“Does job satisfaction mediate the effect of a reward system on organizational citizenship behavior? Evidence from the public sector”

Employees with organizational citizenship behavior are characterized by the attitude of people who show employees’ willingness to exceed the minimum targets set by the organization. Thus, employees will work voluntarily even outside their duties and re-sponsibilities. This study aims to investigate the interactions between reward systems and organizational citizenship behavior, considering work satisfaction as a mediating factor. This paper employs a quantitative methodology. Thirty-eight agricultural extension employees from the Agricultural Office in Labuhanbatu Regency, Indonesia, served as the samples. SEM (SmartPLS) approach was utilized to analyze the data. The findings discovered that the reward system has a favorable and considerable impact on job satisfaction. The results also boosted that the increase in employee job satisfaction has a positive and significant effect on increasing organizational citizenship behavior. The relationship between the reward system and organizational citizenship behavior is positive but insignificant. Moreover, the study also demonstrates that job satisfaction significantly and favorably mediates the impact of the reward system on organizational citizenship behavior. Therefore, a reward policy must be implemented to satisfy employees because job satisfaction is crucial in increasing organizational citizenship behavior.


INTRODUCTION
Organizational success depends on human resources as initiators and agents of continuous changes.The engagement and contribution of all employees is needed to enhance organizational performance (Ahdiyana, 2015).Therefore, employees must have high organizational citizenship behavior to benefit their organizations.Unfortunately, the problems related to organizational citizenship behavior often include employees coming late to work, playing on the phone, and chatting with other employees during working hours -all unrelated to work tasks.These are some indications that the contribution of extra roles or organizational citizenship behavior is still low in an employee (Lubis, 2020).cause of their duties and responsibilities for administrative tasks but as a form of concern for transparency (Vigoda & Golembiewski, 2001).Therefore, organizational citizenship behavior must be noticed and need to be improved.As stated by Vigoda and Golembiewski (2001), the organizational citizenship behavior of employees in the public sector has a very important role in increasing productivity.Basirudin et al. (2016) revealed that public sector employees' organizational citizenship behavior is fundamental to increasing employee productivity.According to de Geus et al. (2020), work satisfaction is the third largest component affecting employee organizational citizenship behavior.It is also second-order motivator as a critical antecedent for increasing the organizational citizenship behavior of workers in the public sector.A reward is one of the motivational factors for an employee (Lidinnillah et al., 2019).Besides, Basirudin et al. (2016) also stated that government organizations or the public sector should keep or enhance employee job satisfaction.Therefore, organizations must pay attention to employee satisfaction (Gautam, 2019;Masharyono et al., 2018).Rewards can increase employee job satisfaction (Widyastiara & Silvianita, 2020).Swaminathan and Jawahar (2013) discovered that organizational citizenship behavior is influenced by employee work satisfaction.This also strengthened the findings of Foote and Li-Ping (2008), who revealed the link between employee satisfaction and organizational citizenship behavior.Ingrams (2020) also stated that employee satisfaction is an antecedent and predictor of organizational citizenship behavior.Kamel et al. (2015) indicated that work satisfaction has a favorable and significant impact on the improvement of organizational citizenship behavior.Abbasi and Rana (2012) also proved that the reward system significantly affects organizational citizenship behavior.Tawil (2021) concluded that the reward system must be adequately applied if one wants to improve organizational citizenship behavior.Thus, the organization needs to pay attention to the reward system policy if it wants to improve the organizational citizenship behavior of an employee.

LITERATURE REVIEW
Organizational citizenship behavior considers an employee's action that gives added value to the work assigned to him and provides added value to the organization.When employees perform work beyond their primary tasks, they have organizational citizenship behavior.An organizational culture well embedded in an organization will provide a comfortable atmosphere for fellow employees (Ahdiyana, 2015).Employees continuously and consistently behave voluntarily to do tasks that exceed the standards set by the organization, and such behavior will increase the effectiveness of organizational success (Mazidi et al., 2015).In other words, organizational citizenship behavior is employee activity not accompanied by orders or mandates (Massoudi et al., 2020).The behavior expected by organizations to improve individual performance is extra-role behavior, or can be called organizational citizenship behavior (Ariesta, 2016;Massoudi et al., 2020).Based on the explanation, employees with organizational citizenship behavior will work more optimally and support organizational success.
The characteristic that shows an employee's organizational citizenship behavior is an employee's willingness to complete the job even though the job is not on the job list.Castro et al. (2004) presented the key elements of employee organizational citizenship: 1) an employee behaves in a way that deviates from what the organization has formally established; 2) a group of unclear behaviors; 3) an employee behavior that is not formally appreciated and not formally recognized by the company; 4) an employee behavior that is important to the performance, effectiveness, and success or development of the organization.The dimensions of altruism and courtesy are related to direct relationships between individuals and indirectly related to companies.In comparison, conscientiousness, sportsmanship, and civic virtue are directly related to company problems (Ariesta, 2016).
Organizational leaders in a company want to find employees willing to exceed their job descriptions (Bazgir et al., 2018).The ability of a business to successfully implement its organizational plan and acquire a competitive advantage is positively correlated with employees' organizational citizenship behavior (Xerri & Brunetto, 2013).
Extra-role behaviors of employees can include property protection, constructive suggestions for organizational improvement, self-training for increased responsibility, creation of an environment that is beneficial to the organization and its surroundings, and engagement in cooperative activities (Bolon, 1997).The rewards mean a policy prepared by the organization to appreciate employees' achievements at work.Implementing a reward system policy is needed to increase employee satisfaction at work and, of course, improve employee performance.Gautam (2019) showed the main factors in the reward system: compensation policy, benefits policy, work-life balance of employees, performance recognition from the organization, empowerment policy, and employee career opportunities.Compensation as a reward component must be given to employees fairly (Fanggidae et al., 2019).Furthermore, the reward system is a motivational factor that can improve employee performance (Lidinnillah et al., 2019).Thus, the reward system as a compensation component is a significant fac-tor to be managed by the company to attract the best employees.
Rewards encourage employees to increase their work performance (Wasiman, 2020).They can be divided into intrinsic and extrinsic (Gautam, 2019).
The reward system can enhance employee productivity, and the employee will feel happy to be part of the organization (Ajmal et al., 2015).One of the aims of rewarding the employee is to retain employees of high quality or with good skills (Muzakki et al., 2020).Wages can be classified as a reward for the work of an employee.The reward is one of the drivers of motivation.If the payroll system is managed and implemented correctly, it can increase employee motivation, productivity, and satisfaction (Jamal Employee job satisfaction must be a serious concern that the organization must manage.Employee work satisfaction can be described as the positive feelings or opinions employees feel for their work (Robbins & Judge, 2017).Job satisfaction is an expression or feeling of an employee's happiness at work (Uddin et al., 2019), and it can influence job performance (Chen et al., 2016).Job satisfaction of an employee describes an attitude or behavior of an employee.Employees with higher satisfaction will have more effective work results than those with low job satisfaction (Suwandana & Perdanawati, 2020).Thus, job satisfaction can be concluded as the conformity of expectations for what is received by employees at work.
Employee job satisfaction is a primary factor for employees at work that make employee enjoy working.
A satisfied employee will feel comfortable and at home as part of the organization (Sishuwa & Phiri, 2020).Some principal employee job satisfaction factors are pay, working conditions, promotion opportunities, supervision, and co-workers.This indicator is also considered an organizational situational factor.Job conditions include the work and day-to-day operations that every employee has to go through.Supervision is a measure of employee relations with superiors and colleagues in the workplace (Budiman et al., 2014).
Previous studies have revealed that the reward system can be associated with job satisfaction.Linz and Semykina (2012) noted that job satisfaction can be increased through a good reward policy.They also found that both intrinsic and extrinsic rewards gave an advantage in enhancing employee satisfaction at work.Fanggidae et al. (2019) showed that employees' positive feelings will be attained if the employee successfully does a job through extrinsic rewards given by the organization.Widyastiara and Silvianita (2020) noted no relationship between the reward system and employee satisfaction at work.Rewards given by the organization as a form of extrinsic motivation can increase employee job satisfaction (Suwandana & Perdanawati, 2020).Ajmal et al. ( 2015) also explained that rewards or extrinsic rewards increase employee job satisfaction.
The level of job satisfaction will affect the willingness of employees to work voluntarily more than the minimum standards set by their organization.They will work earnestly and are willing to be actively involved in the progress and achievement of organizational goals.A high level of job satisfaction will make employees feel happier, increasing organizational citizenship behavior.Swaminathan and Jawahar (2013) surveyed faculty members in India and found an influence between employee satisfaction and employee organizational citizenship behavior.Kamel  Therefore, this study intends to examine the effect of the reward system through job satisfaction on the organizational citizenship behavior in the Agricultural Office, Labuhanbatu, Indonesia.The conceptual framework and hypotheses are shown in Figure 1.
The study elaborates on the following hypotheses: H1: Reward system positively influences job satisfaction.H2: Reward system positively influences organizational citizenship behavior.
H3: Job satisfaction positively influences organizational citizenship behavior.
H4: Job satisfaction positively mediates the effect of the reward system on organizational citizenship behavior.

METHODOLOGY
This is a quantitative research study.This paper examines the effect of the reward system and employee job satisfaction on organizational citizenship behavior.This population comprises the public sector, namely the Agriculture Office in LabuhanbaturRegency, North Sumatra, Indonesia.
Participants are employees of an agricultural extension at the Agriculture Office in Labuhanbatu, totaling 38 respondents.The sampling technique was total sampling, which means that all population was used as the participants in this study.
The variables in this study consist of reward systems, job satisfaction, and employee organizational citizenship behavior.The reward system is measured using eight questions from Umayah (2015), such as "I feel that the better I work, the higher the incentive I receive ."Employee job satisfaction is measured using a 6-item questionnaire from Risqi et al. ( 2015), such as "I am satisfied with the salary I receive, and it is enough for my daily needs."Finally, organizational citizenship behavior was measured using a 10-item questionnaire adapted from Organ et al. (2006), such as "I am willing to help provide orientation to new employees."A five-point Likert scale was used to get the participants' ratings (strongly agree (5), agree (4), neither agree nor disagree (3), disagree (2), and strongly disagree (1)).Table 1 shows the variable measurements.Table 2 shows that the loading factor of indicators in measuring the latent variable has a loading factor > 0.70.Thus, all the indicators have strong validity in measuring their latent variables.

RESULTS
The paper considers composite reliability and Cronbach's alpha to check the reliability of the research variables used in this study (Table 3).A construct is reliable if its Cronbach's alpha value exceeds 0.70 and its average variance extracted (AVE) value is greater than 0.50 (Hair et al., 2019).This study's hypotheses directly investigate the relationship between the reward system and job satisfaction and the relationship between the reward system and employee job satisfaction on organizational citizenship behavior.Therefore, the hypothesis can be accepted with a statistical t-value > 1.96 and a probability level < 0.05 (Byrne, 2010).
Testing the first hypothesis, the finding shows that the reward can increase the satisfaction of em-ployees with a P-value of 0.000 < 0.05 and a t-statistic of 9.562 > 1.96.Therefore, a reward system can increase job satisfaction.If the orgaцnization awards employees, employees will feel satisfied and work earnestly.
Testing the second hypothesis, the finding demonstrated that the reward system did not significantly affect employee organizational citizenship behavior with a P-value of 0.487 > 0.05 and a t-statistic of 0.702 < 1.96.Therefore, the reward system has an insignificant effect on employee organizational citizenship behavior.In other words, the rewards given by the organization to employees increase organizational citizenship behavior, but insignificantly.
Testing the third hypothesis, job satisfaction positively and significantly affects employee organizational citizenship behavior.The findings show a P-value of 0.002 > 0.05 and a t-statistic of 3.347 > 1.96.Therefore, there is a positive and strong correlation between job satisfaction and organizational citizenship behavior.
This study also examines the mediating effect, namely whether job satisfaction positively mediates the effect of the reward system on organizational citizenship behavior.The results showed that job satisfaction mediates this relationship; the t-statistic value is 3.166 > 1.96 and the P-value is 0.003 (Figure 2).

DISCUSSION
This study examines the constructs of a reward system and job satisfaction, and its consequence on employee organizational citizenship behav- ior in the Agricultural Office, North Sumatera, Indonesia.This paper also tested the model using employee satisfaction as a mediating variable.Employee organizational citizenship behavior has a critical role in achieving organizational goals, in this case, achieving the agricultural office goals in Indonesia.Organizational citizenship behavior of extension workers can be seen in their behavior as voluntarily carrying tasks even though they are outside their responsibilities and are not listed in the job description of the employee concerned.People with high employee organizational citizenship behavior have the will to do their jobs and want to do additional tasks to achieve organizational goals (Lidinnillah et al., 2019).
The first hypothesis testing results prove evidence about the reward system's positive effect on employee satisfaction.This finding suggests an essential role of the reward system in increasing employee job satisfaction.Employees will feel satisfied if a reward is under what the organization promises.These results support the findings of Majumder (2012), who examined the practice of human resource management, namely the effect of reward on employee job satisfaction.The results show that employees are satisfied with the compensation provided by the company as a human resource management practice.Mani and Manida (2020) showed that high remuneration, promotion, good pension scheme, job security, and recognition are motivational factors that make employees more satisfied.The other opinions also state that the reward policy is a component of motivational factors that can avoid the emergence of job dissatisfaction by employees (Wasiman, 2020).
Organizations need to provide rewards to employees to increase worker satisfaction that will affect the performance of these employees (Widyastiara & Silvianita, 2020).However, the company's efforts to increase employee satisfaction are inseparable from the reward policy provided by the company, and the most important thing is that the company must be able to implement fair rewards (Surya et al., 2021).
Second, the study discusses the effect of reward systems on extension workers' organizational citizenship behavior.Again, the results show a Testing the third hypothesis shows that the impact of extension workers' satisfaction on organizational citizenship behavior was positive and significant.This means that the higher the employee satisfaction, the higher the organizational citizenship behavior.Conversely, if satisfaction decreases, organizational citizenship behavior will also be low.The findings of this study align with Swaminathan and Jawahar (2013), who found an association between job satisfaction and organizational citizenship behavior.Kamel et al.
(2015) also showed that job satisfaction effectively increases organizational citizenship behavior.The higher the level of employee job satisfaction, the higher the organizational citizenship behavior.The findings also strengthened Massoudi et al. (2020) that employee organizational citizenship behavior can be improved by enhancing job satisfaction.Employee job satisfaction has become an essential factor influencing employee attitudes and work behavior (Basirudin et al., 2016).Based on research findings and theoretical support that has been found, in order to encourage employees to do the job as well as possible, to do work that exceeds established standards, it is necessary to pay attention to employee job satisfaction.Employers must consider whether the salary is sufficient, whether the work environment and atmosphere meet employee expectations, and whether promotions have been carried out fairly.If all of this meets employee expectations, employees will be willing to work beyond the main tasks set by the organization.
Then, testing the mediation of job satisfaction in shaping the effect of the reward system on organizational citizenship behavior shows that job satisfaction mediates the effect of the reward system on organizational citizenship behavior.This can be seen from the significance value of 0.003 with a t-statistic of 3.116.Thus, the findings of this study prove that job satisfaction positively and significantly mediates the influence of the reward system on agricultural extension workers' organizational citizenship behavior.This means organizational citizenship behavior will only be realized with increasing employee job satisfaction.Therefore, the results show that job satisfaction is vital in enhancing organizational citizenship behavior.

CONCLUSION
This study examines the effect of the reward system on organizational citizenship behavior through job satisfaction.Every organization expects employees who can work extra for the company's progress.To encourage this, adopting organizational citizenship behavior has a crucial role.If an organization applies an excellent reward system policy and cares about employee satisfaction, it will increase organizational citizenship behavior.The research findings confirmed the impact of reward on job satisfaction; job satisfaction affects organizational citizenship behavior; and reward system affects organizational citizenship behavior.However, the effect of the reward system on organizational citizenship behavior was positive but insignificant.The research findings also prove that job satisfaction can positively and significantly mediate the effect of the reward system on organizational citizenship behavior.In other words, job satisfaction significantly improves organizational citizenship behavior.
The findings of this study have implications for the leadership of every organization in the public sector.However, they can also be applied to other sectors to analyze reward system policies, whether they are as expected or not.Furthermore, the reward can affect employee job satisfaction and ultimately increase organizational citizenship behavior.Therefore, it is suggested that organizational leaders always pay attention to the reward system for employees and strive to maintain and increase employee job satisfaction.
This study has several limitations.First, the sample is relatively small, and this study targets only the public sector.Second, the variables include reward system and job satisfaction as antecedent variables.Thus, future research may enrich the research model by adding other research variables to the model.Finally, future studies can further analyze the relationships between reward systems, job satisfaction, organizational citizenship behavior, and employee performance.

Table 2
(Hair et al., 2017)loadings of the constructs.The indicator is valid if the loading factor value exceeds 0.70(Hair et al., 2017).

Table 3 .
(Purwanto & Sudargini, 2021) step, the examination was done to clarify that the concept from each latent model is different from other variables or discriminant validity(Hair et al., 2019).The discriminant validity test uses the cross-loading value (Table4).Therefore, if an indicator has the highest cross-loading value on a particular variable compared to other variables, it has excellent discriminant validity(Purwanto & Sudargini, 2021).

Table 4
shows that the cross-loading value in each indicator has the largest cross-loading value in the variable it forms compared to the cross-loading value in other variables.Thus, the indicators used in this study have good discriminant validity.

Table 5 .
Hypotheses testing results