Contract workers at HEIs within a framework of motivational leadership

Abstract

Most literature sources are based on negative assumptions about contract workers and career success. Despite the growing number of contract workers employed at higher education institutions (HEIs), and the changes it elicits in the work place, there has been little theoretical work conducted about a positive perspective of contract workers in relation to achieving organisational or personal goals. A review of the topic about contract workers has been undertaken from the perspective of motivational leadership, incorporating the theoretical perspectives of the goal setting theory (Locke 1960 in Jooste 2009) and the model of complex man and organisations (Schein 1992 in Jooste 2009).