A Study of Occupational Self Efficacy among Traditional and Telecommuting Workers

The present study aimed at equating a comparison of workers who work with a traditional work setting and that of telecommuting professionals residing in Chandigarh, India on the premises of Occupational self-efficacy(OSE) and its factors. The hypothesis used is a null hypothesis stating that there will be no significant difference observed in occupational self-efficacy between telecommuting workers and those pursuing a traditional work setting but the results verify the need and effectiveness of traditional work schedules compared to telecommuting.

For the purpose of the current study, OSE Scale, developed in the year 2005 by Sanjyot Pethe, Sushama Chaudhary, and Upinder Dhar was used. The respondents were sent he questionnaire by electronic-mail. A sample of 60 employed personnel was taken and a non probability sampling technique of snowballing was used out of which 30 employees were from the traditional work setting while 30 were telecommuting. A correlational research design was employed and for the purpose of analysis of results, an independent sample t-test was used.

Results were subjected to Shaipro-Wilk test for normality, following which independent sample t-test and Mann Whitney U test were used to test the formulated hypotheses. The employees who adhered to the traditional work setting scored relatively higher in occupational self efficacy and its several parameters like individuality and positive attitude. However there was no particular difference on adaptability, command, confidence, and personal effectiveness factors was observed in the two groups.