Work Alienation Among Manufacturing Workers; The Case Of Selected Manufacturing Industries At Adama, Ethiopia

Abstract

The study was conducted to investigate work alienation among manufacturing workers at selected manufacturing industries of Adama Town. The study employed quantitative and qualitative research method; and data was collected through questionnaire and in-depth interview guides. The questionnaire was mixture of close ended questions consisting of five point scale response and open ended questions. Interview guide was utilized for the purpose of in depth interview. Respondents of the study were from four selected manufacturing industries of Adama town. The study purposively selected 10% of manufacturing industries of Adama taking financial constraints and convenience into consideration. The data was collected from one hundred eighty six (186) randomly selected study participants using list of employees from each selected manufacturing industries. In addition, 12 in depth interviewees were conducted with purposively selected interviewees. Descriptive analyses were utilized to analyze quantitative data and qualitative data were thematically analyzed. The study findings revealed that majority (61.8%) of the respondents were alienated and centralization, formalization, lack of autonomy, and physical working condition were important predictors of work alienation. The study also found that work schedule (night shift), lack of transportation, low salary and promotion as other factors determining workers experience of alienation. In trying to investigate the relationship between workers’ well-being and experience of alienation absenteeism-induced low pay, depression, deskilling and dissatisfaction are mentioned. On the other hand, upgrading educational level, Absenteeism, changing department and job termination are mentioned as copping strategies to escape from work alienation and its effects. Generally, even though employees in the studied manufacturing industries experience work alienation and it affects their well-being in different ways, they used different copping strategies to escape from work alienation. Management/owners of manufacturing industries, better to give attention to their workers and use various mechanisms in such a way that can alleviate their negative attitudes towards the work and work related activiti