Job satisfaction among library managers: a cross‐cultural study of stress, freedom and job conditions

Based on a survey of British and Danish Library Managers the paper explores the concept of job satisfaction and its relation to stress, job content and job conditions. The paper evokes the theories of Hofstede as a tentative explanation of national differences. The paper sets out to analyse job satisfaction in relation to a range of demographic variables. On the basis of a multitude of questions and statements the author forms several composite variables. They concern factors such as stress, freedom in the job, perception of management style and the actual job content. Hofstede's theories about cultural differences are at least partly confirmed through the analysis. They cannot explain all the differences, but at least some of the major ones. It is also evident that nationality plays a significant role in relation to factors such as stress and freedom in decision making. The paper also hints that an intervening variable could be the way nations adopt different methods to reorganise the public sector. A last point made in the paper is the partial rejection of a generic theory about job satisfaction. The factors tend to be the same, but the weighting of the single factor and its significance are influenced by background factors such as nationality, size of the employing institution and the mix of tasks in the job.