Money cannot buy happiness: improving governance in the banking sector through spirituality

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/CG-05-2021-0189
• Published date: 12 November 2021
• Date: 12 November 2021
• Pages: 546-561
• Subject Matter: Strategy,Corporate governance
• Author: Rafael Robina-Ramírez,José Amelio Medina-Merodio,Rosa Estriégana,Hector V. Jimenez-Naranjo

Money cannot buy happiness: improving

governance in the banking sector

through spirituality

Rafael Robina-Ramírez, José Amelio Medina-Merodio, Rosa Estriégana and

Hector V. Jimenez-Naranjo

Abstract

Purpose –A model is proposedto develop happiness in the banking sector basedon an improvement in

the spiritualityof employees.

Design/methodology/approach –Following the Schwartz’s model for behavioural transformation, a

new path has been proposed based on the development of the transcendent vision of work.The data

obtainedwere analysed using the partial least squares-structuralequation modeling (SEM) method.

Findings –Contrary to the widespread idea that happiness is orientated towards the enjoyment of

goods, bank employees prefer to develop spiritual values and resources that allow them to respond

adequatelyto massive layoffs and pressures at work.

Research limitations/implications –The bank employees’ schedules made it difficult to organise

group sessions.Multiple sessions prevented us all frominteracting.

Practical implications –It is established a training strategyfor the pursuit of happiness, to propose an

engine for actions orientated towards happiness and to introduce transcendence and spirituality as

requirementsfor finding happiness during daily work.

Social implications –There is a need to return to traditionalvalues and principles in daily work. This will

have a positiveeffect on communities and society.

Originality/value –A new concept has been coined:spiritual resources. This new variable can help to

combatadversity by exploring the meaning of transcendenceat work.

Keywords Values, Banking, Money, Transcendence, Happiness, Spiritual resources

Paper type Research paper

1. Introduction

International economic crises have caused banks to undergo various restructuring

processes (De Haan et al., 2020;Reinhart and Rogoff, 2009). The consequences have

been devastating; massive layoffs (Tarki et al., 2020), excessive control systems in pursuit

of objectives (Altavilla, 2020) and poor results (Sanusi et al.,2020) have sometimes caused

toxic work environments where trust between employees and managers has been lost

(Robina-Ramı

´rez and Palos-S

anchez, 2018;Wang et al., 2020). The management of

financial entities (Aldhamariet al., 2020), corporate social responsibility policies (Jang et al.,

2019;Robina-Ramı

´rez et al.,2021;S

anchez-Hern

andez, et al.,2020) and organisational

culture (Lobrij et al.,2020;Ramirez, 2017) have all been affected, with their extent

determined by the characteristicsof managers (Al-Matari, 2019).

In Spain, the economic crisis of 2008 led to a fall in the number of bank branches from

45,662 (2008) to 24,855 (2019; CCOO, 2020). This affected not only the health of bank

employees (Khalid et al.,2020) but also their happiness (Polysos et al., 2020). Various

Rafael Robina-Ramı

´rez is

based at the Universidad

de Extremadura, C

aceres,

Spain. Jose

´Amelio

Medina-Merodio and Rosa

Estrie

´gana are both based

at the Universidad de

Alcala de Henares, Alcal

a

de Henares (Madrid),

Spain. Hector V. Jimenez-

Naranjo is based at the

Universidad de

Extremadura, Caceres,

Spain.

Received 19 May 2021

Revised 13 June 2021

12 July 2021

Accepted 15 July 2021

The research team sincerely

express their gratitude to all the

participants involved in the

research since the beginning of

the study.

PAGE 546 jCORPORATE GOVERNANCE jVOL. 22 NO. 3 2022, pp. 546-561, ©Emerald Publishing Limited, ISSN 1472-0701 DOI 10.1108/CG-05-2021-0189

studies have addressed the concept of governance and its relationship with happiness in

response to this situation. In “Happiness management in the era of Industry 4.0,”, Ravina-

Ripoll et al. (2020) warn of the shortcomings of the current governance systembased on job

insecurity and the consequences of the vertiginous automation of work, which are eroding

the welfare state. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and De velopment

(OECD, 2011), human well-being translates into an improvement in the quality of life based on

aspects such as health, social relationships and security (Ro bina-Ramı

´rez et al.,2021a). That

quality of life as well as governance are closely connected and positively inf luence the

happiness of individuals (Ott, 2010;Woo, 2018).

In the study: “Happiness at workplace: Building a conceptual framework”, Tasmin (2016)

underlines the relation between the pressure at work and the pursuit of happiness. That

pressure could be originated by the working culture in the company. According to Ng

(2006) and Aparicio Cabrera (2009), a monetarist behaviour at work reduces the loyalty

towards the organisation when the economic or organisational pressure affects the

employees. As a result, personalsatisfaction and happiness are gradually reduced.

To define the relationship between good governance and happiness, objective parameters

of happiness can be set as socio-economic and subjective factors based on people’s

aspirations and expectationsat work (Debnath and Shankar, 2014). Within the welfare state,

happiness has been understood mainly as the acquisition of goods of a material and

economic nature (Lambsdorff, 2007). According to Frey and Stutzer (2002), the type of

employment, better access to basic subsistence resources, the level of per capita income

and the availability of material consumer goods are the main elements that contribute to

people’s happiness. Dew and Xiao (2013) claim that the main indicators of happiness are

good financial management and a stable monetarysituation.

The centrality of monetary motivation as a requirement in reaching a state of happiness is

detailed by Oliveira and Marques (2020) in “The love of money and the propensity to

engage in unethical behaviours.” They studied 297 Portuguese entrepreneurs, most of

whom regarded financial stabilityas a route to happiness.

Although it is true that money has a high instrumental and symbolic value, as it provides

status, visibility, prestige, respect and highly desired recognition (Cunha et al., 2012), its

effects on happiness can be contradictory. In The Philosophy of Money (1997), Simmel

explains how an obsession with being financially stable can generate states of unhappiness

in the individual. This can then generate hedonistic attitudes, and possessing goods

becomes the main goal (Frank, 2020; Robina-Ramı

´rez, 2021).

This reductionist conception traps some people because their aspirations to happiness are

focused on material gain, a perspective that hasnothing to do with the real attributes of the

person, which are immaterial and immeasurable. As a result, happiness becomes

something concrete, perishable, fickle and of little value. It distorts the real meaning of

happiness and makes it difficult to obtain (Tavits, 2008).

The notion of happiness should be conceived not only as improving one’s economic

circumstances through the possession of goods but also the cultivation of values and

internal resources that are based on the ability to transcend the physical (Robina-Ramı

´rez

and Cotano-Olivera, 2020; Robina et al., 2020). To develop the spirituality of the employee

and enable them to reach transcendence, we start from Schwartz’s well-known model of

behavioural transformation (1973). This model has three pillars: knowledge of the

consequences of materialistic society for the behaviour of workers, an attitude built on

personal values and the developmentof the qualities or internal resourcesof individuals.

A total of 519 employees from the five largest banks on the IBEX-35 participated in the

present study. Of these, 24 employees took part in two focus groups to draw up the

indicators (S

anchez-Oro S

anchez and Robina-Ramı

´rez, 2020). Currently, there is insufficient

empirical evidence to support a model of the pursuit of happiness based on the ability to

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