Exploring the Motivational and Hygiene Factors of Baby Boomers, Generation X, and Millennials in the Workplace

The disengagement of multiple generations in the workplace captured the interest of many industrial/organizational psychology researchers. Human resource departments across the U.S. have not had effective strategies in place to teach management how to accommodate each generation's specific needs. The specific problem that leads to the loss of productivity is the disengagement and turnover of employees. This quantitative bivariate linear regression study examined the relationship between motivation and hygiene factors and worker satisfaction among administrative support service activities, management occupations, and manufacturing employees. Worker satisfaction was used as a basis to form inferences about levels of employee engagement or turnover intent within the context of Herzberg's two-factor theory of motivation and hygiene. The analyses examining the relationship between each type of motivation and job satisfaction resulted in support for hypotheses 1 to 9, except for hypothesis 9b. Specifically, for these analyses that were statistically significant (p = .027 to p < .005), the R2 values indicated strong model fit (R2 = .08 to .67). The next logical step in this line of research was to begin to include Generation Z in future cross-generation studies.