Belgian Banking Sector Challenges and Research

This assignment delves into the complexities of researching the Belgian banking sector, focusing on sample size selection (21,000 employees), advantages and drawbacks of random sampling and cross-sectional design. It highlights challenges like cultural differences, language barriers, and coordination issues in gathering information. The document suggests utilizing secondary data sources such as articles, surveys, and government records for research.

Job Satisfaction in the
Banking Industry

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
1.Advantages and disadvantages of using samples size and factors to be considered on sample
size...............................................................................................................................................3
2.Advantages and disadvantages of current sampling method and suggestion for enhancement
of sampling method.....................................................................................................................4
3.Advantages and disadvantages of cross-sectional design in comparison with longitudinal
design..........................................................................................................................................5
4:Discuss some of the problems in the process of data collection and how to address them in
future...........................................................................................................................................6
5.To check the representatives of the sample what secondary data set can be used and how
can it be used...............................................................................................................................7
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

Introduction
The traits of jobs are considered to have an effect on stress and well-being at work. The
two factors that collectively defines how stressful a job is are the demands of the job and the
extent of control over own activities (Vermaseren, 2017). Jobs with high demands and limited
control can be considered as a high strain and may have an increased risk of dissatisfaction of
jobs,stress etc.
This case study will examine a research to address the relationship between job traits and
job satisfaction in all Belgian banks at specific level. It will discuss the advantages and
disadvantages of sample size to investigate the employees and factors that need to be considered
in decision on sample size. It will also provide knowledge about current method of sampling to
find out relationship between job characteristics and job satisfaction and the secondary data set
that can be used to represent the sample.
1.Advantages and disadvantages of using samples size and factors to be considered on sample
size
Advantages of using samples in Belgian Banks are as follows-:
Cost reduction - As the total employees that are working in Belgium banks are about 69,000 and
questioning all these employees would be more expensive and complicated. So, with use of
sampling technique instead of using whole population(69000 employees) for collection of data ,a
small sample of merely 15000 employees was taken to reduce both cost and complexity for the
research of Belgium Banks (Rahman, 2017).
Faster speed - Use of sampling gives more amount time to researcher for collecting data so it is
quite faster. The speed of data collection will be fast due to sample method used in Belgium
banks and also researchers will get enough time to collect data.
Detailed information - By making use of large sample size in Belgium bank the researchers and
investigators can investigate a population of employees at Belgium banks to provide a detailed
and comprehensive information.
Accuracy of data collected is high - Due to limited area of operations it will permit a high
degree of accuracy. So, the results of sampling at Belgium banks turn out to be accurate.
Segmentation – The measurement of large sample size allows division of sample into segments
that share similar characteristics. To provide more deeper and deeper information regarding
population segmentation is necessary.

Diversity and outliers – If the size of sample is large, it will represent the full diversity of the
population. Similarly, the greater odds of the outliers will be captured if the sample is large.
Disadvantages of using large sample size in Belgium banks are as follows-:
Costs and time – The time and cost will be more to gather information from large set of
employees at Belgium banks. And the researchers have to put in more efforts to collect the data
from large population of 69,000.
Difficulties in appointing a truly representative sample – Problems that are faced in selecting a
a representative sample will produce an accurate and reliable outcomes when they are
represented to the entire group. When the phenomena under study are of complex nature it is
difficult to select a truly representative sample.
The factors that might affect the size of sample can be estimation of population
parameters, the cost of sampling, complexity in collecting data and the spread of population etc.
2.Advantages and disadvantages of current sampling method and suggestion for enhancement of
sampling method
The current sampling method that is used is simple random sampling in which every
individual of the sample is selected from population in such a way that the outcomes of that
selected individual from the group of population is same (Pringle, 2017).
Advantages of using simple random sampling are as follows-:
 The most important advantage of random sampling is that it requires only a limited
knowledge of the study group of population in advance.
 In classification, it is free from errors.
 It includes the use of inferential statistics which is suitable for data analysis.
 The sampling error can be easily assessed by using random sampling.
 It is free from biasses and a simpler method to be used.
 One can get a feedback from a person who is using the service.
 It provides equal opportunities of being selected to every individual from a large
population.
Disadvantages of using random sampling are s follows-:
 Due to the same sample size, this method of random sampling may have larger errors
than that are found in stratified sampling.
 If the units or items are widely spread the selection of sample becomes impossible.

 If the units of population are heterogeneous in nature then this method of random
sampling cannot be employed.
 This method does not make efficient use of knowledge to address the population.
Suggestions for improvement of sampling methods are as follows-:
Recognition of the data collectors
In order to make use of instruments a little training need to be given to the volunteers and helpers
as they can be a great source of information (Paulin, 2017).
Train the helpers
Appropriate training need to be given to the data collectors in order to respond to questions,
protect confidentiality and to turn out the information collected.
Identification of appropriate methods
The major issue that can arise in collection of data is the method used. Various considerations
need to be taken while collecting information. it is not the best way. To make use of surveys by
sits and programs.
Providing confidentiality
The respondents need to be informed regarding the confidentiality of guidelines while obtaining
data from them.
3.Advantages and disadvantages of cross-sectional design in comparison with longitudinal
design
The cross-sectional design is a type of observation study that examines information that
are gathered from a population at a particular point of time. In longitudinal study, the data is
collected for the similar topics again and again over a time period. This research can be extend
over years. The current investigation at Belgium bank make use of cross-sectional design with a
sample of 15,000 employees.
The advantages of cross-sectional design in comparison with longitudinal design are-:
 The research for the cross-section is not takes a longer period of time to complete it is
studies completely only once. However the longitudinal study continues for long period
of time (Mertens, 2017).
 The cross-sectional design cost is low in comparison with the longitudinal design. They
are also fast in reaching the observational outcomes with jut few points.

 The cross-sectional can be useful to represent the population fully rather than subsets.
When considering policy changes this can be beneficial.
Disadvantages of cross-sectional design in comparison with longitudinal design are-:
 The cross-sectional design are not fit to make conclusion observation about the direction
of any association between variables due to their single survey nature. However on the
other side longitudinal design can be fit for the conclusion observation as they conduct
survey multiple times.
 The longitudinal design are more powerful than cross-sectional studies as make use of
observation method without changing the state of world. When it comes to excluding
time invariants and unobserved individual differences that are known to have more power
(Komjathy, 2017).
 The cross-section design is less effective in doing research on development trends in
comparison with longitudinal design.
4:Discuss some of the problems in the process of data collection and how to address them in
future
There are various logistical problems that occurred while gathering data for Belgium
bank (Harlow, 2017). The investigators have to visit each bank in order to gather the completed
questionnaire and in Belgium a part of population know Flemish and other part of population
speak French,there were two set of questionnaires need to be made for two different set of
population in Belgium. Also these questionnaire ate translated carefully and are tested for
correctness of their translation. If the respondent lived in French part of Belgium ,the
questionnaire were sent to respondents home address. Various issues occurred when the French
part or vice versa got questionnaire that does not belong to their native language. Brussels,where
two languages are spoken but to complicate the matter there were certain headquarters where the
spoken language was English. So it was important that these respondents must receive
questionnaire in English.
The other problems that arise in data collection was control and coordination
information distribution .In Belgian bank the decentralized way of working was choose and to
organize a campaign in each bank the researchers have to go to all banks to explain theoretical
framework and research outline was represented to both employee and employers (Feillard and
Madinier, 2017).

Various initiatives were taken by individual banks to prompt a higher response rate. To
ensure that there initiatives remained both neutral and valid for the research the researchers were
required to carefully follow-up on those initiatives implemented by the banks. Due to selective
use of information that had been employed some of these initiatives proved difficult to deal with.
For the respective organizational cultures,the researchers had to be sensitive while making sure
that equal positioning to all partners are there in the research.
To address these issues in future one needs to conduct an assessment so as to understand
the organization both inside out. Various policies,practices,programs that are applicable to
employees need to be reviewed. The organization culture,goals and history about the business
need to be explores. Also the questionnaire need to be distributed in a proper way so that it is not
received by the wrong respondents (Demiralp, Eisenschmidt and Vlassopoulos, 2017).
5.To check the representativeness of the sample what secondary dataset can be used and how
can it be used
The data that have been already collected by and readily available from other sources are
secondary data. In comparison to primary data,they are more cheaper and faster for obtaining
information. To conduct research there are several sources available in secondary data. The use
of primary data need more human and non-human resources such as time ,money and energy so
the researchers make use of secondary data to be better and executable. In order to represent the
sample various types of secondary data can be used such as-:
Personnel records
This is useful in research if the information is not there in the published form. Invaluable
assets like letter and diaries are some personal sources. Before using these sources for references
the chances of bias need to be eliminated (Campbell, 2017).
Government records
These are available in the form of government surveys,tax records,and other statistical
records. They are used widely and are easily available in research work. The research conducted
by Belgium bank is a type of government record where investigation is done to understand the
relationship between job satisfaction and job characteristics.
Secondary data can be both qualitative and quantitative. Through
newspapers,diaries,interviews,transcripts etc. Qualitative data can be obtained while through
survey,financial statements and statistics quantitative data can be obtained.

One of the important advantage of secondary data is less amount of times is required to
collect all the important information. The researchers can get the data from both outside and
inside the organization (Allison, 2017). The internal sources can be sales report,company
information,financial;a statements,customer details like age,contact details etc. The sources of
collecting secondary data externally can be government departments such as social
security,social books,business journals etc.
CONCLUSION
Summing up the above research it focuses on the research that has been carried out in
order to investigate the traits between job characteristics and job satisfaction. To implement this
the research pool was selected to conduct research in Belgium bank. The sample size of 16,000
was selected from 21,000 employees and the advantages of this samples size is that it will more
accurate and clear picture of the Banks at Belgium and the drawback can be the cost and the time
to conduct such research is more.
The random sampling methods select the population randomly from the entire population.
It is an easy way of sampling but does not make use of proper knowledge to address population.
The cross-sectional design used is cost effective than the longitudinal design but it is not
effective to conduct research on development trend in comparison with longitudinal design.
There are various issues that are faced by Belgium bank in gathering information as the culture
and languages differs and also there was a lack of coordination and control. Various types of
secondary data like articles,surveys,government records can be used to represent the samples.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Allison, J.A., 2017. The Impact of Monetary and Regulatory Policy on Main Street Banking.
Cato Journal, 37(2), p.207.
Campbell, A.C., 2017. How international scholarship recipients perceive their contributions to
the development of their home countries: Findings from a comparative study of Georgia
and Moldova. International Journal of Educational Development, 55, pp.56-62.
Demiralp, S., Eisenschmidt, J. and Vlassopoulos, T., 2017. Negative interest rates, excess
liquidity and bank business models: Banks’ reaction to unconventional monetary policy
in the euro area.
Feillard, A. and Madinier, R., 2017. The end of innocence? Indonesian Islam and the temptation
of radicalism. Biography, 40(1).
Harlow, R., 2017. A Maori reference grammar. Cross-Currents, 6(1).
Komjathy, L., 2017. Index to Daoist Collections. Cross-Currents, 6(1).
Mertens, D., 2017. Putting ‘merchants of debt’in their place: the political economy of retail
banking and credit-based financialisation in Germany. New Political Economy, 22(1),
pp.12-30.
Paulin, A.A., 2017. Informating public governance: Towards a basis for a digital ecosystem.
International Journal of Public Administration in the Digital Age (IJPADA), 4(2), pp.14-
32.
Pringle, R., 2017. Understanding Islam in Indonesia: Politics and Diversity. Cross-Currents,
6(1).
Rahman, S., 2017. Role of Government in the Promotion of Corporate Social Responsibility
(CSR): The Case of Bangladesh Banking Sector. Australian Academy of Accounting and
Finance Review, 1(1), pp.44-68.
Vermaseren, M.J., 2017. Legend of Attis in Greek and Roman art. Brill.
Zou, C., 2017. Unconventional petroleum geology. Elsevier.