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* . NBSIR 77-1257 - D0 N0T REMOVE

An Analysis of Employee

Publics and Employee

Communication Programs in

the National Bureau of

Standards

James E. Grunig

Seminar in Corporate Communication

College of Journalism

University of Maryland

June 1977

Final

Prepared for National Bureau of Standards

Washington, D.C. 20234

NBSIR 77-1257

AN ANALYSIS OF EMPLOYEE

PUBLICS AND EMPLOYEE

COMMUNICATION PROGRAMS IN

THE NATIONAL BUREAU OF

STANDARDS

James E. Grunig -

Seminar in Corporate Communication

College of Journalism " University of Maryland

June 1977

Final

Prepared for National Bureau of Standards

Washington, D.C. 20234

U S. DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE, Juanita M. Kreps. Secretary

Dr. Sidney Harman, Under Secretary

Jordan J. Baruch, Assistant Secretary for Science and Technology

NATIONAL BUREAU OF STANDARDS, Ernest Ambler, Acting Director
. A ; .*'• i 1 j

•' "
Index

Page

Introduction 1

Concepts and Methods 2

Discussion of Results 5

Media Use (Questions 1-5) 6

Content Preference (Question 6) 6

Evaluation of Media (Question 7) 6

Knowledge of Bureau News (Question 5) 6

Theoretical Variables (Part II, Questions 1-4) 7 Factor Analysis of Situational Variables 8

Factor Analysis of Media Use 9

Analysis of Content Preferences 9

Factor Analysis of Knowledge Questions 10

Conclusions and Results 16

Table 1 - Conditional Probabilities of Information

Processing and Information Seeking for 16 Communications Situations 19

Table 2 - Results of Employee Communications Study

for Entire Sample 20

Table 3 - Factor Loadings for 14 Communication Situations from Factor Analyses of Four Variables 30

Table 4 - Factor Loadings on Five Types of Media Use 31

Table 5 - Factor Loadings on Three Types of Content

Preference 32

Table 6 - Factor Loadings on Three Areas of Knowledge 33

Table 7 - Canonical Correlation of Grunig Situational

Variables with Communication and Media Variables 34

Table 8 - Comparison of Age and Years with Bureau of

Four Employee Types 35

Table 9 - Comparison of Four Employee Types by

Organizational Unit 35
Index (Continued)

Table 10 - Comparison of Four Employee Types by 36

Level of Education

Table 11 - Comparison of Four Employee Types of 36

Job Description

Table 12 - Comparison of Four Employee Types by GS or Wage-Scale Rating 37

Table 13 - Comparison of Four Employee Types by Sex 37

Table 14 - Comparison of Employee Types by Most Important

Publication 38

Table 15 - Comparison of Four Employee Types to Six

Questions about NBS Media 38
Introduction

The National Bureau of Standards, as a typical large research

organization, could be expected to have a number of gaps between

employees whose bridging is necessary for the coordination of the

organization. NBS employs hundreds of specialized scientists who

typically communicate with others in their specialty but communicate

little with scientists or nonscientists outside their specialty.

Likewise, the Bureau employs hundreds of technical, service, administrative, and clerical employees with little in common with their

research-oriented scientists. Finally, there typically is a gap

in large organizations between managerial and nonmanagerial employees,

a gap which is especially large when the nonmanagerial employees are themselves highly educated and autonomous professionals.

Communication is generally the most effective means of bridging

gaps of these kinds, and the National Bureau of Standards, as most

large organizations, engages in a number of internal communication

programs designed to bridge different gaps. Questions exist about

these programs, however, which only research can answer. Have all of

the gaps been identif ied— i .e. , are there information needs of employees which have not been recognized? Are the internal media now used the

most effective means of providing needed information? Do media now exist which once served a purpose but no longer are necessary? Do some media meet the same information needs and thus duplicate efforts?

Are there different information needs for different kinds of employees,

and are different media needed to meet these needs?

With these questions in mind, graduate students in the University

of Maryland's Seminar in Corporate Communication planned a study in

cooperation with the Bureau's Office of Information Programs. The

study was designed to result in a profile of employee publics, each

with different information needs. The profile also was designed to

determine how each employee public uses existing internal media and

each public's knowledge of information now being disseminated to em- ployees.
2

Concepts and Methods

Applied research may be approached in at least two ways. The

most common approach is to take a set of practices, or programs, as given and then observe the consequences--effects--of those programs.

The research results can then be used to revise the programs in order

to promote desirable consequences and reduce undesirable consequences.

The shortcoming of this approach, however, is that the programs being

studied may not have been the most appropriate in the first place.

When existing programs are evaluated in isolation, alternative programs

are seldom considered and seldom will the results of the research suggest new programs.

This seminar took a second approach to applied research. We believed that an applied researcher should begin with a theory which,

when measured in a research setting, would result in a profile of

communication problems and needs which the practitioner must deal

with. This profile then can be used as a yardstick to explain why

some existing programs are effective and others are not. It might

also suggest new programs which the practitioner may not previously

have considered.

The theory applied in this study was developed by Grunig as a means of identifying and targeting publics on the basis of similarity

in people's communication behaviors. The assumption behind the theory

is that a professional communicator should concentrate on communicating

with publics which are most likely to be communicating with him and

that he should provide information to publics which are most likely to

need and to seek that information. Information cannot affect the behavior of people unless they first process that information. Therefore, any communication program designed for people who are unlikely

to process the information represents a waste of resources.

The theory also assumes that communication is a situational behavior— i.e., that people communicate as a consequence of the way they

perceive a specific situation and not because of cross-situational

personality traits, attitudes, etc. Thus, the theory allows a re- searcher to do two things. First, by looking at how different people

perceive several situations, he can predict which people will seek

information about each of the situations. Second, by looking at the

nature of those situations, he can predict which kind of information

will be needed by people who are actively communicating —i.e., they

generally need information relevant to the situations about which

they are actively communicating.
3

In this study, the theory was used to isolate different types of

NBS employees with different kinds of information needs. These employee

types were then compared by their demographic characteristics in order

to make it possible to identify them. They were then compared by their

media use, their content preferences for NBS media, and their knowledge

of news items appearing in NBS oubl ications

In order to understand these results, it is useful at this point

to describe the Grunig theory in somewhat more detail. The theory uses

the combinations of four variables to indicate the extent to which a person will actively communicate about a particular situation. The

first of these concepts, problem recognition , represents the extent to

which a person recognizes that something is missing or indeterminant in

a situation so that he stops to think about the situation. The second

concept, constraint recognition , represents that extent to which a person perceives constraints in a situation which limit his freedom to

construct his own behavior. Generally, the theory holds, people will

communicate about situations in which they perceive something to be

missing and in which they do not perceive constraints which limit their

ability to personally affect the situation.

The combinations of these two concepts can be viewed as four types

of situations, situations in which people's behaviors can be expected

to be similar. The behaviors resulting in these four situations have

been called problem-facing behavior (high problem recognition, low

constraints), constrained behavior (high problem recognition, high

constraints), routine habit behavior (low problem recognition, low

constraints), and fatalistic behavior (low problem recognition, high

constraints)

Within each of these situations, a person may or may not make use

of a referent criterion, the third variable in the theory. A referent

criterion, in essence, exists when a person knows what to do in a situation. He might have knowledge or experience from similar situations,

or he might have a goal, a solution, or an attitude which he carries

from situation to situation. The effect of the referent criterion

is to reduce a person's need to communicate about a situation because

it indicates to that person, what his behavior should be in the situation.

Finally, a person can either be involved or not involved in each

of these four basic situations. This fourth variable in the theory,

level of involvement , is important because it changes a person's com- munication behavior from active information seeki ng to passive information processing . A person who perceives himself to be involved in

a situation actively--and selectively--looks for information to deal

with the situation--if he also perceives the situation in a way that

leads to problem-facing or constrained behavior. When involvement

is low, a person is unlikely to seek information at his own initiative.
4

The low-involvement problem-facing situation, however, often brings

forth "curious" people who seek information about situations that do

not involve them. On the other hand, a person will process information

about situations which do not involve him if he is exposed to it without any effort on his part. For example, a person waiting in a waiting

room may process information in an available magazine although he would

not otherwise seek out that information.

These four variables can be grouped into 16 different combinations,

combinations which can be viewed as 16 different ways of perceiving a situation. Previous research has shown that the probability that a person will seek or process information differs across these 16 com- binations. Table 1 presents the most accurate set of probabilities

that have been calculated to date. The communication professional

can use this theory to identify, in this case, how each type of em- ployee views each of several types of situations confronted on the job.

Once he knows how these employee types view the job, he can consult

the table of probabilities to determine his chances of communicating

with these employee types about the situations of concern.

In this study, the theory was measured for 14 different situations

that might affect NBS employees. These situations were chosen to cover

a wide range of potential information needs that NBS employees might

experience. For each of the 14 situations, respondents used a fourpoint scale to respond to four questions designed to measure each of

the concepts in the theory: Is this situation something you stop to

think about? (problem recognition); To what extent do you see a con- nection between yourself and each of the situations? (level of involvement); How much experience or knowledge do you have that could help

you make judgements about each of the situations? (referent criterion);

and How much could you do personally, that might improve the handling

of each of the situations? (constraint recognition).

In addition to measuring these concepts, questions were also designed to measure readership or use of 21 NBS employee media. Employees were also asked how likely they would be to reach each of 16 different

types of articles if they appeared in NBS media, content areas which

were chosen to represent current media content and to relate to the

situations chosen for measurement of the Grunig theory. Finally, em- ployees were asked if they had heard each of nine different items of

NBS information, and, if they had heard them, the source from which

they first got the information. These nine items were chosen to fit

situations measured in the Grunig theory and to represent items which

had appeared in different employee media. These knowledge questions,

therefore, allowed us to determine if the employees that the theory

predicts would seek or process certain kinds of information had indeed

heard that information. It also allowed us to determine if employees

who had heard the items tended to use any particular media in seeking

that information.
5

These questions, then, were arranged into a 10-page questionnaire

which was mailed to a sample of 600 Bureau employees (out of approximately 3,000 total employees). Fifty of the 600 were returned because

the employee no longer worked at the Bureau or for similar reasons.

Of the remaining 550 respondents, 425 returned usable questionnaires,

for a response rate of 77 percent.

Of these returns, 339 came after the first mailing and 86 after a follow-up mailing. Page 10 of Table 2 compares the resultant sample

with actual population percentages on one demographic characteristic

and compares the first-return respondents with the follow-up respondents on seven characteristics. The comparison of the first-return

and follow-up respondents was done to identify the characteristics

of the nonrespondents who tend to be similar to respondents who return

a questionnaire after a follow-up appeal.

These data show that there are somewhat more professionals and

administrative personnel in the sample than in the entire population

and somewhat fewer wage scale and clerical employees. The same differences were found in comparing the first-return and follow-up subsamples. These comparisons also showed that employees in the firstreturn sample had somewhat more education than those in the followup sample and that they were found in higher GS grades. Employees in

the first return sample also had worked significantly fewer years at

the Bureau than those in the follow-up sample. This pattern of more

educated employees being more likely to return the questionnaire is common for self-administered questionnaires, and with the high return

rate in the study represents a minor bias. It should be remembered,

however, that professional employees are slightly overrepresented when

the results are examined.

Several statistical techniques were used to analyze the data,

and these techniques will be explained in more detail when the results

are discussed. In the results which follow, frequency counts for all

questions on the questionnaire are first presented and discussed.

Factor analysis then was used to reduce the situational theory questions,

media questions, content questions, and knowledge questions to a few major categories. Canonical correlation then was used to relate the situational theory results to the media and communication variables and to

develop employee types. These employee types then were cross-tabulated

with the demographic variables and other media use variables to provide

a complete profile of the employee types.

Discussion of Results

Table 2 is a reproduction of the entire questionnaire with re- sponse frequencies for the entire sample for each question. These

total responses are useful primarily in giving perspective on the data

and in some instances in indicating the most used media, most important
6

situations, etc. The most useful results are found, however, when

these responses are combined into a profile of employee types and compared across employee types. Briefly, these overall responses can be

summarized as follows:

Media Use (Questions 1-5) : In large part, these results reflect

the numbers of people who receive each of the publications. For example, program newsletters are not frequently used because over half of

the sample do not receive them. Nevertheless, the two media which

stand out as most used are the NBS Standard and the Technical Calendar,

followed by Fire Prevention and Accident News and SEBA News. Likewise,

when respondents were asked to choose which publication they would

read if they had time to read only one they chose the Technical Calendar first, followed by the Standard and Dimensions magazine. Question

4 shows that about two-thirds of NBS employees spend some time but less

than an hour a week reading Bureau publications. Question 5 shows

little redundancy in Bureau publications. The most frequent responses

for each publication is that employees sometimes or rarely see information in each publication that they have already heard from other sources.

Content Preference (Question 6) : Mean responses on the content

categories show that people would read most of the items at least half

of the time they appear. The most popular areas, however, are news about pay and benefit plans, congressional legislation affecting NBS,

news from the Department of Commerce affecting NBS, messages from the

Director, and news of appointments and awards. Least popular are reports

of speeches by NBS administrators and news of SEBA sports activities.

Most research news categories get middle-range scores indicating they

are popular with some employees but not others. Later we will identify

these employees. In general, then, it seems that most employees are interested in news about changes affecting the organization and presumably their jobs. Some, but not all employees are interested in the more specialized types of content.

Evaluation of Media (Question 7) : Results indicate that the first source of information about Bureau activities is the Standard and "other

employees." The most dependable sources of information are the Technical Calendar and the Standard. The most useful sources are the Technical Calendar and the supervisor. Several media are chosen as providing

the most complete information: the Standard, Technical Calendar, the

supervisor, Dimensions magazine, and other employees. Most employees

would choose the Standard to communicate information about themselves,

and most say the Standard and Dimensions present the most accurate picture of Bureau events and people. Finally, the Standard, Dimensions,

Administrative Issuances and the Technical Calendar are most likely

to be saved for future reference.

Knowledge of Bureau News (Question 5) : From 40 to 70 percent of

employee respondents had not heard each of the news items. The most
7

known items were that NBS had published product standards for toys, the

"flextime" experiment for civil service employees, and the appointment

of an administrator. These results follow closely the content preferences reported earlier. The least heard items were the research items

and the employee sports items, again reflecting a more specialized interest by fewer employees. The sources from which employees had first heard

these items showed no dominant media, but rather seemed to show that

employees who had heard information heard it from the source where it

first appeared. In other words, they seem to be seeking information

relevant to them from a number of sources and not from a limited number

of sources.

Theoretical Variables (Part II, Questions 1-4) : These results

will be useful primarily in categorizing employees, but they do give

some indications, in raw form, of how employees perceive these NBS

situations. First, the problem recognition question shows that em- ployees think the most about public understanding of NBS research,

decisions in the Dept, of Commerce, Congressional legislation affecting

NBS, the relationship between NBS and the scientific community, decisions made in the director's office, the NBS budget, employee benefits,

and transportation to and from NBS. As expected these results closely

resemble the information preference results and again indicate the most

frequently felt information needs of the largest number of Bureau em- ployees.

The level of involvement results follow a similar pattern, but

the scores are generally lower than the problem recognition scores. This would indicate that although employees think about these issues

they do not feel a strong personal involvement in them. Thus, they

would not actively go out and seek the information but would process it

if it appears in a convenient form when they have time to attend to it.

This interpretation also seems to be borne out by the relatively small

amount of time employees report reading NBS publications.

The referent criterion results show most employees do not perceive

much knowledge and experience which might be relevant--indicating that

they can use information. But employees feel constrained in most of

these situations so that they probably do not believe they can personally

use much of the information provided them. The major exceptions to this

pattern are the categories of public understanding of NBS research and

the relationship between NBS and the scientific community. In both

cases, employees do feel they have knowledge and experience and that they

can personally do something. Although outside the scope of this study

these two results seem to indicate that employees perceive a need and are willing to communicate to outside groups, a situation which the information staff should take advantage of.

Given these overall results, we can turn to a series of statistical

manipulations that were done to reduce the data to more manageable categories. The first of these manipulations were factor analyses of the
8

four situational variables, the media use variables, the content preference variables, and the knowledge variables. Factor analysis is a technique which examines inter-relationships between a set of variables and places i ntercorrel ated variables into factors--major dimensions

or categories. Thus 15 variables, for example, might be grouped into

three factors. Each variable then has a "loading" on each factor,

which is the degree to which the variable correlates with or relates

to all of the variables with high loadings on the factor. In essence,

then, factor analysis is a means of reducing a large number of variables

to a smaller and more manageable number of variables. In this study, seven separate factor analyses were conducted as preliminary stages in

developing profiles of employees. These results, however, are useful

in discerning situational patterns and patterns of media use.

Factor Analysis of Situational Variables : Each of the four situational variables--problem recognition, level of involvement, referent

criterion, and constraint recognition--was measured for 14 different

NBS situations. Factor analysis of each of these four variables, for

the 14 situations, was done to reduce the situations to a smaller number

of categories. In each of these analyses, three factors resulted (factors were extracted as long as they had an eigen value of 1.0).

With minor variations, the three factors were almost identical for

the four variables. Based on the loadings shown in Table 3, the three

factors were named the administrative situations factor, the research

situations factor, and the employee situations factor. Situations

loading highly on the administrative factor generally included the NBS

budget, Congressional legislation, appointments of program directors,

decisions in the Department of Commerce, and decisions made in the

director's office. Situations loading highly on the research factor

included research and services of the four NBS technical institutes,

public understanding of NBS research, and the relationship between NBS

and the scientific community. The employee factor included situations

such as providing social activities for employees, improving employee

benefits, and transportation to and from NBS.

There are some deviations from this pattern, however. Some situations, particularly the NBS budget, load on all three factors--indicating

they are important to all types of employees. Congressional legislation,

decisions in the Department of Commerce, decisions in the director's

office, and appointments of program directors also load across factors.

The greatest overlap, however, is between the administrative and research

factors, indicating an overlap of interest between those employees con- cerned with research and those concerned with administrative matters.

The final stage of the factor analysis was the computation of a factor score for each employee respondent on each of the factors. These

factor scores are the average of each person's scores on the variables

making up a factor, weighted by the loading of each variable on the
9

factor. In other words, after the factor analysis, a person has a score on three factors rather than on 14 individual situations. These

factor scores, then were used as the input in later statistical analyses.

Factor Analysis of Media Use : Because 21 different NBS media were

included in the study, a factor analysis was also performed to indicate

which media tend to be used together and by the same people. Five factors resulted from this analysis, factors which were named the principal

media factor, the bulletin board factor, the administrative media factor,

the addresses factor, and the technical seminar factor (Table 4).

The principal media factor consists primarily of these media which

employees reported using most often. It includes the NBS Standard, the

SEBA News, the Technical Calendar, the Credit Union Newsletter, and the

Fire Prevention and Accident News. The Administrative Calendar, Administrative Bulletins, and Dimensions magazine also received substantial

loadings on this factor.

The other factors represented more specialized media. The bulletin

board factor consisted primarily of signs, posters, and official bulletin boards. SEBA News, the Credit Union Newsletter, and Fire Prevention

and Accident Information also loaded on the factor, however. As its name implies, the administrative media factor consisted mostly of administrative outlets: press releases, Monthly Highlights, program news- letters, the Annual Report, Administrative Bulletins, Administrative

Manual Issuances, and Dimensions magazine. The addresses factor con- sisted primarily of the State of the Bureau address and other formal

addresses. Finally, the technical seminar factor consisted of technical

seminars and colloquia. Most other media loaded negatively on this factor, indicating that people who attend technical seminars and colloquia

tend not to use the other media. It is also interesting to note that

Dimensions magazine loaded on all of these factors except the bulletin

board factor, indicating that the magazine is being used by a number of

different kinds of employees.

Factor scores were also computed for these five factors and input

into later analyses.

Analysis of Content Preferences : In the questionnaire, employees

had indicated how often they believed they would read 16 different kinds

of content in NBS publications. In this case, factor analysis fit these

variables into the same categories as the factor analysis of the situational variables: an administrative content factor, a research content

factor, and an employee content factor (Table 5).

The major loadings in the Administrative Content Factor include

news from the Department of Commerce, the NBS budget, Congressional

legislation, messages from the director, reports of speeches by administrators, and news of pay and benefit plans. The research content factor consisted primarily of news of technical programs in each of the
10

four technical institutes. However, speeches by administrators , the

budget, news from Commerce, messages from the director, and Congressional

legislation also loaded on this factor, indicating that those employees

with an interest in research information also have a secondary interest

in these administrative items. Finally, the employee content factor

was typified by news of activities at NBS, human interest stories about

employees, SEBA sports activities, letters to the editor, news of appointments and awards, and news of pay and benefit plans. Historical articles

about the Bureau loaded about equally on all three factors, indicating

that most employees have about the same level of interest in this area.

Again these results were converted to factor scores for each re- spondent and used in later analyses.

Factor Analysis of Knowledge Questions : The final factor analysis

was performed on nine knowledge items that had been chosen to represent

different kinds of NBS situations. Whereas the content preferences had

measured what employees say they would like to hear, the knowledge items

determined whether in fact they had heard those kinds of information.

Again, these items factored into three factors similar to those found for

other variables: an administrative factor, a research factor, and an employee factor (Table 6).

The most important items on the Administrative Factor were the

appointment of an institute director, the appointment of the Undersecretary of Commerce, and the 1977 NBS budget. The most important

loadings on the research factor were four research items from each of

the technical institutes. The administrative items also had moderate

loadings on the research factor, however. The most important items

on the employee factor were the softball team reaching tournament finals

and the "flextime" experiment for civil service employees. However,

two research items and two administrative items also loaded highly on this factor, as they did on all three factors. These four items, the

budget, under secretary appointment, flame inhibitors, and standards for

toys thus seemed to have been heard by employees with all three types of

information needs.

As with the other factor analyses, factor scores again were computed for use in further analysis.

After these preliminary factor analyses to reduce the data to more manageable categories, the next step was to combine the categories into a profile of employee situations. For this purpose, a canonical correlation analysis was performed to correlate the situational

variables with the communication variables, thus making it possible to use the situational variables to explain the content preferences, knowledge levels, and media use of different types of NBS employees.
11

A canonical correlation works somewhat like a simple correlation

which is used to determine the extent to which two variables are associated with one another. For example, the attribute of blond hair may be

correlated with the attribute of blue eyes, and a high correlation co- efficient would indicate that blond-haired people tend to have blue

eyes. Canonical correlation works in much the same way, except that

instead of two variables several variables are correlated simultaneously

with several other variables. The result is a set of canonical variates that are much like the factors that result from factor analysis.

In contrast to factor analysis, however, canonical correlation begins

with two sets of variables--one set of independent variables and one

set of dependent variables--rather than a single set of interrelated

variables. Canonical variates, then, consist of sets of independent and

dependent variables which are maximally correlated with each other. In this study, the Grunig situational variables were the independent variables and they were used to explain the dependent communication variables. The variables used in the canonical correlation were the seven

sets of factor scores which resulted from the preliminary factor analyses

and the variable of how much time employees reported spending each week

with NBS media.

As used in this study, the canonical variates can be interpreted

as different kinds of communication behavior patterns exhibited by Bureau

employees. Any one employee may engage in more than one of these behavior

patterns, but for simplicity each employee was assigned into an employee

type, as determined by his highest score on the canonical variates.

Canonical variate scores can be computed for each person just as factor

scores are computed from factor analysis, and these scores--from the independent variables half of the analysis (the situational variables)--

were used to place employees into types. The types then were cross- tabulated with demographic variables to make identification and location

of each employee type possible.

As Table 7 indicates, four statistically significant canonical

variates resulted. Three of them corresponded to the three sets of

factors that had resulted in earlier stages, a research variate, an administrative variate, and an employee variate. A fourth variate

also resulted, however, which can be named the non-involved variate.

We will describe that fourth variate in more detail later, but its

characteristics seem to represent an important type of employee behavior. That behavior seems to be characterized by a lack of involvement in Bureau situations, a high level of constraints in those situations, and a lack of attention to Bureau media and information.

The research variate seems to describe a type of employee who pays

most attention to research-related situations at the Bureau. The type's

highest level of problem recognition occurs in research situations. However, this type does not feel particularly involved, feels constrained,

and does not have a referent criterion in research situations. This

type no doubt represents scientists engaged in research. Thus it seems
12

anomalous that these people are only average in involvement, are high

in constraints, and are low in having a referent criterion. The ex- planation seems to lie in the fact that the items in which employees

responded concerned all kinds of research in the Bureau. Thus, these

employees may be involved, unconstrained, and have knowledge in their

own research field, but would not perceive other research situations

in the same way.

Thus, this type perceives research situations in a way that,

theoretical ly, can be labeled low involvement, constrained behavior

without a referent criterion. The probabilities shown previously in

Table 1 indicate that this type of employee would be moderately high

in both seeking and processing research information, and the communication variable scores in Table 7 bear this out. Time spent with NBS

media has neither a positive nor negative relationship with this variate indicating only an average time spent seeking a wide range of Bureau

information. But the scores on addresses and seminars is high, indicating seeking of more specialized information. The type does show

a preference for research content over other types of content and is more likely to have heard the research items than the other items

(probably because they have processed available research information

rather than sought it out). That the type is not an active information

seeking type is also shown by average scores on use of principal media,

administrative media and bulletin boards.

The situational variables for the research type also indicate that

it would be likely to process administrative information (low involvement problem-facing behavior with a referent criterion), although the

moderate presence of a referent criterion indicates that this type believes it knows how to deal with administrative situations. The re- search type, however, would be unlikely either to process or seek employee

information (low involvement fatalistic behavior with a referent criterion.)

Both predictions are borne out by the communication scores in Table 7.

The second variate clearly represents a type of employee who is most

involved in administrative situations. The type perceives administrative

situations as high involvement problem-facing situations with no referent

criterion present, a way of perceiving situations that Table 1 indicates

should lead to maximum processing and seeking of administrative information. The bottom half of Table 7 strongly supports this prediction.

But this type also perceives employee situations in the same way, and

Table 7 also supports the prediction that the administrative type will

both seek and process employee information.

The administrative type perceives research situations as low involvement constrained situations with no referent criterion. Thus, it could

also be expected to process but not to actively seek research information,

a prediction also supported by Table 7. Because the score on knowledge

of research information is lower than the score for interest in research

content, this type seems to have a desire to process research information

but does not actually carry out this desire.
13

The third variable represents a type of employee who would be

most likely to communicate about employee situations. It views em- ployee situations as high involvement problem facing situations with

a referent criterion present. As predicted this type expresses a strong preference for employee content, but interestingly has a negative score in actually having heard employee items. This could have

resulted from the presence of a referent criterion. Or it could have

resulted because the employee knowledge factor contained a number of

administrative items, and this type scored particularly low in interest

in administrative information. The employee type should also process

research information (it viewed research situations as low- involvement

problem-facing situations without a referent criterion), and the scores

on research content, research knowledge and attendance at addresses and

seminars bear this out. This type also should have no interest in administrative information (low involvement routine habit without a referent criterion) and the communication and media scores support this com- pletely.

The final variate, which we have called the noninvolved variate,

represents a type of employee who recognizes problems and thinks about

all three types of situations. Nevertheless, the other three situational

variables discourage information seeking--al though not information processing— in employee and administrative situations. Low involvement,

high constraints, and the presence of a referent criterion would discourage seeking of employee-related information and high constraint and

low involvement would discourage seeking of administrative information.

A problem-facing situation with regard to research situations, however,

should stimulate this type to seek research information although a moderate involvement level may limit this type to the processing of

research information. That prediction is supported by a strong ex- pressed interest in research information but is not supported by a negative score on knowledge of research items. Interestingly, the type has

opposite scores also on its expressed preference for administrative

content (positive score) and employee content (negative score) and its

actual knowledge of administrative information (negative score) and

employee information (positive score).

The best explanation is that this fourth type does not feel involved in most Bureau situations and thus spends little time seeking

information (note negative coefficient for time spent on media). However, this type is more likely than other types to use the principle

Bureau media— not doubt by processing information easily available in

these media— and its knowledge level simply reflects the agenda set

by these principle media. Such results can generally be expected in

low involvement situations. In any case, this fourth type does appear

to represent a type of employee which is largely unconcerned with the

kinds of communication formally carried out at the Bureau.

One overall conclusion that can be drawn from Table 7 is that the

level of involvement variables generally did not come out with high
14

coefficients on the canonical variates. The one exception is the

level of involvement in employee situations. There could be many

reasons for this lack of correlation, but the most plausible seems

to be that employees do not perceive that most of the situations

measured involve them. Table 2, as discussed above, showed the

-involvement scores to be skewed to the lower end of the scale, and

in most of the situations a third to a half of the respondents said

they could see no connection between themselves and the situations.

Since the correlations were low with the involvement variables we

can conclude that perceived involvement is low for most employees

and that this low involvement does not differ much for the four

types of employees. The exception, again, is employee situations

in which some employees perceive a higher involvement than others.

We will return to the implications of this result later, but it

should be said here that it probably indicates that employee communication programs, in this organization at least, must communicate information that does not involve the employees receiving it. Thus employees

will process the information if it is not difficult to obtain but will

not expend much effort in seeking out the information. Again, the

small amount of time employees report they spend reading NBS publications support this conclusion.

We can then turn to a comparison of the demographic characteristics

of these four employee types. Tables 8 to 13 show that the types differ significantly on all of the demographic measures. It should be

noted first that approximately equal numbers of NBS employees had their

highest scores on each of the four types, although there are slightly

more employees on the noninvolved type than on the other types.

Table 8 shows that the research type is older than the other types

and has been with the Bureau longer. The administrative type and the

noninvolved type are not younger than the other types but have been

with the Bureau fewer years. Table 9 shows that employees in the four

technical institutes are most likely to be found in the research type,

although this is less true for employees in the Institute for Computer

Sciences and Technology. The administrative type consists mostly of

employees in the Office of the Director and in the Office of Administration. Employees in the Office of Information Programs tend to

split between the research type and the administrative type although

more are found in the research type. Finally, Table 9 shows that

employees in the employee type and the noninvolved type come from all

organizational units. Thus, it would seem that the employee and non- involved types consist of employees who are on the fringes of being

actively involved in the programs for which they work and thus are most concerned with their status as employees or tend not to be con- cerned with the Bureau at all.

A similar pattern shows up when the types are compared by education

(Table 10). The research-oriented employees have high levels of education, the admini strati ve-oriented employees lower levels of education,
15

and the employee-oriented and noninvolved employees come from all

educational levels. Comparison of the types by job description and

salary grade also supports that pattern. Most of the research type

are professionals, most of the administrative type are administrative,

wage scale, or clerical employees, and the employee and noninvolved

types come from all job descriptions. Research-type employees come from higher salary grades and administrative-type employees from

lower salary grades (although a number of higher-grade administrators

also fit into the administrative type). The employee type and non- involved type come from all but the highest salary scales. Tables 11 and 12 show, however, that the noninvolved type consists mostly of

wage scale, technician, and clerical employees in lower salary scales.

Finally, Table 13 compares the types by sex, and shows that males

are more likely than females to be in the research type while the sex distribution in the employee type is about the same as in the Bureau

as a whole. Females, however, are more likely than males to be in

the administrative and noninvolved types.

As a final comparison of the four types of employees, the types were cross tabulated by the media questions that were not included in

the canonical correlation analysis. Table 14 shows that when asked

which Bureau publication they would read if they could read only one,

the research type chose the Technical Calendar and Dimensions magazine.

The other three types chose the Technical Calendar and the Standard in

that order, although both the employee type and the noninvolved type

had Dimensions in third place (both types also expressed an interest

in research content). The administrative type also expressed interest

in the Administrative Calendar. Thus, all types tend to choose the

two principle NBS news publications first, but there is an across-theboard interest in a research-oriented pub! ication--i .e. , Dimensions.

A comparison of the responses to the question asking if there

was any redundancy in NBS media showed little deviation from the

overall pattern discussed earlier. The noninvolved type generally

saw less redundancy, probably because it spends less time with the

media. Generally, however, all types reported little redundancy in

media content.

Table 15 compares the responses of each of the types to the series

of questions asking them to compare and evaluate various NBS media. Most

of these results do not deviate from the overall pattern. The only difference is that the research type said "other employees" are its first source of information whereas other types choose the Standard. Likewise, the research type said its supervisor is the most dependable source

of information and the others chose the Standard or the Technical Calendar. Also, the research type said the supervisor provides the most com- plete information while the others choose the Standard or the Technical

Calendar. Otherwise, all types say the Technical Calendar is most useful,
16

all would choose the Standard to communicate information about themselves, and all think the Standard presents the most accurate picture

of Bureau events and people.

Finally, the four types were compared on the media from which they

had heard the items of information included in the knowledge questions.

Most of the differences here were in whether the types had heard the

items, as already discussed in presenting the canonical correlation

results. When employees had heard the information, all types tended

to hear it from the same place. Likewise, these knowledge sources

showed no dominant medium. Rather, employees with knowledge of Bureau

news tended to pick it up from a number of sources.

Conclusions and Recommendations

The results of this study seem to suggest three major conclusions

about employee communications in the National Bureau of Standards. First,

the results suggest that NBS employee media contain information about

situations which employees do not perceive to involve them. Second,

the study has isolated four types of employee publics with different

communication behaviors, different information needs, and for which

different communication strategies are necessary. Finally, the re- sults make it possible to evaluate whether existing NBS media currently

meet the internal communication needs of the Bureau and whether changes

are necessary.

The first conclusion is an important one for a scientific organization like the Bureau which has a high proportion of professional em- ployees. An organization of this type typically grants its employees

a great deal of autonomy in their work so as to maximize innovation.

In other words, professional employees are allowed a great deal of

personal involvement in their own work. What this study seems to have

shown, however, is that this involvement in one's own work is accompanied

by a low level of involvement in the overall administration of the

organization and in the activities of other employees. In a decentralized organization, internal communication is especially important if

the activities of employees are to be coordinated. However, it is

difficult to force employees to communicate and if their level of involvement is low they will seldom actively communicate--seek information— about the situations which do not involve them.

The study also indicates, however, that employees will process

information about 1 ow- involvement problems. In other words, employees

can be informed about administrative and research activities of the

Bureau but such information is not really as critical to them as is

information directly relevant in their day-to-day jobs. While internal

communication in such a setting cannot secure active cooperation among

professionals and between administrators and other employees, it can secure awareness of and perhaps appreciation of one another's problems

and activities.
17

The nature of the information that employees will process, however, differs by types of employees. The research-oriented type--

which consists mostly of scientists--wi 1 1 process research information

and to some extent administrative information, particularly such administrative information as budgets. Congressional legislation, and

decisions in the Department of Commerce and the Director's office.

The administration-oriented type consists both of top administrators

and of lower-level administrative and clerical aides. They think

most about administrative problems, but also pay attention to employee

and research problems. They are also highly involved in employee situations and moderately involved in administrative situations. Thus

they will process--and perhaps actively seek--administrative information

and employee information and are most likely to use administrative

media. They are also predisposed to process research information,

but in practice do not seem to have time to do so.

The employee oriented type seems to consist of employees from

many levels and positions of the Bureau who are probably less involved

in their own work than the first two types and as a result are mostly

concerned with their status as employees. Although they indicate an interest in employee and research information, in practice they demonstrate only a moderate awareness of this type of information. The

fourth, noninvolved type, thinks about most of the situations which

were measured but because of a low level of perceived involvement or

high perceived constraints seeks or processes little information. This

type consists mostly of nonprofessional employees from several different organizational levels. This last type does use the principal

NBS media, however, and thus processes the information available in

these media. They are most likely, however, to process such employeerelated information as items about social and recreational activities

and employee benefits, rather than information about the research or administrative activities of the Bureau.

The use employees make of NBS media begins to make sense when it

is compared with each employee type's perception of Bureau situations.

The two most frequently used publications, the Technical Calendar and

the NBS Standard are publications used by all types, but particularly

by the employee-oriented and noninvolved types. These are broad-scale

media which, in essence, indicate what is on the Bureau's agenda.

Reading enough to know what is on the agenda is typical behavior for

noninvolved people--e.g. , watching television news or scanning newspaper

headlines. Thus, the roles of these two media are simply to let people

know what is happening. Likewise, the noninvolved types also are most

likely to scan bulletin boards. The research-oriented and administrativeoriented employees, however, use more specialized media--addresses , seminars, and Dimensions magazine for research and the Administrative Calendar, Administrative Issuances, and addresses for administrative information.

Thus, there seems to be little overlap in NBS media. Some simply tell
18

people what is on the agenda, some provide research information, and

others provide administrative information.

However, there do seem to be some gaps which either modified or new media should fill. Most of the employee types--but especially the

research and administrative types--are interested in information about

budgets, Congressional legislation, decisions in the Department of

Commerce, and decisions in the Director's Office. If such information were provided more and in more depth in the Standard it could become

a publication that is sought out rather than simply processed. Finally, a large group of people need information about the research activities in the Bureau, and no single publication now seems to do this.

If possible, Dimensions magazine should be distributed to all Bureau

employees, and in particular to the scientists that make up the research

type. The recent conversion of Dimensions to a more technical publication

also would seem to strengthen its utility for these people. Second, more research items could be included in the Standard. And open houses,

in which employees can observe research activities of others, would seem desirable.

Finally, some recommendations for the NBS Standard seem to be in

order. Most commercial newspapers follow a format in which the news most relevant to all readers is put on the front page and in which

specialized information is placed in specialized sections. This format also seems ideal for the Standard. The front pages should contain

the most relevant information for everyone--budgets , legislation, major

decisions, etc. Inside there should be a specialized research section

for research-oriented employees and an employee news section for employeeoriented employees. There might also be a specialized section for administrative news of concern to administrative-oriented employees, although several specialized media now serve this function.
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of

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over

all

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was

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for

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for

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and

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for

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an

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Source:

James

E.

Grunig,

"A

Situational

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of

Environmental

Communication

Behavior,"

manuscript

submitted

for

publication,

December

1976.
20

Table 2. Results of Employee Communications Study for Entire Sample

I. The first set of questions asked about media used to communicate with

employees at the Bureau. You may not have received some of these publications. For each question place a check in the column that best

describes your answer.

(5)

Always

(4)

Most of

the time

(3)

About Half

of the Time

(2)

Hardly

Ever

(1)

Never

Don't

or Receive

How often do you read:

NBS Standard 49.4 34.5 11.8 2.8 1 .4

Mean

Score

(4.3)

Technical Calendar... 53.9 29.2 10.0 3.6 3.3 (4.3)

Administrative

Calendar 29.6 21 .8 10.9 11.4 26.2 (3.2)

Administrative

Bulletins 25.8 26.0 14.6 15.8 17.8 (3.3)

Fire Prevention and

Accident Information. 27.4 34.0 21.2 12.3 5.2 (3.7)

NBS Press Releases. .

.

8.2 16.2 14.5 23.7 37.3 (2.3)

Monthly Highl ights. .

.

15.9 21 .4 19.5 19.0 24.1 (2.9)

Program Newsletters.. 3.7 9.4 14.1 22.2 50.6 (1.9)

NBS Annual Report 14.7 15.9 15.2 20.7 33.5 (2.6)

Dimensions Magazine.. 21 .0 26.3 20.0 16.2 16.4 (3.2)

Administrative Manual

Issuances 18.8 15.4 12.7 17.1 35.9 (2.6)

Signs posted throughout the buildings. 9.8 37.6 31.9 17.7 2.9 (3.3)

Official bulletin

boards 7.9 20.6 31.2 35.0 5.3 (2.9)

Posters 9.3 27.8 37.3 20.6 5.0 (3.2)

SEBA News 29.4 28.9 24.2 11.5 6.0 (3.6)

Credit Union Newsletter 23.0 25.4 19.2 16.9 15.4 (3.2)

How often do you attend:

State of the Bureau

address 22.7 23.0 15.6 19.2 19.4 (3.1)

Other formal addresses

by high-ranking NBS

officials 3.8 19.3 23.4 32.0 21 .5 (2.5)

Technical seminars... 1.0 13.6 28.4 30.5 26.5 (2.3)

Colloquia 0.5 10.5 25.4 32.1 3.1 -JL (2.2)
o

21

\ 3. If you had time to read only one NBS publication, which would you read?

(check one)

23.4 N BS Standard (1)

17.9 D imensions magazine (2)

38.8 Technical Calendar (3)

9.1 Administrative Calendar (4)

4.5 Administrative Issuances (5)

4.5 Monthly Highlights (6)

1.7 Program Newsletters (7)

4. About how much time would you estimate you spend each week reading NBS

publications such as those just mentioned?

1.9 N o time (1

)

68.2 S ome time, but less than 1 hour (2)

28.1 1-3 hours (3) Mean = 2.3

1.7 4 -6 hours (4)

0.2 More than 6 hours (5)

5. How often would you say you see information in the following NBS publications which you have already heard from other sources?

(5) (4) (3) (2) (1)

Often Sometimes Rarely Never I Don't Receive

Mean

NBS Standard 13.3 46.7 28.0 10.1 1.9 1376)

Dimensions magazine... 8.3 35.0 30.1 14.3 12.4 (3.1)

Technical Calendar.... 3.7 30.6 41.6 19.8 4.4 (3.1)

Admin i strati ve Calendar 3.7 23.3 27.8 15.4 29.8 (2.6)

Administrative

Issuances 2.5 21 .0 26.2 17.0 33.3 (2.4)

Monthly Highl ights . .5.2 28.7 24.3 16.5 25.3 (2.7)

Program Newsletters.. 1.5 15.4 18.1 16.9 48.1 (2.1)

Next, would you indicate about how often you would read each of the foillowing

types of articles if it appeared in an NBS publ icat ion? Would you read it?

(5) (4) (3) (2) (1)

Most of Half the Hardly

Always the time time Ever Never Mean

News of appointments

or awards 26.1 39.7 19.7 12.1 2.4 (3.8)

News about pay and

benefit plans 49.5 31.0 12.6 6.2 0.7 (4.2)

Stories about social

activities at NBS.14.5 25.7 28.6 26.0 5.2 (3.2)

News about SEBA sports

activities 10.5 18.4 24.6 34.7 11.7 (2.8)

Letters to editor

and responses 14.7 33.4 27.7 20.4 3.8 (3.3)
22

(Continued) (5) (4) (3) (2) (1)

Most of Half the Hardly

Always the time time Ever Never Mean

News on Congressional

Legislation affecting NBS 31.4 46.0 14.5 7.4 0.7 (4.0)

Human Interest Stories

about NBS employees 17.4 35.8 32.2 12.6 1.9 (3.5)

Messages from the

Director 29.0 41.1 19.5 8.6 1.9 (3.9)

News from the Department of Commerce

affecting NBS 30.3 43.2 18.9 6.0 1.7 (3.9)

Historical articles

about the Bureau . .

.

19.6 38.3 31.6 8.6 1.9 (3.7)

News about the NBS

budget 24.0 33.1 24.7 15.1 3.1 (3.6)

News of technical programs in the Institute for Basic

Standards 14.9 26.4 27.8 24.5 6 5 (3.2)

News of technical programs in the Institute for Materials

Research 14.6 25.4 27.1 26.1 6.7 (3.2)

News of technical programs in the Institute for Applied

Technol ogy 14.4 27.8 27.0 25.4 5.5 (3.2)

News of technical programs in the Institute for Computer

Sciences and Technology 10.8 21 .2 27.5 30.6 9.9 (2.9)

Reports of speeches by

NBS administrators.. 3.8 15.6 28.4 40.1 12.0 (2.6)
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25

II. After each of the next four questions, several situations or issues

are listed which might be considered important for you or the Bureau

to think about. Answer the question for each item, placing a sheet

in the column that best describes your answer.

1. Is this something you stop to think about?

(4)

Often

(3)

Sometimes

(2)

Rarely

(1)

Never Mean

Improving employee benefits 19.8 38.8 32.3 9.2 (2.7)

Public understanding of MBS

research 34.2 44.5 15.7 5.7 (3.1)

Research and services of the

Institute for Computer

Sciences & Technology 15.5 21.5 33.4 29.5 (2.2)

The NBS Budget 21.6 39.6 28.2 10.7 (2.7)

Transportation to and from NBS.. 25.9 34.4 26.3 13.4 (2.7)

Research and services of the

Institute for Basic Standards 17.2 28.6 33.0 21.1 (2.4)

The relationship between NBS and

the scientific community 28.4 41 .7 19.7 10.2 (2.9)

Providing social activities for

NBS employees 6.3 22.6 41 .4 29.7 (2.1)

Research and services of the

Institute for Materials

Research 18.0 23.4 33.6 25.1 (2.3)

Appointments of new NBS program directors 9.5 31 .9 35.0 23.6 (2.3)

Congressional legislation that

affects NBS 25.2 48.3 19.0 7.5 (2.9)

Decisions in the Department of

Commerce affecting NBS 25.4 45.5 22.0 7.2 (2.9)

Research and services of the

Institute for Applied Technology 16.1 25.2 38.1 20.6 (2.4)

Decisions made in the NBS

Director's Office 24.0 45.4 20.2 10.3 (2.8)

To what extent do you see a connection between yourself and each of the

following? Is the connection:

Improving employee benefits

(4)

Strong

11.6

(3)

Moderate

24.6

(2) No (1)

Weak Connection

32.8 31.1 (2.2)

Public understanding of NBS

research 23.4 35.5 26.1 15.0 (2.7)

Research and services of the

Institute for Computer

Sciences and Technology 8.9 15.9 28.3 46.9 (1.9)
26

II. 2. (Continued)

(4)

Strong

(3)

Moderate

(2)

Weak

No (1)

Connection Mean

The NBS Budget 17.4 24.7 26.4 31.5 (2.3)

Transportation to and from NBS.. 13.5 22.8 31.0 32.7 (2.2)

Research and services of the

Institute for Basic Standards 13.9 21.8 26.6 37.7 (2.1)

The relationship between NBS and

the scientific community 21 .3 33.7 27.1 18.0 (2.6)

Providing social activities for

NBS employees 3.8 16.5 33.2 46.6 (1.8)

Research and services of the

Institute for Materials

Research 16.2 18.5 23.0 42.3 (2.1)

Appointments of new NBS program directors 6.9 17.0 24.9 51.1 (1.8)

Congressional legislation that

affects NBS 18.8 21 .8 22.1 37.3 (2.2)

Decisions in the Department of

Commerce affecting NBS 16.8 22.3 24.4 36.5 (2.2)

Research and services of the

Institute for Applied Technol ogy 13.4 18.5 25.8 42.3 (2.0)

Decisions made in the NBS

Director's Office 14.8 25.7 24.7 34.9 (2.2)
27

How much experience or knowledge do you have that could help you make

judgments about each of the following?

(4)

A Great

Deal

(3)

Something

(2)

Very

Little

(1)

None Mean

Improving employee benefits 4.3 34.1 44.5 17.0 (2.3)

Public understanding of NBS

research 12.0 48.7 27.3 12.0 (2.6)

Research and services of the

Institute for Computer

Sciences & Technology 7.4 16.8 29.3 46.6 0.9)

The NBS Budget 5.4 24.2 37.5 32.9 (2.0)

Transportation to and from NBS.. 7.7 35.6 36.9 19.8 (2.3)

Research and services of the

Institute for Basic Standards 7.6 25.4 29.2 37.8 (2.0)

The relationship between NBS and

the scientific community 12.5 40.1 26.8 20.7 (2.4)

Providing social activities for

NBS employees 1.3 19.0 39.6 40.1 (1.8)

Research and services of the

Institute for Materials

Research 9.7 19.2 27.4 43.7 (1.9)

Appointments of new NBS program directors 1 .8 14.7 32.6 50.9 (1.7)

Congressional legislation that

affects NBS 3.3 28.9 32.2 35.5 (2.0)

Decisions in the Department of

Commerce affecting NBS 3.6 25.3 35.7 35.5 (2.0)

Research and services of the

Institute for Applied Technology 6.9 22.3 30.3 40.5 (2.0)

Decisions made in the NBS

Director's Office 3.8 27.8 33.2 35.2 (2.0)

How much could you do, personally , that might. improve the handl ing of each

of the following?

(1)

A

Great Deal

(2)

Something

(3)

Very

Little

(4)

Nothing

Improving employee benefits 1.6 19.9 48.6 30.0 (3.1)

Public understanding of NBS

research 9.0 44.2 32.0 14.7 (2.5)

Research and services of the

Institute for Computer

Sciences & Technology 6.5 9.9 27.9 55.6 (3.3)

The NBS Budget 3.1 12.9 34.8 49.2 (3.3)

Transportation to and from NBS.. 1 .6 22.2 43.9 32.3 (3.1)
28

II. 4. (Continued)

(1)

A

Great Deal

(2)

Something

(3)

Very

Little

(4)

Nothing Mean

Research and services of the

Institute for Basic Standards 4.7 18.9 28.6 47.8 (3.2)

The relationship between NBS and

the scientific community 9.7 37.5 28.3 24.6 (2.7)

Providing social activities for

NBS employees 1 .2 19.2 39.6 40.0 (3.2)

Research and services of the

Institute for Materials

Research 6.0 16.7 26.4 50.9 (3.2)

Appointments of new NBS program directors 1 .7 8.7 30.6 59.0 (3.5)

Congressional legislation that

affects NBS 2.2 13.2 32.9 51 .6 (3.3)

Decisions in the Department of

Commerce affecting NBS 3.0 12.4 31.3 53.2 (3.3)

Research and services of the

Institute for Applied Technology 5.5 16.9 27.6 50.0 (3.2)

Decisions made in the NBS

Director's Office 3.2 15.7 30.7 50.4 (3.3)
29 First Returns

Follow-up

n=324

n=86

III. Finally, please answer a few questions about yourself that are necessary for statistical tabulation.

First Returns Follow-up

1. How old are you? 40.1 39.6 42.6 (n.s)

First Returns Follow-up

2. How many years have you been with the Bureau? 10.6 10.1 12.6 (5%)

3.

In what major organizational unit do you work?

19.8 Institute for Basic Standards (1)

21.6

Institute for Materials Research (2)

21.1 Institute for Applied Technology (3)

9.0

Institute for Computer Sciences & Technology (4)

0.8 P rogram Office (5)

3.3

O ffice of the Director (6)

19.0

O ffice of Administration (7)

5.5

O ffice of Information Programs (8)

4. What is your highest level of education?

3.9 D id not complete high school (1)

13.0 H igh school graduate (2)

26.0 S ome college or technical school (3)

12.0 C ollege graduate (4)

22.5

Post-graduate study (5)

22.5

P h.D. degree (6)

5. Are you:

69.7 Male (1)

30.3 F emale (2)

6. What is your GS or Wage Scale rating?

6.5

GS4 or below (1)

20.4 GS 5-7 (2)

13.1 GS 9-11 (3)

48.7 G S 12-15 (4)

3.3 GS 16 or above (5)

6.0

WG (6)

WL (7)

0.3 WP (8)

1.8 WS (9)

7.

Which of the following best describes your job:

Actual Sample

45 55.0 Professional (Scientist, enqineer, etc.) (1)

12 12.2 Technician (2)

14 5.2 Wage Scale (3)

14 19.7 Administrative (4)

16 7.7 Clerical (5)

First

Returns Follow-•up 18.6 24.4

21.1 23.2

20.8 22.0

9.5 7.3 S 0.9 0.0

3.8 1 .2

18.9 19.5

6.3 2.4

2.5 9.3

13.7 10.5

26.4 24.4 S

11 .8 12.8

22.0 24.4

23.6 18.6

69.1 72.0

30.9 28.0

6.1 8.2

21 .1 17.6

13.1 12.9

50.8 41 .2

2.9 4.7 S 4.5 11 .8

0.3 0.0

1 .3 3.5

55.8 51.9

11.5 15.2

4.0 10.1

20.2 17.7 S

8.4 5.1

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31

Table 4

Factor Loadings on Five Types of Media Use

Bulletin

Board

Factor

Admin.

Media

Factor

Principal

Media

Factor

Addresses

Factor

Technical

Seminar

Factor

How often do you read:

NBS Standard .14 .15 .68 .18 -.02

Technical Calendar -.03 .14 .60 .20 .11

Administrative

Calendar .02 .32 .38 .12 -.28

Administrative

Bulletins .10 .45 .27 .14 -.48

Fire Prevention and

Accident Info .22 .20 .42 -.07 -.16

NBS Press Releases .18 .69 .08 .07 i o co Monthly Highl ights .06 .66 .23 .20 .06

Program Newsletters... .16 .58 .05 -.06 . .06

NBS Annual Report .03 .53 .11 .30 .06

Dimensions Magazine... -.12 .34 .30 .35 .10

Administrative Manual

Issuances .07 .39 .22 .20 -.40

Signs posted throughout the buildings. .

.

.78 .04 .09 .07 -.08

Official bulletin

boards .67 .20 .17 -.02 -.03

Posters .72 .13 .18 .04 -.06

SEBA News .39 .03 .66 .01 -.10

Credit Union Newsletter .34 .07 .49 -.07 -.09

How often do you attend:

State of the Bureau

address .08 .12 .08 .88 .09

Other formal addresses

by high-ranking NBS

official s .03 .17 .10 .76 .19

Technical seminars -.06 .08 .02 .23 .79

Colloquia -.09 .12 -.01 .29 .77
32

Table 5

Factor Loadings on Three Types of Content Preference

Administrative Research Employee

Content Content Content

Factor Factor Factor

News of appointments

or awards .40 .04 .55

News about pay and

benefit plans .33 -.03 .48

Stories about social

activities at NBS .06 .05 .80

News about SEBA sports

activities -.07 .04 .71

Letters to editor and

responses .17 .16 .62

News on Congressional

legislation affecting

NBS .66 .21 .04

Human Interest Stories

about NBS employees... .20 .03 .70

Messages from the

Di rector .64 .21 .33

News from the Department

of Commerce affecting

NBS .76 .20 .23

Historical articles

about the Bureau .30 .25 .31

News about the NBS

budget .63 .42 .03

News of technical programs in the Institute for Basic

Standards .20 .77 .04

News of technical programs in the Institute for Materials

Research .14 .76 .02

News of technical programs in the Institute for Applied

Technology .18 .70 .04

News of technical programs in the Institute for Computer

Sciences and Technology .14 .63 .07

Reports of speeches by

NBS admini strators . . .

.

.43 .47 .25
33

Table 6

Factor Loadings on Three Areas of Knowledge

Administrative Research Employe*

News News News

Factor Factor Factor

--Jim Wright was named Acting Director of Institute

for Applied Technology .57 .10 -.03

--The NBS Budget for fiscal

year 1977 increased only

enough to cover increased

costs of doing business

over 1976 .21 .23 .22

--The House has approved a 2-year experiment in "flextime" for civil service em- ployees .01 .17 .32

--Edward 0. Vetter named Under Secretary of Commerce. .46 .12 .29

--NBS studies show flame inhibitors not always effective in full-scale fires.. .07 .34 .28

--NBS has published voluntary product standards for

toys .18 .36 .45

--The NBS softball team

reached the finals of the

Dept, of Commerce Tournament .06 -.01 .51

--NBS has helped the Bureau

of Radiological Health control x-rays through Calibration service .05 .58 .13

--Cerebellar Model Arithmetic Computer developed at

NBS won an Award from Industrial Research Magazine .21 .53 .03
34

Table 7

Canonical Correlation of Grunig Situational Variables

with Communication and Media Variables

Canonical Coefficients

Research

Variate—/

Administrative

Variate

Employee

.

Variate-/

Non-Invol ved

Variate

Situational Variables

Administration Situations:

Problem Recognition .27 .69 -.53 .31

Level of Involvement -.02 .08 -.13 -.05

Constraints -.04 -.36 -.06 .24

Referent Criterion .15 -.31 -.12 -.21

Research Situations:

Problem Recognition .45 .17 .21 .79

Level of Involvement -.08 -.11 -.08 .09

Constraints .32 .10 -.66 -.21

Referent Criterion -.21 -.13 -.21 -1.15

Employee Situations:

Problem Recognition -.23 .26 .45 .33

Level of Involvement -.05 .22 .13 -.42

Constraints .06 -.25 -.16 .42

Referent Criterion .07 -.04 .07 .21

Communication Variables

Media Factors:

Bulletin Boards

Administrative

Principal Media

Addresses

Seminars

Knowledge Factors:

Administrative Items

Research Items

Employee Items

Content Factors:

Administrative

Research

Employee

Time Spent on Media

Canonical Correlation

Chi-Square

-.16 .13

.10 .34

-.02 -.05

.41 .20

.28 -.17

.05 .18

.17 -.24

-.02 .18

.20 .39

.38 -.05

-.26 .38

.00 .10

.77 .64

711 .06 383.74

144df , .01 1 2 1 df , .01

.18 .24

.06 -.20

.03 .24

.27 -.36

.28 -.31

-.17 -.46

.07 -.10

-.16 .26

-.61 .48

.36 .68

.68 -.19

.04 -.23

.47 .32

193.91 105.50

lOOdf , .01 81 df , .05

a/ Signs reversed for easier interpretation

.
35

Table 8

Comparison of Age and Years with Bureau of Four Employee Types

Age^ Years—

All employees 39.9 10.5

Research Type 44.3 14.2

Administrative Type 38.9 8.5

Employee Type 38.4 11.3

Non-Involved Type 37.9 8.1

— F= 6.23, significant at .01 level. — F= 8.48 significant at .01 level.

Table 9

Comparison of Four Employee Types by Organizational Unit

Percentage of Unit

Research Administrative Employee Non-Involved

N Type Type Type Type

Institute for Basic

Standards

Institute for

74 35.1 12.2 24.3 28.4

Materials Research

Institute for Applied

78 37.2 9.0 28.2 25.6

Technology

Institute for Computer Sciences

78 23.1 25.6 21 .8 29.5

and Technology 33 18.2 24.2 27.3 30.3

Program Office

Office of the

3 100.0 0.0 0.0 0.0

Director

Office of Admini13 7.7 58.8 15.4 23.1

strati on Offfice of Infor72 6.9 41.7 22.2 29.2

mation Programs 20 45.0 25.0 20.0 10.0

N 371 97 86 88 100

Chi square 61.14, 21 d.f, significant at .01 level.
36

Table 10

Comparison of Four Employee Types by Level of Education

Percentage of Educational Level

Research Administrative Employee Non-Invol ved

N Type Type Type Type

Did not complete high school 14 0.0 42.9 21 .4 35.7

High school graduate 51 5.9 39.2 23.5 31 .4

Some college or technical school 95 9.5 30.5 24.2 35.8

College graduate 46 23.9 17.4 30.4 28.3

Post-graduate study 88 40.9 18.2 21 .6 19.3

Ph.D. degree 82 46.3 9.8 23.2 20.7

N 376 97 87 90 102

Chi square = 68.42, 15df, significant at .01 level

Table 11

Comparison of Four Employee Types by Job Description

Percentage of Job Description

Research Administrative Employee Non-Invol ved

N Type Jm. ... TlP.e- Type

Professional 203 38.4 13.8 25.1 22.7

Technician 44 11.4 18.2 25.0 45.5

Wage Scale 19 0.0 36.8 21 .1 42.1

Administrative 74 13.5 50.0 17.6 18.9

Clerical 30 6.7 26.7 20.0 46.7

N 370 95 88 85 102

Chi square = 77.56, 12df, significant at .01 level
37

Table 12

Comparison of Four Employee Types by GS or Wage-Scale Rating

Percentage of Rating Level

Research Administrative Empl oyee Non-Invol ved

N Type Type Type Type

GS4 or below 24 8.3 25.0 33.3 33.3

GS 5-8 77 6.5 36.4 24.7 32.5

GS 9-11 47 12.8 27.7 27.7 31 .9 GS 12-15 178 42.1 15.2 23.6 19.1

GS 16 or above 12 66.7 16.7 8.3 8.3

Wage Scale 28 0.0 35.7 21.4 42.9

N 366 96 86 89 95

Chi square = 75.23, 15df, significant at .01 level

.

Table 13

Comparison of Four Employee Type s by Sex

Percentage of Sex

N Research

Type

Administrative

Type

Empl oyee

Type

Non-Involved

Type

Male 254 30.7 16.9 26.0 26.4

Female 115 13.9 38.3 18.3 29.6

N 369 94 87 87 101

Chi square = 26.34, 3df, significant at .01 level
38

Table 14

Comparison of Employee Types by Most Important Publication

Percentage of Type

All Research Administrative Employee Non-Invol ved

Employees Type Type Type Type _

NBS Standard 23.1 12.1 26.7 28.6 25.7

Dimensions magazine 17.6 22.2 6.7 22.0 18.8

Technical Calendar 38.8 53.5 35.6 33.0 32.7

Administrative Calendar 8.9 5.1 12.2 8.8 9.9

Administrative Issuances 5.0 2.0 8.9 3.3 5.9

Monthly Highlights 4.7 4.0 7.8 2.2 5.0

Program Newsletters 1 .8 1 .0 2.2 2.2 2.0

N 381 99 90 91 101

Chi square = 34.80, 18df, significant at .01 level

.

Table 15

Comparison of Responses of Four Employee Types to Six Questions about NBS Media

Research Admini strati ve Employee Non-Involved

Type Type Type Type

Which of the following:

--is the source from Standard

which you first get (32.6%)

information about Other Other

Bureau activities Employees Standard Empl oyees Standard

and achievements (35.6%) (34.9%) (29.1%) (34.8%)

--is the most dependa- Supervi sor Standard Technical Calendar Technical

ble source of NBS (23.9%) (25.3%) (26.7%) Calendar

information Technical Calendar Technical Calendar Standard (28.9%)

(21 .6%) (20.7%) (23.3%)

--is the most useful Technical Technical Technical Technical

to you Calendar Calendar Calendar Calendar

(33.7%) (33.3%) (28.6%) (33.3%)

—do you feel provides Standard Technical Calendar

the most complete Supervi sor Standard (22.5%) (20.0%)

information (27.4%) (30.1%) Technical Calendar Standard

(21 .2%) (18.8%)

--would you choose to

communicate news about yourself (such

as awards, retirement, Standard Standard Standard Standard

etc . ) (58.1%) (59.5%) (56.4%) (46.5%)

--do you think presents

the most accurate picture of Bureau events Standard Standard Standard Standard

and people (41.0%) (60.7%) (53.7%) (52.9%)
NBS-114A (REV. 7-73)

U.S. DEPT. OF COMM. BIBLIOGRAPHIC DATA

SHEET

1. PUBLICATION OR REPORT NO. NBSIR 77-1257

2. Gov’t Accession

No.

3. Recipient’s Accession No.

! 4. TITLE ANO SUBTITI.l

An Analysis of Employee Publics and Employee Communication

Programs in the National Bureau of Standards

5. Publication Date June 1977

6. Performing Organization C ode

7. AUT)IOR(S)

James E. Grunig

8 . Performing Organ. Report No. NBSIR 77-1257

9. PERFORMING ORGANIZATION NAME AND ADDRESS

NATIONAL BUREAU OF STANDARDS

DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

WASHINGTON, D.C. 20234

10. Project/Task/Work Unit No.

11. Contract/Grant No.

4

12. Sponsoring Organization Name and Complete Address (Street, City, State, ZIP)

National Bureau of Standards

Department of Commerce

Washington, D.C. 20234

13. Type of Report & Period Covered

Final

14. Sponsoring Agency Code

15.

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES

16.

ABSTRACT (A 200-word or less (actual summary of most significant information. If document includes a significant

bibliography or literature survey, mention it here.) An evaluative study of the employee communication

program at the National Bureau of Standards was conducted in cooperation with the

Seminar in Corporate Communication, University of Maryland College of Journalism to:

1) identify the information needs of different types of NBS employees, 2) relate these

information needs to use of internal employee media, and 3) evaluate and make recom- mendations on these media. Information needs were identified using a communication

model developed by Grunig, which predicts the probability that a public will actively

seek out information or passively process it. The variables of this model were related

to content preference and media use through factor analysis and canonical correlation.

The study identified four types of employee publics: 1) a research-oriented employee,

2) an administrative-oriented employee, 3) an employee programs and benefits-oriented

employee, 4) an employee who perceives himself to be uninvolved in most NBS programs.

The study also showed that most employee media in a research organization contain

information which employees do not perceive to involve them. Thus, following the

logic of the Grunig theory, employees will passively process the information if it

is easily available, but they will not seek it out. Recommendations are then made

for how employee media should be designed for each employee type and on how to deal

with the generally low level of employee involvement.

17.

KEY WORDS (six to twelve entries; alphabetical order; capitalize only the first letter of the first key word unless a proper name; separated by semicolons) commun i ca ti on among scientists; coordination of research

organizations; employee communication; information needs; information processing;

information seeking; internal media.

18. AVAILABILITY [~^~] Unlimited

For Official Distribution. Do Not Release to NTIS

Order From Sup. of Doc., U.S. Government Printing Office Washington, D.C. 20402, SD Cat. No. C 1 3 Order From National Technical Information Service (NTIS)

Springfield, Virginia 22151

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21. NO. OF PAGES

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22. Price

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