Focus Group

The family is considered the center and structure of our society. Several employees
are likely to be faced with personal problems that significantly affect their job
performance. They experience lack of concentration resulting in poor quality or quantity
of work, fatigue due to stress, becomes more and more prone, exhibits higher grievance
rates while they transmit their concerns in the workplace.
Our hypothesis in the survey assignment is that employee’s personal and family
concerns affects and reduces their productivity in the workplace. For the purpose of
proving that our hypothesis is true, we developed a questionnaire writing four
demographic questions about participant’s gender, age, marital status and annual income,
three questions trying to identify how much time they spend in their workplace during the
day and how well their annual income satisfies their financial needs in order to
comprehend if this is a factor of increasing their personal problems and three questions
trying to find out if the productivity is actually affected by the personal and family
problems.
Our questionnaire was anonymous and was given to ten participants working in
several private businesses. Because of the fact that the number of participants was small,
it raises issues whether our sample is statistically representative of the research
population as a whole while it reflects the characteristics of the population. But we have
to consider that because of conducting an assignment for the class, it was unfeasible to
manage an appropriate, random sample.
The choice of participants wasn’t by chance. We selected particular persons to
participate, trying to include males and females, aged from twenty to forty- two, single,
married, married with children, divorced and divorced with children. For those people of
our selection, we could get some necessary and valued information for our survey
project.
The small sample I used raises issues about the credibility of the data that I obtain.
Having a small number of participants, I can not sustain that the collected data can be
considered as both reliable and valid. It is difficult to support that I can generalize the
results of my enquiry and that similar results would be obtained in similar situation or
make any judgment about whether the data really provides evidence to support my
hypothesis.
FREQUENCY TABLE

According to demographic questions, 40% percent of the participants were males and
60% males, 30% of the participants aged between twenty to twenty- five years old, 30%
aged thirty one to twenty- six to thirty, 30% aged thirty- one to thirty- six and 10% aged
thirty- seven to fourty- two. Singles were 70% while married had a 20% and divorced
with clildren took a 10%. From the participants, a 90% reported an annual income of
1.000 to 20.000 euro and another 10% an annual income of 21.000 to 40.000 euro. No
responses to annual income above 41.000 euro.
In the first question which was considered to be an open question, asking them how
many jobs they have and how many hours they spend on each of them per week, from the
answers that were given, we concluded that the majority of them was occupied with one
job with an average of 40 to 50 hours. Only one of the ten participants had 2 jobs, one of
it was 20 hours and the other one was 15 hours.
Regarding the question of whether their annual income satisfies their economic needs,
10% strongly disagreed, 50% disagreed and 40% agreed while no participant gave an
answer of strongly agreed.
In the question of how many hours do participants work daily, we found that 80% of
them work 7 to 9 hours daily, while 20% of them work 10- 12 hours.
Concerning of whether work life is the first priority more than their personal and
family life, 40% answered YES and 60% answered NO.
As regards the question about the negative effect of personal and family concerns in
their productivity, 10% answered that personal and family concerns never affect
negatively their productivity, 40% rarely, 40% sometimes, and 10% often.
The last question was related to the percent of their work time that they spend
discussing personal and family issues. 70% answered that they spend 0- 20% discussing
personal and family issues, 20% spend 20-40% and finally, 10% spend 40-60%.
CHI SQUARE

We selected the question 4 - whether work life is the first priority more than their
personal and family life - having two variables, gender as independent, and question 4 as
dependent variable, both measured at nominal level with YES or NO answers. We
concluded that 66.7% of the females and 50% of males have not as priority their work
life more than their personal and family life. Thus, the probability is .598, so we conclude
that there is no significance between the relationship of the independent and dependent
variables because it is higher than 0.05.

ANOVA

We decided on choosing the question 6 - the percent of their work time that they
spend discussing personal and family issues – having two variables, gender as an
independent variable measured at nominal level and question 6 as a dependent variable
measured at an interval level. We concluded that the probability is .015, so the
relationship between variables is significant because it is lower than 0.05.

CORRELATION

We selected the question 2- whether their annual income satisfies their economic
needs – having two variables, age as independent, and question 2 as dependent, both
measured at the interval level. The r of question 2 is .223, so it is positive and weak. the
relationship between the variables is not significant because it is higher than 0.05.
.

REGRESSION

We selected the question 3- many hours do participants work daily – having to variables,
marital status as an independent variable, and question 3 as a dependent variable, both
measured at the interval level. R Square is .063, so 63% of the hours that participants
work daily is explained by the marital status. We conclude that there is no significance
between the relationship of the independent and dependent variables because it is higher
than 0.05.
According to the coefficient table, the slope is that for every one unit increase in the
independent variable, there is a slope decrease in the dependent variable. The standard
deviation is not interpreted. Moreover, the t is the result of the slope divided by the
standard deviation. Finally the probability is .486, we conclude that there is no
significance between the relationship of the independent and dependent variables because
it is higher than 0.05.
.