A multi-level analysis of the relationship between job satisfaction and job performance: The importance of interpersonal justice climate

Although job satisfaction—an indicator of employees’ happiness at work—is thought to contribute to higher job performance, past research findings have been inconsistent, suggesting that there could be important contextual factors that moderate this relationship. This study aims to revisit this important relationship by drawing attention to the role of supervisor-focused interpersonal justice climate as an important social context that may moderate the effect of job satisfaction on job performance (i.e., task performance and organizational citizenship behaviors). Based on a multi-source sample of 192 individuals in 40 teams from a large public organization in Thailand, the hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) analyses revealed that when interpersonal justice climate was high, job satisfaction did not contribute significantly to job performance. However, when interpersonal justice climate was low, the influence of job satisfaction became significant. These findings lend support for a compensatory model in which job performance only suffers when both factors are low.