MOTIVATIONAL FACTORS AND JOB SATISFACTION OF TEACHERS IN MACAU: THE IMPACT OF WORKING ENVIRONMENT

The study investigates the primary motivational factors for teaching staff in Macau and their statistical relationship with job satisfaction. Considering the rise of fluctuating levels of job satisfaction for educators since the pandemic, understanding the current underlying motivations is integral for policymakers and stakeholders of educational institutions. Utilising a mixed-methods approach, the study consists of a systematic literature review, in-depth qualitative interviews with eight participants, and a survey of 134 teaching staff within Macau. The findings go on to reveal that career empowerment and support factors, job tasks, monetary motivators, and work environment are all primary motivators to job satisfaction of the target population; however, regarding the impact on the target construct, the use of SmartPLS and quantitative analysis illustrate that monetary motivators has a marginal statistical effect on job satisfaction with a path coefficient with 0.100 and working environment has the most significant impact with 0.436. The study contributes a parsimonious model with an R-squared of 0.620 for job satisfaction and recommendations for improvement of the constructs.