Factors Affecting Faculty Morale
in Seventh-day Adventist
Tertiary Institutions
Research Thesis Presented, 1999, to the
School of Education Studies
University of New South Wales
Sydney
Using a multi-method approach, this study set
out to examine the concept of faculty morale in
the setting of the four South Pacific tertiary
institutions owned and run by the Seventh-day
Adventist (SDA) Church.
Based on three research questions, the
study was carried out in two stages
representing the two models of research quantitative and qualitative.
The study confirmed the multifaceted and complex nature of
morale as well as the close
relationship between this concept
and that of job satisfaction.
Definition
Morale is the state of mind which predisposes a
group (or individual) at a particular time, to
view their leader/s, organization and its policies
as contributing to, or thwarting their need
satisfaction.
The Issue of Faculty Morale
• Faculty Morale in higher education has been the focus of
numerous studies over the previous 30 years (prior to 1997),
quite a few being very big. One of the biggest studies involved
20,000 faculty members in 14 countries in 6 continents.
• However most of the colleges and universities in these studies
had been large institutions, both public and private.
• The size of these universities raises the important educational
and sociological question about potential differences
between large universities and small institutions in terms of
faculty morale and the factors that affect it.
For example, do the factors that affect faculty morale
in large institutions operate in exactly the same
manner for very small colleges and universities? Or are
there factors inherent in small institutions that warrant
studying them separately as far as faculty morale is
concerned? As important as institutional size may be
the question of church ownership of a college or
university.
Are there factors, for example, inherent in a
church-owned and church-run institution that
make them significantly, if not inherently,
different from the much larger non-religiousbased institutions, both state and private, that
have been the main subjects of various recent
morale studies in higher education?
• These questions gave rise to the need for the study.
The term “higher education institutions” does not
invoke a homogenous line-up of colleges and
universities but a whole array of widely differing
establishments.
• These differences make if difficult and problematic to
generalise the results of any one single-institution
study (or even several institutions that belong to a
single category).
• It is these differences that give salience to this study
which looks at faculty morale in four small tertiary
institutions owned and operated by one Christian
church denomination.
• There is a dearth of material on faculty morale when
it comes to church-owned and church-run
institutions of higher learning. There is none on the
morale of faculty in universities/colleges whose
members all belong to the same church that runs
the institutions.
• This study attempts to fill this gap by presenting a
snapshot of faculty morale in all four institutions
owned and run by the Seventh-day Adventist
Church in the South Pacific. These are institutions
where 100% of the academic staff are also members
of the SDA Church.
Thus the Purpose of the Study was to examine, in the
setting of SDA tertiary institutions in the South Pacific,
the level of faculty morale and the relationship
between faculty morale and a number of variables that
might affect it.
The literature reveals a close association
between high morale and 3 factors:
1. High faculty involvement in institutional
decision-making processes
2. A participatory leadership style on the
part of senior administrators
3. A democratic organizational structure.
Colleges with high morale had leaders
who were “aggressively participatory”.
Faculty members find that this leadership
style is empowering and inspires trust.
• The literature reported faculty dissatisfaction with
the authoritarian management style, the “highcontrol style”, of a university leadership.
• It also reports that faculty rebelled against an
authoritarian style and the subordination of their
personal dignity in order to increase production at
lower costs.
• It also cautioned that academics will “strongly resist
being treated like factory workers” and pointed out
the need to project more positive images of
university leadership, alternatives to the “unilateral,
top-down, command-and-control variety”.
Research Questions
Literature like the above raises important questions in
relation to the four SDA tertiary institutions mentioned
above. So this study set out to find answers to the
following 3 research questions:
Q1. What is the current state of faculty morale in the
four SDA tertiary institutions under study?
Research Questions
Q2. What factors have contributed most to the current state of faculty
morale in these institutions?
a. To what degree is leadership style a major determinant of the current
state of faculty morale?
b. To what extent does institutional size make faculty more
vulnerable/immune to morale issues?
c. Does it make any difference to the morale equation that all administrators
and faculty members are SDA Christians?
d. Are there things in the SDA teachings and/or practices that tend to
exacerbate or alleviate morale issues?
e. To what extent does the faculty’s commitment to their church, or to God,
or their patterns of shared experiences with the leader, override factors that
would otherwise lead to dissatisfaction and low morale?
f. Does the fact that they are church-owned, church-run institutions
decrease or raise the levels of faculty stress in relation to workloads and
other morale-related factors?
Research Questions
Q3. What elements could be changed in these
institutions to improve faculty morale?
Research Design
In the quantitative-vs-qualitative debate there are
purists, who would have nothing to do with the idea of
combining the two approaches, and there are
pragmatists, who see quantitative and qualitative
methods as being able to inform one another, and in
cooperation, combine their strengths to answer a
research question more effectively.
This study, adopting a pragmatist stance, is a
combination of quantitative and qualitative research
methods where the results of one approach guided
and informed the development and implementation of
the other.
Target Population
All 166 full-time faculty members at the four tertiary
institutions owned and operated by the SDA Church in
the South Pacific.
Instrumentation
The construction of the questionnaire for this study was
based primarily on existing research and the current
literature on morale. The literature, for example, reports
that when members had a high regard for their
organization, it follows that their morale is correspondingly
high. In other words, members’ regard for their
organization would be a good measure of the group’s
morale. This helped this researcher in constructing at least
one question which aimed at finding out how highly the
respondents regarded their institution. The construction
of other questionnaire items, in a similar way, adhered
closely to the current literature.
Having received the approval from the UNSW’s Ethics
Committee, and the SDA education authorities, the
final version of the questionnaire was mailed, along
with a covering letter, an interview card, and a
stamped return envelope, to all full-time members at
the four institutions.
The response rate was 63% and there were 50
interview cards mailed back separately at the expense
of the respondents.
In preparation for the development of interview
schedules, the survey returns were initially analysed
using descriptive statistics.
Interview Questions (Example):
My findings show that only 35% of College X
respondents agreed that faculty morale was high. A
similar percent (36%) agreed that the consultative
process allowed at College X is appropriate; a similar
percentage (34%) were satisfied with the level of
faculty participation in the decision-making process at
the College. Participation in decision-making seems
connected to the morale of College X faculty. Do you
agree? Why or why not?
A fairly representative group, 33% of respondents, was
interviewed, including at least one woman faculty
member from each institution, a total of 8 women or
24% of the interviewees. This reflected closely the
percentage of the respondents, 22%, who were
women, and was not too different to the target
population which was 25% women.
Analysis
The statistical analysis of the survey was carried out
using the SPSS computer program.
The qualitative data was analysed using a computer
program called Ethnograph 4
The qualitative and quantitative data in this study
complemented each other remarkably well, with the
quantitative data giving the overall picture of faculty
morale, and the qualitative data focusing in to provide
a more in-depth examination of specific aspects of the
morale of faculty, thus arriving at a more accurate
evaluation of faculty morale at the 4 institutions.
Findings
While faculty morale appeared better in some
institutions than others, the data reported in this study
indicate that faculty morale overall seemed to have
suffered due to a variety of factors.
• Most notable among these was the perceived leadership
style of senior administrators as manifested through a
range of activities and attitudes comprising their
willingness or otherwise
* to share power with the faculty,
* to follow a satisfactory process of consultation,
* to allow adequate academic freedom,
* to promote faculty participation and representation
in institutional policy- and decision-making, and
* to communicate openly with academic staff.
When Leadership Style is seen to be appropriate and
supportive of faculty and their work, Job Satisfaction,
the second major factor that impacts on faculty
morale, is also given a boost.
A third major finding was the surprising noncorrelation between Faculty Morale and Commitment.
Commitment, as understood by respondents in this
study, refers, first and foremost, to their dedication
and devotion to their Church, to God and His calling,
as well as to their work, their students and to each
other.
The non-correlation between this religious
commitment and morale seems to suggest that the
two factors, while they may at times coincide, operate
independently of each other much of the time. This
may explain why many faculty members in SDA tertiary
institutions are quite willing to continue working at
their job despite what they themselves admit to be
demoralising conditions.
Size of institution did not emerge in this study as
having an important relationship with faculty morale,
either positively or negatively. However, from an
examination of the responses to the four items that
dealt with Size, it is clear that respondents generally
regarded smallness of Size positively in regard to the
issues of staff relationships, workloads, collegial
support, and faculty harmony.
To what extent does the faculty’s commitment to
their church, or to God, or their patterns of shared
experiences with the leader, override factors that
would otherwise lead to dissatisfaction and low
morale?
Religious commitment appears to be a very powerful
force in the life and work of SDA faculty members in
the institutions involved in this study. However, rather
than preventing low morale, commitment, as
understood by SDA faculty members, acted as a
“stand-by power pack” which kept faculty members
going when motivation from high morale is low or
non-existent.
The following representative comments from interviewees make this point
clear:
 I think commitment is something that pulls you through the hard times
when morale is low.
 In spite of all the problems at the College, the faculty believe that they are
serving God. This commitment to their God and the Church tends to
transcend all the negatives around them. ....If it wasn’t for this
commitment, I think it would have been a very different story.
 Although morale is low, we continue because we have that commitment
to God. That’s the dedication of the staff to their mission despite the
existence of factors that have brought about low morale.
 For me commitment to God and the Church is a very important factor.
Without that commitment, my family and I would probably have quitted
by now.
Implications
1 If “the lives and work of faculty are central to
institutional quality and students’ learning” (Austin, Rice
and Splete: 1991, 153), if “the faculty is the heart of our
institutions of higher learning” (Schuster and Bowen:
1985, 19), if “a university is its faculty” and “the
excellence of a university is the excellence of its faculty”
(Smith: 1978, 1), and, if “morale is regarded as a
measure of the ‘health’ of an organisation” (Hunter:
1982, 95), then it behoves administrators in SDA tertiary
institutions to do all within their power to improve
faculty morale.
Implications
In the context of this investigation, this might mean
listening to faculty and heeding their calls for greater
participation in governance issues and other
institutional decision-making processes. “Even in times
of difficult decisions, morale will be bolstered by
faculty involvement” (Olswang and Lee: 1984, 56).
Implications
2 The data in this study seem to suggest the
appointment of men (and women) who have, or are
prepared to learn, the necessary skills for the
improvement of faculty morale, men and women
who can build trust rather than empires, men and
women who can exercise authority not domination,
those who are confident enough in themselves to
empower others. SDA Church leaders in the South
Pacific may find it advisable to have in-service
training on these issues for some senior
administrators in its tertiary institutions.
Implications
3 Where morale is low, the behaviour of senior
administrators may need to come under scrutiny.
Morale problems may not require huge amounts of
financial resources to rectify. However it will
probably require a change of thinking and a change
in the way people are treated and how things are
handled.
Implications for Faculty
1 Participation in governance issues and institutional
decision-making inevitably takes time, time many faculty
members may be unwilling to expend. However, if the
joint involvement of faculty and administration in the
governance processes is to be successful, faculty
members must be willing and able to put in the
necessary time. “Willingness” is a matter for staff
themselves. “Ability”, on the other hand, may require
supportive actions by the institutional leadership to
enable staff members to contribute effectively to
decision-making processes - through the provision of the
necessary information and in-service training to make
such participation effective, and, perhaps by a review of
workloads to make it possible.
Implications for Faculty
2. Involvement in the governing process also entails
accountability. Faculty members who wish to be
involved in the institution's governing or
administrative processes must be willing to be
held accountable for the consequences of their
actions and decisions. Evidence from the current
data suggests that faculty members are willing to
accept this sort of responsibility which some SDA
institutional administrators evidently are rather
reluctant to give.
Faculty morale and commitment
The data in this study indicate that religious-oriented
commitment is very sturdy, particularly in the three socalled mission-field institutions of the SDA Church. Despite
this apparent vitality, however, only 3% of the current
combined faculty at College B, College C and College D
have remained in these institutions for 10 years or longer
(compared to 64% at College A). The above low 3%,
coupled with the high faculty turnover rate in these three
institutions, speaks volumes about the limits of the effects
of religious commitment in these institutions. There are
implications in this for the SDA Church and its
administrators.
Final Word
Successfully addressing morale-related issues raised in
this report may not prove a panacea for all the
problems of SDA tertiary institutions in the South
Pacific. However, it would, more than likely, lead to a
much happier staff, a condition which should bring
about more positive results in terms of staff
enthusiasm and productivity, as well as greater
commitment to SDA tertiary institutions and their
goals.
Factors Affecting Faculty Morale
in Seventh-day Adventist
Tertiary Institutions
Research Thesis Presented, 1999, to the
School of Education Studies
University of New South Wales
Sydney