The effects of pending redundancy on construction workers in Ireland

Abstract

The objective of this study was to determine what effects the experience of pending redundancy within the construction sector would have on the workers lives. The sample consisted of 120 office and site based construction workers from one company in Ireland. Quantitative analysis was used to determine the findings between the office and site based staff in terms of their job satisfaction, their overall satisfaction with life, perceived stress levels and their total self-esteem. The overall findings indicate that male and female workers with the construction company experience much higher levels of stress than what is perceived to be normal by Cohen (1983). Overall the study found that females had a slightly higher level of stress compared to their male colleagues. Females are also less likely to be made redundant within the company. The higher the educational attainment a person has the less likely they are to be made redundant. Females on average have a higher education attainment than male workers. Further findings suggest that overall both male and female workers were only slightly satisfied with life while working with the construction sector. From the results it is clear that the employee’s job satisfaction will progressively go up with longer years of employment. Further analysis suggests that overall office based workers have a higher satisfaction with life than that of site based workers. The study suggests that the participants of this study have above average self-esteem levels. But may be subject to change over the course of time according to (Steiger., Allemand., Robins & Fend, 2014)