Hypotheses Testing

Twelve hypotheses were tested in this study, and three were found to be
supported by the data. The hypotheses supported by the data are: 1) as a city
editor’s dissatisfaction with working conditions increases, the city editor’s self-
satisfaction decreases; 2) as a city editor’s perception of how well reporters do
what the city editor thinks senior newsroom managers expect of reporters
becomes increasingly negative, the city editor's perception of the journalistic
performance of reporters will tend to be increasingly negative; and 3) as a city
editor’s perception of the journalistic performance of reporters becomes

increasingly negative, the city editor's decision-making orientation will tend to be

increasingly authoritarian.

129

Figure 4

 

 

Supported Hypotheses

Manager Manager

Self-satisfaction Decision-

On the Job Making

A /Orientation
H10(+)
Manager Manager
Perception . Span of
H1 (+) Of Reporter Control
Journalistic
Performance
l H5(+)

Manager I

Dissatisfaction

With Working Manager

Conditions Perception of What Senior
Newsroom Managers
Expect of Reporters

Path Analysis

As discussed in the method chapter, the hypotheses in this study reflect a
modified leadership orientation model that assumes explanation and prediction
are a function of multiple independent variables.

However, the model is under-specified, which suggests all relevant
relationships among variables may not have been accounted for when the model

was conceptualized and the hypotheses developed.

130

In particular, direct or indirect impacts may exist among the relevant
variables that were not anticipated.
- In path analysis, all variables to the left of or on the same plane as a
dependent variable can be incorporated into a multiple regression equation.
Thus, both relationships among variables as specified in a conceptual model and
possible unspecified relationships can be examined.

Table 14
Manager Perception of What Senior Managers Expect

Regression Standard Error Beta T Value Statistical
Coefficient of Coefficient Weight Probability

Manager
Self-satisfaction .017 .092 .017 .188 .851
On the Job
Manager
Dissatisfaction 368 .087 .390 4.23 .001
With Working
Conditions
Manager
Span of .017 .072 .019 .238 .812
Control
Multiple R = .402, R square = .161, Adjusted R square = .144, DF = 3, 142
F = 9.05, Significance of F = .001
N = 145
The data in Table 14 show a Beta weight of .39 for the impact of city editor
dissatisfaction with working conditions on city editor perception of what senior
newsroom managers expect of reporters. The relationship is statistically

significant at the .001 level.

131

The data, however, show a Beta weight of .02 for the impact of city editor
self-satisfaction on city editor perception of what senior newsroom managers
expect of reporters. The relationship is not statistically significant.

The entire regression equation is statistically significant at the .001 level.
And the adjusted R square is .14, which indicates dissatisfaction with working
conditions and self-satisfaction explain 14 percent of the variance in how the city
editors surveyed said they perceive what senior newsroom managers expect of
reporters.

Most of the variance in city editor perception of what senior newsroom
managers expect of reporters is attributable, however, to city editor

dissatisfaction with working conditions.

 

Figure 5
Path Analysis Diagram
Manager
Self-satisfaction
On the Job
Manager Manager
Perception Decision-
Of Reporter-....”- .27 .__.)Making
.55 .56 Journalistic Orientation
Performance
.46
Manager Manager Perception
Dissatisfaction of What Senior
With Working ... .39 ———--> Newsroom Managers
Conditions Expect of Reporters

Multiple R = .402, R square = .161, Adjusted R square = .144, DF = 3, 142
F = 9.05, Significance of F = .001
N = 145

132

The data obtained in Tables 5 and 10 in the hypotheses testing portion of
this chapter represent application of multiple regression consistent with the
application of multiple regression in path analysis.

As the path diagram indicates, however, applied multiple regression
demonstrates a direct effect between city editor dissatisfaction with working
conditions and city editor perception of what senior newsroom managers expect
of reporters that was not anticipated when the modified leadership orientation
model was conceptualized and the hypotheses were devel0ped.

Moreover, contrary to the conceptual model, city editor self-satisfaction
and dissatisfaction with working conditions do not have a substantive and
significant direct impact on city editor perception of the journalistic performance
of reporters.

All other identifiable relationships in the path diagram are consistent with
specified associations between variables in the modified leadership orientation
model that are supported by the data analysis conducted in the testing of
hypotheses.

The control variable span of control is eliminated from the path diagram
because its influence on all other variables was found to be neither substantive

nor significant.

Comparison by Newspaper Size
The difference-of-means data in Table 15 indicate that the only variable in

this study that can be meaningfully differentiated based on circulation as an

133

indicator of newspaper size is how the city editors surveyed said they perceive
the performance expectations senior newsroom managers have for reporters.
Significant and substantive differentiation is possible, however, only between
small and medium-sized newspapers.

Table 15

Difference-of-Means Test

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Variables Small vs. Medium Mean T Statistical
Mean Mean Difference Value Probability
Reporters -.14 .03 -.17 -.87 .39
Decision-MakirLg .01 -.08 .09 .46 .65
Dissatisfaction .07 -.04 .1 1 .59 .56
Self-satisfaction -.03 .09 -.12 -.71 .48
Superiors .25 -.1 1 .37 2.02 .05
Medium vs. Large
Mean Mean
Reporters .04 .18 -.14 -.70 .49
Decision-Makiflg -.08 .19 -.27 -1.37 .18
Dissatisfaction -.04 -.07 .03 .12 .90
Self-satisfaction .09 .04 .05 .24 .81
Superiors -.1 1 -.1 1 -.00 -.02 .98
Small vs. Large
Mean Mean
Reporters -.14 .18 -.32 -1.49 .14
Decision-Making .01 .19 -.18 -.96 .34
Dissatisfaction .07 -. 07 . 14 .65 .52
Self-satisfaction -.03 .04 -.07 -.36 .72
Superiors .25 -.1 1 .36 1.85 .07

 

‘ DaitynawwarsinthaUnitad StabswithcirculationuptoZSDOOara categorizadasamal (N=62). lfcircdat’onisbatuaan

25.001 and 505110. the chiy is categorized as medium-sized (N=47). Daily newspapers with circulation of 50,001 or more are atagorized

as large (N=38). Small daily newspapers are underrepresented in this study while medium-sized and large dafliaa

are ovar-rsprsaanbd.

"The two-tailed hat of statistical significance was employed because no hypothesis assumes directionality based on

134

 

If the survey responses of city editors from small newspapers are
compared to the responses from city editors at medium-sized daily newspapers,
the difference of means is significant for how they said they perceive what senior
newsroom managers expect of reporters (T value = 2.02; two-tailed significance
at 95 percent confidence level p :05).

Comparison of the survey responses of city editors from small
newspapers with responses from city editors at large dailies finds the difference
of means is substantive but does not achieve significance (T value = 1.85; two-
tailed significance at 95 percent confidence level p =.07).

However, the difference between city editor perceptions at medium-sized
and large dailies is not significant (T value = -.02; two-tailed significance at 95
percent confidence level p =.98).

Only two other variables in this study may be differentiated based on
circulation as an indicator of newspaper size - how the city editors surveyed said
they perceive how reporters perform as journalists, and city editor decision-
making orientation.

If the survey responses of city editors from small newspapers are
compared to the responses from city editors at large dailies, the difference of
means for how survey respondents said they perceive the journalistic
performance of reporters is substantive but does not achieve significance
(T value = -1.49; two-tailed significance at 95 percent confidence level p =.14).

And if how city editors at small dailies said they make decisions is

compared to the survey responses of their counterparts at medium-sized dailies,

135

the difference of means is substantive but does not achieve significance (T value
= -1.37; two-tailed significance at 95 percent confidence level p = .18).

If circulation size is an indicator of social complexity in the newsrooms at
daily newspapers in the United States, than the difference-of-means test in this
study suggests how city editors perceive what senior newsroom managers
expect of reporters may reflect variation in newsroom social complexity.
Newsroom social complexity at medium-sized and large daily newspapers may
be sufficiently compatible for differentiation to be insignificant, while smaller
dailies may be differentiated from other daily newspapers on the basis of less
social complexity or possibly enhanced small-group social interaction.

In leadership research and business management literature, it is assumed
that the greater the social complexity within an organization, the gmater the need
for effective leadership to attain organization goals. However, as social
complexity and size of organization increase, business management literature
assumes effective leadership is both more essential and more difficult for

managers to achieve.

136

Chapter 6

DISCUSSION

City Editor Stereotypes

City editors at daily newspapers in the United States are an understudied
population. Mass communication researchers have tended to ignore the role city
editors play in coverage of local news, supervision of local news reporters, and
management of local news departments. And when newsroom leadership or
management studies have been attempted, researchers have found it difficult to
identify and categorize the leadership orientation of newsroom managers at daily
newspapers, including city editors.166

The deficiencies in the descriptive mass communication and media
management research literature are especially meaningful because city editors
may be the newsroom managers reporters at daily newspapers have in mind
when they cite ineffective, inept, arbitrary, incompetent, or inconsistent
leadership as an important variable associated with reporter job dissatisfaction.

One outcome of the lack of research is stereotypes of city editors prevail
in mass communication literature. The most traditional stereotype is city editors
control local news departments like personal fiefdoms. Their judgment typically is
characterized as absolute. Traditional city editors also are portrayed as powerful

but callous iconoclasts who control reporters through favoritism, fear,

 

”'3 For example, see Argyris, Behind the Front Page.
1 37

intimidation, negative reinforcement, caustic critiques, and persistent pressure to
perfonn.‘57

The traditional characterization emphasizes the predisposition of city
editors to be independent-minded even when senior managers at the top of the
newsroom management hierarchy issue commands or attempt to actively
exercise direct management control. Traditional city editors are portrayed as
preoccupied mostly with their own autonomy and authority.

A more contemporary stereotype portrays city editors as bureaucratic
politicians focused on their own survival and success in a competitive newsroom
management structure.168 Such city editors have been described as defensive,
turf-conscious, uncooperative with other department heads, suspicious of senior
newsroom managers, critical of reporters, and motivated primarily by self-
interest.

Bureaucratic city editors also may be perceived by subordinates as
inclined to value and implement their own ideas while they ignore or demean the
ideas of others. They also are likely to praise themselves but not subordinates for
how well local news is covered or how well the local news department performs.

The most contemporary stereotype portrays city editors simply as
bureaucratic functionaries who do what they think is necessary primarily to

please their newsroom superiors but not subordinates. This characterization

portrays city editors as self-protective administrators who tend to focus on

 

"’7 Walker, City Editor.
“‘3 Argyris, Behind the Front Page.
138

efficient newsroom routines and procedures intended to minimize organization
problems in the daily production of local news.

The authority of city editors perceived as bureaucratic functionaries has
been described as limited to assignment of news stories, editing news stories,
communication with senior newsroom managers, and enforcement of daily

deadlines.169

Manager Decision-making Orientation

The first meaningful finding in this study is the city editors surveyed,
regardless of the circulation size of their daily newspaper, said they tend to see
themselves as efficient, benevolent authoritarian managers who make decisions
that incorporate organization goals rather than as leaders who routinely employ
the social influence process to effectively motivate local news reporters to
associate attainment of organization goals with self-satisfaction on the job.

As path analysis demonstrates, five variables were found in this study to
have some direct impact on city editor decision-making orientation. Those
variables are city editor self-satisfaction on the job, city editor dissatisfaction with
working conditions, city editor perception of what senior newsroom managers
expect of reporters, city editor perception of reporter journalistic performance,

and city editor span of control.

 

‘" Schierhom, Ann B., Endres, Fred R, and Schierhom, Carl, “Newsroom Teams Enjoy Rapid
Growth in the 1990s,” Newspaper Research Journal Vol. 22 No. 3, (Summer 2001 ); 2-15.
1 39

The five variables, however, together account for only 10 percent of the
explained variance in the decision—making orientation expressed by the city
editors surveyed.

Moreover, of the five variables, only city editor perception of reporter
journalistic performance was found to have both a substantive and significant
impact on how the city editors surveyed said they perceive their decision-making
orientation (Beta =.27, p =.005).

City editor dissatisfaction with working conditions was found to be the
second most influential predictor of city editor decision-making orientation (Beta =
-.18, p =.08), followed by city editor perception of what senior newsroom
managers expect of reporters (Beta =.16, p =.11). The Beta weights for both
variables are not particularly substantial, however, and neither variable achieves
statistical significance.

The impact of city editor self-satisfaction on the job and city editor span of
control on city editor decision-making orientation was found to be less than
substantive and without statistical significance.

The data in this study suggest that city editors at daily newspapers in the
United States tend to see themselves primarily not as effective leaders but as
efficient managers who rely on the formal authority associated with their position
within the newsroom management hierarchy to make decisions that affect local
news reporters.

Most of the city editors surveyed, for example, tended to characterize

themselves as never being inclined to seek reporter advice when they make

140

decisions that involve organization goals, and many also said they never
incorporate reporter opinions into their perspective as to what decision is likely to
be the best.

However, the city editors said that they see themselves as inclined to try
to be sensitive about reporter feelings when they make a decision, and they also
said they tend to expect desk editors to routinely explain editing changes in news
stories to reporters.

Mass communication researchers have found that when desk editors
interact with local news reporters, news story outcomes tend to be a function of
negotiation, with reporters having the opportunity and ability to use the social
influence process to persuade desk editors to integrate their perspective and
concerns into how their stories are edited. The researchers, however, left
unexamined whether organization goals are as open to negotiation with reporters
as news story outcomes.170

The data in this study suggest that, as far as the city editors surveyed are
ooncemed, organization goals rarely, if ever, are open to discussion or
negotiation with local news reporters.

The finding is consistent with a command-and-control approach to
newsroom management, which media management literature emphasizes is the
most common newsroom management style at daily newspapers in the United

States.

 

17° Gaziano and Coulson, “Effect of Newsroom Management Styles on Joumelists: A Case
Study,” Joumelism Quartedy Vol. 65 No. 4 (Winter 1988); 869-880.
141

The finding also is consistent with motivation-hygiene theory and human
relations management literature, which argue that managers either ignore or
misunderstand the role effective leadership can play in subordinate commitment
to organization goal attainment.

Descriptive mass communication researchers have found manager
decision-making in daily newspaper newsrooms is likely to be situational and
reactive.171 Local news reporters thus may perceive city editors to be inconsistent
or even contradictory in the decisions they make as situations and time available
to make decisions vary.

If city editors are perceived as arbitrary, inconsistent, or unpredictable
decision-makers, then it is possible, even probable, that local news reporters
may have city editor decision-making orientation in mind when they express
dissatisfaction with what they characterize as arbitrary or inept newsroom
leadership.

In other words, local news reporters may equate city editor decision-
making with city editor leadership even though the two variables are treated as
distinctly different concepts in social science and mass communication research
literature.

However, if local news reporters at daily newspapers in the United States
tend to expect their city editors to have a clearly identifiable and effective
leadership orientation, the data in this study suggest it is possible, even probable,

that the reporters are likely to be dissatisfied.

 

‘7‘ Sohn, Wicks, Lacy, Sylvie et. al., Media Management: A Casebook Approach (2" ed.) 149.
142

Manager Leadership Orientation

The second meaningful finding in this study is the failure of leadership
orientation to stand as a dependent variable.

Confirmatory factor analysis failed to identify common or shared variance
among eight leadership orientation measures incorporated into this study. The
eight measures, in other words, lack validity as multiple indicators of leadership
orientation as expressed by the city editors surveyed.

The finding is especially noteworthy because the measures were derived
from indicators demonstrated to have intemal consistency or reliability in
leadership studies that have examined leadership orientation as an independent
variable.

It is possible validity was adversely affected in this study by researcher
bias in the selection of the measures. Validity also may have been adversely
affected by modest word changes in some of the measures to make them
compatible with the population under study and consistent with the research
method employed. The measures thus may have been under-specified, ill-
specified, or mis-specified.

An equally plausible explanation, however, is the measures lack validity
because they may not accurately reflect how the city editors surveyed see
themselves as managers who are responsible for local news department
operations.

When the leadership orientation model tested in this study was

conceptualized, it was assumed, based on leadership and descriptive mass

143

communication research, that the self-perceptions of the city editors surveyed
would reveal a leadership orientation that might vary from fully participatory to
democratic, benevolent authoritarian, or rigidly authoritarian.

The assumption about how the city editors surveyed might characterize
their leadership orientation was derived from research outcomes leadership
researchers have obtained in other studies.

Vlfith sufficient variation in city editor responses to the leadership
measures, it was assumed a leadership index could be developed that would
associate variation in leadership orientation with variation in how city editors
perceive reporter journalistic performance, with span of control as a control
variable.

Variation in the leadership measures was insufficient, however, for a city
editor leadership orientation index to have been constructed even if leadership
orientation had remained the dependent variable in this study.

The finding is not inconsistent with motivation-hygiene theory or with both
human relations and leadership literature. All three are critical of managers for
either failing to effectively incorporate leadership principles into how they manage
subordinates or failing to differentiate between efficiency in decision-making and
effectiveness as a leader.

In human relations management literature, failure to exert positive social
influence to effectively motivate subordinates to associate attainment of
organization goals with self-satisfaction on the job is defined not as inept or

incompetent leadership but as lack of leadership.

144

Manager Perception of Goal Attainment by Reporters

The third meaningful finding in this study is confirmatory factor analysis
found that goal attainment by reporters could not be isolated as an independent
variable in the responses of the city editors surveyed.

Instead, four goal-attainment measures loaded exclusively as valid
indicators of how city editors said they perceive the journalistic performance of
reporters. Those measures are: production of interesting news features,
production of hard news stories, humanization of news stories, and generation of
information for Charts and graphics.

The finding suggests traditional standards of reporter journalistic
performance, such as being first with the news, skilled writing, and thorough
reporting, are insufficient to explain and predict how city editors perceive how
well reporters do their jobs because city editors routinely integrate organization
goal-attainment into how they evaluate reporters.

The data in this study indicate, however, that city editors are not likely to
include reporters in the determination or articulation of goals. Reporters thus may
not be sufficiently or fully aware of how goal attainment affects how their
journalistic performance is perceived by their city editors. Moreover, reporters
may not even know what the City editor’s goals are.

One possible consequence might be that the more local news reporters
concentrate exclusively on traditional standards of journalistic performance, the
more they are likely to express dissatisfaction with the leadership orientation of

their city editors.

145

It should be noted, however, that it also is possible that the measures
used as indicators of goal attainment by reporters in this study were incorrectly
specified.

Motivation-hygiene theory stresses the importance of goal setting and goal
attainment in any industrial organization, but the theory provides no clear
guidance as to what constitutes a goal or goals in the context of daily newspaper

publication. Nor does the theory suggest reliable measures of goal attainment.

Manager Perception of Reporter Journalistic Performance

The fourth meaningful finding, based on analysis of response means for
each measure of reporter journalistic performance, is the City editors surveyed
tended to express slight to moderate dissatisfaction with most aspects of reporter
journalistic performance.

Conversely, no city editor expressed extreme dissatisfaction with what has
been described in this study as traditional standards of journalistic performance.

However, 85 percent of the city editors surveyed indicated that they are
extremely dissatisfied with one aspect of reporter journalistic performance -
news production. Most of the city editors said they think their reporters can and
should produce more news.

“I am convinced that if editors and I spent more time personally with staff a
lot of the gulf between performance expectations and production could be filled,”

said a city editor at a large daily newspaper in Alabama.

146

“I could push my staff harder,” said a City editor at a small daily newspaper
in Mississippi. “I could push myself harder.”

That the city editors surveyed said they were slightly to moderately
dissatisfied with most aspects of reporter journalistic performance may indicate
city editors want higher levels of reporter journalistic performance, including
attainment of organization goals, but they tend to accept the performance
reporters actually demonstrate as long as it is not incompetent or consistently
below management expectations.

Moreover, local news reporters apparently function in a newsroom work
environment in which city editors are likely to expect them to do more and be
better at what they do regardless of how reporters actually perform. Conversely,
it also is unlikely that city editor dissatisfaction with reporter journalistic
performance routinely will be extreme regardless of how reporters actually
perform.

It also is probable that reporters are likely to be aware of city editor
dissatisfaction with their performance as journalists because the city editors
surveyed said they tend to engage in social interaction with reporters only when
they are dissatisfied. Local news reporters thus are not likely to receive positive
reinforcement or praise even if their city editor thinks they have done their jobs

especially well.172

 

"2 It should be noted that only one measure failed to satisfy the .40 criterion for inclusion as a
valid indicator in confirmatory factor analysis. That measure is: “I make sure I compliment
reporters when they do a good job.”

147

“I do tell reporters when they've done something wrong, in as constructive
a way as I can, so they’ll know better next time. If that’s what is meant by

criticism, then yes, I do criticize them,” said a city editor at a small daily

newspaper in Kentucky.
The data further suggest that social distance between the city editors

 

surveyed and local news reporters may result in reporters being unaware that

their city editors may share some professional or organization concems similar to

 

those reporters have expressed in mass communication research on reporter job

dissatisfaction.
Because city editors are both managers and journalists who have

operational responsibility for local news production, it appears possible that they

 

may perceive some difficulties associated with local news coverage in a manner

similar to that of local news reporters.

For example, a city editor at a mid-sized daily newspaper in Iowa

commented: “I am very put off with marketing’s role in determining editorial

content.”
Another City editor at a large daily newspaper in Alabama said: 'The

increasing corporatization of American newspapers makes it increasingly difficult

i stun-1...

I

for journalists to function with enthusiasm.”

And at a mid-sized daily new5paper in Michigan, the city editor said: ‘The

(newspaper) industry’s push for ridiculous profits is pretty alienating.”

148

Manager Perception of What Superiors Expect of Reporters
The fifth meaningful finding in this study is city editor perception of reporter

journalistic performance was found to be a positive function of three variables -
city editor perception of the performance expectations senior newsroom
managers have for reporters, city editor dissatisfaction with working conditions,
and city editor self-satisfaction with intrinsic rewards associated with the city
editor’s job.

Overall, the three variables explain 29 percent of the variance in how the
city editors surveyed said they perceive how well reporters do their jobs as
journalists.

By far the strongest predictor of city editor perception of reporter
journalistic performance is how the city editors surveyed said they perceive what

senior newsroom managers expect of reporters (Beta = .46, p =.001). The

influence of how city editors perceive what senior newsroom managers expect is
both substantive and significant.

The second strongest predictor of how city editors perceive reporter
journalistic performance is city editor dissatisfaction with working conditions (Beta
= .12, p = .18), followed by city editor self-satisfaction on the job (Beta = .08, p =
.36). However, the influence of city editor dissatisfaction and self-satisfaction is
neither substantive nor significant.

Motivation-hygiene theory emphasizes that all managers in industrial

organizations tend to perceive the environment in which they work and the

149

1

 

 

«muss, _
. .

subordinates on whom they rely for goal attainment through their own

dissatisfaction with working conditions.
Motivation-hygiene researchers argue that manager dissatisfaction is
synonymous with manager perception of organization problems to be solved.

Based on their dissatisfaction, managers frame the perspective that they make

 

positive contributions to the organization by minimizing or eliminating what they

perceive to be negative conditions in the work environment.

 

Herzberg and his colleagues contend that such an approach to
management decision-making represents hygiene maintenance, not motivation

of subordinates to associate attainment of organizational goals with self-

satisfaction on the job.
The data in this study suggest that the city editors surveyed are like

 

managers in other industrial organizations. They tend to perceive subordinate
performance more through their dissatisfaction with working conditions than their

self-satisfaction on the job, and they tend to emphasize newsroom hygiene

maintenance.
However, because city editors are low-level managers in command-and-

control newsroom management hierarchies, how they perceive what their

 

newsroom superiors expect of reporters explains more variance in how they

perceive reporter journalistic performance than either their own self—satisfaction

or dissatisfaction with working conditions.
The data also suggest that city editors are likely to perceive that they, like

reporters, are expected to routinely respond positively to whatever new ideas or

150

 

newsroom procedures senior newsroom managers introduce even if they

disagree with them.
The city editors surveyed indicated that they disagree the most with three

common expectations among senior newsroom managers - that reporters
routinely should cover positive aspects of the community served by the daily
newspaper, that reporters routinely should respond positively to any ideas senior
managers introduce for news coverage, and that reporters routinely should

respond positively to any new newsroom procedures.
'Positive news shouldn’t be any manager’s goal. The goal should be

stories that reflect the full range of reader experiences in all communities,” the

city editor of a large daily newspaper in the state of New York said.
“Although our executive editor, as well as other editors, relay to reporters

the findings of surveys, focus groups and other outreach efforts, I certainly hope
and believe that our reporters have sufficient intelligence, judgment and initiative
to help determine what kind of journalism is warranted and needed on their
beats,” the city editor at a mid-sized daily newspaper in the state of New York
said.
Only 15 percent of the city editors surveyed said they strongly agree with

all the expectations senior newsroom managers have for reporter performance

as journalists.
However, the more the city editors surveyed said they agree with the

reporter performance expectations of their superiors, the more dissatisfied they

said they are with reporter journalistic performance.
151

 

: l

Manager Dissatisfaction With Working Conditions

The sixth meaningful finding in this study is path analysis demonstrates
that the city editors surveyed said how they perceive what senior newsroom
managers expect of reporters is a substantive and significant function of their
dissatisfaction with working conditions (Beta = .39, p = .001) but not of their self-
satisfaction on the job (Beta =.02, p = .85).

The finding is consistent with mass communication research that has
found low-level newsroom managers may tend to associate their dissatisfaction
with working conditions with what senior newsroom managers expect or do.

Low-level managers may tend to perceive newsroom working conditions
differently than their superiors. If the difference in perspectives is substantial,
then cooperation among low-level and higher-level newsroom managers may be
difficult to achieve!”

Moreover, a comparison of means found that the only variable in this
study that can be meaningfully differentiated based on circulation as an indicator
of newspaper size is how city editors perceive what senior newsroom managers
expect of reporters. The difference is substantive and significant between small
and mid-sized daily newspapers, and substantive but not significant between

small and large dailies.
The city editors surveyed also indicated that how they perceive how well

their superiors in their newsroom management hierarchy do their jobs is a

 

"3 Argyris, Behind the Front Page.
1 52

 

1

 

relatively strong positive function of their dissatisfaction with working conditions in
their newsroom.
”Senior managers here do a good job by industry standards,” said the city

editor at a large daily newspaper in the state of New York, ”but not by the

standards of what this paper could and should do.”

The city editors surveyed tended to cite insufficient financial resources to
do their job well, insufficient human resources, and lack of clarity in newsroom
policies as contributing the most to their dissatisfaction with working conditions.

”Many of our problems stem from a lack of resources,” a city editor at a
small California daily newspaper said. ”That leads to some burnout and bad
attitudes.”

The city editor at a mid-sized daily newspaper in the state of New York
commented: ”I love being metro editor, but at times there is too much of a
‘stretch’ between demands and resources that becomes wearing on my staffers
and myself.”

At a small daily newspaper in New Mexico the city editor observed: ”This
being a family-owned smaller newspaper, I find (senior) management unwilling to

spend money until absolutely necessary. This means little maintenance, low

salaries, lots of turnover, and low morale.”

The city editors also associated limited job autonomy, insufficient positive
reinforcement from superiors, inconsistent support from senior managers for
decisions the city editors make, and lack of advancement opportunity at their

newspapers as also contributing to their dissatisfaction with working conditions.

153

 

9 a.—
I
r

 

 

 

”While I find my job is interesting and enjoy the responsibility, the fact that

I’m always on call, always responsible, has worn me out,” said a city editor at a

 

small daily newspaper in the state of New York.

Autonomy, positive reinforcement, and advancement opportunity are
important measures of self-satisfaction in motivation-hygiene theory. That the city
editors surveyed said they associate all three with dissatisfaction with working

conditions suggests city editors at daily newspapers in the United States

 

perceive their self-satisfaction to be inhibited and their dissatisfaction with

working conditions augmented by organization and newsroom management

constraints.

 

Manager Self-satisfaction on the Job

The seventh meaningful finding is that even though the City editors
surveyed tended to be slightly more than moderately self-satisfied in their jobs,
city editor self-satisfaction has little substantive and significant influence in the
modified leadership orientation model tested in this study.

The city editors surveyed indicated that they are most satisfied with the

responsibility and the professional achievement they associate with their job. To

 

a lesser extent, they said their self-satisfaction also is associated with the
interesting nature of their work and the amount of personal growth they associate
with their job.

In the modified leadership orientation model, however, city editor self-

satisfaction on the job has no substantive and significant impact on city editor

154

 

“Q’s“-‘v #- —-- -... ..

perception of reporter journalistic performance, city editor perception of the
performance expectations senior newsroom managers have for reporters, and
city editor decision-making orientation.

However, city editor self-satisfaction on the job was found to have a
substantive and significant impact on city editor dissatisfaction with working
conditions (Beta = .56, p = .001). The relationship also was found to be recursive,
with City editor dissatisfaction having a substantive and significant impact on city
editor self-satisfaction (Beta = .55, p = .001).

The data demonstrate that city editor self-satisfaction on the job explains
30 percent of the variance in city editor dissatisfaction with working conditions,

and city editor dissatisfaction explains 31 percent of the variance in city editor

self-satisfaction.
The finding is consistent with motivation-hygiene theory. Herzberg and his

colleagues argue that managers in industrial organizations focus on hygiene
maintenance because solving problems reduces a manager’s dissatisfaction with
working conditions, and as a manager's dissatisfaction decreases, a manager’s
self-satisfaction is likely to increase.

The data further suggest that city editors at daily newspapers in the United
States are likely to express negative perceptions of senior newsroom managers
and local news reporters even when the city editors say they are self-satisfied in
their job.

For example, a city editor at a large daily newspaper in the state of New
York observed: ”An interesting set of (survey) questions that show me to be more

155

-i :—

 

iILI‘ ”a”

 

 

-.'- r 1' ' '4‘.AJ
'maa

 

satisfied with my own work than that of others. It makes me think I am letting

others down.”

Motivation-Hygiene Theory
The final meaningful outcome in this study is the data tend to be

consistent with motivation-hygiene assumptions, but the data are not entirely
consistent with the core axiom of motivation-hygiene theory, which is that before

self-satisfaction can be moderate to high dissatisfaction with working conditions

must be moderate or low.
In effect, the core axiom of motivation-hygiene theory posits that high self-

satisfaction on a job is caused by moderate to low dissatisfaction with working
conditions. In this study, however, four City editors expressed very high self-

satisfaction but also said they were extremely dissatisfied with working conditions

at their daily newspaper.
Motivation-hygiene theory posits that self-satisfaction is a concept of a

higher order than dissatisfaction with working conditions. Based on that

normative assumption, the theory asserts that managers in industrial

organizations should strive to increase employee self-satisfaction. Highly self-
satisfied employees, motivation-hygiene theory assumes, are likely to be

effectively motivated to attain organization goals.
In this study, the relationship between self-satisfaction on the job and

dissatisfaction with working conditions was found to be recursive, which means

156

 

 

'12 ...- .
{Tam—e

 

the influence of self-satisfaction and dissatisfaction with working conditions

among the city editors surveyed is mutual, not causal.

The inconsistency between the data obtained and what motivation-
hygiene theory predicts may be related to how the core axiom of motivation-
hygiene theory is worded. A more precise statement of the axiom that would be
consistent with the data in this study is: The likelihood of moderate to high self-

satisfaction on a job increases as dissatisfaction with working conditions

decreases.

157

 

 

 

 

Chapter 7

CONCLUSION

Overview
Business management literature emphasizes that inept leadership is a

strong predictor of employee dissatisfaction. Effective leadership, human
relations management literature assumes, sustains the market viability of an
industrial organization, enhances the likelihood of long-term organization

success, and increases the likelihood of employee self-satisfaction on the job. If
organization leadership is inept, however, business management literature
stresses that organization dysfunction, the risk of business failure, and employee
dissatisfaction are likely to increase.

Moreover, if leadership is inadequate in only one or a few departments or
sub-units in an organization, business management literature emphasizes the
likelihood of organization dysfunction increases. Consequently, business
management literature stresses that the most significant indicator of how well an
organization is managed is how effective all managers at all levels within the

structure of formal management authority are as leaders.
With mass communication research that shows reporter job dissatisfaction

increased as daily newspapers changed in the 19905 and business management

literature that suggests effective leadership is most difficult to achieve when

organizations attempt to alter established patterns of employee behavior, this

study asked: What is the leadership orientation of City editors at daily
158

 

 

 

 

 

newspapers in the United States, and what explains and predicts that leadership

orientation?

Research Implications

 

That no clearly identifiable leadership orientation emerged in the
responses of the city editors surveyed in this study suggests that city editors at
daily newspapers in the United States tend not to see themselves as managers

who have leadership responsibility for motivating local news reporters to

is

associate attainment of organization goals with self-satisfaction on the job.

Instead, the city editors surveyed indicated that they tend to see
themselves as having the management responsibility and formal authority to
exercise control of local news departments through decision-making that
emphasizes goal attainment and what motivation-hygiene theory characterizes
as hygiene maintenance.

The conclusion that city editors at daily newspapers in the United States
see themselves as efficient decision-makers but tend not to see themselves as
effective leaders can only be tentative, however.

In this study, the measures of city editor decision-making orientation are

not as reliable as normally expected in social science research (Cronbach’s

 

alpha = .67), which suggests the measures are under-specified and possibly ill-
specified.
In addition, the determination that the measures represent a decision-

making orientation rather than a leadership orientation is based on the measures

159

 

demonstrating a lack of social interaction. The definition of leadership in use in
this study, derived from human relations management literature, assumes social
interaction is a necessary precondition for the exercise of positive social
influence, and only positive social influence can motivate subordinates to

associate attainment of organization goals with self-satisfaction on the job.

In other words, this study assumes that without positive social interaction
that focuses on subordinate self-satisfaction there can be no effective leadership.
It is an assumption as yet untested in studies by other mass communication
researchers interested in media management and newsroom leadership.
Research, including case studies that employ qualitative research
methods, is needed to further examine whether the leadership typology in use in
this study is consistent or incompatible with observed city editor decision-making
behavior, and how that typology can be made reliably operational. Such research
could incorporate direct observation of city editor decision-making and social
interaction with local news reporters that might elaborate upon, affirm, disconfirm,

or modify the findings in this study.
Of particular interest should be whether and how city editors demonstrate

sensitivity about reporter feelings when they make decisions. In this study, the
characterization that city editors tend to be benevolent authoritarian decision-
makers may be unreliable and of questionable validity because it is premised on
survey responses that may incorporate respondent bias. Self-reports in which
respondents volunteer information about their most negative traits or

characteristics are improbable.
160

 

 

 

 

Moreover, even though the city editors surveyed said they tend to see

themselves as benevolent, how City editors are perceived by local news reporters

 

at daily newspapers may not be consistent with and may even contradict how the
city editors said they see themselves in this national sample survey.

In particular, research is needed that examines how city editors make
management decisions that affect the local news department as an operational l
unit within a larger publishing organization, how they make decisions as

journalists who oversee local news coverage, and how they make decisions that

 

may affect individual local news reporters or specific local news stories.

It is possible that city editor decision-making orientation can be more
precisely differentiated on the basis of type of decision, time available to make a
decision, range or scope of formal city editor authority, degree of complexity of
the newsroom management structure, number of local news reporters, extent or
degree of journalistic professionalism exhibited by local news reporters, and the
extent or degree of direct control over the local news department exercised by
senior newsroom managers.

Research also is needed to examine a possible second variable, city

editor editing orientation, that emerged in this study. Confirmatory factor analysis

 

found that city editors tell reporters what to do and how to do it, and that variable
is distinct from city editor decision-making orientation.

The editing orientation variable, however, was eliminated from this study
because the measures are under-specified and unreliable (Cronbach’s alpha =

.45).
161

 

A research contribution could be made based on qualitative methods that
attempts to explain what constitutes an editing orientation among city editors at
daily newspapers in the United States, how and why that editing orientation may
vary, how editing orientation and decision—making orientation may or may not be
associated, and how city editor editing orientation may be associated with the
self-satisfaction and dissatisfaction of local news reporters.

The city editors surveyed also indicated that they tend to focus on what
motivation-hygiene theory characterizes as hygiene maintenance in the
newsrooms at their daily newspapers. The city editors surveyed, in other words,
indicated that they tend to react to what they perceive to be deficiencies or
problems in local news department operations and make decisions they think will
eliminate the deficiencies or correct the problems.

For example, a city editor at a mid-sized daily newspaper in the state of
New York said: “I talk to reporters about each mistake that is made. I would not
describe these conversations as criticism. Rather, I'm interested in how the error
occurred. By determining how the mistake was made, we may be able to institute
changes in procedures that would prevent a similar error from occurring.”

Motivation-hygiene theory suggests managers focus on minimizing their
dissatisfaction with working conditions to increase their self-satisfaction on the
job. In this study, however, city editor self-satisfaction was found to have no
substantive or significant impact on city editor perception of reporter journalistic
performance, city editor perception of what senior newsroom managers expect of
reporters, and city editor decision-making orientation.

162

 

 

 

 

City editor dissatisfaction with working conditions was found to be a
stronger predictor variable than City editor self-satisfaction. City editor perception
of reporter journalistic performance, city editor perception of what superiors in
newsroom management expect of reporters, and city editor decision-making

orientation were all found to be to some degree a function of city editor

dissatisfaction.
Concomitantly, the data indicate that the relationship between city editor

self-satisfaction and city editor dissatisfaction is recursive, with each variable
having approximately equal influence on the other. Additional research is needed
to explain and predict why dissatisfaction is a stronger predictor of city editor

perceptions when dissatisfaction and self-satisfaction share almost equal

variance with each other.

The data also are insufficient to explain why the city editors surveyed tend
to be reactive rather than proactive managers and decision-makers. Leadership
researchers argue that reactive managers can not be effective leaders because
effective leadership requires proactive management behavior.

When city editors make decisions that incorporate organization goals, the
city editors tended to say that they never seek reporter advice and tend not to
solicit reporter opinions. The city editors also said they integrate goal attainment
into how they perceive reporter journalistic performance, which suggests
traditional journalistic skills are necessary but not sufficient if reporters are to be

viewed with a minimum of dissatisfaction by their city editors.

163

 

Goals are identified in motivation-hygiene theory as an important source of
employee dissatisfaction, but media management literature offers little guidance

as to what constitutes a goal or goals in newsrooms at daily newspapers in the

 

United States.

Research is needed that examines newsroom goals, attempts to explain
why city editors routinely exclude reporters from participation in goal-setting, and J

examines what relationship, if any, may exist between reporter exclusion from

,

goal-setting that affects the local news department and local news reporter
dissatisfaction with newsroom working conditions.

Descriptive mass communication researchers have found that as
newsroom goals increasingly reflect the business needs of a daily newspaper,
the more reporter dissatisfaction is likely to increase. Such research, however,
has tended not to elaborate upon what constitutes business-related news goals
at daily newspapers.

Research that examines goals in the context of local news coverage at
daily newspapers in the United States also is needed to more fillly explain and
predict how city editors perceive the journalistic performance of reporters. Of

special interest should be the extent or degree to which goals are or are not in

 

conflict, the extent and degree to which city editors determine goals for the local
news department, the extent or degree to which goals are imposed on city
editors by senior newsroom managers, and the extent or degree to which senior
newsroom managers solicit reporter and city editor advice or opinions before
organization goals are determined.

164

 

Moreover, research is needed that examines the differentiation between
short-tenn and long-term newsroom goals. If reporters perceive city editors to be
inconsistent decision-makers, then it is possible city editors are perceived as
being focused on short-terrn goals. As short-term goals vary or are in conflict,
reporters may perceive the decision-making of their city editors as synonymous
with arbitrary or unpredictable leadership.

Concomitantly, the city editors expressed dissatisfaction with what they
perceive to be inconsistent support from senior newsroom managers for the
decisions the city editors make.

Research that examines when senior newsroom managers overturn city
editor decisions and why could contribute to more precise explanation of city
editor decision-making. Moreover, research is needed to clarify whether a low-

level newsroom manager such as a city editor is likely to be disinclined to be an

effective leader if the manager perceives a lack of support from senior newsroom

managers for decisions the city editor makes.

If city editors manage local news departments but do not necessarily lead

local news reporters, as the data in this study suggest, then research also is
needed to identify who within the stmcture of newsroom management authority
at daily newspapers assumes leadership responsibility for local news reporters.
To what extent and to what degree the perceptions of city editors at daily
newspapers in the United States are consistent with the perceptions of other
newsroom managers also merits attention from mass communication
researchers. It is possible that city editor perceptions of superiors and

165

 

 

It“

subordinates are a function of operational responsibility. As a manager’s
operational responsibility varies, the manager’s perceptions and decision-making
orientation may vary.

Furthermore, as the difference-of-means test in this study suggests,
substantive and significant differences are likely in the performance expectations
of senior newsroom managers at small daily newspapers compared to all other
daily newspapers in the United States. What those differences may be and how
they may be associated with how city editors perceive their leadership and
decision-making orientations is beyond the scope of this study.

It can be concluded that explanation and prediction of the lack of a clearly
identifiable leadership orientation among the city editors surveyed in this study
lies in future survey research that examines the performance expectations senior
newsroom managers have for city editors at daily newspapers in the United
States.

How executive editors and managing editors say they expect city editors
to perform would likely enrich explanation and prediction of city editor decision-
making orientation, editing orientation, and leadership orientation regardless of
newspaper size.

The central question in such future national sample survey research could
be: What explains and predicts a benevolent authoritarian decision-making
orientation and a lack of a clearly identifiable leadership orientation among city

editors at daily newspapers in the United States?

166

Hana." -~—
g '1 “ha—r
II ‘.

 

 

l

APPENDICES

 

167

 

 

APPENDIX A

SURVEY INSTRUMENT

Management Questionnaire

SECTION I: For each statement, please circle the number that most closely

represents what you think.

1) My job gives me a feeling of professional achievement.

1 2 3 4 S
Strongly Not sure
Disagree

2) My boss often tells me that I do my job well.

1 2 3 4 S
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

3) The work I do is interesting.

1 2 3 4 S
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

4) I enjoy the responsibility that comes with my job.

1 2 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

5) I have opportunity for advancement at my newspaper.

I 2 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

6) My job gives me a feeling of personal growth.

1 2 3 4 S
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

168

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

 

l
I
i
r.

 

7) I am free to do my job the way I think it should be done.

1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

SECTION II: For each statement, please circle the number that most closely

represents what you think.

8) Senior managers at my newspaper do their jobs well.

1 2 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

9) My newspaper’s policies are clear.

1 2 3 4 S
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

10) I have the human resources I need to do my job well.

1 Z 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

1 1) I have the financial resources I need to do my job well.

1 2 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

12) My boss usually supports my decisions.

1 2 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

13) My salary is adequate.

1 2 3 4 S
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

14) I have the job security I need to do my job well.

1 2 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

169

7

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

 

 

1‘]

1 S) I have the authority I need to do my job well.

1 2 3 4 S
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

7

Strongly
Agree

SECTION III: For each statement, please circle the number that most closely

represents what you think.

16) My reporters usually are first with the news.

1 2 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

17) My reporters are as productive as they can be.

1 2 3 4 S
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

18) My reporters consistently show a lot of self-initiative.

1 2 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

19) My reporters usually report thoroughly.

1 2 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

20) My reporters write skillfully.

1 2 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

21) My reporters cooperate well with editors.

1 2 3 4 5
Strongly Not Sure
Disagree

Strongly
Agree

7

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

Strongly
Agree

7

Strongly
Agree

7

Strongly
Agree

SECTION IV: For each statement, please circle the number that most closely

represents what you think.

22) My reporters usually achieve management’s goals for production of

interesting news features.

170

 

1 2 3 4 S 6 7

Strongly Not Sure Strongly

Disagree Agree

23) My reporters usually achieve management’s goals for production of
informative hard news stories.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

24) My reporters usually achieve management’s goals for enterprising
information for charts and graphics.

1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

25) My reporters usually achieve management’s goals for humanizing
hard news stories.

1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

26) My reporters usually achieve management’s goals for coverage of positive
aspects of our community.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

SECTION V: For each statement, please circle the number that most closely
represents what you think.

27) My reporters do all they can to meet the performance expectations
of my boss.

1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

28) My reporters react positively when my boss introduces new procedures
in the newsroom.

1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

171

 

29) My reporters react positively when my boss introduces new ideas for
how to improve news coverage.

1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

30) My reporters do their best to give readers the kind of journalism my boss
says readers want.

1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

SECTION VI: For each statement, please circle the number that most closely
represents what you think.

3 1) I encourage my reporters to develop their own story ideas.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

3 2) I encourage my desk editors to tell reporters why they change stories.

1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

33) I try to be sensitive about the personal feelings of my reporters.

I 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

34) I often tell reporters what to do.

1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

35) I make sure I compliment reporters when they do a good job.

1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

36) I routinely criticize reporters when they make mistakes.
1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly

172

 

 

In

Agree

Disagree
37) I usually ask reporters for their opinions before I make a decision.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

3 8) [always incorporate advice from reporters into goals that I set.

1 2 3 4 S 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree
39) All things considered, 1 am satisfied with my job.

I 2 3 4 5 6 7
Strongly Not Sure Strongly
Disagree Agree

SECTION VII: Please fill in or check the appropriate response.

 

How long have you been a manager? (Years)

 

 

 

40)
41) How long have you been a manager at your current newspaper?
(Years)

42) How many reporters are you responsible for? (Number)_.__.
43) How many editors do you supervise? (Number)

44) Have you had formal management training? (Yes) __ (No)

45 ) Do you want formal management training? (Yes) .... (No)
46) How old are you? ___.._.__.___

 

 

47) Are you male or female?
48) Did you graduate from a four-year college or university with a degree
in journalism? (Journalism degree) _ (No Journalism degree) _

Thank you very much for completing the questionnaire. Please include any

comments you might like to make on the following page.

173

 

APPENDIX B

FIRST WAVE COVER LETTER

July 15, 1999

Sully Kidding

The Daily Blade

300 S. Main St.
Smithville, Ark. 14455

Dear Ms. Kidding:

You are one of a select group of newspaper editors being asked to
provide information about newspaper management. Your name was drawn from
a nationwide list of daily newspapers. The management study concerns sources
of self-satisfaction and dissatisfaction among editors responsible for local news
coverage, and how job self-satisfaction and dissatisfaction may be associated
with leadership orientation.

 

For the study results to truly represent newspaper management, it is
important that you complete and return the enclosed questionnaire. It takes only
minutes to fill out By completing and retuming the questionnaire, you indicate
your voluntary agreement to participate in the project.

You may be assured of complete confidentiality. Under no circumstances
will you or your newspaper be identified by name in any report, published or
unpublished. The identification number at the top right of the questionnaire
serves to prevent me from sending a follow-up questionnaire to newspaper
managers who already have responded.

This study is not connected with any commercial enterprise. However,
results may be published in journals and magazines.

 

If you have any questions, please feel free to call me at (517) 353-3859, or
e-mail me at stcyrcha@pilot.msu.edu.

Thank you very much for your assistance.
Sincerely,

Charles St. Cyr
Project Director

174

APPENDIX C

POST CARD TO REMIND SUBJECTS OF QUESTIONNAIRE

Aug. 1, 1999

Two weeks ago, a questionnaire was mailed to you seeking your expertise
about newspaper management.

If you already have completed and returned the questionnaire, please
accept my sincere thanks for your cooperation. If not, would you please complete
and return it as soon as possible. You may be assured of strict confidentiality.
Under no circumstances will your name or the name of your newspaper be
identified in any report, published or unpublished.

If you did not receive the questionnaire or it has been misplaced, I will
send another in two weeks. If you have any questions, please call me at (517)

353-3859.

Sinceme

Charles St. Cyr,

Project Director

175

 

APPENDIX D

SECOND WAVE COVER LETTER

Aug. 15, 1999
Sully Kidding
The Daily Blade
300 S. Main St.
Smithville, Ark. 14455

Dear Ms. Kidding:

A few weeks ago, a questionnaire was mailed to you seeking your
expertise about newspaper management. If you already have completed and
returned the questionnaire, please accept my sincere thanks for your
COOperation. If not, would you please complete the enclosed questionnaire and
return it as soon as possible.

You are one of a select group of newspaper editors being asked to
provide information about newspaper management. Your name was drawn from
a nationwide list of daily newspapers. The management study concerns sources
of job satisfaction and job dissatisfaction among editors responsible for local
news coverage, and how job satisfaction and job dissatisfaction may be
associated with leadership style.

For the study results to truly represent newspaper management, it is
important that you complete and return the enclosed questionnaire. It takes only
minutes to fill out. By completing and returning the questionnaire, you indicate
your voluntary agreement to participate in the project.

You may be assured of strict confidentiality. Under no circumstances will
you or your newspaper be identified by name in any report, published or
unpublished. This study is not connected with any commercial enterprise.
However, results may be published in journals and magazines.

If you have any questions, please feel free to call me at (517) 353-3859, or
e-mail me at stcyrcha@pilot.msu.edu. Thank you very much for your assistance.

Sincerely,

Charles St. Cyr
Project Director

176

 

 

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