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PURPOSE The purpose of this study was to test how basic psychological needs satisfaction contributes to career commitment through career satisfaction among nurses. BACKGROUND There is an increasing rate of turnover among nurses and a general shortage of nurses in many countries. This has made it necessary for researchers to focus on the career satisfaction of nurses and their commitment to their careers. DESIGN AND METHODS A cross-sectional design was employed in a survey of 233 nurses in public hospitals in southeastern Nigeria. Participants responded to self-report measures of career commitment, career satisfaction, and work-related basic needs satisfaction. FINDINGS In the regression-based path analysis, basic psychological needs satisfaction was positively related to career satisfaction (p < .001) and career commitment (p < .001) of nurses. Career satisfaction was positively related to career commitment (p < .05). Career satisfaction mediated the relationship between basic psychological needs satisfaction and career commitment (95% confidence interval [.009, .068]). CONCLUSIONS The results show that basic psychological needs are relevant for employee commitment, giving support to the self-determination theory. Career satisfaction provides further explanations for the relationship between psychological needs satisfaction and career commitment, although there could be reverse causal links. CLINICAL RELEVANCE The results advance knowledge on how satisfaction of basic psychological needs can increase career satisfaction and foster more career commitment. Designing work environments that help employees to fulfil their basic psychological needs is important in the retention of nurses.

Team-based work (TBW) plays a crucial role in the success and quality of public services. In the context of the Spanish public sector, our study evaluates if a low level of hierarchical distance (HD) in public organizations condition the public employees’ commitment (EC) as well as TBW, assessed in terms of participation and consensus among team members. Simultaneously, we evaluated to what extent EC help to enhance TBW. Employing a sample of 213 government organizations from the south of Spain through a model of structural equations, we were able to answer the above questions. Our results revealed that team-based work functions more successfully within public organizations where there exists little verticality in their structures, norms, values and rules – in simplest terms, where there is minimal organizational HD. Such results also suggest that although regulations exist in the Spanish public sector, should public organizations attempt to be less vertical and more horizontal, they would perhaps have public servants that were more committed to their organizations. As a result, servants view the organization as their own and remain loyal. Finally, from an academic perspective, this study could be one of few to research and evaluate the hierarchical role and employees’ commitment to the functioning of public employees based on participation and consensus in their work teams.

Support from employers to help parents balance work and family responsibilities has become an increasingly important issue, particularly in the United States, where public support for families is scarce. Little is known about the effectiveness of employer-provided child-care support. Who participates in these programs, and what are their benefits? This study is among the first to address these questions using a dataset that combines administrative with survey data from employees at a large organization. Findings indicate that employer financial support for child care can be structured so that employees with the greatest need benefit and employee participation is not associated with stigma. Results suggest the employer benefits from increased employee commitment and reduced employee stress, but employees do not report increased parent or child satisfaction with care. Although employer financial support alone cannot compensate for structural problems with regard to child care, it may reduce stress and increase employee commitment in the workplace.

In connection with the literature on strategic reward and agency theory, this study investigates the effects of incentive pay on employee outcomes and firm performance. We identify employee outcomes, such as commitment and competence, as mediating processes that explain the effects of incentive pay on firm performance. We further propose procedural justice climate and environmental turbulence as boundary conditions that determine the strength of the effects of incentive pay on employee outcomes. The research model is tested using multisource data collected at three time points over a five-year period from 227 Korean companies. Our analysis confirmed that incentive pay enhanced employee commitment and competence, which, in turn, improved the operational and financial performances of firms. The effect of incentive pay on employee commitment was negative for firms with a low procedural justice climate, but positive for firms operated under a highly turbulent environment. By contrast, the effect of incentive pay on employee competence was positive only for firms operated under a stable environment. This study enriches the literature by presenting and validating plausible underlying mechanisms and boundary conditions under which strategic performance–contingent incentive pay affects firm performance. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

This paper evaluates the link between employee affective commitment and wages using a theoretical model predicting that affective commitment and wages can be complements. We estimate simultaneous quantile regressions based on a matched worker–employer sample of private sector workers from the UK's Workplace Employment Relations Survey 2004. Our results suggest that wages increase with increasing levels of affective commitment, consistent with the idea that the two are complements.

Taulbert finds that since the financial crisis of 2008, workplaces are faced with financial pressures and restraints, increased competitiveness, and “in some cases a lack of employee commitment and accountability.” Yet bottom-line success still must be achieved, and how the leader articulates the vision and mission continues to matter. Leaders must embrace and model entrepreneurial thinking, and the “growth mind-set” articulated by Stanford University's Dr. Carol Dweck. With this way of thinking, one's abilities are capable of continued growth and learning, not fixed and unchangeable. This mind-set represents, he writes, “the path of opportunity and success.”

In this study, the authors examine the effects of commitment-based human resource management practices on the performance of small businesses. These effects are examined through the mediators of employee involvement and quit rates. In addition, they contribute to arguments that the effect of human resource management practices on performance takes place through the establishment and support of exchange relationships with employees. Using responses from CEOs and employees of small businesses, their results indicate that human resource practices in small businesses that are based on leaders' views of employee commitment are positively related to revenue growth and perceptions of performance. Further, the authors found that employee involvement and quit rates mediate these relationships.

The current study incorporates predictions from socioemotional selectivity theory to evaluate the role of future time perspective in moderating the effects of work–family and family–work conflict on continuance and affective commitment. Results derived from a sample of managers (n = 251) supported the hypothesized relationships. Specifically, when work interfered with family, employees who had a more shallow future time perspective experienced lower continuance commitment. Further, those with a deep future time perspective experienced lower affective commitment than did employees with a more shallow future time perspective in situations in which family interfered with work.

This paper examines the impact of contemporary cross-boundary working on employee commitment. It contributes directly to the literature on employee commitment and in particular it advocates a multiplicity approach to commitment. We identify three foci of commitment which co-exist and illustrate their dynamic interaction. Importantly, our unit of analysis extends beyond the boundaries of the firm to include the actions of professional working which capture the main influences on employee commitment. Thematic analysis of data in 12 professional service firms identifies the interaction between the foci of commitment as well as managerial responses to tensions between the commitment foci that arise within the cross-boundary context.

Building on the insights from a growing number of studies on the HRM implications of inter-organisational relations, this article investigates the HR issues in two case studies of ‘best practice’, long-term collaborative working. It identifies three common challenges for HRM: (a) how to build employee commitment and identity to the partnership without putting at risk the employing organisation's goals; (b) how to establish attractive career pathways in a partnership context requiring some degree of sharing of skill standards and coordination of training provision; and (c) how to sustain partnerships in a changing policy and organisational context. The data point to inherent problems in managing employment when there is more than one employing organisation exercising influence. Differences in organisational goals and HRM approaches in hospital networks are an obstacle to long-term integration – especially in public–private arrangements where integration of goals and HRM is more difficult.

Knowledge of the pay system has been identified as one of the key elements affecting the success of the reward system. In this paper, the aim is to study how communication, performance feedback and membership length are related to profit-sharing knowledge, and how profit-sharing knowledge is related to profit-sharing satisfaction and organisational commitment. The data is collected from Finnish personnel funds, which are deferred profit-sharing schemes. Survey data from over 753 employees in 30 companies in different sectors were used. In studying the antecedents of profit-sharing knowledge, we found strong evidence that better profit-sharing communication and higher membership length increase profit-sharing knowledge. Furthermore, we find strong evidence that the relationship from profit-sharing knowledge to commitment is mediated by profit-sharing satisfaction. We discuss the implications for management.

Summary An integrative model of antecedents and outcomes of managerial perceptions of employee organizational commitment was developed and tested with 490 employees of a publicly owned U.S. manufacturing firm. The results are consistent with predictions showing that self-reported affective commitment and supervisor-focused impression management predicted managerial perceptions of affective commitment, whereas age, tenure, education, training and development, and self-focused impression management were related to managerial perceptions of continuance commitment. Furthermore, manager-rated affective and continuance commitment were differentially related to supervisory treatment of the employee (i.e. receiving contingent rewards and non-contingent punishment). The results of this study show how managers develop perceptions of affective and continuance commitment, and through their associated treatment of employees, has important implications for the ways managers may serve to enhance or detract from employee contributions to the organization. Copyright # 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

This study explores the extent to which gender dissimilarity in the workplace affects employees' commitment to their organization, using data from the British (1998) Workplace Employee Relations Survey. The results showed that the effects of organizational-level gender dissimilarity on organizational commitment were more complex than has commonly been assumed in the literature. The relationship between organizational-level gender dissimilarity and employee commitment was U-shaped for women whereas it was not significant for men. The relationship was moderated by the respondents' status as measured by their level of pay. For men, the relationship between gender dissimilarity and commitment was negative for high-paid individuals but not for low-paid ones, while for women the U-shaped relationship was weaker for high-paid individuals than for low-paid individuals.

Studies by ORC Worldwide have found that long hours, travel, and other work-related factors intrude into personal lives and create stress for a significant portion of HR professionals and expatriates around the world. But while HR professionals believe work-life balance policies have benefited their organization and themselves, expatriates believe quite the opposite. Given the cost of expatriate assignments and the potential for work-life imbalance to erode employee commitment, organizations can do more to communicate and support work-life practices outside their home country, and to better prepare the expatriate and family for life in their new location.

Recent writing about the ‘service encounter’ suggests that high-quality service requires employee commitment and this will involve a more developed and sophisticated approach to HRM than has traditionally characterised the sector. Through an in-depth study of a sample of high service level hotels in the US and UK this paper argues, in contrast, that commitment can be created through a workplace culture that draws on family discourses and practices. It explores the ways in which this culture is developed and endorsed by both management and employees. This approach to generating commitment has costs in terms of the time and priority employees can give to their ‘real’ friends and family. By drawing on the highly gendered and hierarchical organisation of the family, it is argued that culture also contributes to gender stereotyping and hierarchies within and outside the workplace in ways that limit women's career opportunities

Even during times of economic prosperity, organizations strive to improve financial and operational performance to enhance their viability and competitiveness in the marketplace. Given the plethora of methods available today to improve performance, the challenge is to identify the most comprehensive and comprehensible approach that holds the most promise of generating significant improvements. This article outlines a well-tested approach from which 12 steps have been extracted that managers can follow that will result in dramatic improvements in bottom-line performance, as well as improved competitiveness, customer loyalty, and employee commitment. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Research on the link between HRM and organisational performance has neglected the role of front-line managers, yet it is these managers who are increasingly charged with the implementation of many HR practices. Using an employee survey in 12 'excellent' companies we explore the extent to which employee commitment towards their employer and their job are influenced by the quality of leadership behaviour and by satisfaction with HR practices. Both have a strong effect on employee attitudes. The article concludes with a case study of a planned effort to improve front-line managers' skills in people management. © 2007 The Authors.

Today, employees are encouraged to become more career-resilient and engage in career development activities to deal with changes in required knowledge, skills, and abilities, and to facilitate their mobility. This study found that participation in decision making (PDM) and autonomy, along with supervisory career support (information, advice, and encouragement), fostered this career adaptability. These practices were also positively associated with commitment and negatively with intentions to leave. However, career adaptability was positively associated with both commitment and intentions to leave, suggesting some unintended consequences for management approaches supporting career adaptability. Implications for research and practice are discussed. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

When General Mills acquired larger rival Pillsbury in 2001, it structured its transition strategy around key HR systems and methodologies that it believed would build strong employee commitment to the new organization and a shared culture for success. Two years later all signs indicate the strategy was a winner. © 2003 General Mills

Performance appraisal systems are a popular tool within organisations to enhance employee commitment and productivity. This paper examines the consequences of three aspects of a performance appraisal system (distributive justice, procedural justice and the performance rating) on the level of emotional exhaustion reported by employees in a large public sector research organisation.

The events of September 11, 2001, have led us to rethink the importance of public service and public–sector employees’ commitment. In previous research, we argued that employee commitment is a construct comprising three dimensions: commitment to the boss, to the work group, and to the organization. However, this characterization cannot explain the behavior of public employees on September 11. For this article, we argue that employee commitment is a construct that comprises four dimensions: With the help of identity theory, there is reason to include commitment to a job as part of the commitment construct. Based on an analysis of an existing data set, we find that firefighters identified themselves as committed to their job, which they viewed as an honorable profession that performs a valuable service to the community.

Vision is a key part of both the concept and practice of leadership. Many managers successfully create it and present it to employees. However, they are often less good at retaining employees’ long-term commitment to the vision, which results in lost opportunities. This article explores how effectively senior managers build and sustain employee commitment to strategic vision, and how they could improve.

A number of authors have recently drawn attention to the need to explore, conceptually and empirically, the relationships between different types of employee commitment and work outcomes. Management, continually grappling with the challenge of organizational effectiveness, is often interested in outcomes such as the individual job-performance levels of employees and absenteeism as well as the number of resignations from the organization. One of these, turnover as measured by intentions to resign, and its relationship with multiple commitments in the organization, is the focus of this study. The first objective was to compare the impact of four constituent-specific commitments (commitment to the organization, job, profession and supervisor), termed ‘employee commitment’, on intentions to resign. Second, the ‘key mediating construct’ proposition of organizational commitment suggested by Hunt and Morgan (1994) was empirically evaluated. The empirical results show that the impact of commitment to the profession on intentions to resign is the most influential. In addition, the data suggest that neither the ‘one of many’ model nor the ‘key mediating construct’ theory of employee commitment can be described as superior in explaining intentions to resign.

This article examines the pattern and antecedents of employee commitment to company and union in the Hong Kong context. Findings are consistent with those from the United States. In general, company and union commitment have different antecedents, although the perceived industrial relations climate is a common predictor. Dual commitment is in evidence. Union membership is a function of union commitment. The findings caution against attempts to explain the pattern of Hong Kong industrial relations purely in terms of culture.

A growing trend in employment practices is for firms to concentrate on their core functions and outsource peripheral activities. While an assessment of the economic benefits of outsourcing has been the subject of a number of research projects, little attempt has been made to evaluate the impact of such practices on employee commitment. This is the purpose of this paper. The central questions are can employees be committed to their employer and to their host enterprise, and what determines each form of commitment? The research is based on a survey of employees working for a major labour hire firm. The key finding of the research is that employees can have a dual commitment, although different factors influence commitment to the employer and to the host firm.

This article discusses the need to manage survivors' reactions to downsizing in order to seek to fulfil other organizational goals related to employee commitment and the achievement of high quality. Variables are identified which affect survivors' reactions to a downsizing situation, including those which can be influenced by an organization within which this event occurs. A model of the key areas where managerial action should be focused to manage survivors' reactions, which has been derived from research involving senior human resource management practitioners, is described. A diagnostic tool developed from this model and the research underpinning it is presented. The use of this diagnostic tool, including its validity, is discussed.

Investment in vocational education and training is commonly regarded as a prerequisite of competitive success. Training is also seen as a cornerstone of management initiatives designed to enhance employee involvement and co-operation in the production process. Ironically, however, commentators have rarely sought to assess employee attitudes towards, and experiences of, training provision. the claims made by advocates of a high skills strategy with respect to employee commitment and motivation have not been empirically tested. This article seeks to fill the gap through a presentation of findings from a unique survey, undertaken by the authors, designed to examine the link between training and employee attitudes.

Studies of British-based Japanese manufacturing companies often assume an absence of worker resistance stemming either from high levels of employee commitment or from extensive control systems. This article, based on three case studies of Japanese manufacturing transplants, disputes this assumption, arguing that the control of labour continues to pose a challenge to management

Research evidence from North America shows that employees can be committed simultaneously to both their union and their company. Moreover, a co-operative industrial relations climate has been seen to be conducive to the existence of higher levels of commitment to both organizations. This study utilized a sample of white-collar unionists in Australia to identify whether union and company commitment could be predicted by the same factors and whether positive perceptions of the industrial relations climate were related to dual commitment. The research found no evidence of dual commitment. Furthermore, company and union commitment were predicted by different factors, and employee perceptions of a co-operative industrial relations climate were associated with higher employee commitment to the company but lower commitment to the union.

This article examines the psychological contract and human resource practices as communications relevant to that contract. We argue that employees, at certain times only, systematically analyze their employers' HR practices for meaning vis-ri-vis their psychological contract. Judgments about the adequacy with which their psychological contracts are fulfilled result from such systematic analyses, and these judgments have important effects on employee commitment. Practical implications of our analysis are also discussed.

Tim Morris, Helen Lydka and Mark Fenton O'Creevy present data on a group of graduates during the first five years of employment. Dividing the sample into those who have remained with their original employer and those who have changed, they examine attitudinal commitment and tenure intentions against a set of human resource policies measured at three points in time. They find that those policies significantly associated with high commitment change over time; that attitudinal and behavioural commitment are conceptually distinct constructs; and that behavioural commitment is a less stable construct than attitudinal commitment. Generally, it appears that employee commitment is more provisional than is implied by much of the literature.

Although much research has been conducted in the area of organizational commitment, few studies have explicitly examined how organizations facilitate commitment among members. Using a sample of 291 respondents from 45 firms, the results of this study show that rigorous recruitment and selection procedures and a strong, clear organizational value system are associated with higher levels of employee commitment based on internalization and identification. Strong organizational career and reward systems are related to higher levels of instrumental or compliance-based commitment.

This study of common patterns of communication and behavior in mergers and acquisitions relied on a survey of twenty-one managers and professionals in acquired organizations in three separate mergers or acquisitions (M/A). The survey used focused interviews to construct three cases. Common patterns are identified and a syndrome is specified connecting communication variables with rumor mills, employee turnover, and employee commitment to the new organization.

The future aspirations of trade apprentices have important implications for further supplies of skilled labour. An interview survey of 89 engineering apprentices in Auckland, New Zealand, revealed that the majority intended to travel overseas following qualification, and to move into occupations not directly connected with their trade. Few intended long-term service with their training organizations, and large institutional settings were generally rejected. These results are interpreted as supporting a trend towards ‘post-materialist’ values among young people, and are in direct contradiction to fundamental assumptions concerning employee commitment on which the apprenticeship system is based.

This article investigates the relationship between perceptions of equity, occupational stress and employee commitment in a health care setting. Significant relationships were found among these variables and implications for the health care field are discussed.