Management Position Questionnaire

Abstract

The Management Position Questionnaire (MPQ), developed by Lyman W. Porter in 1961, is a foundational psychological instrument designed to assess the perceived need satisfactions of individuals in management roles. The scale comprises 15 items that measure characteristics of a management position, primarily corresponding to Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, specifically focusing on security, social needs, esteem, autonomy, and self-actualization. The MPQ is crucial for examining how perceived fulfillment and importance of these needs differ across various organizational levels, providing key insights into job attitudes and organizational behavior based on hierarchical status.

The instrument is unique in that it requires respondents to provide three distinct ratings for each item: the amount of the characteristic presently connected with the position, the amount that should be connected, and the importance of the characteristic to the manager. This multi-faceted scoring approach allows researchers to calculate a deficiency score (what should be minus what is) for specific needs at different job levels.

Keywords

Management Position Questionnaire, MPQ, Need Satisfaction, Job Attitudes, Management Level, Maslow’s Hierarchy, Organizational Behavior, Need Fulfillment, Job Satisfaction, Management Psychology

Authors

Lyman W. Porter

Purpose

The primary purpose of the Management Position Questionnaire (MPQ) is to systematically measure the extent to which various organizational needs are perceived as being fulfilled—or deficiently fulfilled—by managers occupying different hierarchical levels within an organization. The scale was initially created to empirically test the assumption that job satisfaction and the fulfillment of higher-order needs (such as autonomy and self-actualization) increase as one moves up the management hierarchy.

By comparing the perceived amount of fulfillment currently available versus the amount believed necessary, the MPQ provides a quantified measure of need deficiency. This allows researchers and organizations to identify specific areas where management positions fail to meet the psychological requirements of the incumbents, thus informing job redesign and organizational development strategies.

Construct

The core construct measured by the MPQ is Perceived Need Satisfaction, which is theoretically grounded in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. The 15 items are designed to cover five key categories of needs:

• Security Needs: The feeling of stability and safety in the position.
• Social Needs: Opportunities for interpersonal relationships (e.g., developing close friendships, helping others).
• Esteem Needs: Feelings of self-esteem and the prestige of the position (internal and external).
• Autonomy Needs: Authority, independent thought and action, and participation in goal setting and procedure determination.
• Self-Actualization Needs: Personal growth, self-fulfillment, and the feeling of worthwhile accomplishment.

While omitting physiological needs, which are typically satisfied for managers, the MPQ includes two additional, highly practical organizational needs: pay and the feeling of being-in-the-know, reflecting specific extrinsic and cognitive job characteristics important to management roles.

Validity

The validity of the MPQ is primarily established through its strong theoretical alignment with Maslow’s Hierarchy, lending it high face validity and conceptual soundness. The original study demonstrated empirical support for the scale’s ability to detect meaningful differences in perceived need fulfillment based on job level, suggesting robust construct validity within the context of organizational hierarchy.

Specifically, the finding that middle managers reported higher fulfillment of higher-order needs (autonomy and self-actualization) than bottom managers, while lower-order needs (security, social) showed less differentiation, aligns directly with organizational theory regarding the scope and responsibility associated with increasing hierarchical level. This differential pattern of results confirms the scale’s utility in measuring specific need categories as a function of job structure.

Reliability

The original publication by Porter (1961) does not explicitly detail standard internal consistency coefficients (e.g., Cronbach’s alpha) or test-retest reliability statistics for the Management Position Questionnaire. However, the rigor of its development—being based on a robust theoretical framework—and its subsequent widespread adoption and adaptation in later organizational psychology instruments (many of which report high reliability) suggest acceptable internal consistency within the derived need categories.

The scale’s methodology, which requires three distinct ratings for each item, minimizes response bias by separating the objective perception of the job characteristic (what is) from the subjective value placed on it (what should be and importance), thereby contributing to the measurement stability of the resulting deficiency scores.

Factor Analysis

While the initial study utilized the MPQ primarily for comparative descriptive analysis, the instrument is structured around five underlying theoretical factors corresponding to Maslow’s need levels. Subsequent research utilizing factor analysis on similar need satisfaction instruments derived from the MPQ often confirms the distinct clustering of items into the hypothesized need categories (Security, Social, Esteem, Autonomy, and Self-Actualization).

The MPQ served as a critical starting point for developing more refined instruments aimed at measuring organizational motivation and job attitudes. Its conceptual clarity provided the necessary framework for future factor analytic studies to validate the multi-dimensional nature of managerial need satisfaction.

Instrument

Test Type: Needs Assessment / Job Attitude Survey / Organizational Psychology Scale

Format: 15-item questionnaire, using a 7-point Likert-type scale (1=minimum, 7=maximum). Each item requires three separate ratings (present fulfillment, desired fulfillment, and importance).

Language Available: English (Original)

Population Group: Managers and Administrators

Age Group: Adult working population (typically mid-career professionals)

Population Details: The original sample included 139 managers (64 bottom-level and 75 middle-level) from three distinct organizations. Bottom-level managers were defined as the lowest level of supervision, and middle-level managers were defined as those above the first level of supervision.

Test Methodology: Comparative analysis of mean differences between perceived fulfillment and desired fulfillment, and assessment of the importance of needs across different hierarchical levels.

Keywords

Need Deficiency, Job Level, Management Attitude, Organizational Psychology, Porter, Job Characteristics, Extrinsic Needs, Intrinsic Needs, Hierarchy of Needs

Authors

Author ORCID Identifier: Not provided (Historical publication)

Affiliation Email addresses: Not provided (Historical publication)

Correspondence Address: Not provided (Refer to original publication: Journal of Applied Psychology, 1961)

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The Management Position Questionnaire was first published in 1961. As a classic, foundational instrument in organizational psychology, it is widely utilized in academic research, often without requiring specific fees, though proper citation of the original source (Porter, 1961) is required for scholarly use. Specific permission details should be sought from the publisher of the Journal of Applied Psychology.

Reference’s

• Porter, L. W. (1961). A study of perceived need satisfactions in bottom and middle management jobs. Journal of Applied Psychology 45:1–10.
• Brown, F. (1973). The job satisfaction of administrators within a multi-ethnic setting. Paper presented at American Educational Research Association. ERIC ED 090 654.
• Mitchell, V. F., and Moudgill, P. (1976). Measurement of Maslow’s need hierarchy. Organizational Behavior and Human Performance 16:334–49.
• Porter, L. W. (1962). Job attitudes in management: I. perceived deficiencies in need fulfillment as a function of job level. Journal of Applied Psychology 46:375–84.
• Trusty, F. M., and Sergiovanni, T. J. (1966). Perceived need deficiencies of teachers and administrators: A proposal for restructuring teacher roles. Educational Administration Quarterly 2:168–80.
• Van Maanen, J. (1975). Police socialization: A longitudinal examination of job attitudes in an urban police department. Administrative Science Quarterly 20:207–28.

Items of the Management Position Questionnaire

IMPORTANT: The following scale items must be preserved in their original language and must not be changed in any way.

1. The feeling of security in my management position
2. The opportunity, in my management position, to give help to other people
3. The opportunity to develop close friendships in my management position
4. The feeling of self-esteem a person gets from being in my management position
5. The prestige of my management position inside the company (that is, the regard received from others in the company)
6. The prestige of my management position outside the company (that is, the regard received from others not in the company)
7. The authority connected with my management position
8. The opportunity for independent thought and action in my management position
9. The opportunity, in my management position, for participation in the setting of goals
10. The opportunity, in my management position, for participation in the determination of methods and procedures
11. The opportunity for personal growth and development in my management position
12. The feeling of self-fulfillment a person gets from being in my management position (that is, the feeling of being able to use one’s own unique capabilities, realizing one’s potentialities)
13. The feeling of worthwhile accomplishment in my management position
14. The pay for my management position
15. The feeling of being-in-the-know in my management position