The influence of applicants’ perceptions of fairness to job offer acceptance in the private sector in vietnam

2015 developed more with previous studies to study two aspects of organizational justice, procedural justice perceptions and interactional justice perceptions.. Qualitative research is u

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY

CAO VU HA TRANG

THE INFLUENCE OF APPLICANTS’

PERCEPTION OF FAIRNESS TO JOB OFFER ACCEPTANCE IN

THE PRIVATE-SECTOR IN VIETNAM

MASTER’S THESIS BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

Hanoi, 2019

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY

CAO VU HA TRANG

THE INFLUENCE OF APPLICANTS’

PERCEPTION OF FAIRNESS TO JOB OFFER ACCEPTANCE IN

THE PRIVATE-SECTOR IN VIETNAM

MAJOR: BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

CODE: 60340102

RESEARCH SUPERVISORS:

PROF DR DANIEL ARTURO HELLER

Dr TRAN HUY PHUONG

Hanoi, 2019

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I would like to express my deep gratitude to all those who have given me the possibility to complete this graduation thesis In preparing this graduation thesis, I have had generous help and advice from my teachers, my colleagues, my family and

my friends, I would like to express my great thanks to all of them

First of all, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor Dr Tran Huy Phuong and my co-supervisor Prof Daniel Heller, who have given immeasurable help, constant guidance with many careful instructions, comments and valuable advices to me Without their support, I am not able to have a complete thesis

Secondly, I wish to show my sincere thanks to all my teachers at Vietnam- Japan University, who have provided me with worthy lessons throughout two years

of study Without their helps, it would be impossible for me to finish this work

Last but not least, I would like to send my loving thanks to my family and

my friends whose great love and care in both terms of spirit and health to encourage

me to complete the thesis

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter 1 Introduction 1

1.1 Background 1

1.2 Research rationale 2

1.3 Research objective and research question 4

1.4 Research scope 5

1.5 Research methodology 6

1.6 Structure of the research 6

Summary of Chapter 1 7

Chapter 2 Literature review 8

2.1 Overview of job offer acceptance 8

2.1.1 Definition of job offer acceptance 8

2.1.2 The importance role of job offer acceptance 8

2.1.3 The main factors affecting job offer acceptance 10

2.2 Overview of application perceptions of fairness 12

2.2.1 Interactional Justice 12

2.2.2 Procedural Justice 14

2.2.3 Distributive Justice 16

2.3 Empirical results of applicant perceptions of justice and job acceptance 19

Summary of Chapter 2 20

Chapter 3 Research model 21

3.1 Analytical framework 21

3.2 Hypothesis development 23

Summary of Chapter 3 26

Chapter 4 Methodology and Data Analysis 27

4.1 Data collection 27

4.2 Measurement test 28

4.3 Hypothesis testing 30

4.3.1 Descriptive statistics about the candidates participating in the survey 30

4.3.2 Cronbach’s Alpha Test 31

4.3.3 Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) 36

4.3.4 Pearson Correlation Test 38

4.3.5 Regression analysis 40

4.4 Analysis result summary 46

Summary of Chapter 4 47

Chapter 5 Findings, Implications and Discussion 48

5.1 Findings and discussion 48

5.2 Implications 50

5.3 Limitations of research and future research orientation 53

Summary of Chapter 5 54

References 55

LIST OF CHARTS

Chart 3.1 Conceptual framework of Konradt et al (2015) 22

Chart 3.2 Conceptual framework 23

Chart 4.1 Age group of candidates 30

Chart 4.2 Experience of interviewed candidates 31

LIST OF TABLES

Table 4.1 Cronbach’s Alpha Test of Procedural Justice Perception scale 32

Table 4.2 Cronbach’s Alpha Test of Distributive Justice Perception scale 34

Table 4.3 Cronbach’s Alpha Test of Interactional Justice Perception scale 35

Table 4.4 KMO and Bartlett's Test 36

Table 4.5 Total Variance Explained 37

Table 4.6 Rotated Component Matrix 38

Table 4.7 Pearson Correlation Test 39

Table 4.8 Model summary 40

Table 4.9 ANOVA Test 41

Table 4.10 Regression result 41

Table 4.11 Tests of Interaction effects between GEN and PJ 43

Table 4.12 Tests of Interaction effects between GEN and DJ 44

Table 4.13 Tests of Interaction effects between EXP and PJ 45

Table 4.14 Tests of Interaction effects between EXP and PJ 46

Chapter 1 Introduction 1.1 Background

In Eastern philosophy, the use of people is highly valued and considered one of the prerequisites of success Especially in the field of business, people are considered one of the most important resources to decide the success or failure of the business

A company or organization has strong financial resources, modern technical machinery but if the operation of human resource management is ineffective, it is difficult to develop long term Therefore, recruiting to provide quality human resources for the organization is the most important function performed (Rynes & Cable, 2003) However, the fact that people are the most expensive and difficult to manage resources in the business The high recruitment cost that were not associated with accepting the candidate's job offer affected the efficiency of recruitment and reduced the organization's success (Murphy, 1986)

In the context of Vietnam’s integration, the wave of investment by foreign enterprises is increasing, leading to a fierce competition in the labour market Domestic enterprises are increasingly struggling to maintain and manage human resource, especially the high-quality human resource To survive and to grow in the marketplace, business owners need to have good human resources to achieve common goals of organizations This shown the great role of human resources and the recruitment of personnel (International Labour Organization and Asian Development Bank, 2014)

In a human resource strategy, it is necessary to promote close relationships between employees, employees and administrators, employees and organizations (Legge, 1995) More interestingly, businesses no longer focused on control and submission but instead promote their working capacity and the cohesion of staff with the organization (Farnham & Pimlott, 1990) To achieve cohesion as mentioned above, ensuring fairness in the organization is essential In previous research, authors emphasized the role of organizational justice in order to gain the trust of employees, loyalty, high labour productivity promotes the ability of organizations to fulfill their

vision Employees tended to show their confidence in the organization or supervisor and also became effective when they realized to be treated fairly by their organization Greenberg (1990) suggested that organizational justice has a strong impact on a number of organizational variables, including faith, commitment, job satisfaction, intention to quit, participation in work, productivity action and civic behaviour of the organization Therefore, justice policy should be applied by organizations (Akanbi & Ofoegbu, 2013) Moreover, the organizational justice aspects (procedural, distributive, interpersonal) should be applied in the organizational, practical and regulatory policies of the enterprise (Colquitt, Conlon, Wesson, Porter, & Nguyen, 2001)

Derived from the above-mentioned empirical studies and analyses, a study of the perception of enterprise fairness and the acceptance of job offers of employees is essential This is the motivation for conducting a behavioural study of workers Therefore, the research topic “The influence of applicants’ perception of fairness to job offer acceptance in the private-sector in Vietnam” is selected for implementation

1.2 Research rationale

This study was implemented for several reasons as follows:

Firstly, in recent years, along with the trend of the world, integration process of Vietnam has become stronger than ever, especially in the private sector This integration process opens up great opportunities for employment for workers Typically, to join in the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC), Vietnam can create more 6 million jobs equivalent to 1/10 of the increase in employment by 2025 of the entire ASEAN regions due to the impact of the formation of the AEC (International Labour Organization and Asian Development Bank, 2014) Thus, with multilateral and bilateral agreements, regional integration creates great opportunities for Vietnamese workers However, more competition with foreign businesses in the wake of strong foreign direct investment is a major challenge for domestic enterprises Therefore, understanding the behaviour of employees is necessary to

provide operational policies, recruitment policies and personnel policies to attract high quality labour Of these factors, organizational equity is an aspect of policy This is the reason for this study to be conducted The pretension is that outputs of this research can contribute greatly to organizations

Secondly, in Vietnam, research on workers’ behaviour is a common topic, but only focus on the analysis of factors affecting recruitment activities based on internal and external indicators In the selection of jobs, Pham (2013) studied the impact of a number of objective factors on the current job choice behaviour of high school students The research results show that the behaviour of career choice is affected

by the school’s career orientation and family orientation In the period when workers join the organization, some authors conduct research on employee satisfaction with their work (Nguyen, Nguyen, Nguyen, & Nguyen, 2018; Nguyen

P , 2018) Nguyen's research team (2018) studied on the subjects of construction workers and discovered factors including promotion opportunities and working conditions relationships with colleagues and work characteristics having a relationship with job satisfaction The above studies were typical of the recruitment phase that was preceded by posting employment The candidate stage was still confused when deciding whether or not to approve the job offer (Chapman, Uggerslev, Piasentin, & Carroll, 2005) This topic has not been paid much attention

by the study authors in Vietnam Therefore, the analysis of candidate behavior in this period is limited In particular, currently, no research has been done on the topic

of organizational justice and its relationship with the decision of job offer acceptances This is the motivation for this research to be carried out

Thirdly, some previous researchers had conducted researches on the relationship between awareness of fairness and decision to job offer (Chapman, D S.; Webster, J., 2006; Walsh, Tuller, Barnes‐Farrell, & Matthews, 2010; Harold, Holtz, Griepentrog, Brewer, & Marsh, 2015; Konradt, Garbers, Böge, Erdogan, & Bauer, 2015) However, these authors conducted research based on a general organizational equity perspective that does not divide into different aspects of

equity Typically, improving the situation of previous studies only focused on process-based justice Chapman & Webster (2006) had added a number of other factors to the research that were candidates' signals and expectations, payment of salaries, locations and marketability Although this study had a strong point of being implemented on a large sample size with 588 applicants from 215 businesses in Canada However, the two authors were still limited when only focusing on three mechanisms of process justice In the same case, Konradt et al (2015) also focused

on the process of justice awareness according to the process when carrying out a year long study with data from 182 candidates in the apprenticeship program of a large industrial company in Germany

3-In another study, Harold et al (2015) developed more with previous studies to study two aspects of organizational justice, procedural justice perceptions and interactional justice perceptions Besides, authors also studied some other aspects such as the image of organization awareness, organization familiarity, the compatibility between people and organization, recruitment behavior It also used the control variable Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT) scores, age and gender of candidates Although it was considered to be more complete than the studies, this study was still limited when allocation justice was not studied According to the classification, organizational justice included three aspects which were distributive justice, procedural justice and interactional justice (Ambrose, Hess, & Ganesan, 2007; Yean & Yusof, 2016) This is a research gap to conduct a complete study on each aspect of organizational justice Expanding from previous studies, this study examines three aspects of organizational justice as mentioned above In addition, two control variables are also used as candidates' gender and work experience

1.3 Research objective and research question

The target of the review study is analysis of the influence of candidates on fairness for accepting private sector job offers in Vietnam In order to clarify this objective, specific objectives are given below:

- To systematize the theoretical basis related to accepting job offers and awareness of fairness

- To study empirical relationships between awareness of fairness and acceptance of job offers

- Based on the analytical framework, to conduct an empirical analysis of the impact in the candidate's perception of fairness to accepting job offers in private sector in Vietnam

- To provide recommendations to enhance the candidates’ job offer acceptance

To clarify the specific research objectives above, the below research questions are conducted answer:

- Which theoretical bases relate to accepting job offers and awareness of justice?

- The empirical relationship between awareness of justice and acceptance of a job offer?

- How the candidate's perception affects the acceptance of job offers in private sector in Vietnam?

- What are the recommendations for businesses to enhance the candidates’ job offer acceptance?

1.4 Research scope

The scope of this study is defined as the spatial scope and the time range The scope

of space is the private sector in Vietnam, the focus is on private enterprises Specifically, due to time constraints, information resources and relationships with businesses, this study focuses on businesses in the two major cities of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City Businesses are selected to submit questionnaires to survey candidates with diverse industries such as finance, banking, construction, information technology, etc Besides, time range relates to research data The primary data source in this study is synthesized through a survey of questionnaires

in the period from February to April 2019

1.5 Research methodology

The research method is an association of quantitative methods and qualitative methods Qualitative research is used in synthesizing theoretical bases related to awareness of fairness, the relationship between awareness of fairness and the decision to accept work offers Specifically, in qualitative research, it used the secondary materials from international publications, books, international journals, reports and workshop materials to develop literature review The core part of the study is quantitative analysis Specifically, a linear regression analysis model is used to study the impact of the candidate's perception of fairness to the acceptance

of job offers Quantitative analysis techniques include saving reliability with Cronbach’s Alpha Test, Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA), Pearson Correlation Test, Regression analysis and Multi-collinear testing The data used in the analysis are primary data compiled through a survey of the questionnaires to the candidates

who have interviewed in private companies in Vietnam

1.6 Structure of the research

The structure of the study consists of 5 chapters In the introductory chapter, it is introduced the research context, research facilities, research objectives and research questions, the scope of the study Chapter 2 introduces literature review The content of the theoretical basis involves job offers and application perceptions of fairness Research gaps are also given in chapter 2 of the study In the next chapter, the content is the analytical framework and the development of research hypotheses These contents combine theoretical framework and empirical research results in previous studies The content of Chapter 4 is the method of research and data analysis In this chapter, along with describing the techniques used to analyze data, the aggregated data is analyzed The research hypotheses built in the previous chapter are also tested The output of empirical analysis in chapter 4 is the basis to develop the final chapter content Chapter 5 includes conclusions as well as discussion of those conclusions and application

Summary of Chapter 1

In Chapter 1, the thesis introduces an overview of research topics, research objectives and questions It also provides content about the scope of research, research methodology and structure of the thesis In the next chapter, it introduces the theoretical overview of accepting the candidate’s job offer

Chapter 2 Literature review 2.1 Overview of job offer acceptance

2.1.1 Definition of job offer acceptance

The concept of job offer is simply an invitation for a potential employee, whether or not the applicant has applied for a job in an organization (Heathfield, 2019) The job offer often have the outline of the terms and conditions of employment offered to employees in the future These include wages, benefits, job responsibilities, and the name and title of the report manager The job offer may also include expected working hours, desired start dates and provide important details for future employees

The process of forming the job offer may include the following two stages First, the organization attracts candidates to organizations for employers to select and screen qualified people to work at a certain position in the organization Secondly, the organization evaluates candidates in many different ways, based on the requirements of the job, among those attracted through recruitment The recruitment process needs to identify the skills, knowledge and personal characteristics necessary for immediate needs of the business position as well as the future development goals of the business (Ployhart & Harold, 2004)

Based on the simple concept above, the job offer acceptance can be understood simply as the acceptance of an invitation for a given job It implies that candidates are willing to join the organization to work with the terms and conditions of employment given In another aspect, acceptance of work offers was related to the amount of work and wages that employees receive (Abraham, et al., 2013)

2.1.2 The importance role of job offer acceptance

One of the main functions of human resource management is ensuring organizations

to access to appropriate candidates for achievement of the organization's goals (Konradt, Garbers, Böge, Erdogan, & Bauer, 2015) According to research results of Boston Consulting Group (2012), the recruitment of the best qualified candidates

had the effect of promoting the growth of revenue and the rate of the organization Another important argument also emphasizes that human resource management is responsible for attracting and selecting the appropriate workforce, providing them with appropriate training to improve their capacity The ultimate goal is to achieve the organization's goals Effective recruitment not only enhances the overall effectiveness of the organization but also helps manage human resources more effectively (Saddam & Mansor, 2015) Moreover, effective recruitment activities help organizations attract and hire people with appropriate qualifications and always update their knowledge, skills and professional attitudes As a result, workers are able to meet what the organization requires them to do (Lockwood, 2007)

In the field of recruitment, the candidate's acceptance of a job offer is considered a success factor The final stage of recruitment is that the candidate accepts or rejects job offers (Harold, Uggerslev, & Kraichy, Recruitment and job choice, 2013) Combined with the above analysis, it is important for businesses to accept job offers that are important for businesses not only to reduce recruitment costs but also to increase revenue efficiency and profit of the business

In another result, Chapman et al (2005) answered the question of why the candidate who made the final decision was accepting a job offer They discovered influencing factors including job characteristics and organization, employer characteristics and job expectations Thus, the acceptance of the job offer by the candidates also partly shows whether the recruitment activities and characteristics of the business are effective or not Another aspect, it should be noted that important vacancies weigh much on information The fact that candidates cannot access information including objective and subjective aspects leads to a decision not to commit to long-term commitment to the organization This reflects that the candidate's decision whether

or not to help the business review the process of providing information through online job boards, company websites and web log (Harold, Uggerslev, & Kraichy, Recruitment and job choice, 2013)

Moreover, subjective images and relevance, as well as features of the recruitment process can simultaneously predict candidates’ job choice decisions Therefore, it implies that, through the results of the proposal of accepting jobs, organizations can adjust these factor (Barber, 1998) Supporting this view, Walker et al (2013) confirmed that the results of accepting job offers also meant higher organizational relationships and attractiveness

2.1.3 The main factors affecting job offer acceptance

Factors influencing the applicant's ability to accept job offers have been studied and provided diverse evidence in previous studies Specifically, Jurgensen (1978) confirmed that the following 10 attributes in terms of what was most important to them in a job: advancement, benefits, company, co-workers, hours, pay, security, supervisor, type of work and working conditions Turban (1995) argued that website access, workplace awareness and the ability to host servers positively impacted the decision to accept jobs In the previous research However, these two authors did not provide a clear comparison to clarify the difference between the decision to accept the job offer of unemployed and unemployed candidates It was clear that there was a difference based on the argument of search theory It implied that unemployed individuals should make significant concessions to get new jobs However, there was a lack of information regarding how the unemployed considered their decision-making process (Abraham, et al., 2013)

In another aspect, the cost of commuting to work also affects the acceptance of work offers In a previous study, the research team discussed that job offers could

be rejected because of high travel costs or low availability of unemployed people (Abraham, et al., 2013) However, through empirical studies, an opposition result was discovered This proves that there is no clear relationship between employment status and migration (Kley, 2013) While in another study, migration was higher in the unemployed group (Boenisch & Schneider, 2010)

According to another approach related to job search theory, job search was a logical strategy for individuals trying to escape unemployment (Mortensen, 1976)

Unemployed people would try to expand the search radius, conceding terms to increase the chances of getting a suitable job offer It came from the characteristics

of this group of people as a low level and lack of expertise to access better networks (Abraham, et al., 2013) This also shows that the characteristics of workers are also

a factor affecting the acceptance of work offers

On the enterprise side, the income of employees was also a factor affecting the decision to accept job offers Workers may decide to accept a new job with a higher income (Abraham, et al., 2013) However, it is not simple in the current income, another idea is the decision to accept a job offer driven by expectations of future work Therefore, employees may accept new job offers if future job prospects are better than their current status, regardless of whether they are employed or unemployed (Logan, 1996)

Interestingly, the awareness of the fit between Person – Organization fit is also an important factor closely related to the candidates' decision to accept the job offer (Harold, Holtz, Griepentrog, Brewer, & Marsh, 2015) A supportive argument for this point was given as social identity theory by Tajfel and Turner (1986) According to this theory, each individual's actions are related to the social context around them like their family, the neighborhood they live in, where they work Often, in order to develop and maintain a positive concept, individuals look to groups with the appropriate features and characteristics In other words, individuals seek to organizations that were compatible with them (Tajfel & Turner, 1986) In accordance with this view, the attraction – selection – attrition hypothesis confirmed that candidates were attractive and engaged in organizations when they see a high degree of relevance (Schneider, 1987) From the analytical framework, this theory offers several solutions to increase the relevance of candidates Recommendations

to address organizational changes Specifically, the utility of measures and its benefits in corporate governance, environment and organizational culture There is also the importance of recruiting, the need for human-based theories of leadership and work attitudes

The above content mentioned a number of factors affecting the decision of approving work proposals However, when discussing the issue in depth, previous studies had focused on the outcome of recruitment, which was a non-behavioural factor Therefore, it implied that it was impossible to predict the decision to accept the job (Chapman, Uggerslev, Piasentin, & Carroll, 2005) For example, an appealing assessment of an organization did not necessarily mean that labour accepts changes in their careers

To solve this problem, some authors had studied the psychology of workers Specifically, authors have focused on research and found that awareness of justice was the central determinant of applicant behaviour (Bell, Ryan, & Wiechmann, 2004; Hausknecht, Day, & Thomas, 2004; Ployhart & Harold, 2004) In a previous study, Lind (2001) had confirmed that demonstrating high degree of equity is the most important in the early stages of recruitment Accordingly, the fairness of the organization was a factor for the applicant to decide whether to become a member

distributive justice, and interactional justice Accordingly, procedural justice and distributive justice are two basic aspects of organizational justice Interactive justice

is the latest justice discovered regarding the elements of justice between individuals and information (Muzumdar, 2012) The following are theories related to each of above types of justice

In terms of concept, sociologist John R Schermerhorn defined interactive justice as the degree to which people affected by decisions were treated with respect and dignity Interactive justice is divided into two parts The first part is called interpersonal justice and the second part is informational justice (Muzumdar, 2012) Interpersonal justice was defined as how a person was treated by his supervisors and subordinates, etc (Lin & Tyler, 1988) Treating supervisors is respect, dignity, encouragement and encouragement According to Frazier et al (2010), interpersonal justice considered personality and attitude of communication affecting individuals It involved how individuals were responsible for allocating resources and rewards at work to recipients (Chou, 2009) One facility was given that apology was seen as a tactic to enhance justice among individuals as they relate to showing remorse In addition, apology helped those who were harmed avoid their negative effects, thereby reducing anger effectively (Greenberg, J., 1990)

In another aspect, informational justice is seen as an explanation provided to those who convey information about why the procedure is used in a certain way or why the result is distributed according to a certain way When an explanation is more full than common, the level of awareness of information justice is higher (Greenberg, J., 1990) Thereafter, Greenberg (1993) asserted that information explanations can help people affected by decisions to understand the reasons for those decisions Because

it is a means of changing the response and receptive ability of employees to the given procedures

In the early stages of the recruitment process, before the candidate makes a decision

to accept a job offer, interactional justice can be perceived through a number of factors These factors include the interviewer giving kindness and consideration to

the candidate; interviewers treat candidates with respect and dignity; the interviewer

is sensitive to the applicant's individual needs; the manager treats the candidate honestly It helps the candidate understand clearly before making a decision about accepting the job On the other hand, interactional justice is also expressed through the way the company’s representative shows interest in the candidate's rights as employees In order to interact with candidates on the decision to join the organization, the interactional justice is also reflected by the company's agent or interviewer discussing with candidates about their decision making and the meaning

of decision making (Yaghoubi, Mashinchi, Ebrahimi, Abdollahi, & Ebrahimi, 2011) Thus, when the candidate has not participated in the organization, the awareness of the interaction is reflected through interaction with the representative

of the company In Vietnam, this representative may be the head of a certain department in the company or the head of the HR department, even the executive board of the enterprise Although different in responsibilities, these subjects have a common feature of being knowledgeable about the core business and business model of the business

2.2.2 Procedural Justice

In term of concept, Thibaut and Walker (1975) introduced the definition of procedural justice that solved the common process that the distribution of results was carried out Besides, Brockner and Siegel (1996) defined that procedural justice was a positive personal awareness of the processes and procedures relating to the determination of outcomes related to higher levels of trust in the organization and managers Therefore, procedural justice plays an important role for every organization When employees feel that their views and concerns are heard in the decision-making process, they are often more likely to support than reject or deal with decisions of the entire leadership and organization This view is confirmed by one previous research (Lin & Tyler, 1988) Two authors further explained that organizations ignoring procedural justice concerns were at risk of causing negative organizational attitudes The result was dissatisfaction with the organization’s

results on decisions, even employees who do not comply with rules and procedures Some cases led to low labor productivity

The question is why procedural justice can have a strong impact on such organizations? Thibaut and Walker (1975) stressed that procedural justice is considered as a control process that functions as a protector of personal interests This helps individuals protect their interests Two authors demonstrated this assumption that individuals would be more satisfied with adverse results if they believe that the decision-making processes were fair In the context of strategic decision making, Kim and Mauborgne (1998) stressed the way of justice according

to the procedure emotional recognition and promotes intellectual Two researchers believed that a fair process in each organizational activity made organization members feel being respected for the intellectual and their emotional values This made them ready to accept new challenges and cooperated with others in a way that enhanced value creation at the enterprise level

Moreover, another important factor in the applicant’s fair perception was what they receive from the candidate This information included recruitment interviews, job samples These were information that candidates believed to be valid and appear to measure candidates' perceptions of fairness (Hausknecht, Day, & Thomas, 2004) Some studies on manipulation of procedures shown that violation of administrative consistency and speech in the recruitment process negatively affected this fair perception (Rolland & Steiner, 2007) For computer-based testing, studies show that the applicant's consistency, treatment and opportunity were the most powerful predictors of fair awareness (Konradt, Garbers, Böge, Erdogan, & Bauer, 2015) However, the perception of procedural justice of the candidates is different in each stage of recruitment Chan and Schmitt (2004) argued that the candidates distinguished procedural justice rules from being more or less different from changes in time This reflected when candidates moved from earlier to later stages Procedural justice rules are measured by a number of items such as formal characteristics (represented by rules related to work, execution opportunities,

reconsideration opportunities, consistency of governance), explanation (feedback, open and known information) and interpersonal treatment (treatment of applicants and ownership of questions) (Konradt, Warszta, & Ellwart, 2013)

In the first phase of recruitment, by the perception of procedural justice, when the applicant requests additional responsibilities of the job, the company’s representative or interviewer clarifies what the candidate is interested in On the other hand, procedural justice is also confirmed through interviewers' treatment with candidates during the interview process The process from filing and interviewing is also considered as fair to candidates according to the company's procedural justice On the other hand, in many cases, the labor contract is the result

of the interview process The procedures related to the content of the contract given

by the company representative during the interview are also used by the candidates for evaluation These procedures are legal provisions in the recruitment process Thus, during the interview process, the behavior of the company representatives with the candidates in a fair manner is very necessary

2.2.3 Distributive Justice

Just like the two types of justice introduced above, distributive justice is also a diverse concept Sezen (2001) provided that distributive justice based on the distributive of organizational benefits for deserving employees In another view, Toremen and Tan (2010) defined distributive justice as an employee's perception of rational distributive of resources and benefits of the organization The emergence of distributive justice may be related to the fair theory of Adam (1965) This theory described that people compared their job performance ratios to their own work input with the proportion of their peers In this case, it appeared a consideration between the efficiency of work among individuals in the same organization When evaluating distributive justice, individuals often evaluate their work input and the results received from the organization Previous studies have found that distributive justice had a relationship with employee satisfaction, employee satisfaction with

leaders, and revenue goals of employees (Tyler & Caine, 1981; McFarlin & Sweeney, 1992; Foley, Kidder, & Powell, 2002)

Moreover, in businesses, distributive justice played a very important role The most common goal in most equity distribution studies had been maximizing productivity Most studies had focused on fair rules (Adam, 1965) Because unfair distribution can lead to distrust, dispute, disrespect and other social issues between employees and their managers (Suliman, 2007) In other words, employee productivity was likely to increase when they were rewarded When employees achieve expectations that were not met, some negative impacted on businesses appear such as reducing labor productivity, organizational dissatisfaction and distrust (Frazier, Johnson, Gavin, Gooty, & Snow, 2010)

According to Noruzy et al (2011) Distribution justice focused on employee confidence and feeling satisfied with the results of their work such as salary and job assignment Distributive justice refereed to equity awareness of the results an individual received from the organization Results can be distributed on an equal basis, needs or contributions and individuals determine the fairness of distribution through comparison with others (Alsalem & Alhaiani, 2007) To assess the perception of fairness distribution, Leventhal (1976) gave a number of items to assess related outcomes such as salary or promotion at work, rewards in labor, refresher classes, the requirement of appropriateness in distributing results related to the contributions of workers Three distribution rules including justice, fairness and demand were considered aspects of distribution justice (Colquitt, Conlon, Wesson, Porter, & Nguyen, 2001) On another aspect, Forsyth (2006) refers to the five norms

of distribution justice included:

 Equity: This factor assumes that the distribution of results is based on employee input Employee inputs include skills, time, money and energy invested by individuals to perform their tasks As a result, more investment-intensive employees are required to receive more results than those who

invest less Individuals who invest in high levels of inputs will receive more results than those who invest less

 Equality: Although the employee's input is different, the employees are entitled to equal rewards

 Power: In this respect, the fact that people with multiple rights, status or control over the group should receive more than those in lower positions, with less authority, status or control over the group

 Need: People with the greatest needs need to be provided with the resources needed to meet those needs These individuals should be provided with more resources than those who already own them, regardless of their inputs

 Responsibility: This norm is based on distribution justice based on resource sharing In other words, the most resource-intensive individual group members should share their resources with those with less

In the first phase of recruitment, distribution justice can be perceived through a number of manifestations such as: the company representative proposes fairness to candidates for work schedule, salary, workload (Yaghoubi, Mashinchi, Ebrahimi, Abdollahi, & Ebrahimi, 2011) During the interview process, an opinion that is always given by the candidates is a balance between the work, the proposed responsibilities and the achievements of the candidates In particular, candidates are aware of the information the interviewer gives, such as job responsibilities, salary, bonuses, promotion schedule, or whether the work schedule is equal Thereby, the candidates will evaluate and compare with the volume and responsibility of such work, the salary and bonus of the company is worthy of what we spend This comparison can take place in the company, especially in comparison with group interviews, any difference perceived in the interview about the allocation of resources and what is going on with the company or industry can change the perception of the applicant’s distribution justice

2.3 Empirical results of applicant perceptions of justice and job acceptance

The content of this section is an introduction of some empirical studies on the relationship between awareness of justice and acceptance of work offers (Chapman,

D S.; Webster, J., 2006; Walsh, Tuller, Barnes‐Farrell, & Matthews, 2010; Harold, Holtz, Griepentrog, Brewer, & Marsh, 2015; Konradt, Garbers, Böge, Erdogan, & Bauer, 2015) The result of studies showed that the existence of two schools in the result, which were relationship and non-relationship between the perception of fairness and the decision to accept work offers

The study of Chapman and Webster (2006) was a testament to the school of relationship between awareness of fairness and acceptance of job offers Two authors conducted a study on college students in Canada The research results showed that procedural awareness was not related to job choice Authors argued that the observed relationships may have influenced the short-term nature of cooperative positions

non-In a contradictory development, Walsh et al (2010) studied at a large multinational company They found out that candidates who accepted job offers more preferred in awareness of job-related fairness and information sharing during the hiring process The result of this study was supported by the later study that deciding whether or not to accept an offer to join the organization, candidates with a sense of fairness can be particularly productive (Harold, Holtz, Griepentrog, Brewer, & Marsh, 2015) To detect the results of this study, Harold et al (2015) conducted a study based on two sample groups with size of 332 observed from US military candidates However, the study of Harold et al (2015) also had limitations when collecting only samples from the US military Usually, military candidates, in the early stages, wanted to join the organization, not a specific position Due to differences in the recruitment process of the military and the private sector, the degree of influence of the results of the research is different (Harold, Holtz, Griepentrog, Brewer, & Marsh, 2015)

A larger-scale study was conducted, regarding the perception of organizational justice and each stage of the job including approving job offers and the post-employment period of 1 - 5 years, post-employment 3 years (Konradt, Garbers, Böge, Erdogan, & Bauer, 2015) In terms of sample size, the authors conducted a study based on a sample

of 182 candidates for the apprenticeship program of a major German industrial company Data collection time is 3 years This study was evaluated professionally when focusing on three points in the recruitment process These included procedural justice expectations that employees have before taking part in the process of selecting perceptions of procedural justice, right after taking part in the process and three weeks after joining the selection system but before receiving feedback Findings of the study also show that awareness of fairness also affects job choice decisions Specifically, fair awareness of procedures in the post-inspection period and before feedbacks were positively related to the probability of accepting job offers In addition, candidates who find fairness of post-inspection procedures were also more likely to accept job offers (Konradt, Garbers, Böge, Erdogan, & Bauer, 2015) Remarkably, by measuring the responses of applicants at different stages of the recruitment process, authors found that awareness plays a different role in each stage Specifically, it discovered that post-test awareness of justice was measured immediately after the most relevant test involved in accepting work offers This is reasonably explained that when the applicant waited to receive the company's results, he or she felt uncertain, worried, frustrated, leading to a reduction in the level of perceived fairness (Konradt, Garbers, Böge, Erdogan, & Bauer, 2015)

Summary of Chapter 2

In chapter 2 of the thesis, it summarizes the theoretical basis for accepting the candidate's job offer regarding the definitions and factors affecting the decision to approve the job offer Besides, the content related to awareness of fairness and its relationship with the decision to accept job offers Theories are provided in parallel with the results of quantitative studies In the next content, the thesis provides content on research methods

Chapter 3 Research model 3.1 Analytical framework

According to organizational justice theory by Adam (1965), Workers compare what they put into a job (input) with what they get from that job (output) and then compare their input-output ratio to the input-output ratio of others If their ratio is equal to the ratio of others, it is in a state of fairness If this rate is not equal, it shows that there is an injustice situation When unfair conditions existed, employees would make efforts to correct them (Adam, 1965) Based on the theory of organizational justice, Gilliland (1993) studied the applicant's response The model proposed by this author described that the response of the applicant included awareness and related behavior Under that model, procedural fairness rules will trigger the cognitive and behavioral response of applicants As a result, Gilliland (1993) stated that compared to candidates who find the recruitment process to be fair, those who consider this process unfair were less likely to accept a job offer This author has argued that unfair perception of candidates' disgust or fears of unfair treatment in recruitment is predicting that the organization treats employees badly

In a later study, Lind (2001) developed fairness heuristics theory to explain why fair perception affects the decision to accept jobs This theory affirmed that people had a need to reduce uncertainty and used fairness as a prerequisite to confidently decide whether to join or not to an organization (van den Bos & Lind, 2002) According to Lind's explanation (2001), the organization demonstrates fairness was a great signal that shows a valid conclusion that existed the credibility of attaching personal results to that organization Besides, this author also emphasized that demonstrating high degree of equity was the most important in the early stages of employment relations At that time, the uncertainty about basic social dilemmas was often the highest

Developed from the above theories, Konradt et al (2015) proposed an analytical framework on the relationship between organizational awareness and each stage of

employment including accepting job offers and later stages Below is an analytical framework on the relationship between awareness of organizational justice and the acceptance of job offer given in the study of Konradt et al (2015)

Chart 3.1 Conceptual framework of Konradt et al (2015)

(Source: Konradt et al., 2015, p.118)

In the above analysis framework (Chart 3.1), the relationship between awareness of fairness and decision to approve work has been reviewed generally However, as analyzed in the previous chapter, organizational justice is an immense concept, including many facet gases In particular, organizational justice includes three aspects, namely distributive, procedural and interactional justice (Ambrose, Hess, & Ganesan, 2007; Yean & Yusof, 2016) Therefore, the analytical framework of these three aspects is proposed, which affects the decision to accept job offers The below analytical framework is proposed in this study (Chart 3.2)

Chart 3.2 Conceptual framework

After proposing the analytical framework, the following research hypotheses was developed

3.2 Hypothesis development

Interactional justice reflected the quality of interpersonal relationships in the organization (Folger & Cropanzano, 1998) Its content included two smaller aspects which were interpersonal and informational justice (Lin & Tyler, 1988) For candidates, information regarding personnel procedures and interaction between individuals had a special relationship (Lind, 2001) Bies (1987) argued that interpersonal communication was one of the behaviors of decision makers regarding fairness and unfair treatment among individuals

Furthermore, interpersonal treatment included applicants who needed respect from the representatives of the organization (Konradt, Garbers, Böge, Erdogan, & Bauer, 2015) In another aspect, Frazier et al (2010) reflected that information justice considered the explanations given to individuals about why some decisions were made In the previous study, authors assumed providing information to applicants

on how to make choices and how to make employment decisions The information provided in detail and in specificity regarding the decisions will minimize employee negative emotions (Chapman, Uggerslev, Piasentin, & Carroll, 2005) The fact was that candidates cannot collect subjective and objective information of the

Perception of interactional justice (IJ)

Perception of procedural justice (PJ)

Perception of distributive justice (DJ)

Likelihood of Acceptance of Job

offer

organization meant a commitment to not work for long (Harold, Uggerslev, & Kraichy, Recruitment and job choice, 2013)

Within the scope of this study, it is expected that the candidate’s perception of interactive justice positively affects the acceptance of job offers Therefore, the following research hypothesis H1 is developed

Hypothesis H 1: Applicant’s perception of interactional justice (IJ) positively effect

on job offer acceptance

Procedural justice refers to the perception of fairness in the decision making of organizations (Lin & Tyler, 1988) When the standard of justice was violated, individuals often assessed negatively about the organization and did not accept the job offer (Sumanth & Cable, 2011) According to Sessa and Taylor (2000), job applicants prefer non-invasive, easy-to-manage selection methods, often with low predictive effect Besides, when employees felt that their views and concerns were absorbed in the decision-making process, they often supported instead of refusing to make decisions or implementing it in a coping way (Brockner, 2006)

In previous research, Bauer et al (2001) pointed out that procedural corporate rules are the basis for candidates to select jobs as a basic understanding of social structure Procedural justice aspects of a job-related test, company representatives provide the opportunity to demonstrate the candidate's skills, the information provided about the test is pushing enough Besides, on the social aspect, procedural justice is also described that the candidates are treated the same, in an open, polite way; The questions are given to candidates who are not prejudiced or too personal and have enough two-way communication during the interview process

On the other hand, the more group interviews the more participants are, the more obvious this is because it shows more social interaction In group interviews, candidates are not only assessed by the interviewer; They are evaluated first, and indirectly also by other candidates Therefore, group interviews are likely to represent a threat of social assessment (Dickerson and Kemeny 2004) People are motivated to preserve their social self: their social self-esteem, status and

acceptance Social situations in which poor performance can be considered to reflect a lack of a characteristic or ability to create a threat to this goal (Dickerson and Kemeny 2004)

In the same case, within the scope of this study, it is expected that the candidate's perception of justice according to the procedure positively affects the acceptance of the job offer Therefore, the following research hypothesis H2 is developed

Hypothesis H 2: Applicant’s perception of procedural justice (PJ) positively effect

on job offer acceptance

At work, employees generally considered allocating rewards as well as resources to see if a fair distribution was made (Colquitt, Conlon, Wesson, Porter, & Nguyen, 2001) This was consistent with Adam’s equality theory Forsyth (2006) also identified resource allocation as an organization’s response to workers’ needs Through empirical research, Walker et al (2013) found that employees can be in a better starting position when they join the organization if they receive positive signals before entering the country Because having positive expectations in the organization will motivate a new employee to fully participate in their new environment, helping employees do better when they start new jobs

Moreover, resources allocated in the enterprise include tangible (financial) and intangible material (non-financial) (Adam, 1965) If the applicant felt fairness in the allocation, it would motivate their appreciation in accepting the job offer (Folger & Cropanzano, 1998) On the opposite side, a previous study found that an unfair distribution of work can lead to candidate resistance to decisions (Cohen-Charash & Spector, 2001) It is worth mentioning that those who receive sudden salary increases or unexpectedly receive commissions and distribute from on-demand training activities can work more and have a sense of equality with the benefits received from that overtime job (Gilliland, 1993)

In the early stages of the interview, the perception of distribution justice is described by the perception of the interviewer in a fair assessment of the responsibilities and duties of the job with what the applicant receives That is the

distribution of income However, it is also reflected through the allocation of candidates' working time to the company's business In addition to salary and working time, the resource factors related to the candidate's work are also evaluated through interviews Even the candidate’s contribution rights are considered Therefore, any difference perceived in the interview about the allocation of resources and what is going on with the company or industry can change the perception of the applicant's distribution justice Typically, if the company does not have benefits, it is the vacation while other businesses are doing It also reflects on the company's distribution justice

Within the scope of this study, it is expected that the candidate's perception of distribution justice positively affects the acceptance of job offers From the above analysis, the following research hypothesis H3 is developed

Hypothesis H 3: Applicant’s perception of distributive justice (DJ) positively effect

on job offer acceptance

Summary of Chapter 3

The content of Chapter 3 is the method of research, its analytical framework is built

on the basis of previous empirical studies From the foundation of the analytical framework, research hypotheses were built These hypotheses are the basis for examining the relationship between the decision to accept the job offer and the perception of justice in the interview From the research method, the next content is empirical analysis of the relationship between the perception of justice and the decision to accept the job offer

Chapter 4 Methodology and Data Analysis 4.1 Data collection

Within the scope of this study, primary data sources are used for quantitative analysis Data collection methods are conducted through questionnaire survey Regarding the development of research questionnaires, it was developed based on upgrading the questionnaire to produce a final questionnaire The last questionnaire

is used for a wide-ranging survey The content of the questionnaire is designed to consist of two parts The first part is an introduction of information of respondents and the purpose of the survey question The rest are questions for research purposes

of the thesis The development of a questionnaire for applicants who have received

a job offer is based on reference in previous studies These studies are closely related to the research topic Specific questions are presented in the description below

The sampling method is divided into the probability sampling method and the probability sampling method Non-random sampling is the sampling method where units in the overall population do not have equal capacity to be selected for the study sample Due to limited human and financial resources, it is difficult to interview questionnaires to all those interviewed at private companies in Vietnam This fact affects the sampling in the study Within the scope of this study, it uses a non-random sampling method to select the candidate for the survey Specifically, convenience sampling is selected based on the accessibility of the object

non-In terms of data collection methods, it is done by sending online questionnaires to a list of participants via email received from the company’s HR department Besides, attracting survey participants on social networks is also applied Facebook Subjects who are attracted to survey questionnaires are those who are and are about to work

at private sector companies Because of the characteristics of Vietnamese labor force with a high rate of participation in social networks like Facebook, it makes it easy to reach these candidates