The impact of working conditions on commitment of academic employees: A socio-affective perspective
-
DOIhttp://dx.doi.org/10.21511/ppm.22(1).2024.42
-
Article InfoVolume 22 2024, Issue #1, pp. 524-533
- 304 Views
-
73 Downloads
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Academic employees face declining working conditions that may reduce the level of commitment to resource-constrained public higher education institutions. The purpose of the study is to examine whether strong social interactions at work affect academic employee commitment amid a poor state of physical working conditions in under-resourced public higher education institutions. A cross-sectional survey obtained data from 63 academic employees across six faculties at a large, under-resourced public higher education institution located in the province of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Academic employees taught many under-prepared students, primarily from previously disadvantaged backgrounds, using limited physical resources. The linear regression (r = –.0.52, CR = 3.21, p = < .001) results showed that stable social interactions were associated with high employee commitment in resource-constrained institutions. Academic employees remain highly committed to the institution despite the poor physical working conditions. The study extends the affective perspective by showing that employees build regular social interactions to remain highly committed and overlook limited access to physical workplace resources. Leaders ought to create regular social interaction opportunities between employees to foster high employee commitment amid inadequate physical working conditions.
- Keywords
-
JEL Classification (Paper profile tab)J81, D23, M12
-
References40
-
Tables5
-
Figures0
-
- Table 1. Demographic profile of respondents
- Table 2. Organizational commitment and working conditions validity and reliability
- Table 3. Association between organizational commitment and working conditions
- Table 4. High organizational commitment and poor working conditions
- Table 5. Social interactions of working conditions descriptive results
-
- Albrecht, S. L., & Matry, A. (2017). Personality, self-efficacy, and job resources and their associations with employee engagement, affective commitment, and turnover intentions. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 31(5), 657-681.
- Allen, N.J., & Meyer, J.P. (1990). The measurement and antecedents of affective, continuance, and normative commitment to the organization. Journal of Occupational Psychology, 63(1), 1-18.
- Amis, J.M., Mair, J., & Munir, K.A. (2020). The organizational reproduction of inequality. Academy of Management Annals, 14(1), 195-230.
- Bakker, A.B., Demerouti, E., & Sanz-Vergel, A. (2023). Job demands-resource theory: Ten years later. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 10, 25-53.
- Becker, H.S. (1960). Notes on the concept of commitment. American Journal of Sociology, 66(1), 32-40.
- Bothello, J., Nason, R. S., & Schnyder, G. (2019). Institutional voids and organization studies: Towards an epistemological rupture. Organization Studies, 40(10), 1499-1512.
- Bunjak, A., Černe, M., Nagy, N., & Bruch, H. (2023). Job demands and burnout: The multilevel boundary conditions of collective trust and competitive pressure. Human Relations, 76(5), 657-688.
- Cao, J., & Hamori, M. (2020). How can employers benefit most from developmental job experiences? The needs-supplies fit perspective. Journal of Applied Psychology, 105(4), 422-432.
- Cohen, A. (2007). Commitment before and after: An evaluation and reconceptualization of organizational commitment. Human Resource Management Review, 17(3), 336-354.
- Colquitt, J. A., Scott, B. A., Rodell, J. B., Long, D. M., Zapata, C. P., Conlon, D. E., & Wesson, M. J. (2013). Justice at the millennium, a decade later: A meta-analytic test of social exchange and affect-based perspectives. Journal of Applied Psychology, 98(2), 199-236.
- Council for Higher Education. (2022). National Review of South African Doctoral Qualifications. South Africa: Council for Higher Education.
- Cunliffe, A. L., & Alcadipani, R. (2016). The politics of access in fieldwork: Immersion, backstage drama, and deception. Organizational Research Methods, 19(4), 535-561.
- Ehrhardt, K., & Ragins, B. R. (2019). Relational attachment at work: A complementary fit perspective on the role of relationships in organizational life. Academy of Management Journal, 62(1), 248-282.
- Evans, J. R., & Marthur, A. (2018). The value of online surveys: A look back and a look ahead. Internet Research, 28(4), 854-887.
- Hair Jr., J. F., Howard, M. C., & Nitzl, C. (2020). Assessing measurement model quality in PLS-SEM using confirmatory composite analysis. Journal of Business Research, 109, 101-110.
- Harter, J. K., Schmidt, F. L., & Hayes, T. L. (2002). Business-unit-level relationship between employee satisfaction, employee engagement, and business outcomes: A meta-analysis. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87(2), 268-279.
- Heaphy, E. D., & Dutton, J. (2008). Positive social interactions and the human body at work: Linking organizations and physiology. Academy of Management Review, 33(1), 137-162.
- Hirschi, A., & Spurk, D. (2021). Ambitious employees: Why and when ambition relates to performance and organizational commitment. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 127, 103576.
- Honig, B., Lampel, J., Siegel, D., & Drnevich, P. (2017). Special section on ethics in management research: Norms, identity, and community in the 21st century. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 16(1), 84-93.
- Kim, M., & Beehr, T. A. (2020). Empowering leadership: Leading people to be present through affective organizational commitment. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 31(16), 2017-2044.
- Lindell, M.K., & Whitney, D.J. (2001). Accounting for common method variance in cross-sectional research designs. Journal of Applied Psychology, 86(1), 114-121.
- Manyisa, Z. M., & van Aswegen, E. J. (2017). Factors affecting working conditions in a public hospital: A literature review. International Journal of Africa Nursing Sciences, 6, 28-38.
- McCormick, L., & Donohue, R. (2019). Antecedents of affective and normative commitment of organizational volunteers. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 30(18), 2581-2604.
- Methot, J. R., Rosado-Solomon, E. H., Downes, P. E., & Gabriel, A. S. (2020). Office chit-chat as a social ritual: The uplifting yet distracting effects of daily small talk at work. Academy of Management Journal, 64(5), 3-55.
- Meyer, J. P., & Maltin, E. R. (2010). Employee commitment and well-being: A critical review, theoretical framework, and research agenda. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 77(2), 323-337.
- Meyer, J. P., Morin, A. J. S., & Wasti, A. (2018). Employee commitment before and after an economic crisis: A stringent test of profile similarity. Human Relations, 71(9), 1204-1233.
- Mihalache, M., & Mihalache, O.R. (2022). How workplace support for the COVID-19 pandemic and personality traits affect changes in employees’ affective commitment to the organization and job-related well-being. Human Resource Management, 61(3), 295-314.
- Mwesigwa, R., Tusiime, I., & Ssekiziyivu, B. (2020). Leadership styles, job satisfaction and organizational commitment among academic staff in public universities. Journal of Management Development, 39(2), 253-268.
- Ngo-Henha, P. E., & Khumalo, N. (2022). Strategies to deter turnover intentions amongst expatriate academics in the institutions of higher learning in South Africa. International Journal of Higher Education, 11(7).
- Podsakoff, P. M., Mackenzie, S. B., Lee, J., & Podsakoff, N. P. (2003). Common method biases in behavioral research. A critical review of the literature and recommended remedies. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88(5), 879-903.
- Ren, S., Tang, G., & Zhang, S. (2023). Small actions can make a big difference: Voluntary employee green behavior at work and affective commitment to the organization. British Journal of Management, 34(1), 72-90.
- Rindfleisch, A., Malter, A. J., Ganesan, S., & Moorman, C. (2008). Cross-Sectional versus Longitudinal Survey Research: Concepts, Findings, and Guidelines. Journal of Marketing Research, 45(3), 261-279.
- Robert, V., & Vandenberghe, C. (2021). Laissez-fair leadership and affective commitment: The role of leader-member exchange and subordinate relational self-concept. Journal of Business and Psychology, 36, 533-551.
- Schwarz, G., Newman, A., Yu, J., & Varina, M. (2023). Psychological entitlement and organizational citizen behaviors: the roles of employee involvement climate and affective organizational commitment. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 34(1), 197-222.
- Sekaran, U., & Bougie, R. (2019). Research methods for business: A skill-building approach (8th ed.). Wiley Publishers.
- Shepherd, D. A., & Suddaby, R. (2017). Theory building. A review and integration. Journal of Management, 43(1), 59-86.
- Soundararajan, V., Wilhelm, M. M., & Crane, A. (2021). Humanizing research on working conditions in supply chains: Building a path to decent work. Journal of Supply Chain Management, 57(2), 3-13.
- Sungu, L. J., Weng, Q., Hu, E., Kitule, J. A., & Fang, Q. (2020). How does organizational commitment relate to job performance? A conservation of resource perspective. Human Performance, 33(1), 52-69.
- Tang, W., & Vandenberghe, C. (2020). Is affective commitment always good? A look at within-person effects on needs satisfaction and emotional exhaustion. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 119, 103411.
- van Rossenberg, Y.G.T., Cross, D., & Swart, J. (2022). An HRM perspective on workplace commitment: Reconnecting in concept, measurement, and methodology. Human Resource Management Review, 32(4), 100891.