DIMENSIONS AND CHARACTERISTICS OF PERSONNEL MANAGER PERCEPTIONS OF EFFECTIVE DRUG-TESTING PROGRAMS

PERSONNEL PSYCHOLOGY 1987.40

DIMENSIONS AND CHARACTERISTICS OF PERSONNEL MANAGER PERCEPTIONS OF EFFECTIVE DRUG-TESTING PROGRAMS

LUIS R. GOMEZ-MEJIA College of Business and Administration

University of Colorado at Boulder

DAVID B. BALKIN College of Business

Louisiana State University

This study examines several dimensions and characteristics of drug-testing programs that are associated with personnel managers’ judgments of the programs’ effectiveness. The data gathered from 190 human resource management (HRM) executives indicate that firms with drug-testing policies differ from non-drug-testing organizations. Drug-testing programs considered to be effective are supported by ancillary activities such as employee assistance programs, supervisory training, and employee drug- awareness communications. Organizations perceived to have effective drug-testing policies engage in drug testing for targeted groups of employees and focus on the rehabilitation of those individuals who test positive.

In recent years drug testing has become a burning societal issue. Some estimates have placed the cost of drug abuse to the U.S. economy at $25 billion in lost employee productivity (Susser, 1985). Organizations are responding to the losses in absenteeism, ruined materials, increased sick leave, and increased litigation caused by drug-abusing employees by enact- ing policies that screen out employees and applicants who are suspected of using illegal substances. A recent survey shows that 25% of the Fortune 500 companies have implemented drug-testing programs during the last five years (Lahey, 1986).

Some have argued that, in addition to their need to prevent potential damage to the organization resulting from the use of illegal drugs, employers are legally required to protect innocent third parties from the actions of substance-abusing employees (Rothstein, 1986). In certain situations, employers may be held liable for the actions of off-duty employees, even if the employees are not intoxicated on the job, but use drugs after work (Angarola, 1985). At present, there is wide variation in the scope of the drug-testing policies used by U.S. firms. Some overzealous companies, in

Correspondence and requests for reprints should be addressed to Luis R. Gomez-Mejia, Division of Strategy and Organization Management, College of Business and Administration, University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, CO 80309. COPYRIGHT @ 1987 PERSONNEL PSYCHOLOGY, INC

745

746 PERSONNEL PSYCHOLOGY

their eagerness to provide a safe workplace, may violate employees ’ rights to privacy by misusing the information provided by the drug tests (Lehr & Middlebrooks, 1986). There are also some troubling doubts about the accuracy of many drug-testing techniques that are currently in use (Susser, 1985). Despite these potential drawbacks, a growing number of firms believe that an obligation to protect the organization, employees, and society outweighs the negative aspects of drug testing (Angarola, 1985).

Because most corporate drug-testing policies have been enacted recently, very limited systematic examination of testing programs is found in the literature. Published reports are generally prescriptive and tend to focus on the legal aspects of drug testing (e.g., Angarola, 1985; Lehr & Middle- brooks, 1986; Murphy, Barlow, & Hatch, 1986; Rothstein, 1986; Schein, 1986; Susser, 1985). The objective of this study is to close this research gap by providing an empirical answer to the following questions: (1) What is the typical profile of “drug-testing” vis-a-vis “non-drug-testing” firms? (2) Which factors appear to play major roles in the relative effectiveness of drug-testing programs?

Method

Instrumentation

The construction of the research instrument used in this study was based on a rational approach similar to the one used in conventional job analysis (Gomez-Mejia, Page, & Tornow, 1982; McCormick, 1974; 1976) and organization development interventions (Fordyce & Weil, 197 1; White & Mitchell, 1976).

In phase one, an exhaustive literature review was conducted, cover- ing publications on drug testing itself as well as on related areas such as employee assistance programs and alcohol abuse.

Approximately 40 articles and books were reviewed. In-depth interviews with human resource management (HRM) executives from 15 different firms that had established drug-testing programs were also held during this first phase. Each interview lasted approximately two hours. These firms were located in the eastern, midwestem, and southern regions of the United States. These executives were asked open-ended as well as structured questions about their organizations’ drug-testing programs. Examples of some of the interview questions are as follows:

I. What prompted your organization to start a drug-testing program? 2. How does your firm conduct the drug testing? (e.g.. outside applicants only

vs. all employees; announced in advance or given unannounced; given only to employees when there is a probable cause of drug abuse or given at random).

GOMEZ-MEJLA AND BALKIN 747

3. Describe major problems encountered in implementing the drug-testing pro-

4. Describe the main strengths and weaknesses of drug testing based on your

5 . What major issues should be seriously considered in establishing a drug-

6. What criteria would you use to judge the effectiveness of a drug-testing

gram.

organization’s experience.

testing program?

program?

In the second phase, information obtained from both the literature review and the HRM executives was used as primary input to construct a standardized paper-and-pencil survey for a larger-scale field study. The drug-testing questionnaire contained both aspects emphasized in the literature and aspects considered important by HRM executives. During the third phase, a draft of the survey was pretested with those HRM executives who had participated in the interviews to ensure that it would be complete and easy to follow and the items would be unambiguous. After incorporat- ing their suggestions, the revised draft was reviewed and critiqued by the Research Committee of the American Society for Personnel Administration (ASPA). This committee is composed of ASPA directors, academics, and top-level practitioners. In this entire process, special attention was paid to whether or not the items in each of the composite scales adequately represented the purported dimensions being measured.

The final version of the instrument included questions pertaining to demographic characteristics, managerial attitudes toward drug testing, general dimensions of drug-testing policies, specific program characteristics, and effectiveness indicators (see Tables 14). These measures are described in greater detail later in the article.

Sample

A random sample of 500 HRM executives from different firms was selected for this study. This random sampling procedure made it possible to ascertain the typical profile of the “drug-testing” vis-a-vis the “non-drug- testing” company. The top HRM executive from each firm was asked to complete the paper-and-pencil questionnaire because these individuals had HRM policy-making responsibilities and were most likely to be knowledge- able about the total scope of employee drug-testing policies. Other types of employees (supervisors and medical technicians, for example) may have had more localized or specialized knowledge of drug-testing implementation, but the HRM executive probably had the most complete information and broadest perspective regarding these programs. Also, we believed that HRM executives would be more willing to cooperate with this highly sensitive project than would other employees or corporate officers.


TABLE 1 A Comparative Profile of Drug-testing Firms and

Non-drug-testing Companies

Characteristics

Drug testers Non-drug testers

x SD x SD (N=42) (N=148)

1. Firm size (total number of employees in OOOs) 18.6* 9.3 8.2 6.8

3. Percentage female emplo ees 28.4 10.3 45.4** 13.2 4. Percentage minority empibyees 10.8* 3.2 4.8 1.3 5. Occupational distribution

a. Percentage production/ laborers 53.6* 19.6 38.2 14.2 b. Percentage ClericaUadministrative 25.2 6.3 30.4 12.3 c. Percentage tecnical/professional 14.7 5.4 22.6; 17.1 d. Percentage managenal 12.4 7.3 19.1 5.3

6. Average age of employees 27.2 8.6 35.9* 10.1

2. Fm age (in years) 35.0* 8.6 20.3 9.7

% N % N 7. Type of business

a. Manufacturing b. Service

8. Geographical location a. Southeast b. Southwest c. Northeast d. Midwest e. Northwest

9. Formal drug policy 10. Employee assistance program

36 85.7* 6 14.3

1 2.4 4 9.5

29 69.0** 5 11.9 3 7.2

42 100.00** 12 28.6

90 48

25 30 40 48

5 60 46

60.8 39.2**

16.9* 20.3* 21.0 32.4*

3.4 40.5 31.1

*Higher than the other group with a p1.05 **Higher than the other group with a p<.O1

The annual membership directory from the American Society for Per- sonnel Administration (ASPA) was used to identify the target sample. ASPA is the largest professional personnel association in the United States, and it contains the Personnel Accreditation Institute (PAI), which accredits many personnel executives as personnel specialists (French, 1986). Multi- ple respondents from the same organization were not included, so the final sample represented a different organization for each respondent.

Of the 500 HRM executives chosen from the ASPA list, 190 (38%) agreed to participate for a free copy of a technical report (see Table 1 for sample characteristics). While the response rate was somewhat low, this was expected because at the time the data were collected (1986) the majority of U.S. firms had not developed drug-testing policies (Lahey, 1986t tha t is, many nonrespondents were expected to be with non-drug- testing firms and, thus, not interested in the study.

All participants were promised strict confidentiality. Of the total of 190 HRM executives who participated in the survey, 42 (22%) indicated that their firms currently had employee drug-testing programs. The percentage

GOMEZ-MEJIA AND BALKIN 749

of drug testers in the sample (22%) was very close to the percentage (25%) found among Fortune 500 firms by Lahey (1986).

Demographic and Attitudinal Measures to Compare Drug-testing and Non-drug-testing Firms

Respondents from drug-testing and non-drug-testing companies (N = 190) were asked to describe the demographic characteristics of the firm in terms of such factors as size, age, occupational distribution, and type of business (see Table 1). Survey participants in both samples (N = 190) were also asked to indicate the prevailing managerial attitudes toward drug testing in their firm by responding to a battery of 11 items (see Table 2). The response format for each of the statements in Table 2 consisted of a five-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). The demographic and attitudinal items shown in Tables 1 and 2, answered by all respondents, were included in the first part of the survey. Drug-testing firms (n = 42) were asked to complete the remaining sections of the survey, which included the operational measures described below.

Operational Measures to Assess Drug-testing Programs

As noted earlier, a review of the literature and interviews with HRM executives were used to develop measures of various aspects of the drug- testing program and specific program characteristics. Table 3 shows the items and the coefficient alphas associated with each composite scale employed in the study. Each composite scale was later utilized as a predictor of program effectiveness (see Table 3) as judged by the HRM executives. A confirmatory factor analytic method, an ideal adjunct to the a priori scal- ing approach used here, was not used because of the difficulty in obtaining a large enough sample of drug-testing firms to meet the ratio of cases to variables required by this technique.

The general dimensions of the drug-testing program and the specific program characteristics were treated as separate categories in this study (see Table 3). The logic underlying this division was that the former concerned global program design issues and would consist of composite scales, while the latter captured the ways management implements the drug-testing program for the employee population and would consist of dichotomous or numeric variables.

General dimensions. Eight general dimensions focusing on the design of the drug-testing program were identified: (1) union support for drug-testing program, (2) protection of privacy/confidentiality, (3) trained personnel, (4) program management, (5) ancillary programs, (6) program

TABL

E 2

Man

ager

ial A

ttitu

des

of D

rug-

test

ing

and

Non

-dru

g-te

stin

g Co

mpa

nies

Dru

te

ster

s N

on-d

rug

test

ers

X

SD

% A

gree

X

SD

%A

gree

M

anag

eria

l A

ttitu

des

(% =

42)

(N

= 14

8)

1.

Man

agem

ent

pref

ers

a “h

ands

off

’ app

roac

h to

em

ploy

ee p

erso

nal

prob

lem

s. 2.

30

0.92

25

3.

35**

* 1.

21

65

2.

Man

agem

ent I

S af

raid

of

the

lega

l ram

ifica

tions

of

drug

test

ing.

2.

55

0.86

27

3.

40**

* 1.

13

72

3.

Man

agem

ent v

iew

s dr

ug te

stin

g as

an

inva

sion

of

priv

acy.

2.

20

1.10

20

3.

32**

* 0.

79

61

4.

Man

agem

ent

doub

ts th

at d

rug

test

ing

will

sol

ve th

e un

derly

ing

prob

lem

s as

-

5.

Man

agem

ent

does

not

fee

l tha

t the

re is

a s

igni

fican

t dru

g pr

oble

m in

the

co

mpa

ny.

2.71

0.

66

42

2.75

0.

84

50

6. M

anag

emen

t fe

els t

hat d

rug

test

ing

has

a ne

gativ

e ef

fect

on

empl

oyee

mor

ale

and

empl

oyee

rela

tions

. 2.

29

1.15

29

2.

35

0.72

36

9.

Man

agem

ent

feel

s th

at w

hile

dru

g ab

use

may

be

a pr

oble

m, t

here

are

mor

e im

porta

nt p

erso

nnel

iss

ues

to d

evot

e re

sour

ces

to.

2.82

1.

20

42

3.76

***

0.75

81

10

. M

anag

emen

t bel

ieve

s th

at a

n em

ploy

ee’s

per

sona

l ro

blem

s ar

e pr

ivat

e un

less

th

ey c

ause

the

empl

oyee

’s ‘

ob p

erfo

rman

ce t

o de

c\ne

and

det

erio

rate

. 3.

15

0.89

51

4.

14**

1.

20

88

11.

All

in a

ll, m

anag

emen

t fee

ls th

at th

e be

nefit

s of

dru

g te

stin

g do

not

just

ify

the

cost

s an

d ha

ssle

s in

volv

ed.

2.54

1.

02

35

3.58

***

0.92

78

soci

ated

with

dru

g ab

use.

2.

74

1.20

46

2.

79

1.34

54

7.

Man

agem

ent f

eels

that

dru

g te

stin

g in

crea

ses

the

turn

over

of

good

em

ploy

ees.

2.40

0.

77

33

2.49

0.

91

41

8.

Man

agem

ent h

as n

ot th

ough

t abo

ut d

rug

test

ing

in a

ny s

yste

mat

ic w

ay.

2.04

0.

89

22

2.32

0.

72

39

Nof

e: T

he “%

Agr

ee”

colu

mn

refe

rs 10

th

e pr

opor

tion

of r

espo

nden

ts a

nsw

erin

g 4

(Agr

ee) o

r 5

(Stro

ngly

Agr

ee)

on t

he f

ive-

poin

t Lik

ert s

cale

. *A

vera

ge h

ighe

r th

an th

e m

ean

of c

ompa

rison

gro

up a

t ~5.06

**A

vera

ge h

ighe

r th

an th

e m

ean

of c

ompa

riso

n gr

oup

at ~

5.

01

**

*Ave

rage

hig

her

than

the

mea

n of

com

pari

son

grou

p at

~5.001

GOMEZ-MEJIA AND BALKIN 75 I

TABLE 3

General Dimensions and Specific Program Characteristics Used as Predictors of Drug-testing Effectiveness

I. General dimensions of drug-testing program (each consrruct measured by multiple Likert scales). A. Union support for drug-testing program

1. Union provides strong support for the drug-testing program. 2. Union is willing to collaborate with management in making the program

3. Rank and file sees the program as good for most union members. work.

(Coefficient alpha: 39) B. Protection of privacy/confidentiality

1. Results are kept strictly confidential by firm. 2. Employees can be certain that results will be kept confidential. 3. Test results are llkely to make their way into the employee’s personnel file. 4. Test results are made available only to qualified counselors. 5. Test results are only used internally within the firm but are never made

6. Test results may be made available within and outside the firm. 7. Employee has easy access to results of testing.

available to outsiders.

(Coefficient alpha: .94) C. Trained Personnel

1. Supervisors are trained on drug problems. 2. Labor steward received training to deal with drug problems. 3. There are people in the firm who are specially trained to deal with drug

problems. (Coefficient alpha: .87)

D. Program Management I. The HRM function plays a significant role in the drug-testing program. 2. There is professional leadership within the company to manage the drug-

testing program. (Coefficient alpha: .75)

E. Ancillary Programs The company has a wide breadth of programs to deal with the drug problems (e.g., EAP services)

F. Program Planning, Monitoring, and Evaluation 1. The firm evaluates/monitors the program on a continuous basis. 2. The firm has conducted careful research on the codbenefit implications of

3. Thorough assessment and planning of the drug program was conducted the drug-testing program.

prior to implementation. (Coefficient alpha: .91)

G. Managerial Trust and Support 1. Employees are given a “second chance” if test results are positive. 2. Prior to the start of the drug-testing program there was high level of trust

3. There is a feeling of compassion and a supportive attitude for employees

4. The company may never penalize workers with medical problems identified

of employees in management.

that are found to use drugs.

through the urine test (e.g., diabetes, epilepsy). (Coefficient alpha: .86)

H. Diagnostic Capability 1. The drug-testing progam allows early problem recognition and intervention. 2. Drug testing has proven to be reliable.


3. The drug-testing program does separate non-users from abusers. (Coefficient alpha: .93)

II. Specific Program Characteristics A. Occuparional Disrriburion. Measured by the total number of occupational

groups involved in the drug-testing program. Groups include productiodlaborers, clerical, technicaI/professional, sales, managers/executives.

B. Tesr Randomness. Measured as a dummy variable, with “ I ” indicating random tests, and “U’indicating tests conducted on a target basis.

C . Severity of Resulrs. For each substance tested (alcohol, “soft” drugs, cocaine, hard drugs), consequences of positive results are measured on the following six-point scale: repeat test, receive verbal reprimand, referred for counseling, receive written reprimand, receive demotion or transfer, get terminated. A score is obtained by adding the severity of consequences associated with each substance tested.

D Rehabiliration Focus. This was measured as a dummy variable, with “1” indicating that the primary reason for the drug-testing program is to help rehabilitate the employee, while “ 0 indicates that other objectives (e.g., controll security, follow what other companies are doing) are most important.

E. Depth of Intervenrion. This was measured as the percentage of the total number of employees tested.

planning, monitoring, and evaluation, (7) managerial trust and support, and (8) diagnostic capability.

Multiple-item Likert scales were developed for each of the dimensions (except “ancillary programs,” which was a one-item scale). The response format for each item consisted of a five-point scale ranging from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree.” As shown in Table 3, the coefficient alpha exceeded -75 for all the composite scales, indicating high internal reliability.

Each of the eight dimensions concerns policy choices that affect the design of the drug-testing program and may ultimately affect its outcomes. “Union support” captures the amount of input the union had in the program design. “Protection of privacy/confidentiality” is concerned with the assurances to employees that drug-testing results will not be divulged to third parties. “Trained personnel” measures the availability of individuals within the firm who are knowlegeable about drug-related problems and the testing policy. “Program management” measures the significance of HRM’s role in administering the drug-testing program and the extent to which there is professional leadership within the company to manage such a program. “Ancillary programs” refer to the question of whether the firm conducts formal activities (such as an employee assistance program) that provide counseling and support to the drug-abusing employee once he/ she has been identified by the drug test. “Program planning, monitoring, and evaluation” measures the degree to which the organization plans and controls its drug- testing policy so that it achieves its intended objectives. “Managerial trust and support” concerns the extent to which management will show compassion and support towards an employee who uses drugs, helping to facilitate the employee’s rehabilitation. Finally, “diagnostic capability” measures the


extent to which the results of the drug-testing method used are considered accurate and reliable.

Specifrc program characteristics. Five measures were developed focusing on various aspects of program implementation (see Table 3). The first one, “occupational distribution,” was measured by the total number of occupational groups involved in the drug-testing program. This variable ranged from 1 to 5 occupational groups, where 1 represented a narrow occupational distribution and 5 a broad occupational cross section of employees involved in the drug-testing program. “Test randomness,” a dichotomous variable, was coded 0 for testing based on “reasonable cause” and 1 for random testing of any employee. “Severity of results” measured the most serious consequences to an employee of a positive drug test. A six-point scale was developed for each substance tested and ranged from the least severe consequence (scored I), which was to repeat the drug test, to the most severe consequence (scored 6), which entailed termination. While the lowest rating on the severity scale, “repeat the drug test”, is standard ad- ministrative procedure in many firms that have drug-testing policies, it was included in the scale because it represented the least severe consequence of a positive drug test. “Rehabilitation focus” was coded 1 if management’s primary objective was to rehabilitate the employee and 0 if some other reason (such as the need to provide security) was the primary motive for establishing the program. Finally, “depth of intervention” was measured by the percentage of the total number of employees tested.

Effectiveness measures for drug-testing programs. Multiple dimensions were identified to assess the effectiveness of the drug-testing program; these dimensions were based upon the literature review and on input provided by the HRM executives. As can be seen in Table 4, a total of six effectiveness scales were developed. The first four scales consisted of Likert-type items: (1) extent to which the drug-testing program enjoys high acceptability among managers and employees, (2) impact the drug-testing program has had on working relations between managers and employees, (3) impact the drug-testing program has had on the organization’s ability to attract and retain employees (obviously, other HRM programs also contribute to the attraction and retention of employees, but this criterion focuses on the unique effect attributable to the drug-testing program as reported by management); and (4) extent to which the drug-testing program has reduced drug problems in the organization. The response format for each item consisted of a five-point Likert scale that ranged from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). As shown in Table 4, the coefficient alpha exceeded .80 all for the multi-item scales, indicating high internal reliability.

The other two effectiveness measures presented in Table 4 consisted of a quantitative effectiveness index and a composite effectiveness criterion. The objective measure was the number of grievances/ complaints received


TABLE 4

Effectiveness Indicators for Drug-testing Program

I. General Effectiveness Factors (Each Construct Measured by Multiple Likert Scales) A.

B.

C.

D.

Program Acceptability by Managers and Employees 1. Management is very satisfied with the firm’s drug policy. 2. Management is very satisfied with the drug-testing implementation. 3. The drug-testing program enjoys high acceptability by most employees. 4. The drug-testing program is fair to all employees.

(Coefficient alpha: .92) Supervisory/ Employee Relations Supervisory/employee relations have deteriorated as a result of the drug-testing Program. Attraction/ Retention of Employees

1. Turnover rates have increased significantly as a result of the drug-testing

2. It has become more difficult to hire people into the organization as a result

3. There are people in the firm who are specially trained to deal with drug

program.

of the drug-testing program.

problems. (Coefficient alpha: .80)

Overall Management Assessment 1. Overall, employee productivity has improved as a result of the drug-testing

2. The drug-testing program has solved much of the drug problem. 3. The drug-testing program has become a powerful deterrent to drug abuse

4. If we had to do it all over again, we would definitely institute the drug-

program.

in the company.

testing program. (Coefficient alpha: .94)

11. Grievances/ Complaints This was measured as the number of grievances/complaints received about the drug- testing program as a percentage of the total number of employees affected.

This is an average of the standardized values for all the measures described in I and I1 above.

ID. Composite Effectiveness Criterion

about the drug-testing program as a percentage of total number of employees affected. The composite effectiveness criterion was the average of the standardized values for all the effectiveness measures. The coefficient alpha was equal to 3 3 for the composite effectiveness criterion.

While the drug-testing program effectiveness measures used here are primarily based upon managerial assessments, there is some solid support for this approach. HRM experts (e.g., Bolar, 1970; Sheibar, 1974; Tsui, 1984) have argued that acceptability of an HRM program (such as drug testing) is a crucial indicator of its utility and that more objective indices (e.g., per capita productivity, percentage of applicants accepting offers) are not necessarily better criterion measures. “Objective” effectiveness measures such as productivity, return on assets, and turnover rates tend to be more difficult to interpret and may even be more contaminated than

GOMEZ-MEJIA AND BALKLN 755

perceptual measures (Ungson & Steers, 1984). Tsui (1984) developed some strong arguments for the use of a “reputational” approach as the best method for assessing the effectiveness of personnel programs. Having said this, the reader is warned that this type of methodology limits the validity of the conclusions both for reasons of method variance (same respondent on both sides of the equation) and time concurrence (predictor and criterion variables measured simultaneously).

Analysis

A comparative profile of drug-testing vis-a-vis non-drug-testing firms was developed by calculating separate means and standard deviations (or percentages for categorical variables) for 10 demographic factors and 11 items measuring managerial attitudes toward drug testing. Tests of statistical significance were then calculated for all mean and percentage differ- entials between the two samples.

A separate stepwise multiple regression equation was calculated in the drug-testing sample for each effectiveness score (as dependent variable), with the program measures used as predictors. The first step of the regression included all eight of the drug-testing program dimensions as independent variables. The second step of the equation consisted of the five specific program characteristics. A total of six stepwise multiple regressions were performed in this manner; one for each dependent variable. For each predictor, this procedure allows one to examine the amount of unique variance explained, and the sign and significance of the standardized beta coefficient.

Results

Comparative Projiles of Drug-testing and Non-drug-testing Firms

Table 1 shows a comparison of the organizational characteristics of companies that currently have drug-testing policies (n = 42 or 22%) with non-drug-testing firms (n = 148 or 78%). Drug-testing firms differed significantly (p 5 .05) from non-drug-testing companies. They tend to be larger, older, have fewer females and more minority members as employees, have a greater percentage of blue-collar/ production jobs and fewer white-collar managerial/ professional jobs, have younger employees, are in manufacturing industries, and are located in the northeastern section of the United States when compared with the non-drug-testing firms.

Table 2 shows the means and standard deviations of managerial attitudes toward drug testing for the two samples. Compared with drug-testing firms, non-drug-testers prefer a “hands off’ approach to employee personal


problems, express fears about the legal implications of drug testing, view drug testing as an invasion of privacy, place a lower priority on solv- ing drug-related problems vis-a-vis other personnel concerns, and believe that an employee’s personal problems are private unless they cause the employee’s job performance to deteriorate. All things considered, non- drug-testing firms believe very strongly that the benefits of drug testing do not justify the costs and hassles involved. Interestingly enough, the two samples did not differ in terms of the perceived impact of drug testing on drug abuse, employee relations, and turnover.

Predictors of Perceived Program Effectiveness for Drug-testing Firms

As can be seen in the intercorrelation matrix (Table 5), the single-order correlations between various aspects of the drug-testing program (variables 1-13) and the six effectiveness measures (variables 14-19) are statistically significant in most cells. The composite criterion, which is an average of the five individual effectiveness measures, is significantly correlated with 12 out of 13 predictors (“occupational distribution” being the only exception). The magnitude of the correlation coefficients among the predictor scores (variables 1-13) strongly suggests that these measures are not redundant and may be used as unique entities in further analysis.

Table 6 summarizes the results of the stepwise regressions for the six effectiveness measures. The overall regression model explained 50% of the variance (R2) for the composite effectiveness criterion. It explained between 43% (grievances/complaints) and 64% (acceptability) of the variance of the five single effectiveness indicators. The first block of variables entered into the regression consisted of the general program dimensions and accounted for 38% of the variance of the composite criterion and between 34% (overall managerial assessment) and 52% (acceptability) of the variance of the individual effectiveness indicators. The second block of variables entered into the regression consisted of the specific program characteristics and explained 12% of additional variance of the composite criterion and between 4% (grievances/complaints) and 12% (acceptability, supervisory/ employee relations) of incremental variance across the five effectiveness indicators.

As can be seen in Table 6, all of the beta coefficients of the drug-testing program dimensions reached acceptable levels of statistical significance against at least some of the effectiveness indicators. The beta coefficients of the drug-testing program dimensions reached statistical significance (p 5 .05) with a minimum of two effectiveness indicators (union support, training programs) and with as many as five effectiveness indicators (planning monitoring evaluation, diagnostic capacity). Acceptability was related to union support, ancillary programs, planning monitoringl evaluation,

TABL

E 5

Inte

rcor

rela

tion

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Stan

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as P

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Seve

ral P

erce

ived

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s Mea

sure

s as

Dep

ende

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aria

bles

(N=42)

Pred

icto

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Perc

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d ef

fect

iven

ess i

ndic

ator

s *

Supe

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ory/

A

ttrac

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/ C

ompo

site

A

ccep

tabi

lity

rela

tions

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ploy

ees

asse

ssm

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plai

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crite

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B B

B B

B B

Step

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am

Dim

ensi

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Uni

on s

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rt Pr

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nfid

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Trai

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m m

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t A

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st ra

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SO

GOMEZ-METIA AND BALKIN 759

and diagnostic capacity. Supervisory/ employee relations was a function of privacy/ confidentiality, program management, planning/ monitoring) evaluation, and diagnostic capacity. Attraction/ retention showed significant beta coefficients with privacy/confidentiality, trained personnel, program management, planning/ monitoring evaluation, and trust/ support. Overall managerial assessment was related to privacy/confidentiality, ancillary programs, planning monitoring/ evaluation, trust/ support, and diagnostic capacity. Grievances/ complaints was a function of privacy/ confidentiality, trained personnel, program management, trust/ support, and diagnostic capacity.

Table 6 also shows that five of the eight beta coefficients of the program dimensions reached statistical significance (p 5 .05) against the composite criterion, which was an average of all the effectiveness measures. The five significant drug-testing program dimensions with respect to the composite criterion are union support, program management, ancillary programs, planning/ monitoring/ evaluation, and diagnostic capacity. Thus, the evidence presented in Table 5 indicates that the constructs of drug-testing program dimensions developed for this study correlate significantly with the perceived drug-testing program effectiveness measures.

Four out of the five beta coefficients for specific program characteristics in Table 6 reached acceptable levels of statistical significance against both the composite criterion and the five effectiveness indicators. Test randomness, severity of results, rehabilitation focus, and depth of intervention all reached acceptable levels of statistical significance with respect to the perceived effectiveness indicators. The only beta coefficient of a specific drug-testing program characteristic that was not significant was the measure of occupational distribution. This was not surprising since the zero-order correlation was quite low (see Table 5), and the profile of drug-testing firms shown in Table 1 indicated that these companies had an occupational distribution heavily weighted toward the production/ labor job category.

The sign of the beta coefficient for “test randomness” was negative, which indicated that random drug testing is associated with lower perceived program effectiveness. The sign of “severity of results” was also negative, suggesting that less severe consequences of drug tests are associated with greater program effectiveness. The sign of the beta coefficient for “rehabilitation focus” was positive, indicating that drug-testing programs that emphasize rehabilitation (instead of punishment) are judged to be more effective. Finally, the sign of the beta coefficient for “depth of intervention” was negative. This finding suggests that wide-ranging testing of employees is associated with those programs that are judged to be less effective.

In interpreting the results of Table 6, the reader should be cautioned that part of the explanation for the relatively high R2 indices and the large


number of significant beta coefficients may be the method covariation issue raised earlier.

Discussion and Conclusions

The findings from this empirical study provide some evidence from 42 firms with drug-testing policies that should contribute to the recognition of some key policy issues surrounding the formulation and implementation of a drug-testing program. Both the content domain of drug-testing programs and the specific characteristics of the programs leading to outcomes that HRM executives perceived to be effective were explored in this study.

The data indicate that firms with drug-testing policies differ from non- drug-testing firms. Drug-testing firms are larger in size, tend to compete in manufacturing industries, are located in the northeast, and have younger employees and a higher proportion of blue-collar production workers than do non-drug-testing firms. Non-drug-testing firms express more “libertar- ian” attitudes toward an employee’s personal life and are heavily concerned with the legal ramification of drug testing.

Because employee drug abuse is a deeply rooted social problem, other less vulnerable firms that do not fit the prototype (e.g., those that are smaller, in the service industries, and located between the east and west coasts of the United States) may be expected to formulate their own drug- testing policies in the near future. For example, the U.S. federal government has recently ordered one million federal workers in sensitive jobs to sub- mit to drug testing (Drug tests, 1987). Drug tests for state, county, and municipal workers in the United States may not be far behind.

The evidence presented here suggests that employee drug-testing programs may be structured along the following dimensions: provisions so- liciting union support and input, assurances to employees that drug-test information will be treated with confidentiality, training supervisory personnel to recognize the employee drug-abuse problem, HRM staff available to manage the drug-testing program, ancillary programs, such as an employee assistance program, to deal with employee drug problems, provisions to monitor and control the drug-testing program, the cultivation of trust between management and employees with respect to the intentions of the drug-testing program, and provisions for the use of a drug test that provides reliable and valid information so that employees are not falsely accused of using drugs at work. The findings also suggest that organizations that intend to implement a drug-testing policy for their employees should plan to have other programs to support the drug testing such as supervisory training, planned communications that heighten employee awareness of drug testing, and drug counseling for those employees with drug problems. An organization that lacks these support programs may have a fair

GOMEZ-MEJIA AND BALKIN 76 1

and reliable drug test but may find the drug testing to be ineffective and disruptive.

In addition to providing some evidence about the design characteristics of employee drug-testing programs, the findings suggest some procedures for their effective implementation. According to the HRM executives, best results are obtained when drug tests are targeted at specific groups of employees that may have an impact on public or employee safety (e.g., air traffic controllers). Further, survey participants believe the drug test should only be given for “reasonable cause” to selected employees in the targeted group. Employees who test positive should not be dealt with harshly, but they should be given every opportunity to prove their innocence with a second test so there is no reasonable doubt of an employee being wrongly accused of drug abuse. Finally, HRM executives indicated that those employees who are identified as drug users should be treated as sick employees, similar to alcoholic employees, and given the opportunity to rehabilitate themselves in a drug-treatment program. Many organizations support drug treatment through their employee group benefits and offer time off with sick leave or unpaid leave to complete the program.

This study had some serious methodological limitations that are worth repeating. First, the same instrument was used to elicit the opinions of HRM executives on both drug-testing program characteristics and perceived effectiveness measures. The presence of common method variance from this procedure tends to overestimate the strength of the relationship between the predictors and the effectiveness measures. Similarly, the respondents shared their perceptions of the predictors and effectiveness measures at a concurrent time. This procedure limits one’s ability to infer any causal link between the variables.

Another limitation was the clinical method (based on a literature review and the interviews) used to generate the items and composite scales. An empirical (e.g., factor analytic) approach to the construction of the composite scales would have provided more compelling evidence to justify the choice of scale items.

Despite these limitations, this study offers some preliminary answers to questions pertaining to the design and implementation aspects of drug- testing programs and the ways these factors relate to judged program effectiveness. As employee drug testing becomes more common over time, additional data on these programs will become available, enabling investigators to conduct empirical studies with greater controls.

We recommend that future research designs on employee drug testing use factor analysis to confirm the program dimensions and characteristics identified in this study (and perhaps some additional ones). The expected increase in the application of drug-testing procedures to large sectors of the labor force over the next few years will allow investigators to collect larger


sample sizes than was possible when data were collected for this study, making it feasible to use more powerful analytical procedures. Further, we recommend that independent measures of drug-testing program dimensions and program effectiveness be used so that stronger causal linkages between the two can be established.

The results from this study generalize most readily to other large organizations with characteristics similar to those in the sample. Smaller firms without the resources of the larger organizations may need to develop drug-testing programs too. Additional research on drug testing with data collected from smaller companies should be undertaken to determine the domain of an effective drug-testing policy for the smaller organization.

As a final note, this study was restricted to policy-level issues regarding drug testing. This limited scope was chosen intentionally to prevent the survey from becoming so lengthy as to discourage participation. There are many important questions related to the medical, moral, and legal aspects of drug testing that could have been examined. For example, a number of relevant variables that could have been included are the actual drugs being tested for, the types of tests used, whether or not the companies prescreen- applicants, and the procedures employed by the firm to protect good per- formers who might be infrequent users of “socially accepted” drugs such as marijuana. These are interesting issues that could be addressed in future research.

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DIMENSIONS AND CHARACTERISTICS OF PERSONNEL MANAGER PERCEPTIONS OF EFFECTIVE DRUG-TESTING PROGRAMS

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