The Development of a New Measure of Global Work Autonomy

Abstract

This article reports the results of three studies in which reliability and validity data were examined for scores obtained on a new measure of global work autonomy. The respondents in these studies were 80 employees of a medium-size manufacturing firm, 6,810 employees of a large defense contractor, and 88 MBA students. To examine the convergence of reports of autonomy, data were also gathered from supervisors and coworkers of these students. Coefficient alphas for the autonomy scale for the three samples ranged from .79 to .90. Scores on the global work autonomy scale correlated with scores on theoretically related measures (e.g., in Studies 1 and 3, global autonomy scores correlated .54 and .69, respectively, with scores on the Job Diagnostic Survey Autonomy Scale). Although small in magnitude, in Study 2, predicted work autonomy score differences were found between union and nonunion employees and between supervisors and nonsupervisors.