E-Interns Job Satisfaction at Work from Home

Abstract

Advancements in technology bring new forms to the world and working from home is one of evolving trends that allows employees to work in the home setting. During the COVID 19 epidemic, work from home became popular in Sri Lankan organizations. Work from home provides opportunities for undergraduates to complete their internships in both local and international organizations in their homes. When this work-from-home trend continues in the future it is important to know about the job satisfaction of interns because this is the continuing trend, and they are the future of the world of work. Moreover, the internship is the entry stage of interns to career life and ensuring the satisfaction of them is paramount important to individuals, organizations and finally to the country. Hence, this study was carried out to examine the job satisfaction of e-interns who work in work-from-home settings. The current study is a quantitative study and data collected from 117 management e-interns in three different state universities located in the Colombo district. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data from respondents and a convenience sample technique was employed. Gathered data analyzed by using SPSS. Study results indicated that job characteristics, supervisor support, flexible schedules, financial compensation, and learning opportunities, and feedback have a significant positive influence on e-interns job satisfaction in work from home setting. Further, this study found that the quality of mentoring has no significant influence on e-interns job satisfaction and lack of awareness about that might be a possible reason for that. This study identified the indicators that influence e-interns job satisfaction in work from home setting and finding beneficial to the universities and policymakers to prepare management graduates with skills and experiences appropriate to their field of study, while still adhering to work from home norms and adaptations. Further, organizations can rearrange and make strategies to their internship programs to ensure the job satisfaction of e-interns in their organization and it will be beneficial to interns, organization, and the future world of work. Finally, to guarantee that the internship program's learning goals are met, all interested parties must evaluate all satisfaction criteria that may create more complete insights into the dynamics. Due to the several constraints, the sample is limited to 117 and future studies can expand the study to a larger sample to make a valuable contribution to the field of study phenomena.