Job Dissatisfaction: Job Satisfaction With The Police Department

Job satisfaction is defined as, “a positive feeling about a job resulting from an evaluation of its characteristics” (Robbins and Judge, 2009, p.83). The police department where I am employed has an extremely high turnover rate. Officers, when they are hired with no certifications, are required to sign a two year contract. Any department who hires an officer under contract to another agency must pay for that officer’s training if they have not fulfilled their obligation to the original department. In my experience with this agency, several officers have left during their two year contract time to go to other departments; however, most will work for two years and then go to another agency, leaving this department with little experience on patrol. Officers leave for a variety of reasons.

REASONS FOR JOB DISSATISFACTION

The biggest reasons officers are leaving is job dissatisfaction. Officers claim that the pay is too low for the economy of the area; although many of these individuals are attempting to support families on $26,000 per year, which would be fine for a single individual but not for a family. The morale of the agency is very low with little to no interaction between employees during off-time and no competition between shifts or divisions. Community satisfaction with the police department is

Poor pay is not always an indicator of job dissatisfaction, yet our text does state that it can be a factor for those making $40,000 or less per year (p.85). As a 15 year veteran of the agency I am currently having to work two or three jobs in order to support my family. “According to one survey, 89 percent of managers said they believe that employees leave and stay mostly for the money….yet actually 80 to 90 percent of employees leave for reasons related NOT to money, but to the job, the manager, the culture, or the work environment” (Branham, 2005, p.