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EFFECTS OF ORGANIZATIONAL COMMITMENT JOB INVOLVEMENTAND ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE ON THE EMPLOYEE

VOLUNTARY TURNOVER PROCESSby

DONNA E. FLE TCH ER B.A. M.A.

A DISSERTATIONIN

PSYCHOLOGYSubmi t t ed to the Gradua te Facu l tyof Texas Tech Universi ty inPar t ia l Fulf i l lment ofthe Requ i remen t s fo rthe Degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

Approved

A c c e p t e d

December 1998

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to express my sincerest gratitude to Dr. RobertBell,mydissertation co-chair, for his guidance and support in this accomplishment and forhis guidance during my graduate study. I would like to express my sincerestgratitude also to Dr. Susan Kirby, my dissertation co-chair, for her guidance andsupport in this endeavor. I would like to thank the other members of mycommittee, Dr. Pat DeLucia and Dr. Mario Beruvides, who have shared theirwisdom,knowledge and encouragement through excellent teaching andresearch. I wish to express special gratitude to Dr. Dennis Cogan for hisguidance and support In my graduate study and to Dr. Ruth Bookstaber for herwisdom, patience and vision. I would like to thank Dr. Ronald Bremer for hishelp, patience and guidance In the analysis of this project.

I would also like to express gratitude to James A. Ridpath and expressappreciation for his knowledge and expertise in flying me safely to the differentgeographical locations of the organization for data collection.

I would also like to thank my friends who have been a source ofreassurance and encouragement. I would like to acknowledge the followingpeople: Cindi Cardwell, Angela Phillips and Sylvia Curtis.

I want to express my love and gratitude to my family for their support andencouragement. I especially thank my parents, Jessie E. Fletcher and Jack W.Fletcher for their love and support. In particular, I want to thank Dr. ThomasGoodin for his support and understanding throughout this endeavor. Finally, Idedicate this work to my children, Laura, Eric and Sarah, who are a constantsource of inspiration, wisdom and encouragement.

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TABLE OF C ONTENTSACKNOWLEDGMENTS liABSTRACT viLIST OF TABLES viiiLIST OF FIGURES ixCHAPTER

I. INTRODU CTION 1Organizational Commitment 2Job Involvement 4Psychological Contract 5Organizational Culture 7Voluntary Employee Turnover 9Research Questions and Hypotheses 10

Job Involvement, Organizational Commitmentand Tumover 10Subcultures: Participation, OrganizationalCommitment, Job Involvement andVoluntary Employee Tumover 11

II. METHODDesign 13Sample 13Measures 15

Demographics 15Organizational Commitment Scale 15

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Job Involvement 16Organizational Culture 16Employees Psychological Contract 18Tumover 18

Procedures 21III. RESULTS 23

Descriptive Statistics 23Statistical Analyses 23

Reliabilities 23Organizational Commitment, Job Involvementand Turnover 26Organizational Culture and Tumover 28Demographics 33Employee Psychological Contract andTumover 38

Altemative Analyses 44Group Differences in Tumover 55

IV. DISCUS SION 61Relationship Between Organizational CommitmentJob Involvement, and Employee Psychological Contract,How Predictive They are of Employee VoluntaryTurnover 61Relationship Between Organizational Culture andEmployee Voluntary Tumover 62The Effect of Gender, Age, Ethnicity and Salaryon Employee Voluntary Tumover 64

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geographical locations of the organization. Tumover was assessed each monthfor a period of six months after the initial administration of the above-mentionedquestionnaires and opinionnaires. Survival analysis, specifically the Coxproportional hazard model, was used to assess the relationship of both theoccurrence and the timing of the tumover process to the multiple predictorsmeasured at one point in time.

Analyses of associations between survival time and qualitative andquantitative variables yield a predictive model for employee voluntary tumovercontaining the variable m easure, Employee Perceived Obligation to theemployer. There exists a significant negative association between the variableand the hazard of voluntary tumover. Demographic variables tested in apredictive model that proved to be significant are gender, age, ethnicity andsalary. There Is a significant negative relationship between the variables ageand salary and the hazard of employee voluntary tumover. A positiveassociation between the two variables gender and ethnicity and the hazard oftumover exists.

VII

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LIST OF TABLES

1. Summary of Descriptive Statistics 242. Summary of Demographic Frequencies 253. Summary of Maximum Likelihood Estimates for Culture 304. Summary of Event Values by Ethnicity 405. Summary of Event Values by Salary 426. Summary of Event Values by Gender 467. Life Table Survival Estimates 478. Summary of Event Values by Ethnicity 489. Life Table Survival Estimates 49

10. Summary of Analysis of Variance for Interval Groups byDemographic Variables 5511. Summary of Frequency and Percentage of DemographicVariables 5612. Summary of Descriptive Statistics for Groups by DemographicVariables 5713. Summary of Analysis of Variance for Interval Groups byDemographic Variables 5814. Summary of Descriptive Statistics for Age and Employee PerceivedObligation by Level of Salary 5915. Summary of Frequency and Percentage for Gender and Ethnicity byLevel of Salary 60

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LIST OF FIGURE S1. Survival by Ethnicity 412. Survival by Gender 523. Sun/ival by Salary 54

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CHAPTER IINTRODUCTION

The relationship formed by the employees to the employer for which theywork is often refen-ed to as organizational attachment (Mowday, Porter &Steers,1982). Involved In the process of the formation of this relationship is anexchange between the individual employee and the employer, which occurs inthe beginning period of membership in the organization. This exchangerelationship involves each party giving up and receiving something of value andmay include both non-economic and economic factors.

Schein (1980) reports that there are two conditions which exert influenceon an employee's willingness to commit to an organization. The first condition isthe goodness of fit or match of the employee's expectations to theorganization's expectations and if there is agreement, then the very nature ofwhat is being exchanged is the second condition. Mutual expectations relative toexchange relationships contribute to the psychological contract. This contractis an unwritten agreement between the organization and the individual whichspecifies expectations of giving and receiving from each other (Rousseau &Parks, 1993: Robinson, Kraatz & Rousseau, 1994; Robinson, 1995; Morrison &Robinson, 1997; Sap ienza, Korsgaard & Schweiger, 1997).

Mowday Porter and Steers (1982) have stated that a salient factorInvolved In this contract Is the nature of the employee's organizationalconnection. Employee work attitudes and behaviors may be measured andexamined to obtain a better understanding of the employee organizational

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attachment process and its effects on the employee voluntary tumover process.Organizational commitment and job involvement are two work-related attitudesthat have been researched extensively relative to the tumover process (Mowday,Steers & Porter, 1979; Steele & Ovalle, 1984; Blau, 1985, 1987; Blau & Boal,1987;Huselld & Day,1991;Lee & Mitchell,1991;Lee, Ashford, Walsh &Mowday, 1992).

Organizational CommitmentMany definitions exist in the literature for organizational commitment. For

the purposes of this study, the definition of organizational commitment is derivedfrom Mowday, Porter and Steers (1982). Organizational commitment is definedin terms of the relative intensity of an employee's Involvement in, andidentification with, a specific organization. Mathieu and Zajac (1990) state thatthis definition reflects multiple dimensions since it includes the concept ofidentification and incorporates the desire to remain with the organization andwork toward organizational goals.

Three factors of attitudes and behaviors lend salience to thecharacterization of organizational commitment. They are (1) acceptance of and abelief in the values and goals of the organization; (2) desire to maintainorganizational membership; and (3) a willingness to contribute to theorganization. This definition of organizational commitment denotes an activerelationship exchange between the employee and the organization and involvesattitudes and behaviors as manifestations of the actual concept of organizationalcommitment. Observed behaviors of the committed employee will be congruentwith the definition constituents (Mowday, Porter & Steers, 1982) .

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O'Reillyand Chatman (1986) define organizational commitment as apsychological attachment to the organization predicted by three independentconstructs, those of compliance, Identification and intemalization. Compliance isdefined as Involvement for the extrinsic rewards. Identification Is involvementwith the organization because of the desire for affiliation and is an importantmechanism In the developing process of psychological attachment (Bowlby,1982). Intemalization Is involvement based on the Individual's acceptance of theorganization's values. The first definitional component of the Mowday, Porterand Steers (1982) organizational commitment model, acceptance and belief inthe values and goals of an organization, is based on psychological attachment(O'Reilly & Chatman, 1986).

Mowday Porter and Steers (1982 ) state that organizational commitment isa global construct revealing the affective responses of the employee to the wholeof the organization. The development of commitment to the organization beginsat time of employment, continues over a period of time and involves an interplayof attitudes and behaviors. Porter, Crampon and Steers (1976) report that thelevel of commitment reported by employees on the first day of employmentpredicted tumover up to several months on the job.

Alternatively, Hunt and Morgan (1994) advocate the multiple commitmentview of organizational commitment. They report organizational commitment tobe defined as multiple commitments to various groups comprising theorganization, such as commitment to the work group, the supervisor and to topmanagem ent. Their research supports a reconceptualization of the globalorganizational commitment model as a key mediating construct withcompliance, intemalization and Identification as the bases of comm itment.

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Constituency-specific commitments are factors that lead to, and result in, theconcept of global organizational commitment.

Of the consequences and outcomes of organizational commitment,reduced voluntary tumover may be the most predictable of the behavioraloutcomes (Mowday, Porter & Steers, 1982; Mathieu and Zajac, 1990; Lee &Mitchell,1991;Lee , Ashford, Walsh & M owday, 1992). A meta-analysisconducted by Mathieu and Zajac (1990) reveals high correlations betweenorganizational commitment and behavioral intentions. Mathieu and Zajacconclude that organizational commitment may represent a summary index ofthe employee's work-related experiences and that organizational commitmentmay influence the behavioral Intentions In a direct way.

Job InvolvementThe organizational commitment meta-analysis conducted by Mathieu and

Zajac (1990) also reveals that among the foci of commitment, the jobinvolvement and organizational commitment relationship is the largest observed.The two variables are considered to Influence some work-related behaviorsIndependently. Job involvement is defined as a belief descriptive of anemployee's relationship with the present job. This Is not to be confused with theterm work Involvement which may be defined as a nomriative belief about thevalue of work In an employee's life. Work involvement is a function of historicalcultural conditioning and socialization whereas, job involvement is a function ofthe satisfaction of eminent personal needs (Kanungo, 1982). Kanungo (1982)suggests a reformulation of the job Involvement construct to be viewed as a formof psychological identification enhanced by a cognitive or belief state. The

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employee's identification process depends on the employee's saliency of bothintrinsic and extrinsic needs and the employee's perceptions about the job'spotentialities to satisfy the employee's needs, a psychological contract relative tojob involvement.

According to Blau and Boal (1987), job involvement Is a better predictor ofvoluntary tumover than absenteeism. Blau and Boal (1987) suggest thatorganizational commitment and job Involvement sen/e as complements relativeto prediction of the voluntary tumover process. They also report a significantInteractive relationship between the two variables (Blau & Boal, 1989),Employees who display high levels of organizational commitment and of jobInvolvement may be the least likely to engage in the voluntary tumover processbecause they are Involved in and committed to both the job and the organization,

O'Reillyand Chatman (1986) report that job involvement is a consequentoutcome of psychological commitment to an organization. Job involvement Isincluded In a category of dependent variables that is relevant to organizationalcommitment. There are certain types of positive Involvement which contribute tothe definition of job Involvement. They are conformity, flexibility, motivation andan acceptance of organizational policies demonstrated through obedience inemployee relationships.

Psvcholoqical ContractInherent to the foundation of employee relationshipsisthe beliefs of the

employee relative to the obligations that are reciprocal between them and theorganization. These expectations relative to the reciprocal obligations betweenemployee and organization are referred to as the psychological contract. This

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contract is an employee's cognitive evaluation of the transactional and relationalmutual obligations between employee and organization which is formed duringthe employee's beginning period of membership in the organization. Thisbeginning period of employment is the most critical interval for employee tumoverand reportedly Is the tim e during which most of the tumover occurs (Mowday,Porter & S teers, 1982 ).

Morrison and Robinson (1997) state that the employee holds conceptionsabout the organization, and not any one specific agent of the organization,meaning that the employee perceives the organization with an identity thatassumes anthropomorphism. The entity of the organization that has directcontact with the employee is management. The role of management Is crucial tothe Implementation of the employee psychological contract, for It is the managerswho may become aware of an employee's perceived contract and respond to thatemployee accordingly.

When events and circumstances occur that are considered to be violationsof the employee's psychological contract, the employee may be distressed andexhibit appropriate attltudinal or behavioral responses (Morrison & Robinson,1997). Robinson (1995) reports that when employees believe that theirpsychological contract has been violated, there is a decrease in the level of theemployee's trust in the employer in addition to a decrease in the level ofsatisfaction with and commitment to the organization. These employee feelingsalter the employee's attitude toward the relationship with the organization and theorganization Itself and In many instances lead to behavioral responses such asvoluntary tumover.

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Organizational CultureWiener (1988) proposes that shared values play a prominent role in the

development of all forms of commitment and in the development of corporateculture. Schein (1981) defines organizational culture as the organization's basicunderlying assumptions, the fundamental values, beliefs and perceptions.Schein (1985) m akes a distinction between beliefs and assumptions. He definesbeliefs as cognitions and basic assumptions as including beliefs and perceptions,values and feelings. Ott (1989) reports fifty-eight published sources withdefinitions of organizational culture. Organizational culture has been defined interms of artifacts (Bates, 1984), pattems of behavior (Deal & Kennedy, 1982),beliefs and values (Allaire & Firsirotu, 1985) and basic assumptions (Schein,1981, 1984, 1985).

Ott (1989 ) makes the point that although there are many existingdefinitions of organizational culture which vary relative to the selection of words,the basic functions do not vary. He offers a functional definition of organizationalculture, which contains four basic functions viewed as the core of the definition.

The first function of organizational culture is that it provides perceptions, orcognitive interpretations as a guideline for thoughts and actions of organizationalmem bers. The second function is providing shared pattems of beliefs in themoral codes and values of the organization so that members will know what theyare expected to feel and to value. The third function is defining and maintainingcertain important boundaries that will Identify members and nonmembers of theorganization. The last function is providing an organizational control systemthat functions to prohibit and prescribe certain behaviors.

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Ott (1989) reports the existence of subcultures within the dominant cultureof an organization. The subcultures may vary from the dominant culture and mayexist in any of the organizational groups. The groups may consist of employeesworking on a project or employees linked by ethnic or religious background.These subcultures may overlap and coincide and even conflict. Slehl and Martin(1984) have Identified three different types of subcultures, those of orthogonal,enhancing and countercultural.

The orthogonal subculture is identified by its congruency with thedominant culture, in Its basic assumptions; yet, the orthogonal subcultureupholds some unique individual basic assumptions. In the enhancing subculture,basic assumptions, values and beliefs are the same as those in the dominantculture and are upheld with more fervor. The third type of subculture is thecounterculture. Mem bers In this type of subculture uphold beliefs, values andbasic assum ptions that are in direct conflict with those of the dominant culture.These subcultures may serve to refine, enhance or even challenge the dominantculture. They may be a source of divisive behavior or of functional behavior.Shared values and beliefs function to form various groups of employees intodifferent subcultures at differing levels of commitment.

For the purposes of this study, the existing culture In the corporate officeof the organization, where the chief executive officer and other executive officersreside, were assessed as the dominant culture. The other geographical locationsof the organization were assessed as subcultures of the dominant culture.

Organizational culture is a contextual factor that will exert some influenceon how organizational climates develop relative to work groups and to work-related behaviors such as tumover (Randall, 1990). Randall (1990) suggests

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that the nature of the relationship of organizational commitment and work-relatedbehaviors such as tumover is greatly influenced by the cultural context in whichthese relationships develop. Randall (1990) advocates empirically exploring theeffects of the organizational context on these relationships. For example, someorganizational behavoirs may be predefined as acceptable to an extent that acorrelation may not exist between organizational commitment and the behavior(Randall, 1990).

Voluntarv Emplovee TumoverVoluntary turnover Is defined as the employee's volitional departure from

the organization and is theorized as a unidimensional concept (Lee & Mitchell,1994b). Employees are resources of the organization and a high voluntarytumover rate may be costly to the organization in terms of replacement costs(Lee & Mitchell, 1994b). Expanding the understanding of the process oforganizational commitment as related to voluntary employee tumover may havebenefits for organizations, employees and society in general (Mowday et al.,1982). Employees' commitment level may enhance their eligibility for extrinsicand Intrinsic rewards. Organizations may benefit by experiencing reducedwithdrawal behaviors, specifically tumover. Society may benefit in terms ofreduced job movement rates and increased national productivity or quality ofwork (Mathieu & Zajac, 1990).

The employee tumover process itself may create negative consequencesfor the organization and the employees who remain (Mobley, 1982).Organizations are faced with a loss of performers, productivity losses andreplacement costs. The employees who remain may experience a loss of valued

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co-workers and an interruption in social pattems and may consequentlyexperience decreased satisfaction (Mobley, 1982).

Lee and Mitchell (1994a) refer to the pull and push theories of voluntaryemployee tumover. The pull theory consists of factors that are extemal for theemployee. Extemal factors may consist of the labor force supply and demandand job market altematlves. The push theory Is related to employees' intemalconstructs that my affect the voluntary tumover process. These constructsconsist primarily of perceptions and attitudes related to the job.

Mathieu and Zajac (1990) propose that the most popular voluntaryturnover theory has been the Mobley, Griffeth, Hand and Meglino (1979) m odel.This m odel Is an expanded model of the Mobley (1977) intermediate-linkagesmodel and incorporates both Intemal and extemal constructs that may affect thevoluntary tumover process. The key constructs are job attitudes and jobsatisfaction. A sequence of events Implementing the employee's decisionprocess Involved In staying or leaving is proposed by Steers and Mowday (1981).First, an employee's affective response to thejob,specified as organizationalcommitment, job Involvement and job satisfaction are influenced by jobexpectations and individual values. The second step is to factor in nonworkInfluences and finally the Intention to leave or stay may lead to the behavior.

Research Questions and HypothesesJob Involvement. Organizational Commitment and Tumover

Organizational commitment and job involvement are two work-relatedconstructs that reportedly are negatively associated with the hazard of employeevoluntary tumover (Mathieu & Zajac, 1990). The two variables are considered to

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influence som e work-related behaviors independently. What is the relationship ofthe two constructs, organizational commitment and job invovlement, to thehazard of employee voluntary tumover in an organization?

Hypothesis 1: Employee organizational commitment and jobinvolvement will interact and be negatively related to employee voluntaryturnover. It is expected that there will be a significant negative associationbetween employee organizational commitment and job involvement, and thehazard of employee voluntary tumover.

Subcultures: Participation. Organizational Commitment.Job Involvement and Voluntarv Emplovee TumoverOrganizational culture provides perceptions, or cognitive Interpretations as

a guideline for though ts and actions of organizational mem bers. Another functionof organ izational culture Is providing shared pa ttems of beliefs in the m oral codesand values of the organization so that members will know what they are expectedto feel and to value . W ithin the dominant culture of an organ ization, subculturesmay exist which ove rlap, coincide o r conflict with the dom inant culture andtherefore be considered orthogonal, enhancing or countercultural (Slehl & Martin,1984;Ott, 1989). The re are several questions for consideration about therelationship between organizational culture and employee voluntary tumo ver. Dothe existing cultures at the various geographical locations of the organizationdiffer from the dom inant cu lture and do the cultures differ relative to theirindividual rates of actual employee voluntary tumover and reported levels ofem ployee organ izational com mitment and job involvement? If the subculturesdiffer from the dom inant culture, will the subcultures be categorized asenhancing or orthogonal or will they report as countercultures?

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Hypo thesis 2: Em ployees of the existing subcultures at variousgeographical locations defined as enhancing or orthogonal subcultureswill demonstrate reduced rate of employee voluntary turnover, andemployees will self-report high levels of the two constructs oforganizational commitment and job involvement, similar to the dominantculture rate of employee voluntary turnover and levels of employeeorganizational comm itment and job involvement. Organ izational culture is acontextua l factor that will exert some influence on how organ izational climatesdevelop relative to a work-related behavior such as voluntary tumo ver (R anda ll,1990).

Hypothesis 3: The employees of existing subcultures at variousgeographical locations identified as countercultural subcultures willdemonstrate an increased rate of employee voluntary turnover, and willself-report lower levels of the two constructs of organizational commitmentand job involvement as compared to the dominant culture rate of employeevoluntary turnover and levels of employee organizational commitment andjob involvement. Emp loyees in countercultures uphold beliefs, values andbasic as sump tions that are in direct conflict with those of the dom inant cu ltureand behaviors of the em ployees in these cultures may exert a divisive influenceon the organizational climate (Slehl & Martin, 1984).

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CHAPTER IIMETHOD

DesignThis study is a post facto, between-subjects, multi-group experimental

design. Subjects were randomly selected from a specific population, assessedon the independent variables and then measured on the dependent variable ofemployee voluntary tumover to determine a predictive model of tumover. Theparticipant employees were administered questionnaires and opinionnairesduring hours of paid employment.

SampleManagerial, sales, and service employees from a large southwestern retail

organization served as the sample population. One of the reasons this particularorganization was chosen is the existence of its multiple, autonomous,geographically separate sites. The sample was composed of 574 employeesfrom the 13 combined geographical locations of the organization which can bedescribed In temris of age, ethnicity, gender, marital status, salary, level ofeducation, position title, and department.

Participants range in age from 16 to 72 years (M=35.312 years,Sd =13.851). The two largest ethnic groups represented in the population werethe Caucasian group, with 391 employees (68.1%) and the Hispanic group with111 employees (19.3%). The number of female employees in the sample is 314(54.7% ) and the number of male employees is 260 (45.3 %). There are five

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groups of the variable marital status and the highest frequency is in the groupmarried, with 245 employees (42.9%). The group with the second highest

frequency is the group single, with 193 (33.8% ). Ninety-one participants(15 .9% ) are included in the group divorced.

The two largest groups of the variable salary were group 1, salary range$10,000 or less, with 301 participants (52.9% ) and group 2, salary range$10 ,000 -$20 ,000 with 175 employees (30.8% ).

Level of education is divided into nine groups, did not complete highschool, high school graduate, some college, college graduate, technicaldegree, some graduate school, Master's degree, Ph.D., and other. Thetwo groups of the nine groups of level of education reporting the highest numberof employees, are group 2, completed high school, with a frequency of 188(32.9%) and group 3, some college, with 126 (22.0%). Group 1, did notcomplete high school, demonstrated a frequency of 125 (21.8%). There are twogroups of position title, the group containing managers and the group ofnonmanagers. Frequency for the manager group is 115 (20%) and for the groupof nonmanagers, 458 (79.8%).

The variable department is divided into 15 groups representing thedifferent departments within the organization. The highest frequency ofemployees in any one department occurs In the department restaurant,composed of managers, cooks and waitresses, with a total of 149 (26.0%). Thedepartment group of second highest frequency Is complex, which is composedof managem ent and housekeeping employees, with a total of 93 (16 .2% ). Andthe third group with 74 (12 .9% ) is the department group, truck terminal, which iscomposed of managers, cashiers and fuel attendants.

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MeasuresDemographics

Demographic information that has been shown to be related to tumoverhas been collected and Includes such Items as gender, ethnicity, age, salary,marital status, level of education completed, and work history (Mowday, Porter &Steers, 1982).

Organizational Commitment ScaleOrganizational commitment was assessed with the15-item Organizational

Commitment Questionnaire devised by Mowday, Steers and Porter (1979).Representative items are Included In Appendix B. Responses to each item aremeasured on a5-polntLikert scale ranging from (1) disagree to (5) agree.

Akhtar and Tan (1994) report that this measure yields a three-factorsolution. Identifying three types of commitment that have been referred to ascontinuance commitment, normative-affective commitment, and volitlvecommitment. Factor I reflects the concept of withdrawal, whether the employeestays with or leaves the organization, and Is referred to as continuancecommitment. Items of Factor II indicate the employee's acceptance of theorganization's values and identification with the organization and so is referred toas normative-affective commitment. Factor III is called volitlve commitment,indicating the employee's willingness to make a contribution to the success of theorganization.

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Job InvolvementJob involvement was asessed with a 10-item scale devised by Kanungo

(1982). Responses to each Item are measured on a5-pointLikert scale rangingfrom (1) disagree to (5) agree. Representative items of this measure areincluded In Appendix C.

Organizational CultureOrganizational culture was deciphered by a quantitative method.

An opinionnaire and an organizational culture scale were administered to allemployees In order to assess the values and norms of the organization. Thedominant culture and existing subcultures in different geographical wereassessed by the Organizational Culture Scale (Deshpande, Farley & Webster,1993) and identified as one of the four types of M arket, Hierarchical, AdhocracyorClan. Norms and values of the cultures were assessed by the OrganizationalNorms Opionnaire (Alexander, 1978). Survival analysis was used to comparethe dominant culture and the subcultures with respect to the hazard of employeevoluntary tumover and the employees' self-reported levels of the constructs oforganizational commitment, job involvement and employee perceived obligation.The Kaplan Meier method of survival analysis was used to compare the survivalcurves of the different locations of the organization to detennine a significantdifference In the hazard of employee voluntary tumover. The Cox proportionalhazards model was used to test the effects of each of the organizational culturecovarlates on the hazard of employee voluntary tumover.

Mark Alexander's Organizational Norms Opinionnaire (Alexander, 1978) isa 42-item scale that requires the employee to assess what the reaction of most

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employees in the organization would be if another person said a particular thingor behaved in a particular manner. Representative Items from this scale areincluded in Appendix D. Responses to each item are m easured on a5-pointLikert scale ranging from (1) strongly disagree with, or discourage It, to (5)strongly agree w ith, or encourage it. The instrument's 42 items can be groupedinto ten scales of, organizational/personal pride, performance/excellence,teamwork/communication, leadership/supen/lsion, profitability/cost effectiveness,colleague/associate relations, customer/client relations, Innovativeness/creativity.training/development and candor/openness. The scores for each of the tencategories are totaled and a mathematical formula applied to obtain a finalpercentage score for each category.

Another scale used to measure organizational culture Is theOrganizational Culture Scale (Deshpande, Fariey & Webster, 1993), Thismeasure is a 16-item scale with responses to each item measured on a5-pointLikert scale ranging from (1) disagree to (5) agree. Representative items of thisscale are included in Appendix E. There are four classifications of organizationalculture that can be determined by this measure. They are as follows: (1) marketculture, characterized by an emphasis on competition and superiority in themarket; (2) hierarchical culture, characterized by its bureaucracy and smoothoperation; (3) adhocracy culture, emphasizing innovation,risk-takingandentrepreneurship; and (4) clan culture, with emphasis on loyalty, tradition andintemal maintenance (Deshpande, Fariey & Webster, 1993).

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Emplovee Psvchological ContractThree opionnaires relative to the psychological contract were administered

to all employees. The three opionnaires are the Employee Perceived Contractwith the organization, the Employee Perceived Contract Fulfilled by the employerand the Employee Perceived Obligation to the employer. The measures werestructured according to infomnation reported by Robinson, Kraatz and Rousseau(1994).

The Employee Perceived Contract Is a7-ltemmeasure designed toassess the employee's perception of the contract that exists between theemployee and the organization. Representative items of this measure areincluded in Appendix F. The Employee Perceived Contract Fulfilled is also a 7-Item measure designed to assess the employee's perception of contractfulfillment by the employer. Representative Items are included in Appendix G.The third measure, Employee Perceived Obligation, is an8-itemone designed toassess the employee's perceived obligation to the organization, or employer.Representative Items of this measure are Included in Appendix H.

TumoverTumover events relevant to this study are the employee voluntary tumover

events. Tumover was assessed each month for a period of approximately fourmonths after the Initial administration of the above-mentioned questionnaires andopinionnaires. All tumover data was obtained directly from the human resourcemanagement department of the organization.

Survival analysis was used to assess the relationship of both theoccurrence and the timing of the tumover process to multiple predictors

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measured at one point in time. Survival analysis Is suitable for studies in whichthe dependent variable Is binary, in this case voluntary tumover. Survivalanalysis measures whether the employee will stay or leave and for those wholeave, the time of exit, referred to as the failed event. Time is thus treated as acontinuous variable, making greater use of the available infonnatlon. From thisinformation, an estimate for each point in time during the study period can beobtained of the probability that an employee in the sample will leave (Allison,1995).

Survival analysis also was used to estimate a causal or predictive modelin which the risk of employee voluntary tumover depends on the covariates. Thedependent variable forthisstudy is length of stay, computed In months from thetim e of initial employment until the failed event. The Cox proportional hazardmodel, a partial likelihood model. Is the method used for estimation of theregression model with censored data (Allison, 1995). The Cox regressionmethod is a combination of the model and estimation method of maximum partiallikelihood. The method yields Wald chi-square statistics for testing the nullhypothesis that all coefficients are zero. The model also yields a summary of thenumber of events and censored values.The survivor function was estimated andplotted in the presence of censoring.

A censored observation is defined as one whose value is not known,specifically because the subject had not been in the study long enough for theoutcome of Interest to occur (Dawson-Saunders & Trapp, 1994). Censoredobservations for this study are the employees who remain with the organization.The employees who leave the organization by other means not beingInvestigated, such as being fired, were deleted from the data, so that two groups

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of employees remained, those that left voluntarily and those who remainedemployed with the organization. Tumover is not observed for these subjects whoremain in the organization, so they are considered to be censored.

The censoring process has been analyzed by the product-limit estimatorof the survivor function. With the product-limit estimator for the probability ofstaying beyond timeffor an employee, quantiles for tenure and expected tenurecan be estimated (Allison, 1995). Important information is supplied by thecensored observations, since survival analysis treats voluntary turnover time as acontinuous variable. Survival analysis treats censored data very efficiently andany of the equations, the log rank statistic or proportional hazard model canaccommodate the censoring process of the data (Morita, Lee, & Mowday, 1989).

To extend the analysis of the data, employees were divided Into fourgroups based on the survival function to compare employees on the variable,length of employment, at 0-3 month interval, 3-6 months, 6-9 months and > 9

months. Descriptive statistics are computed for the significant demographicvariables, gender, age, ethnicity and salary, and the measure of EmployeePerceived Obligation. An analysis of variance is used to determine if the groupsdiffer significantly.

Similar to regression analysis, sun/ival analysis is used for the predictionof a certain dependent variable, in this case employee voluntary tumover,through the use of a set of Independent variables, or covariates, in this case,employee organizational commitment, job involvement, organizational cultureand the psychological contract. The use of these predictor variables yields moresensitive and accurate descriptions of the employee voluntary tumover process.The specific method of sun/ival analysis used is the Cox proportional hazards

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model,to determine the predictor variables of employee voluntary tumover. Thismodel allows for the variables to be constant for each individual, or time-varying,and is capable of yielding a description of the relative hazard (voluntary tumover)rates of the various subgroups (Morita, Lee, & Mowday, 1989 ). The life tablemethod and the Kaplan-Meier method are also utilized to detennine theconditional probability of failure, the hazard estimate function by interval ofemployment, and the point estimates of the tim e variable, length ofemployment.

ProceduresThe employee participants completed the questionnaires and

opinionnaires on the job site during paid working hours at each of the 13geographical locations of the organization In the southwest area of the UnitedStates. The opportunity to participate was made available during the work shiftchange so that employees were able to participate after their shift ended and stillremain on the clock, while participating. Depending upon the number ofemployees available at the end of a particular work shift, the number ofparticipants in a group varied. Each participant was given a booklet composed ofthe questionnaires and opionnaires. The researcher explained the nature of thestudy and the benefit of the study to the organization and reviewed theinstructions to ensure employee understanding. Participants were infomned thatthe researcher would maintain confidentiality with respect to their individualresponse information, which would be used only for the purposes of research.

The employees were allowed to be seated in the back dining room of therestaurant area, separate from customers, and to remain on the clock while they

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completed the demographic information and the various questionnaires andopinionnaires. The measures included the 15-ltem Organizational CommitmentScale, the 10-ltem Job Involvement Scale, the 42-item Organizational NonnsOpionnaire, the 16-ltem Organizational Culture Scale, the7-itemEmployeePerceived Contract, the7-ltemEmployee Perceived Contract Fulfilled and the 8-Item Employee Perceived Obligation. This procedure could be completed inapproximately 35 minutes.

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CHAPTER IIIRESULTS

Descriptive StatisticsDescriptive statistics of the variables in this study and the results are

displayed in Table 1. The frequency scores and percentage of sample arecomputed for some of the demographic variables such as gender, salary andposition title, and are displayed In Table 2.

Statistical AnalysesReliabilities

Scale reliabilities are measured with Cronbach's alpha coefficient. TheCronbach's alpha coefficient value for the Organizational Commitment Scale is0.53, with values on the individual Items ranging from 0 .420785 to 0.554913.Mowday, Porter and Steers (1982) report values of .82 to .90, depending on theirtype of sample population ranging from auto company managers to scientistsand engineers. Comparison of the two studies indicate somewhat lower valuesfor the Cronbach's alpha in this study with sample population of retail sen/iceemployees. The lower value for the Cronbach's alpha reported in this study maybe an artifact of the sample. Comprehension, literacy and education levels of theemployees in this sample may account for the difference reported in the reliabilityscore.

For the Job Involvement Questionnaire, Cronbach's alpha value is 0.69,demonstrating test reliability. The values of the individual Items of the

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questionnaire range from 0.577493 to 0,768164, Kanungo (1982) reportsCronbach's coefficient alpha value to range from .70 to .81 in an experimentalsample population chosen for designing the questionnaire.

Table 1, Summary of Descriptive StatisticsVariables Mean RangeStandard DeviationOrganizationalCommitment 55.826 55.00 11.581Job Involvement 31.743 48.00 9.155Employee PerceivedObligation 31.396 35.00 5.940OrganizationalCulture

Clan 3.465Adhoc 3.468Hierar 3.773Market 3.612Profitability/Cost Effectiveness -30.527 162.50 32.015

EmployeePerceived Contract 20.526 28.00 6,976EmployeeContract Fulfilled 23.675 37.00 7.811

4.004.004.004.00

.840

.742

.712

.608

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Reliability analysis of the Organizational Culture Scale reveals aCronbach's alpha coefficient value of 0.90, with individual item scores rangingfrom0.88539to 0 .913063, indicating supportive results for test reliability,Deshpande, Fariey and Webster (1993) report a range of Cronbach's alphavalues on the four factors of the 16-ltem questionnaire ranging from .42 to .82 intheir sample population from 50 different firms.

Table 2. Summary of Demographic FrequenciesVariable Frequency PercentGender

MaleFemale

Position TitleManagersNonmangers

Salary$10,000 or Less$10,000-20 ,000$20,000-35,000$35,000-50,000$50,000 or more

314260

115459

301175591915

54,745.3

20.080.0

52.930.810.4

3.32.6

An additional scale measuring organizational culture is the OrganizationalNorms Opinionnaire (Alexander, 1978). The instrument's 42 Items can begrouped into ten scales of, organizational/personal pride,

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perfomriance/excellence, teamwori^communication, leadership/supervision,profitability/cost effectiveness, colleague/associate relations, customer/clientrelations, Innovativeness/creativity. training/development and candor/openness.

There are three scales measuring the employee psychological contract,the Employee Perceived Contract Scale, the Employee Perceived ContractFultilled Scale, and the Employee Perceived Obligation Scale. For the7-itemEmployee Perceived Contract Scale, the Cronbach's alpha coefficient is 0.84,with individual item scores ranging from ,814338 to .842535, For the7-itemEmployee Perceived Contract Fulfilled Scale, the coefficient alpha is 0,82, withindividual Item scores ranging from 0.775768to 0.828310. The Cronbach'salpha for the third scale. Employee Perceived Obligation is0.71,with individualItem scores ranging from0.651294to 0.712505.

Organizational Comm itment. Job Involvement and TumoverAnalyses of associations between survival time and qualitative and

quantitative variables are performed with the Cox proportional hazards model toestimate a predictive model in which theriskof voluntary tumover depends oncovariates. Also, estimates of survivor functions are produced using the Kaplan-Meier method and the life-table, or actuarial method (Allison, 1995).

For model building, the Cox proportional hazards model is used,specifically the methods of stepwise regression and the score method, to test theincremental effect of each variable while controlling for all others. Theindependent variables for the first analysis were Organizational Commitment, JobInvolvement, Employee Perceived Contract, Employee Perceived ContractFulfilled,Employee Perceived Obligation and Organizational Culture.

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Initial analysis of variables yielded significant chi-square scores forOrganizational Commitment (8.9894, p

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(0.991) indicate a negative association between the variable and the hazard ofemployee voluntary tumover that Is not significant when the two variables are inthe model together.

When Job Involvement and Organizational Commitment are each enteredinto a model alone, the Wald chi-square (10.35660, p

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The parameter estimates and risk ratios for each covariate are displayedin Table 3. For each covariate, the estimates and risk ratios indicate a strongnegative association between the covariates and the hazard of voluntarytumover. Comparison of the different locations and the mean scores for eachcovariate reveal that for all locations excepttwo,the highest mean score Is forHierarchical (3 .89423) and the second highest Is for the culture type Clan(3.80357).

The hierarchical culture emphasizes the importance of rules, regulationsandorder. Business transactions are controlled by sun/eillance, direction andevaluation. The achievement and consistency of cleariy stated goals aredeterminants of business effectiveness. The clan culture promotes participation,teamwork and coheslveness, with more importance being placed on personalsatisfaction and organizational coheslveness rather than market share andfinancial objectives. Participation ensures the commitment of the members of theorganization.

For the dominant culture of the organization, one of two locations reportinga different type of culture, the highest mean score of the four culture types isAdhocracy (3.96429) and the second highest. Clan (3.80357) and for the Wilcoxlocation, the highest mean of the four is Hierarchical (3.89286) and the secondhighest, Adhocracy (3.59694). Within the adhocracy culture, the primaryemphasis Is on values of creativity, adaptability and entrepreneurship. Thestrategic emphasis is on new directions for growth and new markets in anatmosphere of flexibility and tolerance.

These findings do not support hypothesis 2, that the subcultures, at thevarious geographical locations, of the dominant culture will be defined as

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ClanAdhocHierarMari

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First, the variable Hierarchical, from the Organizational Culture Scale, Istested in the two groups of culture and the Wilcoxon chi-square (4 .9592,p

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hazard of employee voluntary tumover. The largest Wilcoxon chi-square statistic(15.6935 , p

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range from -10 0% to +100 % with -100% meaning that the employee positivelyagrees that all other employees regard profitability and cost effectiveness in theorganization as very important. These results indicate that for those employeeswho agree that other employees regard this variable as important, the hazard ofemployee voluntary tumover decreases by 1.1%.

DemographicsA model of the hazard of employee voluntary tumover containing

demographic variables was generated by the Cox proportional hazards model.The variables entered into the model were gender, age, shift, ethnicity, locationof employment, level of education, marital status, salary and children.

There are four demographic variables that demonstrate a significantassociation to the hazard of employee voluntary tumover, gender, age ethnicityand salary. Gender is represented as male or female and age is the actual ageas self-reported by the employee. The variable ethnicity is divided into eightgroups, Caucasian, African-American, Hispanic, Asian/Pacific Islander, AfricanAmerican/Hispanic, Caucasian/Hispanic, Native American and a group for anyother ethnicity. There are five levels of the variable salary, categorizing byincome calculated in annual salary. The first level of salary is $10 ,000 or less,the second, $10,000 -$20,00 0, the third, $20,000-$35,000, the fourth, $35,000 -$50 ,000 and the fifth level Is $50,000 or more.

The final model contains four demographic variables that report significantWald chi-square scores, indicating a significant association with the hazard ofemployee voluntary tumover. The variables are gender (5.6698 , p

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For the quantitative variable, age, the parameter estimate (-0,029846)and the risk ratio (0 .971 ) indicate a strong negative relationship between thevariable and the hazard of voluntary tumover. For each one-year increase inage, the hazard for voluntary tumover decreases by 2.9%, 100(.971-1)=2 ,9%(Allison, 1995).

For the quantitative variable, salary, the parameter estimate (-0.763494)and the risk ratio(.466)indicate a strong negative association between thevariable and the hazard of voluntary tumover. Results of the formula indicatethat for every one-unit increase in the variable salary, there is a 53 ,4% decreasein the hazard of voluntary tumover. Salary Is divided into five groups with thelowest paid group representing the $10,000 and less, the second, $10 ,000-$20,000 , the third, $20,000-$35,000, the fourth, $35,000-50,000 and the fifthgroup, $50 ,000 or more.

In the survival analysis, testing for the effects of the variable, gender, theparameter estimate (0 .521141) and the risk ratio (1 .684) indicate a strongpositive association between the variable and the hazard of voluntary tumover.These estimates Indicate that males are .5938 times more likely to engage inemployee voluntary tumover than females.

The variable, gender, is further tested by using the Kaplan-Meier and life-table methods of survival analysis for interpretation of tumover by intervals oflength of employment. When testing for the homogeneity of survival curves overthe strata of gender, male and female, specifically comparing time intervals ofemployment, 0 to 24 months by three, there were no significant differences in thesurvival curves of females as compared to the sun/ival curve for males.

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Results from the Kaplan-Meier, comparing tumover by gender on theIntervals of length of employment, there are some similarities in the tumover formales and females as indicated in the life-table survival estimates. For malesand females, the highest number of voluntary tumover failed events is in the timeinten/al3-to-6months employed. The life table method of analysis yields twostatistics for quantifying theriskof failure, a failed event being voluntary tumoverof the employee. The statistics are the conditional probability of failure and thehazard function. Conditional probability of failure (0 .0498) for males at the 3-6month interval quantifies theriskof failure during the interval, given that theymade it to the start of the Inten/al. The hazard function (0.017021) for males atthe 3-6 month Interval quantifies the Instantaneousriskhat a voluntary tumoverevent will occur.

For females, the number of employees failed in any given interval is thehighest in the 3-6 month interval, that number being 11. The conditionalprobability of failure for females at the 3-6 month Inten/al(.0370)is somewhatlower than that of males. The hazard function (0.01257) for females at the 3-6month interval is highest at this interval as compared to all other intervals andalso lower than that of males.

The Kaplan-Meier sun/ival estimates show that by 7 months employed, 25males had failed. At 7 months, the survival estimate (0 ,8992) indicates that theestimated probability that a male will survive or remain employed 7 months orlonger Is 89 .92% . This sun/ival estimate function steadily decreases until at 51months employed the survivor function (0,7341) indicates a decreased probabilityof sun/ival. The point estimate for males at the 25% quantile is51 months. This

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estimate indicates the smallest event time such that the probability of voluntarytumover eariler than this time is >.25. Most interesting is the 50th percentile,which is the median failure time. At the 50% quantile for males, the pointestimate Is 260 months.

In comparison to males, the group females' survival estimate (0.9272) for7-monthsemployed indicates that the estimated probability (92.72%) thatfemales will survive 7 months or longer is somewhat higher than that for males.The point estimate for females at the 2 5% quantile is void meaning that thefunction never reaches a failure probability of > .235, which occurs at 47 monthsfor females as compared to51months for males. The conditional probability offailure and the hazard function estimates are higher for males than for females,meaning that the hazard of voluntary tumover is greater for m ales than forfemales.

Results of survival analysis testing for the effects of the variable ethnicity,specifically the parameter estimate (0.147584) and risk ratio (1.159), indicate apositive association between the variable and the hazard of voluntary tumover.The variable ethnicity is dichotomized into groups of Caucasian and all otherethnicities combined and Is compared by time Inten/als of employment. Thevariable is dichotomized, instead of using the 8 groups of ethnicity, to avoid areduction in power since the number of failure events is relatively low comparedto the number of censored events In the study. When a substantial number ofcases are censored, the effect on the estimates of the mean can be great(Allison, 1995). The number of Caucasian (379) is quite large and when all otherethnicities are added into one group (1 71), the two groups are more nearlybalanced In number.

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The Wilcoxon chi-square statistic(20.0631,p.2020which occurs at 88 months.

The life-table survival estimate tables reveal the number of voluntarytumover failure events In each Interval stratified on the two groups. For thegroup, all other ethnicities, the highest number of failed events in a designatedinterval (15) occurred In the 3-6 month employed inten/al as compared to thenumber of failed events (8) in the group, Caucasian, for the 3-6 month interval.For the group, Caucasian, the highest number of failed events (11) occurred inboth the 6-9 and 9-12 month inten/als.

The conditional probability of failure for the group, all other ethnicities,(.0920)at the 3-6 month interval Is higher than for the group, Caucasian,(.0213)during the same inten/al of employment. For the group, Caucasian, theconditional probability of failure at the 6-9 month inten/al(.0317)and at the 9-12month interval (.0364), the two inten/als reporting the highest number of failedevents (11 each), is signiticantly lower than the probability of failure rate for thegroup, all other ethnicities, (.0920)during the 3-6 month interval.

Comparison of the hazard function estimates for the two groups Indicatesthat the group, all other ethnicities, displays Its highest hazard function estimate

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for any Inten/al(.03254)during the 3-6 month inten/al while the groupCaucasian, experiences Its highest hazard function estimate (.012346), still

lower than the function for the other group, at the 9-12 month inten/al.The difference in the sun/ival cun/es is significant for the two groups, the

group, all other ethnicities, displaying a higher rate of failure events in the formof voluntary tumover at an eariier time Inten/al and an increased hazard functionestimate than the group, Caucasian. The conditional probability of failure andthe hazard function estimates for the group, Caucasian, are lower than for thegroup, all other ethnicities. The group, all other ethnicities, demonstrates anIncreased hazard of voluntary tumover at an eariier interval of length ofemployment.

Emplovee Psvchological Contract and TurnoverThe effects of the significant variable. Employee Perceived Obligation,

from the predictive model of voluntary tumover, was tested in a series of Coxproportional hazards models, stratifying on each of the demographic variablesthat also proved to have significant effects on the hazard of voluntary tumover.

The first analysis, testing for the effects of the covariate EmployeePerceived Obligation on the dichotomous variable ethnicity, yielded a Wald chi-square for the model (16.217, p

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tumover for those employees who are Caucasian Is93,1%of those who are not.The reciprocal of .931 indicates that those employees who are not Caucasian are1.07 time more likely to engage in voluntary tumover. The mean score of themeasure. Employee Perceived Obligation, for the group, all other ethnicities,(30.9379) was slightly lowerthanthe mean score of the group, Caucasian,(32.1753).

A second analysis was performed using the variable ethnicity, this timedividing the variable Into the 8 different groups reported from the demographicinformation. The total number of employees in each group and the number offailed events are listed in Table 4. The Wald chi-square statistic (14 .718,p

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Table 4. Summary of Event Values by EthnicityEthnicity Total Event

51225

02

5726

CaucasianAfrican AmericanHispanicAsian Pacific IslanderBlack HispanicCaucasian HispanicNative AmericanOther

365129843298

The hazard of voluntary tumover for those employees who are femaleIs 92 .5% of those who are male and the reciprocal of .925 indicates that malesare 1.08 times more likely to engage in voluntary tumover. The mean score(31.9749) on the measure for males Is slightly higher than that of females(31.6481).

The next analysis Is perfonned using the third demographic variable fromthe Cox proportional model, salary, divided into the five levels of salary. Again,the Cox proportional hazard model is used to test the effects of the covariate.Employee Perceived Obligation, on the hazard of voluntary turnover as stratitiedon the five groups of salary. The total number of employees in each group of the

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variable salary and the number of failed events for the groups are displayed inTable 5. The Wald chi-square statistic (8.194 , p

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Altemative AnalysesTwo of the thirteen locations of the organization are thought to be

homogeneous with respect to survival curves depicting the hazard of voluntaryturnover, and the two sites In Wyoming and Arizona are believed to significantlydiffer from all other locations. Support for this belief is in the fact that percentageof voluntary participation at each of the two latter sites is higher than that of eachof the other sites. Percentage of participation at each of the two sites is 87.47 %and 66 .84% , respectively. Since percentage of voluntary participation at each ofthe other sites was considerably lower, selection bias is suspected at the othersites of the organization. In other words. It is suspected that those employeeswho would self-report high levels of commitment and obligation are the ones whowould volunteer for the study.

For this reason, an analysis of homogeneity was perfonned comparing theone site located at Rawlins, Wyoming to the othersite,in Tonopah, Arizona. Thetotal number of employees participating in the study at the first site (107) and thenumber of voluntary tumover failed events (29) is comparable to the total of thesecond site (121) and the number failed (28). Using the Kaplan-Meier method ofanalysis, the Wilcoxon chi-square (1 .0635, p

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estimate for the second site (23 months). Comparison of the two sites withrespect to the life table survival estimates indicates that for the first site thehighest number failed (9) Is the same in both the 6-9 month interval and the 9-12month inten/al, while for the second site the highest number of actual failedevents (5) is the same In both the 3-6 month and 6-9 month inten/als.

Since the two sites are considered homogeneous with respect to theirsurvival curves and the hazard of voluntary tumover, a further analysis isperfonned by dichotomizing on location, to compare the two sites, Wyoming andArizona, to all other locations to test for homogeneity of survival curves withrespect to the hazard of voluntary turnover. Comparison of the two groups oflocation with respect to size and number of failed events indicates that the total ofparticipating employees (322) in the first group, all other locations, is greaterthan the total (228) in the second group of two locations; however, the number ofvoluntary tumover failed events (57) for the second group, two locations,exceeds the number (42) for thetirstgroup, all other locations. The Kaplan-Meier method of analysis yields a Wilcoxon chi-square (12.3323, p.1929in the 88 month. Thesun/ival function estimate for the group, two locations, in the eighteenth month(0.7469) Is less than the sun/ival function estimate (0 .8071) of the group, allother locations, for month 88.

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The life table sun/ival estimates by interval of length of stay indicate thatthe group, all other locations, experiences the highest number of voluntarytumover failed events (10) in the 3-6 month inten/al while the group, twolocations, reports the highest number of voluntary tumover failed events in the 6-9 month inten/al. Conditional probability of failure (0.0318) and the hazardfunction estimate (0 .010787) for the group, all other locations, at the 3-6 monthinterval is lower than the conditional probability of failure (0.0700) and the hazardfunction estimate (0.02418) for the group, two locations, during the 6-9 monthinterval. These results Indicate that the hazard of voluntary tumover is higher forthe two locations in Wyom ing and Arizona, than for all other locations.

The same analysis of comparing the two groups of location is perfonnedwith the Kaplan-Meier and life table methods of survival analysis, stratifying oneach of the demographic variables. There is a significant difference In thesun/ival curves with respect to the hazard of voluntary tumover when stratifyingon the variable gender according to the Wilcoxon chi-square (23.0998, p

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estimate is never > .1569 in month 38 , For females in the group, all otherlocations, the 25% quantile is void since the point estimate is never>,2231atmonth 88 and for females in the group, two locations, the 25% quantile is alsovoid with the point estimate never>.2490in month 79 . These results are similarto the previous findings for gender and indicate that males demonstrate a greaterhazard for voluntary tumover than females and at an eariier interval of length ofemployment.

The next demographic variable used in the analysis of the two groups oflocation is the variable ethnicity, divided into two groups, all other ethnicities,and Caucasian. The variable ethnicity is reduced to two comparable groups toenhance the power of the analysis. The Wilcoxon chi-square (27 .6027, p

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Table 9. Life Table Survival EstimatesAll Other EthnicitiesGrpO

GrpO

Grpi

Grpi

Interval0-33-66-99-12Interval0-33-66-99-12Interval0-33-66-99-12Interval0-33-66-99-12

Failed5522

Failed3524

Cond.Prob.0.06410.06850.03230.0392CaucasianCond.Prob.0.01230.02070.00890.0200All Other EthnicitiesFailed

31054Failed

1397

Failure

Failure

Cond.Prob.Fallure0.03230.11110.65800.0635

CaucasianCond.Prob.Fallure0.07410.02240.07260.0683

Hazard0.02200.02360.01090.0133Hazard0.00410,00690,00300,0067Hazard0,10920.03920.02260.0218Hazard0.00240.00750.02510.0235

The hazard function estimates are higher for the group, all otherethnicities, in both groups of location with the group, two locations, reportingthe highest hazard function estimates at the 0-3 month inten/al employed and the3-6 month interval. These results are similar to previous findings that the group,Caucasian, demonstrates a reduced hazard of voluntary tumover as compared

to the group, all other ethnicities.

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Further analysis was perfonned on the two groups of location, stratifyingagain on the two groups of ethnicity and testing for the effects of the covariateEmployee Perceived Obligation. The Wald model chi-square (14 .077, p

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estimate(-0.043272)and the risk ratio (0.958) indicate a significant negativeassociation between the covariate and the variable age. For each one-unitIncrease in the variable age, as grouped Into the five groups, the hazard ofvoluntary tumover decreases by 4.2%. The ratio (37.14% ) of the highest numberof actual failed events (13) to the total participants (35) is in the age group,

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Group Differences in TumoverFrom the previous analyses, findings indicate that there are three intervals

of employment length of stay in which the greatest number of voluntarytumover failed events consistently occur. The inten/als are the 0-3 monthemployed, the 3-6 month employed and the 6-9 month employed. These threeinten/al groups were compared to a fourth group, >9 months employed. AnAN OVA Is perfonned to test for significant difference in the four groups. Theresults of the ANOVA for inten/al groups by demographic variables is displayedIn Table 10. Table 11 presents the frequencies and percentages of thedemographic variables. Table 12 displays the descriptive statistics for thedifferent groups on the demographic variables of age and on the measure ofEmployee Perceived Obligation. The four groups of length of stay differsignificantly on the demographic variables of age, ethnicity, salary and on themeasure Employee Perceived Obligation, The demographic variable, gender, isnot significant by group.

Table 10. Summary of Analysis of Variance for Interval Groupsby Demographic Variables

Source df MS F pAge 3 1912.85 10.52 .0001Ethnicity 3 32.24 11.58 .0001Salary 3 24.16 9.11 .0001Employee Perceived Obligation 3 91.93 2.65 .0480

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Table 11. Summary of Frequency and Percentage ofDemographic Variables by Group

GenderMaleFemale

EthnicityCaucasian

African/AmericanHispanicAsian/Pacific IslanderBlack/HispanicCaucasian/HispanicNative AmericanOther

Salary 10,000orless10000-20,00020,000-35,00035,000-50,00050,000ormore

Groupl81.4571.27

5.901.1871.2700001.180

01.1891.644.731.180000

Group2122,17111,99

81,451.184.72001.185.902

.362.36212.832.36000000

Group3407.23386.87

519.223.54173.0700003.543

.541.18539.65213.833.550000

Group418934,1824844,85

31657,1481.457613,744 ,722 .36203.625

.9061.0820637.5214326.05539.65183.28142.55

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Table 12, Summary of Descriptive Statistics for Age and EmployeePerceived Obligation by GroupGroup 1AgeEmployee Perceived ObligationGroup 2AgeEmployee Perceived ObligationGroup 3AgeEmployee Perceived ObligationGroup 4AgeEmployee Perceived Obligation

Mean26.9329.46Mean29.2630.09Mean29.7831.19Mean37.1632.08

Std.Dev.10.084.82Std.Dev.14.496.93Std.Dev.11.335.82Std.Dev.13.875.23

Min.1621Min.1614Min.1616Min.169

Max.5340Max.7240Max.6440Max.6840

Considering these results, salary may be the one variable that accountsfor the employee voluntary turnover. Other ANOVA's were performed on the fivelevels of salary by each of the demographic variables of age, gender andethnicity and by the measure Employee Perceived Obligation. The five levels ofsalary differ significantly on the demographic variables of age, gender andethnicity and on the m easure of Employee Perceived Obligation. Results of theANOVA's for salary by demographic variable are displayed in Table 13.Summary of descriptive statistics for age and employee perceived obligation by

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level of salary are displayed In Table 14. Summary of frequencies andpercentages for gender and ethnicity by level of salary are displayed in Table 15.

Table 13. Summary of Analysis of Variance for Salary byDemographic Variables

Source df MS F pAgeGenderEthnicityEmployee Perceived Obligation 30

51710

61 9431 474 282 78

2 3836 284 893 41

0001000100010001

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Table 14. Summary of Descriptive Statistics for Age and EmployeePerceived Obligation by Level of SalarySalary Level1 Mean Std. Dev. RangeMin. Max.Age 32.63 14.66 42 16 67Employee Perceived Obligation 29.97 6.04 35 5 40Salary Level 2Age 36.46 12.56 56 16 72Employee Perceived Obligation 31.72 5.45 32 8 40Salary Level 3Age 40.12 9.76 39 22 61Employee Perceived Obligation 34.78 4.76 26 14 40Salary Level 4Age 45.68 10.13 39 28 67Employee Perceived Obligation 35.63 3.15 10 30 40Salary Level 5Age 48.92 10.34 32 32 64Employee Perceived Obligation 37.36 3.38 10 30 40

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Table 15. Summary of Frequency and Percentage for Genderand Ethnicity by Level of Salary

SalaryGenderMale

FemaleEthnicityCaucasian

African/AmerHispanicAslan/Pac.lslBlack/Hlsp.Cauc./Hlsp.NativeAmer.Other

Level1

10519.1318433.5217336.51. 71.287012.75. 2.363.55224.016

1.0961.09

Level2

8114.758916.2112122.04

3 .55305.462 .360071.284.133.55

Level3

336.01244.37509.11

2 .364.73000000001.18

Level4

152.134 .73193.46

00000000000000

Level5

132.371.18142.5

00000000000000

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CHAPTER IVDISCUSSION

The present study examined the relationships between employeeorganizational commitment, job Involvement, the psychological contract,organizational culture and the process of employee voluntary tumover. Analysesof associations between qualitative and quantitative variables and sun/ival timeyielded a predictive model for employee voluntary tumover. Survival analysiswas used to assess the relationship of both the occurrence and the timing of theturnover process to the multiple predictors measured at one point in time.

Relationship Between Emplovee Organizational CommitmentAnd Job Involvement. How Predictive They are of EmployeeVoluntarv Tumover

Findings from the analysis Indicate that the constructs of organizationalcommitment and job involvement demonstrate a significant negative effect on thehazard of employee voluntary tumover as stated In the first hypothesis. Forthose employees self-reporting high levels of organizational commitment and jobInvolvement, the hazard of employee voluntary tumover decreases by 2.8% fororganizational commitment and 2.6% for job involvement. These findings, thatthe two variables demonstrate a negative association with the hazard ofvoluntary tumover, are consistent with those of Blau and Boal (1987) and Morita,Lee and Mowday (1989).

Further exploratory analyses Including the variables of psychologicalcontract yielded a predictive model of employee voluntary turnover. This model

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contains one of the variables of psychological contract. Employee PerceivedObligation to the employer. When this variable was entered into the analysismodel,none of the other variables. Including organizational commitment and jobinvolvement were significant. This measure alone is a good predictor of thehazard of employee voluntary tumover since the m easure accounted for agreater amount of the variance at a lowerp-level(25.7185, p

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Hierarchical type, with emphasis on stability, smooth operations and predictability(Deshpande, Fariey & Webster, 1993).

The countercultures demonstrate higher rates of voluntary tumover thanthe dominant culture, as hypothesized, and the sun/ival cun/es of all locationsdiffer significantly with respect to voluntary tumover(24.7011,p

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involvement, obligation to the employer and the Importance of profitability andcost effectiveness of the organization.

The Effect of Gender. Age. Ethnicity and Salary onEmployee Voluntarv TumoverFour of the demographic variables, gender, age, ethnicity and salary,

demonstrate effects on the hazard of employee voluntary tumover. For the twoquantitative variables of age and salary, the association to the hazard ofvoluntary tumover is negative and for the variables gender and ethnicity, theassociation is positive.The variable salary demonstrates a strong negative effect on the hazard ofvoluntary tumover, with the hazard decreasing 5 3.4% for each one-unit increasein the level of salary. For each one-year Increase in age, the hazard of voluntaryturnover decreases by 2.9%.

The variable gender demonstrates a significant positive association withthe hazard of voluntary turnover; although when testing for the homogeneity ofsurvival curves with respect to gender, male and female, the difference is notsignificant. The positive association for gender is relative to being female. Malesare 1.08 times more likely to engage in voluntary turnover.

There are some similarities in the number of failed events for males andfemales as compared on specific intervals of length of employment. The highestnumber of voluntary turnover failed events occurs in the time interval, 3-6months, for both males and fem ales . The conditional probability of failure(0.0498) and the hazard function (0.017021) of males in the 3-6 month inten/alare both higher than the conditional probability of failure(.0370)and the hazardfunction (0 .01257) for females. When comparing the estimated probability of

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sun/ival at7-monthsemployed for both males and females, females demonstratea higher estimated probability of sun/ival (0 .9272) as compared to that of males'(0.8992). So, when comparing all locations of the organization with respect tothe survival estimates of gender, females demonstrate a higher estimatedprobability of sun/ival.

There is a significant difference in survival curves for the variable,ethnicity, when dichotomized as Caucasian and all other ethnicities.The group, all other ethnicities, demonstrates a higher number of actual failedevents than the group Caucasian when compared In the 3-6 month inten/alemployed. When comparing the groups with respect to the conditionalprobability of failure and the hazard function estimate, the group, all otherethnicities, demonstrates higher estimates for both constructs of failure.The group, all other ethnicities, demonstrates a 9.2 % probability of failure at the3-6 month Interval employed as compared to a 2.1 3% probability of failure for thegroup Caucasian during the same interval. The group, all other ethnicities,engage in voluntary turnover more frequently and at an eariier time Interval ofemployment than do the group Caucasian.

The Effect of Employee Psychological Contracton Employee Voluntary TumoverThe variable. Employee Perceived Obligation, demonstrates a significant

effect on the hazard of voluntary tumover. No other variables were found to besignificant at the p

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that a measure of the employee's perceived obligation to the employer alsoreflects the employee's level of commitmentto,and satisfaction with, theorganization. Robinson (1995) reports that commitmentto,and satisfaction with,the organization are reduced when there Is a violation of the psychologicalcontract.

The effect of the variable. Employee Perceived Obligation, was tested bysurvival analysis, stratifying in separate analyses on each of the demographicvariables that also demonstrated a significant effect on the hazard of voluntaryturnover.

The psychological contract variable Is first tested by stratifying on thedichotomous variable of ethnicity. The variable. Employee Perceived Obligation,demonstrates a significant negative association to the hazard of voluntarytumover by ethnicity. Results indicate that the hazard of voluntary tumover forthose employees who are Caucasian is93.1%of those em ployees who are not.The mean score on the measure for the group, all other ethnicities, is lowerthan the Caucasian group mean score. Consequently, employees in the ethnicgroup, all other ethnicities, when compared to the group Caucasian and testingfor the effects of Employee Perceived Obligation, are 1.07 times more likely toengage in voluntary tumover than the group of Caucasian employees.

Results from a second analysis of the same variable stratifying on all 8groups of ethnicity Indicate a significant negative relationship between thevariable. Employee Perceived Obligation, and the hazard of voluntary tumoverand specifically target the group with the highest percentage (25.51% ) ofvoluntary tumover failure rate, the Hispanic group.

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When the variable measuring the employee's perceived obligation to theemployer Is stratified on gender, a significant negative association to the hazardof voluntary tumover Is reported. The voluntary tumover rate of failed events forthe male employees is 20 .9% as compared to 15.68% for female employees.Male employees are 1.08 times more likely to engage in voluntary tumover eventhough males as a group self-report a slightly higher mean score (31.9749) onthe measure Employee Perceived Obligation than the mean score (31.6481) ofthe group, females.

Results of the next analysis testing the effects of the covariate EmployeePerceived Obligation on the hazard of voluntary tumover and stratifying on the 5groups of salary indicate a negative association between the covariate and thehazard of voluntary turnover. Specifically, for each one-unit Increase in the levelof salary, the hazard of voluntary tumover decreases by 5.4%.

Group supports thistindingn comparison of the mean scores on themeasure. Employee Perceived Obligation, for the groups and comparison of thefailure rates. The lowest mean score (30 .4182) on the measure is reported bythe group, $10,000 or less, annual salary and the highest mean score(37.3571), by the group, $50,000 or more, with the mean scores incrementallyIncreasing in proportion to the level of salary. The highest rate of voluntaryfailure events (25.09% ) Is reported in the $10,000 or less salary group and thefailure rate (12.42%) decreases considerably at the next level of salary, $10,000-$20,000.

Results of the analysis testing the effects of the covariate EmployeePerceived Obligation and stratifying on five groups, of the variable age, 50, Indicate a signiticant negative association between the covariate

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and the hazard of voluntary tumover. For each one-unit increase in age , thehazard of voluntary tumover decreases by 4.7% . The group 50 agegroup. These results indicate that an increase in both employee age andemployee score on the m easure of obligation to the employer decreases thehazard of voluntary turnover for the employee.

Two Homogeneous Locations and Their Relationshipto All Other Geographical Locations of the OrganizationTwo sites of the organization are homogeneous with respect to survival

curve and hazard of employee voluntary tumover. When the two locations arecompared to the group, all other locations, results indicate that the twolocations significantly differfrom all other locations, with respect to survivalcurves and the hazard of voluntary tumover.Comparative analysis of the conditional probability of failure and thehazard function estimate for the two groups indicates that employees in thegroup, two locations, demonstrate a higher conditional probability of failure andhigher hazard function estimate than employees in the group, all otherlocations. Comparing the groups on the point estimate at the 25 % quantile,results indicate that the group, two locations reaches the 25% quantile in month18 while, for the group, all other locations, the 25% quantile is void since thepoint estimate Is never greater than .1929 in month 88 . These two analysesIndicate that employees in all other locations sun/ive longer than employees inthe two locations.

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Further analysis of the location groups Is perfonned, stratifying on the foursignificant demographic variables, gender, age ethnicity and salary. Whenstratifying on the variable gender, there is a significant difference in the sun/ivalcun/es with respect to the hazard of voluntary tumover. Males in the group, twolocations, demonstrated the largest number of actual failed events, the highestconditional probability of failure and the highest hazard function. Comparing thetwo groups on the point estimate at the 25 % quantile, males in the group, twolocations, reach the 25% quantile In month11 ,while the 25% quantile is void formales In the group, all other locations, since the estimate is never greater than.1569 In month 38. Comparing the two groups of location on gender, for females,the 25% quantile in both groups of location is void. These results indicate thatmales are engaging in voluntary turnover more often than females andspecifically, males In the group, two locations.

Using the same groups of location and stratifying on the variable gender,and testing for the effects of the covariate, Employee Perceived Obligation, theresults Indicate a significant negative association between the covariate and thehazard of voluntary tumover. Interpretation of the risk ratio Indicates that malesare 1.077 times more likely to engage In voluntary turnover at any given point.The difference In mean scores of the covariate for this analysis appears in thegroups of location with the group, two locations, reporting lower mean scoresfor the measure. Employee Perceived Obligation, in both groups of male andfemale. Males demonstrate the highest percentage of failed events in the group,two locations. Males in the group, two locations, engage in voluntary tumover

more frequently and report lower mean scores on the measure of employeeobligation to the employer.

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When the two groups of location are compared and stratified on thedichotomized demographic variable, ethnicity, results indicate a significantdifference In the sun/ival cun/es and the hazard of voluntary tumover. Thehazard function estimates are higher for the group, all other ethnicities, in bothgroups of location with the group, two locations, reporting the highest hazardfunction estimates at the 0-3 month inten/al employed and the 3-6 month interval.These results indicate that employees in the group, all other ethnicities, aremore frequently engaging in voluntary tumover at eariy intervals of employment,as compared to employees in the group Caucasian,

When the two groups of location are stratified on the dichotomousethnicity variable and tested for the effects of the covariate. Employee PerceivedObligation, the chi-square (14.077, p

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reported by the employees in the location group, two locations, in the $5 0,000or more annual Income group and the lowest mean score, in the same locationgroup in the $10,000 or less income group.

A significant negative effect for the covariate. Employee PerceivedObligation, on the hazard of voluntary tumover in the two groups of location isalso reported when stratifying on the five groups of age. For each one-unitIncrease in the variable age, the hazard o