THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ORGANISATIONAL TRUST, JOB SATISFACTION AND INTENTION TO LEAVE: AN EXPLORATORY STUDY

Authors have claimed that one of the key ingredients in ensuring that organisations remain effective and sustainable in the turbulent business environment characterising the 21(st) century, is through creating and maintaining organisational trust between an organisation's stakeholders. However, little published research within the South African context, is evident in support of this contention. This exploratory study set out to describe the levels of trust in an organisational context and then to determine the relationship between levels of trust, job satisfaction and employees' intention to leave the organisation. Three standardised instruments were used to measure the research variables and data were collected and analysed on the responses of 91 employees in a company producing bread in the Johannesburg area. The findings indicated that levels of organisational trust and job satisfaction were moderate to high while the intention leave the organisation was found to be low. Statistically significant, strong and positive relationships were found between organisational trust and job satisfaction. A relatively weak but statistically significant relationship was found between organisational trust and employees' intention to leave the organisation.