Determinants of Work Alienation among Knowledge Workers in IT Firms

Abstract

There is a limited number of attempts, found about the alienation of knowledge workers’ in the Sri Lankan context. Thus, the primary purpose of the current study was to identify the determinants of work alienation to fill the gap. Drawing from on the extant literature, the researcher identified the main four determinants of work alienation; task factors, social support at work, organizational justice factors and organizational structural factors. This study was conducted as a cross-sectional, quantitative field study among a sample of 134 knowledge workers selected from three (03) main IT firms in Sri Lanka. Primary data were collected via a standard questionnaire that met the acceptable level of validity and reliability. The collected data were analyzed using SPSS (Version 26). Descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation coefficient, and simple regression were used for data analysis. Findings of the current study empirically provided answers for the research questions that structural factors, social support at work, and task factors are to be the strongest predictors of work alienation among knowledge workers. Further, it revealed that there is no impact of organizational justice on work alienation in knowledge workers in selected IT firms. Hence, it is recommended for practicing managers in IT industry to pay much attention to the job designing, team working, and have a long-term orientation aimed at fostering organizational commitment in order to reduce work alienation.