Organizational cynicism and commitment of novice secondary school principals and head teachers [manuscript] : basis for capacity building strategy / Anne Marie R. Señora.

Dissertation (Doctor of Education - Educational Management).

The study centered on organizational cynicism and commitment of novice secondary school principals and head teachers from the West Central part of Region III. Using convenience sampling, 19 novice principals and 93 novice head teachers from divisions of Bataan, Pampanga, and Zambales served as respondents of the study. Specifically, this study aimed to find out the relationship between organizational cynicism and organizational commitment of the respondents. Also, it investigated on the significant differences and correlations between and among variables. An adopted questionnaire was used to gather the necessary data needed for the study. However, it was further modified to better suit the context of the research. It was composed of two parts. The first part included the profile of the respondents in terms of age, sex, civil status, educational background, seminars and trainings attended, eligibility, and work performance. The second part contained a checklist about organizational cynicism and organizational commitment. Organizational cynicism was further described using its three dimensions namely cognitive, affective, and behavioral whereas organizational commitment included its three approaches which were affective, continuance, and normative. A five-point Likert scale was used in the evaluation. Meanwhile, the data analysis was limited to the use of the following statistical tools: mean, percentage, frequency count, standard deviation, ANOVA for significant difference, ANCOVA using Post Hoc Tukey Test, Pearson's Coefficient of Correlation, and Coefficient of Determination. vii Based on the findings of the study, majority of the respondents have age range of 42-48; female dominated the males; greater number were married; with units in Master's Degree took the lead among the four clusters of educational background; all had relevant seminars and training attended; larger group had eligibility; and mostly were teachers before becoming head teachers. In terms of organizational cynicism, all three dimensions resulted to a fairly cynical interpretation. Similarly, organizational commitment also gained a descriptive interpretation of fairly committed in all of its three approaches. Considering the difference on the organizational cynicism of the respondents when their profiles were grouped, sex and eligibility both displayed statistically significant differences in both cognitive and affective dimensions. For behavioral dimension, sex and performance emerged to have a significant difference. Additionally, taking into account the organizational commitment of the respondents when profiles were grouped, sex and eligibility resulted to a statistically significant difference in terms of affective commitment. In the case of continuance commitment, age, sex, and eligibility exhibited the differences. Considering normative commitment, four of the profile variables appeared to have significant differences. These were sex, civil status, educational background, and eligibility. Lastly, when general impression of organizational commitment was computed, only work performance was seen to have a significant difference. Furthermore, it was also found out that there was no significant relationship between organizational cynicism and the respondents' profile, thus, the null hypothesis was accepted. Similarly, no significant relationship was revealed between organizational commitment and the respondents' profile. On the contrary, a significant relationship was discovered between organizational cynicism and organizational commitment, hence, the null hypothesis was rejected. From these findings, a capacity building strategy through a proposed self-directed module was created. In view of the foregoing findings and conclusions, it was recommended that that district, division or regional leaders address this properly and immediately especially those who are in the early phase of their managerial journey. Capacity building techniques or trainings can be utilized to minimize or if not transform these organizational cynicism attitudes into leadership strengths. Also, school leaders should openly communicate with the members of their organization. Probably, occasional social gatherings could be done to further increase employee's loyalty while mitigating the feeling of anxi ety since these two concepts emerged to have the highest impacts both on organizational cynicism and organizational commitment. Another recommendation was that an organi zation could also plan for periodic in-service trainings or even School Learning Action Cell (SLAC) sessions so that cynic tendencies can be prevented even at the school level. Lastly, for future studies, the researcher strongly suggested to use the same hypotheses to be tested but this time with an increased number of respondents. Instead of just involving West Central Luzon, a region-wide, or perhaps nation-wide conduct could be done to see if the investigation will yield different results. In addition, city and private schools as well as state colleges and universities could also be included as respondents of a future relative study. Finally, a comparative or qualitative study could also be an option.