Formal Training Levels and Employee Complaints in IT

Introduction

Dissatisfied employees are a major detriment in any industry. When employees feel their rights are not being honored, they have the right to file formal complaints, which can cause a dip in both morale and overall productivity. This is often attributed to a lack of proper formal training with respect to appropriate work environment conduct, on both the employee and managerial levels. This is as true within the IT industry as it is in most other contemporary industries.

This study reviews the contemporary discourse regarding the level of formal training as correlated with the number of personnel complaints filed within a particular organization. The following content first examines the problem of high complaint rates and situates it within a theoretical framework that attributes poor training processes as a major contributing cause. It then moves to reviewing the contemporary discourse to uncover recent conclusions in the area of study.

Statement of the Problem and Theoretical Framework

Using content analysis, the study focuses on three previous studies. These three studies were coded, focusing on frequently used words or concepts that showed a relationship between training levels and complaints. Each case was coded, categorized, and then analyzed using the most frequent concepts to test the strength and direction of the correlative relationship between training levels and numbers of complaints. The initial hypothesis was confirmed: the more formal training employees are exposed to, the fewer incidences of complaints there are.

The nature of the problem revolves around a potential detriment to modern IT work environments. High levels of personnel complaints are unfortunately a "significant cost to organizations, both because they raise labor costs and because they lower organizational performance."^[1] When there is inappropriate behavior and poor practices in the workplace, employees will file more formal complaints, which ultimately hurts the organization and its overall productivity. Unfortunately, this is a problem that has persisted throughout contemporary business practice. Yet as IT industries become more widespread and diversified, they are becoming increasingly susceptible to the same problems other industries have faced on a large scale.

The conceptual framework uses prior research as a way to mine data using qualitative research methods. Content analysis focuses on the study of texts as a means of gathering data regarding particular social phenomena. It is often used within the social sciences and can include a thorough analysis of a variety of text types, including books, journals, and websites. Categorizing and classifying prior studies and research within the discourse allows a common thread to emerge that attests to the nature of the relationship between the two variables: the level of formal training and the number of complaints. This type of analysis goes beyond simple inference by coding the frequency of commonly used words, meanings, and relationships between denoted categories within individual texts.

Significance, Research Question, and Hypotheses

The theoretical framework rests on HR theoretical concepts, specifically regarding the importance of workplace training in reducing inappropriate behavior and problems. Such theories hold that HR practices emphasizing more formal training serve to prevent potentially problematic behaviors within the work environment that would otherwise generate more complaints. In this regard, the more formal training employees receive, the more knowledgeable they become about what constitutes harassment and other problematic behaviors within the context of the modern work environment.

This study holds significant implications for modern business practices within the growing IT industry. First, there is relatively little inquiry into the relationship between training and complaints within the specific niche of the IT industry. This study can therefore help lead the way in understanding this phenomenon not just from a general standpoint, but from a more focused one pertaining to IT and its related industries. Such an examination is crucial to social scientists because it opens a conversation about the nature of training in IT industries and how it can improve morale and productivity by reducing the number of employee complaints.

Major Concepts, Variables, and Methodology

Overall, this research aims to dig deeper into the relationship between training levels and the number of employee complaints. The primary research question is: how do levels of formal training impact the number of complaints filed within the context of the contemporary IT industry? Based on prior research and HR theory, the hypothesis is that the more formal training that is implemented, the fewer incidences of complaint reports. The null hypothesis, accordingly, is that there is no relationship between the two variables.

There are two primary variables in this research. The first is the independent variable: the level of formal training received by employees in the industry. This refers to the amount of training regarding employee conduct and workplace behavior. In IT industries, formal training often goes far beyond simply keeping employees current with the latest technologies. As Corrado, Haltiwanger, and Sichel (2009) suggest, "training demands of a firm are not limited to the introduction of new technology; as new organizational structures such as teamwork are put into place, this increases the need of workers to acquire additional training to help them function in a more interactive group environment."^[2] The second variable is the dependent variable: the number of complaints issued by employees, which is theorized to be related to the level of training received.

Overall, there is a general lack of data concerning organizations and the complaints filed against them that were handled internally, due in part to potential nondisclosure agreements. A study of this nature in quantitative format is not present in the modern discourse, especially within the more specific context of the IT industry. Therefore, the methodology had to carefully consider other industries related to IT as well as IT itself.

The primary methodology for data collection and analysis was content analysis. In this method, textual data helps reveal frequencies in meanings and assumptions within existing literature. As such, "content analysis is a research technique for making replicable and valid inferences from texts."^[3] Coding texts for the frequency of words and ideas is a common practice within the structure of content analysis methodology.^[4] This study employs relational analysis to examine the frequency and prevalence of references to formal training in relation to complaint numbers within contemporary organizations. First, the study identifies relevant concepts and then moves to establishing the relationship between them. Coding was done based on the frequency of words and phrases and the assumed meanings those frequencies carry regarding the strength and direction of the relationship between formal training and the number of complaints. As the research suggests, "the frequency with which a symbol, idea, reference, or topic occurs in a stream of messages is taken to indicate the importance of, attention to, or emphasis on that symbol, idea, reference, or topic in the messages."^[5] The text was analyzed based on both the strength and the sign of the relationship, showing at what degree and in what direction the two variables are associated. The study drew on prior studies of complaints filed within the IT industry and related industries, especially telecommunications, coding them for signals and meanings associated with the level of formal training that participants received. Within the structure of content analysis methods, "a measure has hypothesis validity if in relationship to other variables it behaves as it is expected to."^[6]