i
A Study on Factors affecting Affective Organizational Commitment among
Knowledge Workers in Malaysia
Muhiniswari Govindasamy Bachelor of Applied Science (Applied Physics) Hons
University Sains Malaysia Malaysia
1999
Submitted to the Graduate School of Business Faculty of Business and Accountancy
University of Malaya, in partial fulfilment of the requirement for the Degree of Master of Business Administration
April 2009
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ABSTRACT
In 2002, Datuk Tan Chai Ho (Tan, 2002) from the Ministry of Energy,
Communications and Multimedia had said that Malaysia should attract
knowledge workers and technopreneurs in order to make Malaysia the global
test bed for technology. The cry for knowledge workers in knowledge
organizations has been the result of a knowledge-based economy or K-
economy. One of the biggest challenges for most knowledge organizations
in these highly competitive times comes from changes in work behaviours of
the new generation of workers – knowledge workers (Amar, 2002).
Understanding knowledge workers and what makes them stay and continue
to contribute to the organization is a formidable task for most managers.
In this context, knowledge workers affective organizational commitment is a
measurement which determines if the employee will still continue to work with
the current organization. Thus is the nature of this study as it aims to
determine the factors which will influence affective organizational commitment
among knowledge workers. This research has identified and will examine
how five factors of organizational practices namely Knowledge Sharing
Practices, Task Orientation, Fairness of performance management and
promotion, Opportunities of training and development and finally
Compensation will influence affective organizational commitment among
knowledge workers. Thus, this research will contribute significantly to
organizations wanting to encourage knowledge workers to be committed and
continue their service with them in this knowledge–based economy.
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ACKNOWLEDEMENTS
This thesis is a significant milestone in my long journey in obtaining my
degree in MBA. This work would not have been possible without the
presences of those who have contributed significantly towards my endeavour
and made this journey a successful one.
Ms. Sharmila Jaysingam, my project supervisor, who has been a great
inspiration for me. I thank her for her tireless efforts, continuous guidance,
support and mostly for her constructive comments and suggestions during the
course of this project. I am indeed grateful to her for her patience with me in
the most trying times throughout this project.
My deepest appreciation goes to my husband, Mr. Kumaravelu for his love,
support and constant encouragement towards my pursuit of life-long learning.
This is a tribute to him.
My parents, Mr & Mrs Govindasamy, have always been a source of inspiration
to me throughout my life. They have seen me through thick and thin and I
know that they have always prayed for only the best for me.
My sincere thanks go to all my friends for all their continuous moral support.
Finally, to all the respondents who have been willing to participate in this
survey, thank you for participation.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii TABLE OF CONTENTS iv LIST OF FIGURES vii LIST OF TABLES viii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1 1.0 Chapter Overview 1 1.1 Introduction / Background of the Study 2 1.2 Purpose of the Study 4 1.3 Significance of the Study 4 1.4 Research Questions / Objectives of the Study 6 1.5 Scope of the Study 7 1.6 Organization of the study 8 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 10 2.0 Chapter Overview 10 2.1 Definitions and Concepts 10 2.1.1 Knowledge Workers 10 2.1.2 Organizational Commitment 15 2.2 The importance of Affective Organizational Commitment 19
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2.3 Factors Influencing Affective Organizational Commitment
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2.3.1 Leadership 25 2.3.2 Employee Relation 26 2.3.3 Task Orientation 27 2.3.4 Compensation and Incentives 28 2.3.5 Performance Management and Promotion 29 2.3.6 Training and Development 30 2.3.7 Knowledge Sharing 31 2.4 Moderating effect of gender 33 CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 35 3.0 Chapter Overview 35 3.1 Theoretical Framework / Research Model 35 3.2 Research Instrument 39 3.3 Selection of Measures 40 3.4 Sampling Design 42 3.5 Date Collection Procedure 43 3.6 Data Analysis Techniques 44 3.6.1 Factor Analysis 44 3.6.2 Cronbach's Alpha 46 3.6.3 Descriptive Statistical Analysis 46 3.6.4 Pearson’s Correlation Test 46 3.6.5 Multiple Regression 47 CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH RESULTS 49 4.0 Chapter Overview 49 4.1 Response Rate 50 4.2 Demographic Characteristics of Respondents 51 4.3 Goodness of Measures 56 4.3.1 Independent Variables 56 4.3.2 Dependent Variable 62 4.4 Revised Conceptual Framework and Hypothesis 64 4.5 Multiple Regression Analysis 67
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CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 71 5.0 Chapter Overview 71 5.1 Summary and Conclusions 71 5.2 Discussion 72 5.3 Limitation of the Study 77 5.4 Suggestions for Future Research 79 5.5 Implications of the Study 81 5.6 Conclusion 84 BIBILIOGRAPHY 85 APPENDICES 96
Appendix 1 Key Steps in Data Analysis Appendix 2 KMO and Bartlett’s Test on IV
Appendix 3 Items of Independent Variables Dropped after Factor Appendix 4 Cronbach’s Alpha Coefficient Values for Independent Appendix 5 KMO and Bartlett’s Test on DV
Appendix 6 Items Dropped after Factor Analysis on DV
Appendix 7 Outliers cases dropped from the analysis Appendix 8 SPSS Results from Multiple Regression Analysis Appendix 9 The survey questionnaire
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LIST OF FIGURES
FIGURE FIGURE TITLE PAGE NO
3.1 Theoretical Framework for Affective Organizational
Commitment of Knowledge Workers
36
4.1 Revised Conceptual Framework 65
viii
LIST OF TABLES
TABLE TABLE TITLE PAGE NO
2.1 Factors Influencing Organizational commitment 21
2.2 Definition of Constructs used in the Model 34
3.1 Selection of Measures 41
4.1 Research Response Rates 50
4.2 Demographic Characteristics of Respondents 54
4.3 Factor Loadings on IV 58
4.4 Correlation Coefficients and Descriptive Statistics (sample Size= 259)
62
4.5 Factor Loadings on DV 64
4.6 Revised Hypothesis 66
4.7 Hierarchical Regression Results Using Gender as a Moderator in the Relationship between the Independent Variables and Affective Organizational Commitment
69
4.8 Result of the Hypothesis testing 70
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CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.0 Chapter Overview
This initial chapter will focus on the introduction and background of Affective
Organizational Commitment in a general sense. Subsequently, it will discuss
the purpose of the study, the objectives, its scope, and its limitations before
concluding with the organization of the study.
1.1 Introduction / Background of the Study
Organizational commitment is an important area of study to many researchers
and organizations because the outcomes of this behaviour or value may help
to determine many work related interaction of the employees. It is mainly
related to the employee’s desire to continue working with the particular
organization. As such, researchers and practitioners are ever so keen and
interested to understand the factors that may influence an individual's decision
to stay or leave the organization. Here, affective commitment most often tends
to be the most highly related to the desire to leave an organization.
Affective Organizational Commitment is one of the most prominent work
attitudes examined in the work and organizational literature. The study of
organizational commitment is an important and integral part of the literature
on management and organizational behaviour for a long time, since as late as
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the 70’s. Among the first studies on organizational commitment were
conducted by Porter, Steers, Mowday and Boulian (1974), where they studied
on Organizational commitment and turnover among psychiatric technicians.
Mowday, Richard, and Porter (1979) also studied on the measure of
organization commitment. Since then, there have been many studies by
researchers on organizational commitment but mostly amongst salespersons.
These studies encompassed how Affective Organizational Commitment
affects salespersons (Agarwal and Ramaswami, 1993), salespersons job
satisfaction (Bhuian and Menguc, 2002) and salesperson’s the rate of
turnover (Johnston, Varadarajan, Futrell and Sager, 1987).
Studies have shown that Organizational Commitment have received
considerable attention due to the importance that managers place on retaining
personnel (Johnston, Parasuraman, Futrell, and Black, 1990; Mathieu,
Bruvold and Ritchey, 2000; Boles, Madupalli, Rutherford and Wood, 2007).
However, the importance of retaining employees or personnel is not only
confined to any single industry, as many employers place great importance to
employee retention and to reduce employee turnover as this may involve high
costs in terms of induction, training and productivity (Firth, Mellor, Moore and
Loquet 2004).
In today’s world, we see an increase in the use of knowledge in organizations
in various industries. This is the era of k-economy where knowledge is
deemed an important factor that may contribute to the success of an
individual as well as the organization. As such, these individuals whose work
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primarily consists of having the updated knowledge within their area of
speciality and apply it to bring benefits for the organization (Amar, 2002), are
called knowledge workers. The behaviour and attitudes of a knowledge
worker is very different from an average white collar worker and as such, the
behavioural outcomes will also be different.
Therefore, it becomes pertinent that the behavioural outcomes of the
knowledge worker are understood especially with regards to the employee’s
affective organizational commitment. At present, we do not know how
knowledge workers’ organizational commitment is affected by the
organizations leadership traits, nor do we know how the organizations’ view
on knowledge sharing affects the employees’ affective organizational
commitment. Various other aspects of the organizational practices which
affects affective organizational commitment such as the extent of employees
relations, the perception of compensation and incentives, which
encompasses not just salary but inclusive of profit sharing, bonuses and
rewards, opportunities of training and development, the nature of their task
orientation or the perception of fairness of performance management and
promotion practices in their organization is still not established on how it is
related to the affective organizational commitment. We also do not know if
there is a difference between male and female knowledge workers and their
level of affective organizational commitment.
With so much of uncertainties associated with knowledge workers’
behavioural patterns, it is increasingly pertinent that the study on these new-
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age employees is absolutely vital and necessary in this era of growing
competitiveness.
1.2 Purpose of the Study
This purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between various
organizational practices in predicting affective organizational commitment
among knowledge workers in Malaysia. The study also seeks to explore the
role of gender as a moderating factor between the relationship of
organizational practices and affective organizational commitment.
This study aims to make the following contribution to the existing literature, to
study various aspects of Organizational Practices, a very board research area,
in predicting affective organizations commitment among knowledge workers in
the Malaysian context.
1.3 Significance of the Study
One of the biggest challenges for most knowledge organizations in these
highly competitive times comes from changes in work behaviours of the new
generation of workers – knowledge workers (Amar, 2002). These employees
have superior knowledge and skills, at times more than the manager or
superiors supervising them. These managers have the responsibility to
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create policies and establish organizational practices which will influence the
working environment for these knowledge workers. As such, it becomes very
pertinent for the management to understand these knowledge worker’s
psychological and sociological needs, so as to gain maximum benefits from
maintaining them in their employment. Typically a large number of managers
still continue to rely on outdated behavioural theories and practices without
realising knowledge workers are a different breed of employees altogether.
As such, it become pertinent for these managers to understand how some of
the polices and organizational practices affect these knowledge workers’
affective organizational commitment – a measurement which determines if the
employee will still continue to work with the current organization. It is also
interesting to note that, according to Daft (2006), today’s successful managers
aim to cherish people for their ability to think, create, share knowledge and
build relationships rather than seeing employees as factors of production.
The significance of this research is aimed to produce some kind of guidance
and benefits to policy makers and managers in the private organizations to
help them to better plan and move towards retaining their knowledge workers
through specific organizational practises. This study is hoped to provide
some valuable insights to these organizations which seeks to create the
appropriate enabling working environment or establish the significant
organizational practises to encourage knowledge workers to be committed to
their current organization and continue their service with them.
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1.4 Research Questions / Objectives of the Study
The following questions were proposed as part of this research:
1. What is the relationship between the knowledge workers’ perception of
their organization’s top management leadership traits and affective
organizational commitment?
2. What is the relationship between the knowledge workers’ perception of
their organization’s outlook towards knowledge sharing and affective
organizational commitment?
3. To what extent do knowledge workers view of employees relations
have an interactive effect on affective organizational commitment?
4. Do knowledge workers find compensation and incentives having an
effect on their perception of affective organizational commitment?
5. To what extent do opportunities of training and development affect
affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers?
6. Does task orientation affects affective organizational commitment
among knowledge workers?
7. Are knowledge workers concerned about the fairness of performance
management and promotion practices in their organization and is it
related to the affective organizational commitment?
8. Does gender of knowledge workers affect the relationship of the
independent variables and affective organizational commitment?
The ultimate objective of the study is of course to develop a better
understanding of affective organizational commitment especially among
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knowledge workers in Malaysian private sector. As such, specifically, this
study hopes to achieve the following objectives:
1. To determine the relationship between the seven variables identified in
influencing affective organizational commitment among knowledge
workers.
2. To determine whether gender of knowledge workers, as a moderating
variable, affects the relationship between the seven independent
variables and affective organisational commitment.
1.5 Scope of the Study
This academic study was conducted on the private sector knowledge workers
in Malaysia, specifically within the Klang Valley. The industries targeted were
known to employ knowledge workers such as manufacturing, finance and
consultation, retail and distribution, engineering as well as services. The
respondents were selected within the Klang Valley as most of these
organizations would have set up their head offices within the Klang Valley. A
survey instrument of questionnaire was used to collect data and response to
conduct this research study. Approximately 400 copies of questionnaire were
distributed both electronically and by hand to the selected respondents and
their networks, all within the knowledge worker scope.
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1.6 Organization of the study
This research study report is structured into five chapters. Chapter 1 seeks to
present the introduction and the background of the study, highlighting the
interest to study knowledge workers in the Malaysian private sector. It will
also provide an overview of the nature of the knowledge worker as
established by past researchers. Besides that, this chapter will also focus on
the purpose and significance of the study, specifying the objectives of the
study while exploring some relevant research questions. This chapter then
covers the scope of the study and identifies as the various limitations
associated to this study to begin with before concluding with the component
covering the organization of the study.
Chapter 2 is the literature review which seeks to define the term knowledge
worker, affective organizational commitment and the various related
terminologies which will be used in this study as well as critically review the
existing literature pertinent to the study.
Chapter 3 will provide the Research Methodology used in this study. It will
cover the theoretical or conceptual framework model which will be drawn out
to show the relationship of the various variables being studied in this research.
This chapter will also focus on the detailed explanation about the research
instrument; the sampling design, the data collection procedure as well as the
various techniques used to process and analyze the data obtained.
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Chapter 4 will discuss the research results and the analysis. This chapter will
highlight the findings obtained from the study. This chapter will also present
key findings as well as summarizing the statistics available about the
respondents, present the results of the hypotheses testing and conclude with
the discussion of the research findings.
Chapter 5 will conclude the research by confirming the key findings and the
implication of the results derived from this study. It will also highlight on how
these findings contributes towards new knowledge to relevant individuals,
policy makers, manager as well as organizations. Recommendations for
future research will also be included in this final chapter.
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CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.0 Chapter Overview
In this chapter, the definitions and concepts about knowledge workers,
organizational commitment and the various factors affecting organizational
commitment as well as a review of existing literature in support of the entire
research study will be discussed.
2.1 Definitions and Concepts
2.1.1 Knowledge Worker
‘Knowledge work’, is a term coined by management guru, Peter Drucker,
more than 40 years ago in 1959 (Daft, 2006) generally describes an employee
whose job activities are associated with the refining, manipulating and trading
of information (DiGiovanni, 2004). However, a knowledge worker has defined
an employee who applies theoretical and analytical knowledge acquired
through formal education to develop new products or services and required
continuous learning (Scott, 2005). Knowledge workers also are known to
make their living by accessing, creating and using information in way that add
value to an enterprise and its stakeholders (Tymon and Stumpf, 2002).
Gregerman, (1981) has identified some unique characteristics of a knowledge
worker as below:
1. A knowledge worker has total authority in deciding how to do what.
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2. Tasks of a knowledge worker are usually non-repetitive job tasks
where the methods used to resolve problems or issues encompass
numerous different approaches and techniques.
3. The output of a knowledge worker is difficult to quantify.
4. The ‘production rate’ of knowledge workers is dependent upon the
complexity of the issue at hand and the influences of the environment.
5. Projects or tasks being assigned to knowledge workers maybe mid to
long term as it may span over months or years.
6. The effectiveness of the knowledge worker depends greatly on the
extent of knowledge application and innovations employed.
7. Knowledge workers job often impact on other employees’ job as well
as the organization.
8. Knowledge workers respond well to organizational recognition.
9. Knowledge workers show high level of interest in participative work or
team work.
10. Knowledge workers desire the work to be challenging, interesting and
worthwhile to the organization.
11. Knowledge workers show high tendency to personnel development
opportunities to improve themselves.
Although the characteristics of knowledge workers were outlined by
Gregerman in the early 80’s, most of the characteristics hold true in the
present times. The review on knowledge workers by present researchers
shows that knowledge workers deal with complex and often with new
technologies. They daily work may be unpredictable, multi-disciplinary and
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usually non-repetitive (Scott, 2005). The jobs assigned to them have long
term goals and due to the relative complexity of the task, they may need to
collaborate with co-workers in the accomplishment of their task (Beyerlein,
Johnson and Beyerlein, 1995; Scott, 2005). Their work usually has very little
structure and mostly cannot be standardized as they are required to be
unique and exercise ingenuity in accomplishing their tasks (Amar, 2002).
Since knowledge workers are people whose work is primarily intellectual and
non-routine in nature, and which involves the utilizations and creation of
knowledge (Hislop, 2005), based on this definition, a large range of
occupations may be classified as knowledge-intensive, including lawyers,
consultants, IT/software designers, advertising executives, accountants,
scientists/engineers, architects, investment banking, business consultants,
education industry employees and the service industry (de Jong and Hartog,
2007; Tymon and Stumpf, 2002). These knowledge workers demand
reasonable security of employment, employability, autonomy, management
transparency, open culture, tasks that are challenging and suit individual
personality and orientation, social network, immediate and frequent feedback
and rewards, ownership (Thite, 2004). A knowledge worker is a new kind of
employee that is characterized by being paid only not to create, produce or
manage a tangible product and/or service, but rather to gather, develop
process and apply information that generates profitably to the organization
(Smith and Rupp, 2004).
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In the present times in Malaysia, there is an increasing demand for knowledge
workers. In Public Service Proceeding in 2006, the Minister of Human
Resources, YB Datuk Seri Dr Fong Chan Onn, had stated in this speech titled
Developing Human Capital - The Way Forward: Managing Human Capital in
the Globalised Era, that knowledge workers are crucial in an organization in
order to have competitive advantage and to compete in the ever so dynamic
open market (Fong, 2006). In fact, he stressed on knowledge workers being a
pre-requisite for success in this era of K-economy. He had also touched on
the need to develop knowledge workers, keep them ahead of competition, to
be effective and manage them effectively.
In another report by Malaysian Biotechnology Corp Sdn Bhd, its Chief
Executive Officer, Datuk Iskandar Mizal Mahmood (Mahmood, 2008) has
stated that they are in need of knowledge workers who can contribute towards
new product developments, to intensify acquisitions and licensing. By 2011,
Biotechcorp has stated that it will become imperative that they expand the
pool of knowledge workers substantially to ensure competitiveness. Thus is
the importance of knowledge workers to the progress of an organizational as
well as to the country.
As such, typical knowledge workers are said to be complex individuals who
bring unique skills, intelligence and work methods to the workplace (Amar,
2002). Due to these complexities and uniqueness, strategic managers are
finding it extremely difficult to create a uniform system for encouraging and
rewarding creativity (Amar, 2002; Chen and Lou, 2002; Frost, 2002; Smith
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and Rupp, 2004). As such, it is very important to understand these new
generation employees in terms of recruiting, retaining and getting the optimal
performance from them for all the organizations (Amar, 2002). In fact,
understanding them and the level of their commitment to the organization is
vital to retain them in the organization and in getting them to effectively
contribute towards the organization. It is said that these employees, have the
knowledge and skills, maybe even more than the managers who supervise
them, therefore the management needs to understand them and know how to
work with them (Amar, 2002). This understanding will give organization a
direction about how to allocate their resources and how far ahead in the future
to plan. Further to that, organization must address the needs of knowledge
workers in their efforts to retain them in order to achieve competitive
advantage in the industry (Kubo and Saka, 2002).
However, on another note, today’s knowledge worker, also known as the
members of Generation X and Y, according to a study released by Radcliffe
Public Policy Centre in May 2000 (Amar, 2002) have another interesting
characteristic – high turnover rate. According to data collected in Hewitt’s
2007 Total Compensation Management survey (Hewitt Global Report, 2008),
in Malaysia, the average employee turnover rate is 18% and the turnover
among Generation X and Y employees tends to be the highest. Furthermore,
knowledge workers are known to be highly mobile in their jobs, meaning they
are expected to change jobs frequently as they favour advancement in their
careers (Yigitcanlar, Baum and Horton, 2007). The harsh reality is that, when
these knowledge workers leave, they will take their knowledge and skills
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along with them, much to the dismay of the organization and the management.
Hence, the turnover tendency of knowledge workers is a very serious issue
for the organization. Past research has linked the tendency to leave or the
rate of turnover to employees’ organizational commitment (Porter et al., 1974;
Porter, Crampon and Smith, 1976; Stumpf and Hartman 1984; Johnston, et.
al., 1987; Labatmediene, Endriulaitiene and Gustainiene, 2007; Chew and
Chan, 2007). As such, in order to retain knowledge workers, organizations
need to ensure employees have high organizational commitment. Studies
have shown that Organizational Commitment have received considerable
attention due to the importance that managers place on retaining personnel
(Johnston et al., 1990, Mathieu et al., 2000 and Boles et al., 2007).
In the context of this study, knowledge workers are defined as white collar
employees who are generally less than 55 years in age, having at least a
diploma or degree which renders them as experts in their field of work and
have been with the current organization for at least one year. Their job scope
should involve non-repetitive tasks where it should involve application of
knowledge to complete the tasks.
2.1.2 Organizational Commitment
Organizational commitment is a widely researched topic by many researchers
in the past. From these past, studies, many researchers and behaviour
scientists have attempted to define this term, which is now quite established
and well received by researchers.
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But before, we venture into the definition by the researchers, Organizational
Commitment as defined by the BNET, Business Dictionary, available at
http://dictionary.bnet.com/definition/organizational+commitment.html is:
• the commitment of an organization to given goals and objectives, as
demonstrated through its stated goals and policies, and its actions and
allocation of resources
• the degree of employee commitment within an organizational workforce
For the purpose of this research, the employee’s organizational commitment
perspective is being studied.
‘Organizational Commitment’ is the degree to which an employee feels loyalty
to a particular organization (Mueller, Wallace, & Price, 1992; Price, 1997).
Steers (1977) viewed organizational commitment as an employee’s attitude
and as a set of behavioural intentions, the willingness to exert considerable
effort on behalf of the organizational and a strong desire to willingly maintain a
close relationship and membership with the organizational.
Early studies by Mowday, Steers and Porter (1979; 1982) then refined the
concept of organization commitment to be characterized by at three factors:
(a) a strong belief in, and acceptance of, the organization’s goals and
values,
(b) a willingness to exert considerable effort on behalf of the
organization; and
(c) a strong desire to remain in the organization.
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These researchers’ definition of organizational commitment as the strength of
an individual’s identification with the organization’s goals as well as about
positive involvement in developing these shared goals and objectives in that
organization. As such, organizational commitment can be considered to be
affective attitudes or behaviours which link or attach an employee to the
organization. It reflects the positive feeling towards the organization and its
values (Boles et. al., 2007).
Then, recently Meyer and Allen (1991), conceptualization of organizational
commitment as a three-dimensional construct of affective commitment,
continuance commitment and normative commitment. This was called the
Three-Component Model of OC.
• Affective commitment refers to the employee’s emotional attachment
to the organization. Employees with strong affective commitment
remain with the organization because they want to do so (Meyer and
Allen, 1991). This state of attachment reflects the strength of an
individual’s identification with and involvement in a particular
organization (Agarwal and Ramaswami, 1993).
• Continuance commitment refers to the extent to which the employee
perceives that leaving the organization will be costly. Employees with
strong continuance commitment remain because they have to do so
(Meyer and Allen, 1991). The cost of leaving also is said to reflect on a
lack of alternate employment opportunity and / or high personal
sacrifice associated with leaving a particular organization. (Agarwal
and Ramaswami, 1993)
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• Finally, normative commitment refers to the employee’s feelings of
obligation to the organization and the belief that staying is the ‘right
thing’ to do. Employees with strong normative commitment remain
because they feel that they ought to do so (Meyer and Allen, 1991).
In summary, the three component-model of commitment attempts to explain
the cumulative strength of individuals connected to an organization because
they want to (affective), they need to (continuance), and they ought to
(normative) remain in the organization.
Nonetheless, it is interesting to study why an employee would by his or her
own free will and desires to remain connected and commitment to an
organization? What makes him or her develop this feeling and behaviour?
Why is it important for him or her to have a sense of commitment to the
organization he or she is working for? Why would he or she continue to want
to work with the current organization? Incidentally, in a recent meta-analytic
review, Meyer, Stanley, Herscovitch and Topolnytsky, (2002) concluded that
affective commitment had a much stronger relationship with desirable
outcomes (such as attendance, performance, and organizational citizenship
behaviour). As such, to delve deeper into answering the questions above, this
research survey is limiting the scope of research to study only affective
organizational commitment, the ‘want to’ factor, as the purpose of this study is
to understand what factors that influence an employee’s affective
organizational commitment, more so as the turnover rate of knowledge
workers in Malaysia is alarmingly high.
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2.2 The importance of Affective Organizational Commitment
The study of organizational commitment is an important and central part of the
literature on management and organizational behaviour, more so in the effort
to retain knowledge workers. Among the first studies on organizational
commitment were conducted by Porter et al., (1974), where they studied on
Organizational commitment, job satisfaction and turnover among psychiatric
technicians. Mowday et al., (1979) also studied on the measure of
organization commitment. Since then, there have been many studies by
researchers on organizational commitment but mostly amongst salespersons.
These studies encompassed how Affective Organizational Commitment affect
salespersons (Agarwal and Ramaswami, 1993), how Affective Organizational
Commitment affects salesperson’s job satisfaction (Bhuian et. al., 2002) and
how Affective Organizational Commitment affects salesperson’s the rate of
turnover (Johnston, et. al., 1987).
According to a study done by Boles et al., (2007), increased affective
organizational commitment has been positively associated with valuable
organizational outcomes, including job performance ratings, decreased intent
to search for new jobs and reduced turnover (Bergmann, Lester, De Meuse,
and Grahn, 2000; Johnston et al., 1987). Identification with the organizational
goals may prompt an employee to react to the organization by supporting
those goals. Workers may be more likely to be committed to an organization
which is in return committed to the employees that it cares about the
employees and values them (George and Jones, 1996).
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Furthermore, in the effort and the importance of retaining employees,
especially knowledge workers, is generic to most organizations. As such,
many employers place great importance to employee retention and to reduce
employee turnover as this may involve high costs in terms of induction,
training and productivity (Firth 2004). More so, retaining of knowledge
workers not only saves cost but also ensures that the organization is fully
geared up with right strategies and resources needed to succeed in this
competitive market.
2.3 Factors Influencing Affective Organizational Commitment,
Past studies in the literature have attempted to identify various organizational
factors that influence Affective organization commitment. These factors
include: task characteristics (Hunt, Chonko and Wood, 1985), supervisory
behaviours (Johnston et al. 1990), organizational structure (Michaels, Cron,
Dubinsky and Joachimsthaler,1988) and role ambiguity of the employees in
the organization (Agarwal and Ramaswami, 1993), fairness of Human
Resources Management (HRM) practices (Ahmad and Schroeder, 2003;
Colakoglu, Lepak and Hong, 2006), job satisfaction (Price, 1999), among
others.
After reviewing the available literature to support the topic of this research
study, several factors were identified as influencing affective organizational
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commitment. Needless to say, from the vast evidence and literature review
available affective organisational is indeed one of the most studied
behavioural subjects by many researchers. Many existing literatures authored
by various researchers have identified many factors that influence affective
organizational commitment.
As such, table 2.1 will provide a summary of such factors identified by various
researchers. Naturally, this list is non-exhaustive and there might be many
other factors that may affect organizational commitment, as this is a
behavioural study and as such will warrant for further in-depth research in this
area but these said factors will now be considered and utilised for the purpose
of this basic research.
Table 2.1: Factors Influencing Organizational commitment
Factors: Researcher 1 Leadership
- Supervisory support, - top management
leadership
Agarwal and Ramaswami (1993) Benkhoff (1997) Benson and Brown (2007) Boles et al (2007) Boselie and van der Wiele (2002) Churchill et al (1974) Currivan (1999) Johnston et al (1990) Joiner and Bakalis (2006) Lee (2005) Lee and Ahmad (2009) Rowden (2000) Savery and Syme (1996) Stallworth (2004)
22
Table 2.1: Factors Influencing Organizational commitment (continued) Factors: Researcher 2 Employee relation
- team interdependence - team participation - Co-worker relationship
Agarwal and Ramaswami (1993) Ahmad and Schroeder (2003) Ansari, Hung and Aafaqi (2000) Boselie and van der Wiele (2002) Benkhoff (1997) Benson and Brown (2007) Boles et al (2007) Cho, Woods, Jang and Erdem (2006) Churchill et al (1974) Currivan (1999) Ferres, Connell and Travaglione (2004) Hung, Ansari and Aafaqi (2004) Joiner and Bakalis (2006) Lee-Kelley, Blackman and Hurst (2007) Stallworth (2004)
3 Job Scope - Job description, - Job performance, - task variety, - task autonomy, - task orientation
Agarwal and Ramaswami (1993) Benkhoff (1997) Bhuian and Menguc (2002) Boselie and van der Wiele (2002) Cho et al (2006) Chew and Chan (2007) Chow (1994) Churchill et al (1974) Currivan (1999) Firth et al (2003) Savery and Syme (1996) Stallworth (2004)
4 Salary and Compensation on performance
Ansari et al (2000) Ahmad and Schroeder (2003) Benson and Brown (2007) Boles et al (2007) Boselie and van der Wiele (2002) Chew and Chan (2007) Cho et al (2006) Chow (1994) Churchill et al (1974) Lee-Kelley et al (2007)
23
Table 2.1: Factors Influencing Organizational commitment (continued) Factors: Researcher 5 Job Satisfaction (overall) Ansari et al (2000)
Benkhoff (1997) Bhuian and Menguc(2002) Boles et al (2007) Falkenburg and Schyns (2007) Firth et al (2003) Johnston et al (1990) Kalbers and Cenker (2007) Lee and Ahmad (2009)
6 Performance Management and Promotion
Ansari et al (2000) Benkhoff (1997) Benson and Brown (2007) Boles et al (2007) Cho et al (2006) Lee-Kelley et al (2007)
7 Training and development
Ansari et al (2000) Ahmad and Schroeder (2003) Chew and Chan (2007) Cho et al (2006) Churchill et al (1974) Stallworth (2004)
8 Role Ambiguity Agarwal and Ramaswami (1993) Benson and Brown (2007) Currivan (1999) Firth et al (2003) Johnston et al (1990)
9 Role Conflict Agarwal and Ramaswami (1993) Benson and Brown (2007) Currivan (1999) Firth et al (2003) Johnston et al (1990)
10 Secondary working conditions
Ahmad and Schroeder (2003) Benkhoff (1997) Boselie and van der Wiele (2002) Cho et al (2006) Lee-Kelley et al (2007)
11 Knowledge Sharing and Knowledge Management
Ahmad and Schroeder (2003) Boselie and van der Wiele (2002) Cho et al (2006) Massingham and Diment (2009)
24
Table 2.1: Factors Influencing Organizational commitment (continued) Factors: Researcher 12 Years of tenure,
experience Benkhoff (1997) Joiner and Bakalis (2006) Kalbers and Cenker (2007)
13 Organizational culture and policy on hiring
Ahmad and Schroeder (2003) Ansari et al (2000) Boles et al (2007)
14 Resource adequacy Benson and Brown (2007) Joiner and Bakalis (2006) Lee-Kelley et al (2007)
15 Leader-Member-Exchange (LMX)
Hung et al (2004) Morrow, Suzuki, Crum, Ruben and Pautsch (2005)
16 Procedural Justice Benkhoff (1997) Cho et al (2006)
17 Job Security Benson and Brown (2007) Ahmad and Schroeder (2003)
18 Gender Elizur and Koslowsky (2001) Savery and Syme (1996)
For the purpose of this research, six of the top variables identified as key
factors in influencing affective organizational commitment as well as the
knowledge sharing factor will be studied. Therefore the seven variables that
will be used are as follows: Leadership, Employee relation, Task orientation,
Compensation and Incentives, Performance Management and Promotion,
Opportunities of Training and Development and finally Knowledge Sharing.
These seven variables will be tested against affective organizational
commitment to study if their influence is significant.
25
2.3.1 Leadership
In an organization or a department, the top management team, the manager,
department leader or supervisor is usually the mediator between the
employees and the organization itself. Thus, the role of these key people is
vital in establishing the sort of relationship an employee establishes with the
organization. The level of interaction, the trust, the relationship is build
through this interaction. A study by Eisenberger, Huntington, Hutchison and
Sowa, (1986) has shown that employees’ organizational commitment is
strongly influenced by perceived organizational support received through the
managers in that organization. As such, more often, employees are more
likely to feel an obligation to return the supportive behaviour in terms of
affective commitment (Shore and Wayne, 1993). It has also been found from
Mottaz’s (1988) study of 1,385 employees from various occupations found
that employees who perceived a friendly and supportive relationship with their
management team had a strong, positive commitment to their respective
organizations. This was also seen in a study by Joiner and Bakalis (2006),
where supervisor support indicated in high affective commitment among
employees.
Leadership in this context is the support shown and the approach by the top
management team as well as the department heads to ensure that the
employees are well taken care of. In other words, the organization is showing
efforts of being committed towards having a supportive relationship with the
employees.
26
2.3.2 Employee Relation
In any organization, the group of employee working together will constitute the
working environment in that organization. This working environment
encompasses the inter-relationship between employees and the support level
of team members in working together in everyday tasks. According to Lee-
Kelley et al, (2007) team work encompasses the process of creating results
through communication and collaboration amongst employees. This allows
the employees to produce a collective result larger than the sum of the
individuals’ ideas.
Working in teams allows employee relation to flourish and may give some
employees greater job satisfaction. In a constructive and effective team
context and environment, fellow team-mates are more likely to be helpful,
friendly and willing to share information and equipment. Teams are also quite
likely to share authority and responsibility, thus increasing the level an
individual employee experiences (Lee-Kelley et al, 2007)
According to Joiner and Bakalis (2006), it was found that employees who
perceived a friendly and supportive relationship with their co-workers develop
a strong, positive commitment to their respective organizations (Mottaz, 1988).
This is further confirmed in a study by Hung et al, (2004) where it was found
that employee relations is positively associated with affective organizational
commitment. As such, for the context of this research, employee relations
reflect cooperation and team work among the employees in the organization.
27
2.3.3 Task Orientation
Task Orientation basically means the nature of the job or task of an employee.
This includes the type of work, the level of challenge, the freedom to work and
the range of activities involved. Agarwal and Ramaswami (1993) have
described this as task variety and task autonomy which encompasses
characteristics of a job which allows the employees to undertake a wide range
of activities in their work and the extent an employee has a say in how their
job is carried out, respectively.
Studies have shown that an opportunity to work on challenging assignment
has been shown to be positively related to organizational commitment
(Idaszak and Drasgow, 1987; Pil and Macduffie, 1996; Price and Mueller,
1981; Udo et al., 1997; Workman and Bommer, 2004). It is evident from the
vast literature available which has that employees who are offered challenging,
exciting and interesting work tend to be more involved and satisfied, and are
in turn more committed to their organization and are less likely to leave their
organization.
Task autonomy denotes a sense of power or control over the task at hand
(Dubinksy and Skinner, 1984) which allows the employee freedom to manage
his or her task at hand. The employee has freedom to plan, decide and carry
out the tasks associated with his or her job function as seen fit.
Agarwal and Ramaswami (1993) have further confirmed that attachment to
organization or organizational commitment is greatest among the employees
28
with considerable task variety (Hunt et al, 1985; Glisson and Durick 1988) and
task autonomy (Hunt et al., 1985) in their research.
Thus for the scope of this study, task variety and task autonomy is combined
in a single construct as task orientation which reflects nature of the job, the
range of activities involved and the extent of freedom to plan, decide and
carry out the tasks associated with his or her job function as seen fit by the
employee.
2.3.4 Compensation and Incentives
Remuneration or compensation is one of the important contractual and
implied agreements between an employer and an employee (Chew and Chan
2007). Willis (2000) describes compensation as ‘the most critical issue when
it comes to attracting and keeping talents.’ As such, sometimes, some
companies may even provide remuneration packages that are well above the
market rate to attract and retain critical talents (Parker and Wright, 2000),
which may include special pay premiums, stock options or bonuses. In
addition to that, some organizations give profit sharing and group-based
incentive pay (Bassi and Van Buren, 1999) to performing employees.
Past researchers have recognized pay or compensation as a potential
antecedent of organizational commitment (Parker and Wright, 2000). As such,
employees may express greater commitment and tend to remain with the
organization when they feel that their capabilities, efforts and performance
contributions are recognized and appreciated (Davies, 2001; Mercer Report,
29
2003) and is shown through the compensation package offered. In a study by
Mercer Report (2003), states that employees will stay if they are rewarded
fairly and adequately. Most often these compensation packages are in line
with the company’s strategies and are usually made known to the employees.
So, this goes to show that if an organization does not pay equitably compared
to others, it may risk losing the employees because of the non-competitive
compensation package (Adams 1965). In recent studies by Ansari et al,
(2000), the results have shown that employees were more likely to
demonstrate high affective commitment if they perceived the compensation as
fair.
2.3.5 Performance Management and Promotion
Performance management as proposed by Sparrow et al. (1994), consists
performance evaluation and appraisal, followed by rewards for enhancing
skills and knowledge, rewards for business needs and gains, merit philosophy,
and flexible benefit schemes which may be considered as promotion.
Ansari et al, (2000) cited Lawler, (1989) having noted that distribution of
organizational rewards such promotion, status, and performance evaluations
have tremendous impact on organizational commitment. Hung, et al (2000),
citing Kwon (2001) has also found that career development and promotion
opportunities to be predictive of greater affective commitment among
employees.
30
In a study by Ansari, et al (2000), results have suggested that employees
were more likely to express high affective commitment when they perceived
the performance management and promotion as fair.
2.3.6 Training and Development
Training and development are a common form of human capital investment
for individual and organizational improvements (Chew and Chan, 2007).
Training and development can be used to enhance job specific skills,
correction of deficiencies in job performance and development of employees
with abilities the organization might need in the future (Wood and De
Menezes, 1998, Chew and Chan, 2007).
There have been instances where trained individuals become more
marketable and consequently might leave the organization; contemporary
studies have demonstrated that training and development affect job attitudes
(Chew and Chan, 2007). Studies have shown that training and development
has contributed towards organizational commitment (Detoro and McCabe,
1997). Literatures have shown that employee empowerment through training
activities not only help to develop these employees but also help to enhance
their commitment to the organization (McEvoy, 1997). The findings in a
research by Ansari et al, (2000) have also shown that training is positively
associated with affective organizational commitment. This generally is
consistent with earlier researches (Greenberg 1990; McFarlin and Sweeney
1992; Sweeney and McFarlin 1993) conducted, that training and development
does contribute as a significant predictor of organizational commitment.
31
Further to that, it has also been found that when the training and development
needs of employees and employers are met, the employees will more likely
stay in their organizations (Bassi and Van Buren, 1999; Sheridan, 1992;
Wood, 1999).
In the context of this study, training and development is considered the
commitment shown by the organization towards providing training and
development for the employees.
2.3.7 Knowledge Sharing
Knowledge is an organizational element possessed by organizational
members, which includes practical knowledge, high-level technical capabilities,
perceptions of systems and creative abilities (Quinn, Anderson and
Finkelstein, 1996). Sarmento (2005), has described knowledge as ‘the
combination of data and information, to which is added expert opinion, skills
and experience, resulting in a valuable asset which can be used to aid
decision making’.
As such, knowledge sharing is defined as the movement of knowledge within
an organization (Massingham and Diment, 2009). Lee (2001) has defined
knowledge sharing as activities of transferring or disseminating knowledge
from one person, group or organization to another. Song (2001) has indicated
that through effective knowledge sharing, organizations may improve
efficiency, reduce training cost, and reduce risks due to uncertainty. Bartol
and Srivastava (2002) have defined knowledge sharing as individuals sharing
32
organizationally relevant information, ideas, suggestions, and expertise with
one another. Knowledge sharing can also be viewed as a set of behaviours
that involve the exchange of information or assistance to others (Connelly and
Kelloway, 2003).
It is a process of knowledge exchanges between the source and recipient
units over several stages. It is not a random process but more of an effort
instilled by the organization through internal policies, structures, and
processes to facilitate this exchange of knowledge (Inkpen, 1998). Typically,
employees would begin searching for knowledge if they have a problem they
cannot resolve by themselves or if they want to learn something new with
regards to their job (Massingham and Diment, 2009). Knowledge sharing
maybe done in a formal way enables by the organization or through an
informal experiences between co-workers or from the management to the
employees.
As knowledge workers thrive on knowledge and deal with knowledge sharing
and knowledge improving, it would be an interesting fact to study the extent of
knowledge sharing towards affective organizational commitment. However,
according to Hislop (2003) there has been limited research commitment and
knowledge-sharing attitudes and behaviours. Nonetheless, Massingham and
Diment, 2009 have found in their research that Knowledge sharing does
contribute towards organizational commitment among employees. As such, in
the context of this study, knowledge sharing is termed as the organization’s
33
efforts and policies towards encouraging the exchange of knowledge among
employees.
Table 2.2 shows the constructs pertinent to this study as well as the
definitions for each of them
2.4 Moderating effect of gender
According to Elizur and Koslowsky, (2001), one of the most popular
demographic variables studied in the work value or behavioural construct is
gender. It is known that men and women have different behavioural
tendencies. Past studies have shown the existence of some difference in
organizational commitment between men and women (Hartmann, 2000;
Marsden, Kalleberg and Cook, 1993; Mason, 1995; Wiersma, 1990; Mathieu
and Zajac, 1990; Savery and Syme 1996). These studies do indicate some
gender differences of organizational commitment for various reasons.
Although there are studies which indicates otherwise (Russ and McNeilly,
1995) leading to believe that there are no gender differences in organizational
commitment. Gender is also found to act as a moderator in the study
organizational commitment (Mellor et al., 1994). In the study by Elizur and
Koslowsky, (2001) results do confirm that gender is a moderating factor in
determining affective organizational commitment.
34
As such, in the context of knowledge workers, it would be interesting to
understand if there are any gender differences in affective organizational
commitment. For the purpose of this study, gender will be used as a
moderating factor.
Table 2.2: Definition of Constructs used in the Model
Construct Definition Affective organizational commitment
Employee’s emotional attachment to the organization
Leadership The organization is showing efforts of being committed towards having a supportive relationship with the employees.
Employee relation Reflects cooperation and team work among the employees in the organization.
Knowledge sharing Organization’s efforts and policies towards encouraging the exchange of knowledge among employees
Task Orientation Reflects nature of the job, the range of activities involved and the extent of freedom to plan, decide and carry out the tasks associated with his or her job function as seen fit by the employee.
Opportunities of Training and Development
Commitment shown by the organization towards providing training and development for the employees.
Compensation and Incentives
Compensation and incentives provided by the organization for employees and a system which is aligned with the organization’s goals and objectives.
Fairness of Performance Management and Promotion
Fairness of performance appraisal process and the likelihood of promotion.
35
CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
3.0 Chapter Overview
This chapter will provide details of the research model, design and
methodology used in this study. The theoretical framework or the research
model and the related research hypothesis will also be discussed in this
chapter. It will also describe the research instrument, sampling design, data
collection procedures and the data analysis techniques used.
3.1 Theoretical Framework / Research Model
The theoretical framework or the research model is a conceptual model on the
theory or the logical sense of relationships among the several factors that
have been identified as pertinent to the study. This research will explore
seven factors or independent variables namely leadership (LS), knowledge
sharing (KS), employee relation (ER), task orientation (TO), fairness of
performance management and promotion (PP), opportunities of training and
development (TD), and finally compensation and incentives (CI). Figure 3.1
displays the theoretical framework for this study.
36
Figure 3.1: Theoretical Framework for Affective Organizational
Commitment of Knowledge Workers
Hypothesis development was based on the literature review.
Previous studies by past researchers (Eisenberger et al, 1986; Mottaz, 1988;
Shore and Wayne, 1993; Joiner and Bakalis, 2006) have shown that
employees’ organizational commitment is strongly influenced by perceived
Dependent Variable (DV) Independent Variables (IV)
Gender
Moderating Variable (MV)
AFFECTIVE
ORGANIZATIONAL
COMMITMENT
Leadership (LS)
Task Orientation (TO)
Fairness of Performance Management and Promotion (PP)
Opportunities of Training and Development (TD)
Compensation and Incentives (CI)
Knowledge Sharing (KS)
Employee Relation (ER) H3
H2
H1
H5
H6
H7
H4
H8
37
organizational support received through the managers, friendly and supportive
relationship with their management team as well as supervisor support.
H1: Leadership is positively related to the affective organizational
commitment among knowledge workers.
Characteristics of knowledge workers have indicated that they thrive on
knowledge and deal with knowledge sharing and knowledge improving.
Although research on knowledge sharing is limited, Massingham and Diment,
(2009) have found that Knowledge sharing does contribute towards
organizational commitment among employees.
H2. Knowledge Sharing is positively related to the affective
organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
It has been established that team work, a friendly and supportive relationship
with co-workers and strong employee relations (Mottaz, 1988; Hung et al,
2004; Joiner and Bakalis, 2006) is positively associated with affective
organizational commitment.
H3. Employee Relation is positively related to the affective
organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
Many researchers (Price and Mueller, 1981; Hunt et al, 1985; Idaszak and
Drasgow, 1987; Glisson and Durick 1988; Agarwal and Ramaswami, 1993; Pil
and Macduffie, 1996; Udo et al., 1997; Workman and Bommer, 2004) have
shown that task variety, task autonomy and challenging assignments to be
positively related to organizational commitment.
38
H4. Task orientation is positively related to the affective organizational
commitment among knowledge workers.
Distribution of organizational rewards such promotion, status, and
performance evaluations (Lawler, 1989), career development and promotion
opportunities (Kwon, 2001) and fairness of performance management and
promotion (Ansari, et al 2000); have been identified to be predictive of greater
affective commitment among employees.
H5. Fairness of Performance management and promotion is
positively related to the affective organizational commitment
among knowledge workers.
Employees are known to be prone to develop higher levels of affective
organizational commitment when allowed to partake in training and
development activities (Greenberg 1990; McFarlin and Sweeney 1992; Detoro
and McCabe, 1997; McEvoy, 1997; Ansari et al, 2000).
H6. Opportunities of training and development positively related to
the affective organizational commitment among knowledge
workers.
Past researchers have recognized pay or compensation as a potential
antecedent of organizational commitment (Parker and Wright, 2000). Similar
findings have also been obtained through several studies (Adams 1965;
Ansari et al; 2000) on the compensation and incentives.
39
H7. Compensation and Incentives are positively related to the
affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
It is known that men and women have different behavioural tendencies. Past
studies have shown the existence of some difference in organizational
commitment between men and women (Hartmann, 2000; Marsden, Kalleberg
and Cook, 1993; Mason, 1995; Wiersma, 1990; Mathieu and Zajac, 1990;
Savery and Syme 1996). Gender was also used as a moderator in the study
organizational commitment (Mellor et al., 1994; Elizur and Koslowsky, 2001).
H8. Gender of knowledge workers is a moderator between the
relationships of the seven independent variables to affective
organizational commitment.
3.2 Research Instrument
The research instrument used for this study is a four-page self-administered
questionnaire, including a separate cover letter to introduce to the participant
about the nature of the study.
The survey contains three sections; the first section, section A, contains all 37
questions on the factors identified to influence a knowledge worker’s affective
organisational commitment in random order. The second section, section B,
contains 9 questions which describes the respondents level of perception of
their organizational commitment. Section A and B utilised the 5-point Likert
40
Scale, an interval scale, which requires the respondents to indicate their
levels of agreement and disagreement by placing a “X” or a tick at the
appropriate number in the corresponding boxes. The strength of agreement
or disagreement can be reflected in the score assigned (Cooper and
Schindler, 2006; Sekaran 2003). The 5-point Likert scale used was as
follows: 1=Strongly Disagree, 2=Disagree, 3=Neutral, 4=Agree and
5=Strongly Agree. Finally, section C requests demographic details about the
respondent.
The questions for the survey questionnaire were adapted from the works of
several past researchers who have done in depth study on the subject matter.
The list of questions and their origin are displayed in table 3.1. The questions
were then amended and re-worded to suit the context of this study. The
questions in the survey were listed in random order so as not to lead on the
respondents. Some questions were also negatively worded so as to maintain
a reasonable balance as suggested by Oppenheim (1986).
3.3 Selection of Measures
The dependent variable, affective Organizational commitment which focuses
on the extent to which an individual indentifies his or her self and involves in a
particular organization and the willingness to exert considerable effort on
behalf of the organization (Mowday et al., 1979) will be measured using a
reduced 9-item scale by Meyer and Allen (1991). The rest of the seven
41
independent variables namely, leadership, knowledge sharing, employee
relation, task orientation, fairness of performance management and promotion,
opportunities for training and development, compensation and incentives are
shown in detail in table 3.1. Table 3.1 shows the constructs being measured
and the selection of measures utilised.
Table 3.1: Selection of Measures
Construct No of items
Adapted from Question No
Cronbach's Alpha
obtained previously
Affective Organizational commitment
9 Allen and Meyer (1991)
Section B. 1 – 9.
0.83
Leadership
4
3
Agarwal and Ramaswami, (1993) Boselie and van der Wiele, (2002)
1, 8, 15, 22, 29, 30, 31
0.70
0.83
Knowledge sharing
4 Pai, 2006 2, 9, 16, 23 0.86
Employee relation 5 Boselie and van der Wiele, (2002)
3, 10, 17, 24, 32
0.63
Task orientation 5 Agarwal and Ramaswami, (1993).
6, 13*, 20, 27, 36
0.85
Fairness of performance management and promotion
5 Ansari et al (2000). 7*, 14*, 21*, 28*, 37*
0.89
Opportunities of training and development
5 Ahmad and Schroeder (2003).
5*, 12*, 19, 26, 35
0.78
Compensation and incentives
6 Ahmad and Schroeder (2003)
4, 11, 18, 25, 33*, 34*
0.92
Note: * refers to negatively worded questions.
42
3.4 Sampling Design
The sampling design was based on the criteria set for knowledge workers as
specified before. As such respondents were limited to knowledge workers
who fit the description as follows: workers having at least a diploma or degree,
who are as experts in their field of work and have been with the current
organization for at least one year and their job scope involves non-repetitive
tasks where it should involve application of knowledge to complete the tasks.
These criteria were verbally made known to the respondents when handing
out the questionnaire by hand. For the respondents contact via email, these
criteria were also informed through the email.
As such, the sampling method used for this research is non-probability
judgment sampling where the subjects for the survey are limited to knowledge
workers in Malaysia. Since this study is on knowledge workers, special efforts
were made to locate knowledge workers and approached to participate in this
survey. Judgment sampling method is employed when the research requires
the subjects to be selected base on their expertise or who are in the best
position to provide the required information (Sekaran, 2003).
Apart from that, snowballing sampling method was employed which according
to Cooper and Schindler (2006) is a method where participants refer
researchers to other members within their network who may have similar or
different characteristics, experiences or attitude as them. This is type of
sampling method was employed for the respondents approached via email.
43
This type of sampling is advantageous as it enables a widespread and less
expensive way to obtain responses to the survey.
Targeted sample size is about 250 – 300 respondents. Respondents are
taken from various fields of knowledge work in Malaysia – IT consultant,
accountants, financial consultants, engineers, bankers as well as workers
pursuing post graduate studies, representing a diverse mixture of background.
3.5 Date Collection Procedure
The surveys were distributed via personal contacts, networks and their
extended networks. The survey questionnaires were hand delivered as well
as emailed to potential respondents. Using the snowball sampling techniques,
email contacts were approached for their extended network to participate in
the survey. All respondents and contact were made aware of the criteria of
needed for participation, i.e., they fit the description of knowledge workers as
defined in this study. The response was very encouraging using this method
as some respondents obviously had stronger and bigger networks and were
able to reach out to their contacts in their network to help participate in this
survey. This method contributed in a speedier return of the responses
considering the limited time to conduct this research.
44
3.6 Data Analysis Techniques
The data collected was analysed with the Statistical Package for Social
Sciences (SPSS) Version 15. Initially the data was coded in numerical order
in an excel spreadsheet for easy data entry purposes before it was transferred
to the SPSS spread sheet.
All data were first scanned and treated for errors and missing values – the
data was visually scanned for errors in data entry and amended accordingly.
All missing values will be replaced with ‘99’ to denote missing information.
All negatively worded statements were reverse scored using ‘Transform’
function. This is done so that all the negatively worded statements’ score
were reversed and transformed to reflect them in positive manner to enable
correct relationship analysis can be carried out.
Factor analysis, test for reliability using Cronbach’s Alpha were then done
followed by a descriptive statistical analysis, Pearson’s Correlation test and
finally the multiple regression analysis was carried out.
3.6.1 Factor Analysis
Factor analysis was used on all the seven dimensions identified from the
literature review to influence affective organizational commitment. The
purpose of this analysis is to examine whether the items for each factor are in
fact measuring the intended factor. As such, it also analyses the correlation
45
between the different variables in this study. These seven dimensions are:
Leadership (LS), Knowledge Sharing (KS), Employee Relation (ER), Task
Orientation (TO), Fairness of Performance Management and Promotion (PP),
Opportunities of Training and Development (TD) and finally Compensation
and incentives (CI). According to Coakes and Steed (2007), the minimum
number of five subjects per variable is required for factor analysis and a
sample size of above 200 is usually preferable. As such, the number of data
collected, 259 was sufficient to run factor analysis. Also, based on the sample
size of 200 – 300 respondents, significant factor loading was 0.30, any values
lower than 0.3 were to be suppressed (Hair, Black, Babin, Anderson, and
Tatham, 2006).
In Factor Analysis, factors with high cross loadings will be dropped as these
were being effective to more than one factor with high or almost equal loading.
The general rule used for dropping off the items in the factor analysis was as
follows (Hair et al, 2006):
1. Drop factors with eigenvalues less than 1.0
2. Drop factors with only one item in them
3. Drop items which had no loading.
4. Drop all cross loading items – items with similar or near loadings to
more than one factor.
46
3.6.2 Cronbach's Alpha
Cronbach's Alpha is done to examine the internal consistency reliability of the
factors used in this study. This measurement is used to ensure that the
developed factors will measure consistently the items intended to be
measured in the first place. The Cronbach’s coefficient alpha is used to test
this reliability and the alpha readings near 0.9 represent highly consistent
scales, while those nearing 0.7 reflects a more moderate level of consistency
whilst alpha values below 0.3 indicates that the items have little in common
(Nunnally, 1978). As such, data is reliable and acceptable if the alpha
coefficient value is more than 0.7 (Hair, et al, 2006).
3.6.3 Descriptive Statistical Analysis
Descriptive Statistics Analysis - frequency table are generated to provide
frequency details and percentages of demographic characteristics of the
respondents. From these details, some general observations about the data
collected and the respondents may be observed. Some of the output from this
analysis includes frequency tables, percentages, statistics details like
percentages, mean, median and standard deviations.
3.6.4 Pearson’s Correlation Test
The correlation analysis was used to describe the strength and direction of the
linear relationship between two variables ie. each of the seven independent
variables and the dependent variables (Coakes and Steed, 2007).
47
3.6.5 Multiple Regression
Multiple regression analysis is performed to determine the predict power or
strength between the dependent variable and the multiple independent
variables (Hair et al, 2006). The result of multiple regression is an equation
which will represent the best prediction of how the dependent variable is
influenced by several independent variables as well as to determine strength
of the influence.
Prior to the multiple regressions testing, the related assumptions must first be
fulfilled (Coakes and Steed, 2007). The assumptions for multiple regression
are as follows:
1. Ratio of cases to independent variables
2. Outliers
3. Multicollinearity and singularity
4. Normality, linearity, homoscedasticity and independence of residuals
According to Coakes and Steed, (2007), the number of cases needed to run
the multiple regression should at least be five times more than the number of
independent variables. As such, the minimum number required is only thirty
cases and since the number of cases considered in this study is 259, so the
multiple regression test can be performed.
Outliers or extreme cases usually have considerable impact on the regression
solution and should be deleted or dropped to reduce their influence (Coakes
and Steed, 2007). These outliers were detected using the statistical method,
48
Mahalanobis distance and the outliers were listed under ‘Casewise
Diagnostics’, such when the multiple regression test was run. When these
cases were excluded and the regression test was rerun, a better regression
solution would be obtained until there are no outliers to be excluded.
Multicollinearity refers to high correlations among the independent variables
whereas singularity is when there is prefect correlation among the
independent variables. According to Dillon and Goldstein (1984),
multicollinearity will result in highly unstable regression coefficients, and as
such, the independent variable should have a low multicollinearity among
them. The Variance Inflation Factor (VIF) measures this and if the tolerance
values is less than 10 for all factors, then this means that the study is safe
from multicollinearity problems (Hair et al, 2006).
49
CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH RESULTS
4.0 Chapter Overview
This chapter will present the result findings of the survey conducted among
the knowledge workers. This chapter commences with a description of the
general characteristics of the participating respondents and demographic
comparisons.
This was followed by the discussions on factor loadings for all the seven
factors researched in this study. Subsequently, the results of Cronbach’s
coefficient alpha for reliability and the results of correlation analysis for
variable will be discussed.
Finally, the results of the multiple regression analysis will be presented using
affective organizational commitment as the dependent variable (DV) and the
seven factors influencing the affective organizational commitment; Leadership
(LS), Knowledge Sharing (KS), Employee Relation (ER), Task Orientation
(TO), Fairness of Performance Management and Promotion (PP),
Opportunities of Training and Development (TD) and finally Compensation
and incentives (CI), all as the independent variables (IV). The result of the
study will be discussed in accordance to the research objective and the
hypothesises of the study.
50
4.1 Response Rate
The survey questionnaires were sent out using various channels to the target
response group, namely knowledge workers who fit the description of the
definition for this study. These respondents were basically from various
private industries in all levels of the organization but limited to those who
mainly use or apply knowledge in their daily work.
A total of 200 hardcopies of the questionnaires were distributed out and of
which the total useable responses received were only 138. Subsequently, a
total of 200 softcopies of the questionnaires were also distributed out to
targeted respondents via email, out of which 121 responses were received
back. Two sets of the questionnaire were not usable as they were incomplete
in nature and were therefore not included in the analysis. As such, the total
effective response rate is 65%.
Table 4.1 shows the overall result of response rate for this research study.
Table 4.1: Research Response Rates
Method of Questionnaire Distribution
Number of Questionnaires
Sent Returned Usable
Softcopy by email 200 121 121
Hardcopy by hand 200 140 138
Total 400 261 259
Rate of usable response 65%
51
4.2 Demographic Characteristics of Respondents
An analysis was done on the demographic characteristics of the respondents.
Table 4.2 displays the demographic characteristics of the respondents in term
of gender, age, race, highest level of education, marital status, current
position in the organization, monthly income, number of years in current
organization and industry or nature of business.
In terms of gender, this study had a fair proportionate of male (53.28%) and
female (46.72%) respondents. As for the age groups, 67.18% were in the age
group of below 35 years of age and 32.82% were 35 or more. This indicates
that a majority of the respondents who participated in this survey were fairly
younger in age. This very well fits the age group of the knowledge workers as
it was clearly stated by Amar, (2002) that knowledge workers primarily belong
to Generation-X (born after World War II) and Generation-Y (born between
1977 to 1990) and as such their age group should generally be less than 55
years of age. So, based on the age group of the respondents, it is clear that
all of them fit the age limit of knowledge workers.
In terms of race, there was an almost equal distribution among the three
major races in Malaysia, Malays (30.89%), Chinese (28.96%) and Indians
(35.52%). The remainder were others (4.63%). This shows that the study is
done equally among the three major races in Malaysia.
52
With regards to the highest level of education among the respondents, all 258
respondents possessed at least a diploma or certificate with the highest
number of respondents being bachelor’s degree holders (65.25%). This does
indicate that the respondents are equipped with the right level of education for
the job function that they are employed for. This is reflected in their current
job position held in their organization. A majority of them are in the senior
executive level (41.31%) as well as managerial positions (30.50%). Only a
small number are in the non-executive level (3.47%). Since education was
also a pertinent requirement of a being a knowledge worker, it looks like the
respondents for this study fulfil this expectation where all of them are holders
of some form of certification which qualifies them in their own respective fields.
With regards to the respondents’ personal monthly income ranges, a majority
of them are earning between RM3000 to RM3999 followed by RM4000 to
RM4999, with an average income of about RM4350. Only one respondent is
paid below RM2000 (0.39%).
As for the number of years in the current organization, it is important to note
that, all efforts were made to ensure that all respondents have been with their
present organization at least for a year so as to ensure that they are fairly
familiar about the organization and are able to respond constructively towards
the survey questions. As such, the results displayed shows that a majority of
them, 68.73%, have been with their present organization for 5 years or less
and only 16.99% have been with their present organization for more than 5
years. This may also indicate that there is a trend of employees in Malaysia to
53
be more mobile and are more susceptible to change jobs in pursuit for career
growth and development. However, it is also interesting to note that the
majority of the respondents were fairly young, being below 35 years of age
and assuming that they started their career by the age of 25 years old, they
may, on the minimum possess, almost 10 years of working experience and if
they were not in pursuit to change their jobs, then a majority of them may
have indicated that the number of service in their present organization to be
more than 5 years. This is a clear indication of the mobile trends possessed
by the knowledge workers who constantly look towards upgrading themselves
by switching the companies which they work with as they favour advancement
in their careers (Yigitcanlar et al, 2007).
In terms of the industry or the nature of business of their current organization,
the respondents came from various industries in Malaysia, namely from the
private sector. There appears to be a diverse distribution among the
industries, however, the majority of the respondents were from the
manufacturing sector (35.14%). This manufacturing sector includes contract
manufacturing companies as well as OEM companies. The services sector
saw 23.17% respondents while the financial and consultation saw 12.36%.
These sectors have been known to hire knowledge workers as their job
description does not constraint them to perform a set of repetitive or pre-set
tasks.
54
Table 4.2: Demographic Characteristics of Respondents
Item Frequency % Gender Male 138 53.28 Female 121 46.72 Total 259 100.00
Age 20 - 24 8 3.09 25 - 29 90 34.75 30 - 34 76 29.34 35 - 39 48 18.53 40 - 44 24 9.27 More than or equals to 45 12 4.63 Total 258 99.61 Missing 1 0.39 Total 259 100.00
Race Malay 80 30.89 Chinese 75 28.96 Indian 92 35.52 Others 12 4.63 Total 259 100.00
Marital Status Single 125 48.26 Married 133 51.35 Others 1 0.39 Total 259 100.00
Highest Level of Education Diploma / Cert 20 7.72 Degree 169 65.25 Post Graduate 69 26.64 Total 258 99.61 Missing 1 0.39 Total 259 100.00
55
Table 4.2: Demographic Characteristics of Respondents (continued)
Item Frequency % Current Position in Organization
Non-exec 9 3.47 Junior Exec 55 21.24 Senior Exec 107 41.31 Manager 57 22.01 Senior Manager 22 8.49 Others 9 3.47 Total 259 100.00
Monthly Income Below 2000 1 0.39 2000 - 2999 44 16.99 3000 - 3999 64 24.71 4000 - 4999 50 19.31 5000 - 5999 38 14.67 6000 - 6999 24 9.27 7000 - 7999 11 4.25 8000 - 8999 9 3.47 Above 9000 18 6.95 Total 259 100.00
Number of Years in Current Organization Less than 2 yrs 77 29.73 2 or more but less than 5 yrs 101 39.00 5 or more but less than 10 yrs 44 16.99 10 yrs or more 37 14.29 Total 259 100.00
Industry or Nature of Business Manufacturing 91 35.14 Financial / Consultation 32 12.36 Retail, Sales and Distribution 18 6.95 Engineering 21 8.11 Transportation and Logistics 2 0.77 Services 60 23.17 Others 35 13.51 Total 259 100.00
56
4.3 Goodness of Measures
4.3.1 Independent Variables
Factor analysis, a data reduction method, was utilised on the seven
independent variables influencing affective organizational commitment (DV);
Leadership (LS), Knowledge Sharing (KS), Employee Relation (ER), Task
Orientation (TO), Fairness of Performance Management and Promotion (PP),
Opportunities of Training and Development (TD) and Compensation and
incentives (CI) to examine the correlation between the different variables in
the study.
This means, through factor analysis, the inter-relationships among the
variables are studied to find a new set of variables, usually fewer in number
than the original set of variables, which represents a common or shared
variation. It was also suggested that factor analysis is only considered
appropriate if the coefficient values is 0.3 and above in the correlation matrix,
when running this test. Bartlett’s test of sphericity and the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin
(KMO) measure of sampling adequacy are both used to determine the
factorability of the matrix as a whole. If Bartlett’s test is sphericity is large and
significant, and the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) measure is greater than 0.6,
then factorability is assumed (Coakes and Steed, 2007). Tables 4.3 will
display the findings for the factor analysis pertinent to this study.
According to Hair et al, (2006), only factors with eigenvalues of more than 1.0
in the Rotation Sums of Squared Loadings will be considered as significant
57
factors. As a result of the factor analysis, the KMO and Bartlett’s Test results
are generated and in this study, the KMO measure of sampling adequacy was
0.902 and the Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity was significant (Chi-Square =
2853.658, p < 0.01 at 0.000).
The factors were rotated using KMO normalizations method because the
factors were first assumed to be related. This way, which ever factor with
cross loadings may be dropped off from the analysis for this study. There
were ten factors initially, although the number of IVs were only seven, but
after running the factor analysis test, only six were retained, out of which three
of the factors were combined into one new factor and one factor was split into
two. Twelve items (Q4 - CI 1, Q5 - TD 1, Q6 - TO 1, Q8 - LS 2, Q10 - ER 2,
Q12 - TD 2, Q13 - TO 2, Q15 - LS 3, Q21 - PP 3, Q29 - LS 5, Q35 - TD 5,
Q37 - PP 5) were dropped after the factor analysis . However, there was one
item, PP4 which had cross loading but the loading values were very far apart
indicating low or minimal affect to factor 6, therefore, and this item was
maintained in the analysis. As such, a new conceptual framework will be
developed to accommodate this result.
Therefore, based on the remaining factors and items after following through
from the process of dropping the items which had cross loading, the analysis
retained the six new factors with the coefficient value of 0.3 and above so that
they were of practical significance. Based on the items that were loaded on
each factor, the six new factors for this study were then renamed as follows
with the effective questions paired to each factor. The renaming of these
factors was done based on the effective questions which were loaded to each
58
of them. As such, three of the independent variables; Leadership (LS),
Knowledge Sharing (KS) and Employee Relation (ER) were combined into a
new factor as Knowledge Sharing Practices (KSP). The independent variable;
Compensation and Incentives (CI) were split into two new factors being
Compensation (C) and Incentives (I). Table 4.3 shows the Factor Loadings
as well as the six new renamed factors.
Table 4.3 Factor Loadings on IV
No Items Factors 1 2 3 4 5 6
KSP TO C PP TD I 1 LS 1 The top management
members in this organization friendly and approachable.
0.43 0.34 0.19 0.29 -0.08 -0.09
2 KS 1 The organization shares business proposals and reports with each other.
0.53 0.22 -0.09 0.06 -0.06 0.09
3 ER 1 The organization stimulates cooperation within the business units.
0.65 0.19 0.15 -0.01 0.09 0.03
4 KS 2 The organization shares manuals, models and methodologies with employees.
0.49 -0.03 0.18 0.16 0.20 0.00
5 KS 3 The organization shares know-how from work experience with each other.
0.67 0.09 0.25 0.31 0.11 -0.06
6 ER 3 The organization actively promotes exchange of knowledge within the business units
0.66 0.12 0.23 0.16 0.15 0.11
59
Table 4.3 Factor Loadings on IV (continued) No Items Factors
1 2 3 4 5 6 KSP TO C PP TD I
7 LS 4 The management looks out for the welfare of employees.
0.40 0.09 0.27 0.07 0.19 0.13
8 KS 4 The organization shares expertise obtained from education and training with each other.
0.62 0.18 0.18 0.11 0.29 0.08
9 ER 4 The organization appreciates exchange of knowledge within the business units
0.66 0.12 0.15 0.23 0.25 0.03
10 LS 6 There is effective communication between management and employees
0.47 0.27 0.29 0.11 0.16 0.08
11 LS 7 The management stimulates development of skills among the employees.
0.55 0.24 0.33 0.20 0.24 0.08
12 ER 5 There is sufficient co-operation between various business units within the organization.
0.62 0.33 0.31 0.07 0.06 -0.01
13 TO 3 The organization often allows me to decide which tasks to perform
0.29 0.61 0.14 0.12 0.08 0.01
14 TO 4 The organization allows me enough freedom to do what I want on my job.
0.25 0.71 0.20 -0.02 0.19 0.02
15 TO 5 The organization often allows me freedom of choice on how I do my work.
0.10 0.65 0.14 0.12 0.14 0.06
16 CI 2 The organization’s incentive system is fair at rewarding people who accomplish organization objectives
0.33 0.20 0.62 0.10 0.15 0.22
60
Table 4.3 Factor Loadings on IV (continued) No Items Factors
1 2 3 4 5 6 KSP TO C PP TD I
17 CI 3 The organization’s reward system really recognizes the people who contribute the most.
0.29 0.24 0.67 0.21 0.11 -0.07
18 CI 4 The organization’s incentive system encourages us to reach organization goals
0.34 0.25 0.61 0.07 0.28 0.06
19 PP 1 There is favouritism in performance evaluation in this organization
0.08 0.09 0.09 0.58 0.13 0.14
20 PP 2 The management follows a “pick-and-choose” policy for promotion
0.26 0.15 0.09 0.61 -0.01 0.04
21 PP 4 Yearly assessment depends upon the kind of relationship employees have with their supervisor, not the work they perform
0.16 -0.02 0.07 0.66 0.06 0.36
22 TD 3 Organization employees receive training and development in work-place skills on a regular basis
0.22 0.19 0.18 0.02 0.60 -0.10
23 TD 4 The management at this organization believes that continual training and upgrading of employees’ skills is important
0.23 0.16 0.14 0.14 0.76 0.12
24 CI 5 The organization’s incentive system is at odds with our organization goals
0.00 -0.04 -0.01 0.10 0.01 0.56
61
Table 4.3 Factor Loadings on IV (continued) No Items Factors
1 2 3 4 5 6 KSP TO C PP TD I
25 CI 6 In this organization, persons (and/or teams) who achieve organization goals are rewarded the same as those who do not achieve organization goals.
0.13 0.16 0.13 0.22 0.01 0.66
Eigenvalue 4.58 2.09 2.00 1.68 1.48 1.06
Percentage of variance 18.31 8.37 7.99 6.70 5.94 4.23
KMO : 0.902
Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity (Chi-Square = 2853.658, p < 0.01 at 0.000).
Cronbach’s Alpha (Reliability Coefficients) is a reliability measurement used to
ensure that the developed factors will measure consistently the items which
were intended to be measured in the first place. The data was reliable and
acceptable for further analysis if the alpha coefficient were more than 0.7
(Hair et al, 2006). Further to that, the alpha coefficients obtained of all the
variables were above 0.7 except for Incentives (I) which only registered 0.56.
Therefore, to improve the reliability coefficient of the items, items CI 5 and CI
6 were both dropped and this factor was not included in the study. Otherwise,
all the other variables have shown that the factors and items developed in this
study are reliable and acceptable at moderate to high levels.
Correlation analysis was used to describe the strength and direction of the
linear relationship between the IVs and the DV. As such, Pearson Product
62
Moment Correlation coefficient was used to test the relationship and the
strength of each independent variable in influencing the dependent variable
being studied in this research. Table 4.4 shows the complete overview of the
descriptive statistics and the correlation coefficients as well as the reliability
coefficients for the independent and dependent variables.
Table 4.4: Correlation Coefficients and Descriptive Statistics (sample
Size= 259)
Mean Std.
DeviationAOC KSP TO C PP TD
AOC 3.537 0.704 0.79 KSP 3.443 0.568 0.615** 0.90 TO 3.340 0.725 0.506** 0.53** 0.67 C 3.307 0.731 0.569** 0.667** 0.516** 0.82 PP 2.904 0.756 0.264** 0.429** 0.245** 0.307** 0.71 TD 3.625 0.749 0.374** 0.469** 0.387** 0.446** 0.219** 0.71
Note: ** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (1-tailed). Diagonal elements show reliability coefficients.
From the display of results in table 4.6, it is clear that all the independent
variables are correlated at moderate levels and reveals that they are fairly
independent of each other since the Pearson’s coefficient values are less than
1.
4.3.2 Dependent Variable
Factor analysis was also performed on the affective organizational
commitment items to ensure that all the nine items fall into one common factor
only. The factor analysis test results show that only eight of the nine items
63
are significant. Similar to the IV factor analysis above, the KMO and Bartlett’s
Test results were also generated for the DV and in this study, the KMO
measure of sampling adequacy was 0.923 and the Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity
was significant (Chi-Square = 1443.231, p < 0.01 at 0.000).
From the factor analysis, only one item had to be dropped from the factor and
all the other eight items fell into one factor only. The item which was dropped
was AOC 3.
Therefore, the remaining eight items with loading of 0.3 and above after
following through from the process of dropping the items which had no loading
to the factor was maintained to represent affective organizational commitment.
Table 4.5 shows the Factor Loadings for the items for the dependent variable,
affective organizational commitment.
Cronbach’s Alpha (Reliability Coefficients) for affective organizational
commitment was found to be 0.79 compared to 0.83 originally obtained by
Allen and Meyer (1991).
64
Table 4.5: Factor Loadings on DV
No. Items Factor AOC
1 AOC 1 I am willing to put in a great deal of effort beyond that is expected in order to help this organization be successful.
0.70
2 AOC 2 I will always talk up my organization to my friends as a great organization to work for.
0.81
3 AOC 4 I find that my values and the organization’s values are very similar.
0.73
4 AOC 5 I am proud to tell others that I am part of this organization.
0.83
5 AOC 6 I feel this organization really inspires the very best in me in the way of job performance.
0.83
6 AOC 7 I am extremely glad that I chose this organization to work for over others I was considering at the time I joined.
0.84
7 AOC 8 I really care about the fate of this organization. 0.77
8 AOC 9 I feel, for me, this is the best of all possible organizations for which to work.
0.78
Eigenvalue 5.06 Percentage of variance 56.20 KMO : 0.923
Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity (Chi-Square = 1443.231, p < 0.01 at 0.000).
4.4 Revised Conceptual Framework and Hypothesis
Following the results from the factor analysis which was done, certain
variables had to be dropped and certain variables had to be renamed or
regrouped. As such, it is necessary to have a revised conceptual framework
to support this study.
Figure 4.1 shows the revised conceptual framework for this study.
65
Figure 4.1: Revised Conceptual Framework
Now that the conceptual framework was revised, the hypotheses also were
revised to tailor to this study. Table 4.6 shows the revised hypothesis which
will be used from henceforth as the new set of hypothesis for this study.
H5
Dependent Variable (DV) Independent Variables (IV)
Gender
Moderating Variable (MV)
AFFECTIVE
ORGANIZATIONAL
COMMITMENT
Task Orientation (TO)
Fairness of Performance Management and Promotion (PP)
Opportunities for Training and Development (TD)
Compensation (C)
Knowledge Sharing Practices (KSP)
H2
H1
H4
H3
H6
66
Table 4.6: Revised Hypothesis
H Original Hypothesis H Revised Hypothesis H1 Leadership is positively related to
the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
H1 Knowledge Sharing Practices are positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
H2 Knowledge Sharing is positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
H2 Task orientation is positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
H3 Employee Relation is positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
H3 Fairness of Performance management and promotion is positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
H4 Task orientation is positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers
H4 Opportunities of training and development positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
H5 Fairness of Performance management and promotion is positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
H5 Compensation is positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
H6 Opportunities of training and development positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
H6 Gender of knowledge workers is a moderator between the relationship of the seven variables to affective organizational commitment
H7 Compensation and Incentives are positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers
H8 Gender of knowledge workers is a moderator between the relationships of the seven variables to affective organizational commitment.
The above revised hypotheses will be used henceforth in this study and will
be tested using the multiple regression test.
67
4.5 Multiple Regression Analysis
Multiple regression analysis was performed to determine the prediction power
between the dependent variable and the multiple independent variables. In
this study, it was used to examine whether the six factors indentified will
positively or negatively influence affective organizational commitment. The
result of multiple regression is an equation which will represent the best
prediction of how the dependent variable is influenced by several independent
variables.
A total of eight cases were identified as outliers or extreme cases and were
therefore, excluded from the analysis. Multicollinearity on independent
variables was measured using Variance Inflation Factor (VIF). For all the
independent variables, the tolerance values were less than 10 for all factors in
the range of 0.502 to 0.856. Therefore, this means that the study is safe from
multicollinearity problems (Hair et al, 2006).
Normality, linearity, homoscedasticity and independence of residuals can be
determined using the residual scatterplots. According to Coakes and Steed,
(2007), if the residual have a linear relationship with the predicted dependent
variable score, then there is a linear relationship. The scatterplots and the
residual plots were found to have fulfilled the above requirement.
Now that all the assumption related to the multiple regression tests have been
fulfilled, the six hypotheses were examined to see how these five independent
68
variables influence affective organizational commitment among the
respondents as well as how gender as a moderating variable influences this
relationship.
From the results of the multiple regression analysis, R square is 0.46 which
means that 46% variance is explained by the four independent variables,
namely Knowledge Sharing Practices (KSP), Task Orientation (TO),
Compensation (C) and Opportunities of Training and Development (TD), while
the remaining 54% is not explained. This is somewhat typical in a behavioural
study, nonetheless, this low figure shows that there are limitations in the
model and future research is definitely recommended.
Multiple regression analysis was continued with the analysis on gender as a
moderator of the measurement of affective organizational commitment. The
interaction of each factor to gender was tabulated and the multiple regression
analysis was performed on these new scales.
Table 4.7 shows the summary for the Hierarchical Regression Results Using
Gender as a Moderator in the Relationship between the Independent
Variables and Affective Organizational Commitment.
69
Table 4.7: Hierarchical Regression Results Using Gender as a Moderator in the Relationship between the Independent Variables and Affective Organizational Commitment Independent Variable Std Beta
Step 1 Std Beta Step 2
Std Beta Step 3
Model Variables KSP TO C PP TD
0.223** 0.252** 0.237** 0.000
0.156**
0.238** 0.246** 0.235** -0.008 0.166**
0.265** 0.205* 0.237** -0.006 0.200**
Moderating Variable Gender
-0.90
0.160
Interaction Terms Gender*KSP Gender*TO Gender*C Gender*PP Gender*TD
-0.132 0.235 -0.060 -0.046 -0.258
R2 Adj R2 R2 Change Sig. F Change Durbin Watson
0.459 0.447 0.459 0.000 1.719
0.466 0.453 0.008 0.065 1.719
0.470 0.445 0.004 0.898 1.719
Note: *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01
From the regression summary in table 4.11, it is noted that only four of the five
variables are significant (*p < 0.05, **p < 0.01) in influencing affective
organizational commitment. The significant variables are Knowledge Sharing
Practices, KSP (B=0.223, p < 0.01), Task Orientation (B=0.252, p < 0.01),
Compensation (B=0.237, p < 0.01) and Opportunities for Training and
Development (B=0.156, p < 0.01). Fairness of Performance Management
and Promotion was found to be not significant in influencing the affective
organizational commitment in this research. It also shows that gender is not a
70
significant moderating variable when it comes to the relationship of the
various independent variable and knowledge workers’ affective organizational
commitment.
Therefore, the status of the hypothesis testing can be summarized as in Table
4.8.
Table 4.8: Result of the Hypothesis testing
Hypothesis Result
H1 Knowledge Sharing Practices are positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers
Supported
H2 Task orientation is positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
Supported
H3 Fairness of Performance management and promotion is positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
Not Supported
H4 Opportunities of training and development is positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
Supported
H5 Compensation is positively related to the affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers
Supported
H6 Gender of knowledge workers is a moderator between the relationship of the seven variables to affective organizational commitment
Not Supported
This establishes that knowledge sharing practices, task orientation,
compensation scheme and opportunities of training and development do
influence affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers in
Malaysia. The overall result of the moderating effect of gender is found to be
insignificant.
71
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
5.0 Chapter Overview
This chapter will discuss and attempt to interpret the key findings. It will also
provide a summary and conclusion drawn from the research results as well as
provide recommendations for future research and finally the implications of
the findings of affective organizational commitment among knowledge
workers in Malaysia.
5.1 Summary and Conclusions
This research has provided an empirical result of affective organizational
commitment among knowledge workers being influenced by four factors of
knowledge sharing practices, task orientation, opportunities for training and
development and finally compensation.
The total respondents were 259 and the response rate was 65%. Almost
equal proportion of male and female knowledge workers who were younger
than 35 years of age participated in this survey.
Factor analysis revealed that some items needed to be dropped due to cross
loadings along with some constructs which were being studied. As such, only
six factors were found significant to be used for further analysis and these
72
were knowledge sharing, task orientation, fairness of performance
management and promotion, opportunities of training and development,
compensation and finally incentives. As a result, the theoretical framework
was revised along with the hypothesis.
Cronbach’s Alpha (Reliability Coefficient) for the six new factors showed high
reliability coefficient values above 0.7, except for ‘Incentive’ which only
registered 0.55. As such, this variable was excluded from the analysis.
Finally through hierarchical multiple regression, the regression model
revealed that only H1, H2, H4 and H5 were supported. H3 (fairness of
performance management and promotion) and H6 (gender as a moderator)
were not supported.
5.2 Discussion
This research has introduced a new factor configuration named Knowledge
Sharing Practices. This new configuration was a combination of the three
independent variables namely Leadership, Knowledge Sharing and Employee
Relation. Leadership here refers to the organization showing efforts of being
committed towards having a supportive relationship with the employees. This
could mean that, through close relationship building, top management
members’ who encourage and provide an enabling environment to allow
knowledge sharing to take place. These qualities are reflected in the
73
questions pertaining to Leadership in the questionnaire. Knowledge Sharing
describes the organization’s efforts and policies toward encouraging the
exchange of knowledge among employees. Employee Relation reflects on the
cooperation and the team work instilled by the organization among the
employees. This also in fact provides a conducive and an enabling
environment for knowledge sharing to take place. Therefore these three
factors are reorganized to reflect a new factor configuration called Knowledge
Sharing Practices which reflects the organizations efforts to promote,
encourage and provide a conducive and an enabling environment for
knowledge sharing to take place. This new factor is reflected very well by the
items used to measure it with a combined Cronbach’s Alpha value of 0.90
which shows these items are highly consistent and highly reliable in
measuring this factor.
Therefore, it is not surprising to find that the organizational practices which
promotes knowledge sharing among co-workers and the opportunities to work
in teams at the workplace seems to increase the knowledge workers’ affective
organizational commitment, as H1 is supported. By working in teams,
knowledge workers can build positive relationships with their team members
while having an opportunity to share knowledge amongst them. A study done
by Benson and Brown, (2007) confirms this finding where a positive
relationship amongst co-workers was found crucial to attitudinal commitment.
As such, organizations wanting to increase knowledge worker’s affective
organizational commitment should endeavour to create a knowledge sharing
environment conducive for team work and close relationship building amongst
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workers, have strong organizational policies to encourage such knowledge
sharing activities. The sharing of knowledge is also between the top
management and the employees. As such, to enable a smooth exchange of
knowledge and information, members of the management team members
need to be available and approachable by the workers. This may indicate that
they are not subjected to hierarchical order or red tape and prefer a more free
and easy relationship with the organization’s top management. This is
confirmed by Agarwal and Ramaswami, (1993) in his study when he said that
non-supportive and inconsiderateness of leaders has detrimental effect on the
employees. It is certainly necessary to point out that there are limited
researches on the influence of knowledge sharing on commitment levels
(Hislop, 2003), nonetheless, there have been some findings to indicate that
willingness of workers to share their knowledge may influence the
organizational commitment level (Storey and Barnett 2000).
Task Orientation was found significant in influencing knowledge worker’s
affective organizational commitment as H2 was supported. This was
expected as knowledge workers like the freedom of deciding the task at hand.
As such, supervisors should accommodate the need for a higher degree of
freedom so as to allow knowledge workers to carry out their work unimpeded
and uninterrupted (Benson and Brown 2007). As highlighted by Gregerman,
(1981) knowledge workers have total authority in deciding how to do what
their assigned tasks. This was also found in Agarwal and Ramaswami (1993)
which reflects that task characteristics have been known to influence an
employee’s affective commitment, but not in the context of knowledge workers.
75
Now, with the results from this study, it is suggested that task characteristics
or task orientation which includes task variety and task autonomy influences a
knowledge worker’s affective organizational commitment.
In this research it was found that fairness of performance management and
promotion H3 was not supported. This was also the case in the study by Lee-
Kelly et al, (2007) on knowledge workers where it was found that knowledge
workers do not view promotion as important and the indirect relationship to
affective organizational commitment through turnover intention was found to
be insignificant. Lee-Kelly et al, (2007) also suggests that this may be due to
the characteristics of knowledge workers who see formal and public
recognition for their contribution to organisational success as more important.
Incidentally this observation also coincides with the characteristics of
knowledge workers as outlined by Gregerman (1981) which shows that
knowledge workers do respond well to organizational recognition.
The results show that opportunities for training and development influences
affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers as H4 was
supported. This coincides with studies done by Hung et al, (2004) where the
construct had a positive correlation with affective commitment. This may be
due to the fact that opportunities for training and development are a part of
working experiences and such experiences not only enriches the individual
but also benefits the organization. Furthermore, it is an established fact that
knowledge workers do exhibit high tendencies towards personnel
development opportunities to improve themselves to remain competitive in the
76
open market (Gregerman, 1981). Further to that, such opportunities of self
improvement, according to Hung et al, (2004) may lead to a sense of
obligation and a development of affective attachment to the organization.
This has also been confirmed by past researches (Meyer, Allen and Smith,
1993; Wayne, Shore, and Liden, 1997) where training experiences have
brought positive impact on commitment level, and now, this factor can be
suggested that it is positive for knowledge workers as well.
A compensation system which is aligned with the organization’s goals and
objectives, H5 was supported in this study. This indicates that knowledge
workers’ commitment is affected by the compensation system. The study by
Boles et al (2007) confirms this result; however, it was not in the context of
knowledge workers. However, one of the characteristics of knowledge
workers does indicate that they do respond well to organizational recognition
and by recognition, this may mean that they are fairly compensated for
achieving the organizational goals and objective. Yet, the study by (Benson
and Brown 2007) on knowledge workers and compensation confirms
otherwise indicating knowledge workers do not consider the compensation
system as pertinent in influencing affective commitment. This construct may
still need to be studied further to confirm and conclude the findings.
Gender as the moderating variable in H6 was found to be not supported. No
doubt numerous studies have shown the existence of gender differences in
behavioural studies especially on affective organizational commitment
(Hartmann, 2000; Boles et al, 2007; Mathieu and Zajac, 1990); this research
77
study however, did not find any difference among knowledge workers. This
concurs with a study by Russ and McNeilly (1995) however; the respondents
were not knowledge workers. The absence of difference between knowledge
workers’ gender the relationship of the various independent variable and the
affective commitment level does indicate that knowledge workers value
themselves and their commitment by what they do and what they are capable
of and not based on who they are (Blackler, 1995) or their gender for that
matter.
5.3 Limitation of the Study
There are several limitations in this study which might affect the reliability and
the validity of the research results and findings. The following limitations are
highlighted and acknowledged.
The questionnaires for this study were not distributed to all private sector
employees in Malaysia. In fact the respondents were mainly from the Klang
Valley. As such, the survey may not be representative of the entire private
sector knowledge workers in Malaysia. There were no representation lawyers
and the participation from engineering sector (8.11%), retail, service and
distribution sector (6.95%) was relatively low despite the fact that every effort
was made to reach out to these respondents. As such, the results are not
generalizable to the population.
78
The design of the survey questionnaire did have the criteria of participation.
The definition or criteria of knowledge workers should have been included in
survey questionnaire. This would have ensured that all the respondents were
in fact the actual intended target group.
The current research also only examined gender as a moderator of the
relationship between various independent variable and affective
organizational commitment. While gender had some moderating effect on this
relationship, based on previous studies, there may be other moderators such
as tenure or secondary working conditions that can provide greater insight
into relationship between the various factors and affective organizational
commitment.
A majority of the respondents were from the manufacturing sector. The
environment factors in this sector many have been different for these
employees. As such, the result may have been different if the percentage of
employees participated in the survey had been different. Further to that, if
there were a more robust percentage of participation from various sectors,
then an independent t-test could have been done to see if there were any
differences in affective organisational commitment among the various sectors.
There is also the undeniable factor of some parties refusing to cooperate and
participate it the survey when approached. This is evident in the low
response rates from certain sectors despite efforts being made to approach
them.
79
Only 46% variance was able to be explained by the four independent
variables, namely Knowledge Sharing Practices (KSP), Task Orientation (TO),
Compensation (C) and Opportunities of Training and Development (TD) in this
research, while the remaining 54% is not explained. This low figure shows
that there are limitations in the model and future research is definitely
recommended to identify other factors to complete this model.
5.4 Suggestions for Future Research
The following suggestions will be proposed for the benefit of future research in
the study of affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers.
Future research could cover on specific type of industry to get a better
understanding of knowledge worker’s behaviours unique to each industry.
The sample size of 259 respondents may not be representative of the overall
population in Malaysia and there are restrictions in the generalization of the
research findings as non-probability sampling was employed. Perhaps future
studies should explore into a more robust sampling methodology.
Future research on knowledge workers and their affective organizational
commitment may be carried out using different constructs to study the
relationship such as role ambiguity, secondary working conditions or leader-
80
member-exchange (LMX). This would certainly expand the existing
knowledge base in understanding knowledge workers.
Future research on knowledge workers and their affective organizational
commitment may also explore other factors as moderator such as tenure or
secondary working conditions.
This study may also be expanded to do a comparison on the same variables
between knowledge workers and non-knowledge workers to further
understand the difference in behaviours between these two distinct classes of
workers.
The suggestions given above would enable the expansion of the existing
knowledge base and contribute further to the body of knowledge in the
endeavour of understanding knowledge workers.
5.5 Implications of the Study
The results of this research no doubt have several implications to theory and
implications to practice. These implications do provide some indications to
researchers and to show the organizations and practitioners the salient
factors which influence affective organizational commitment among
knowledge workers.
81
The implication to theory is that, through this research it has been suggested
that a configuration of a new factor called Knowledge Sharing Practices has
shown that it influences a knowledge worker’s affective organizational
commitment. This new factor comprises of, organizational support and also
policies that create an enabling environment for knowledge sharing by
working in teams, through close relationship with members of the
management team as well as promoting knowledge sharing activities in the
organization.
It has also been suggested that Task Orientation was significant in influencing
knowledge worker’s affective organizational commitment as this allows
knowledge workers to have the freedom of deciding the best method for
accomplishing the task at hand.
Opportunities for training and development also are found to influence
affective organizational commitment among knowledge workers. Although this
has been confirmed by past studies but now with this research this factor may
be expanded to include its significance for knowledge workers as well.
This research also indicates that knowledge workers’ commitment is affected
by the compensation system which is aligned with the organization’s goals
and objectives. Previous studies which have found similar relationship
however were not in the context of knowledge workers. Yet, this research
suggests that this factor may be expanded to hold true for knowledge workers
as well.
82
Finally, gender was not significant as a moderating variable in this study and it
can be suggested that the relationship of the various factors and affective
commitment level among knowledge workers is not affected by the
employee’s gender.
This research also has provided some useful insights and implications to
organizations and practitioners involved in managing knowledge workers. It
has revealed the various factors and their affect or influence on the construct
of affective organizational commitment. Given the growing demand of
knowledge workers in the future, policy makers may use the salient points
highlighted in this study in order to formulate the organizational practices and
policies aimed at keeping the knowledge workers continuously committed with
the organization.
Organizations wanting to retain knowledge workers and expect them to
develop higher levels of affective organizational commitment should consider
to promote and encourage knowledge sharing amongst employees through
organizational support, policies that create an enabling environment for
knowledge sharing, promoting knowledge sharing activities, encourage team
work amongst employees and forge close relationship between members of
the management team and the employees.
They may also look into ensuring that knowledge workers have the freedom
and the empowerment in completing their assigned tasks as long as this
83
freedom is not abused and in-line with the organization’s policies. Further to
that, the variety of tasks assigned to knowledge workers need to be highly
challenging and involves innovation as well as worthwhile to the organization.
These can be achieved by including these specifications in the employees’ job
description. This would give the employee the reassurance that he or she has
the task autonomy as well as the task variety aspect to his or her benefit.
Organizations should also need to ensure that knowledge workers are
constantly allowed and given the opportunity to improve themselves through
training and development. This may include attending seminar, conferences
and as well presenting their latest achievement and findings with the team,
the management team and organization. This may boost the morale of the
knowledge workers as well as increase the level of their affective
organizational commitment.
Organizations also need to ensure that the compensation system offered to
the knowledge workers is such that their achievement toward organizational
goals and objectives are fairly compensated as well as their efforts are
recognised as knowledge workers are suggested to thrive on these stimulus.
84
5.6 Conclusion
This research study had set out to study the relationship of several
independent variables to affective organizational commitment among
knowledge workers. The overall findings suggests fours factors which have
been found to influence affective organizational commitment among
knowledge workers include Knowledge Sharing Practices, Task Orientation,
Opportunities of Training and Development and Compensation. These
findings have resulted in providing some valuable insights on the behaviours
of knowledge workers as well as in providing some useful implications to
theory and practice. At the same time, it has also contributed towards
expanding the existing knowledge base about knowledge workers and their
level of affective organizational commitment. Nonetheless, there are
limitations in this study so recommendations for future research were also
included.
Needless to say, knowledge is an expensive and a hard to replace commodity
and knowledge workers are an asset to any organization looking for
competitive advantage in the open market. As Malaysia is looking at
becoming triumphant in the world of k-economy, organizations need to ensure
that they understand and manage the key catalyst i.e. knowledge workers
which will ensure their success during these competitive times.
85
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APPENDIX
Appendix 1: Key Steps in Data Analysis
Scan and treat data for errors and missing values
Reverse negatively worded statement scores using
‘Transform’ function
Factor Analysis
Check for Reliability using
Cronbach’s Alpha
Perform Descriptive Statistics
Analysis
Pearson’s Correlation Test
Multiple Regression Analysis
97
Appendix 2: KMO and Bartlett’s Test on IV
KMO and Bartlett's Test on IV
Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy. .902
Bartlett's Test of Sphericity
Approx. Chi-Square 2853.658
do 300 Sig. .000
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Appendix 3: Items of Independent Variables Dropped after Factor
Analysis
No Question Number
Items Question Reason for Dropping
1 4 CI 1 The organization’s incentive system encourages the employees to vigorously pursue organization objectives
No factor loading
2 5 TD 1 Our organization has a low skill level compared with our industry
No factor loading
3 6 TO 1 In this organization, the nature of my job is non-repetitive.
Single item factor
4 8 LS 2 The top management members in this organization try to make employees’ job more pleasant.
No factor loading
5 10 ER 2 The organization appreciates cooperation within the business units.
Cross loading
6 12 TD 2 At this organization, some employees lack important skills
No factor loading
7 13 TO 2 The organization allows me the little freedom to make work decisions.
Cross Loading
8 15 LS 3 The management treats all employees as equals.
Cross Loading
9 21 PP 3 Only certain individuals are entertained for promotional opportunities
Cross Loading
10 29 LS 5 Members of the management team are always available when their help and support is needed by the employees.
Cross Loading
11 35 TD 5 Employees at this organization have skills that are above average in this industry
Single item factor
12 37 PP 5 Promotion in this organization largely depends upon what kind of relationship one has with the top management.
Cross Loading
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Appendix 4: Cronbach’s Alpha Coefficient Values for Independent
Variables
Variables Cronbach's Alpha
No of Items Originator
Cronbach's Alpha
obtained by
originator KSP Knowledge
Sharing Practices
0.90 12 Agarwal and Ramaswami, (1993)
0.70
Pai, (2006) 0.86 Boslie et al (2002)
0.81
TO Task Orientation
0.67 3 Agarwal and Ramaswami, (1993)
0.85
C Compensation 0.82 3 Ahmad and Schroeder, (2003)
0.92
PP Fairness of Performance Management and Promotion
0.71 3 Ansari et al (2000)
0.89
TD Opportunities of Training and Development
0.71 2 Ahmad and Schroeder, (2003)
0.78
I Incentives 0.55 2 Ahmad and Schroeder, (2003)
0.92
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Appendix 5: KMO and Bartlett’s Test on DV
KMO and Bartlett's Test on DV
Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy. .923
Bartlett's Test of Sphericity
Approx. Chi-Square 1443.231
do 36 Sig. .000
Appendix 6: Items Dropped after Factor Analysis on DV
No Items Question Number
Reason for
Dropping Question
1 AOC 3 3 No factor loading
I would accept almost any type of job assignment in order to keep working for this organization.
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Appendix 7: Outliers cases dropped from the analysis
Casewise Diagnostics
Cycle Case Number Std. Residual AOC Predicted
Value Residual
1 147 4.93 4.50 1.92 2.58 159 -3.01 1.00 2.58 -1.58 235 -3.01 1.00 2.58 -1.58 243 -3.01 1.00 2.58 -1.58 248 -3.25 1.50 3.20 -1.70
2 45 3.06 4.63 3.23 1.40 80 -3.34 1.25 2.77 -1.52
3 210 -3.19 1.38 2.75 -1.38 Dependent Variable: AOC
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Appendix 8: SPSS Results from Multiple Regression Analysis
Model Summaryd
.677a .459 .447 .42056 .459 40.327 5 238 .000
.683b .466 .453 .41842 .008 3.448 1 237 .065
.686c .470 .445 .42143 .004 .324 5 232 .898 1.719
Model123
R R SquareAdjustedR Square
Std. Error ofthe Estimate
R SquareChange F Change df1 df2 Sig. F Change
Change StatisticsDurbin-Watson
Predictors: (Constant), TD, PP, TO, C, KSPa.
Predictors: (Constant), TD, PP, TO, C, KSP, Gender_Modb.
Predictors: (Constant), TD, PP, TO, C, KSP, Gender_Mod, Int_PP_Gen, Int_TO_Gen, Int_TD_Gen, Int_Comp_Gen, Int_KSP_Genc.
Dependent Variable: AOCd.
ANOVAd
35.664 5 7.133 40.327 .000a
42.096 238 .17777.759 24336.267 6 6.045 34.526 .000b
41.492 237 .17577.759 24336.555 11 3.323 18.711 .000c
41.204 232 .17877.759 243
RegressionResidualTotalRegressionResidualTotalRegressionResidualTotal
Model1
2
3
Sum ofSquares df Mean Square F Sig.
Predictors: (Constant), TD, PP, TO, C, KSPa.
Predictors: (Constant), TD, PP, TO, C, KSP, Gender_Modb.
Predictors: (Constant), TD, PP, TO, C, KSP, Gender_Mod, Int_PP_Gen, Int_TO_Gen,Int_TD_Gen, Int_Comp_Gen, Int_KSP_Gen
c.
Dependent Variable: AOCd.
103
Coefficientsa
.951 .202 4.701 .000
.245 .074 .223 3.318 .001 .502 1.990
.205 .046 .252 4.479 .000 .717 1.394
.197 .053 .237 3.743 .000 .569 1.757-9.5E-005 .041 .000 -.002 .998 .856 1.168
.120 .043 .156 2.803 .005 .734 1.362
.956 .201 4.750 .000
.261 .074 .238 3.528 .001 .496 2.017
.200 .046 .246 4.384 .000 .715 1.399
.195 .052 .235 3.738 .000 .569 1.757-.007 .041 -.008 -.161 .872 .850 1.177.127 .043 .166 2.977 .003 .728 1.373
-.102 .055 -.090 -1.857 .065 .964 1.037.863 .257 3.352 .001.291 .101 .265 2.869 .004 .268 3.736.166 .066 .205 2.539 .012 .351 2.849.197 .068 .237 2.897 .004 .342 2.927
-.005 .055 -.006 -.087 .930 .470 2.129.154 .057 .200 2.680 .008 .411 2.433.181 .423 .160 .427 .670 .016 61.232
-.041 .154 -.132 -.269 .788 .009 106.127.075 .094 .235 .800 .424 .027 37.631
-.019 .110 -.060 -.175 .861 .020 51.264-.017 .083 -.046 -.206 .837 .045 22.105-.076 .089 -.258 -.851 .396 .025 40.186
(Constant)KSPTOCPPTD(Constant)KSPTOCPPTDGender_Mod(Constant)KSPTOCPPTDGender_ModInt_KSP_GenInt_TO_GenInt_Comp_GenInt_PP_GenInt_TD_Gen
Model1
2
3
B Std. Error
UnstandardizedCoefficients
Beta
StandardizedCoefficients
t Sig. Tolerance VIFCollinearity Statistics
Dependent Variable: AOCa.
Residuals Statisticsa
2.4506 4.8764 3.5907 .38786 244-2.939 3.315 .000 1.000 244
.046 .167 .090 .026 244
2.4450 4.8617 3.5897 .38904 244-1.14649 1.05083 .00000 .41178 244
-2.720 2.493 .000 .977 244-2.804 2.631 .001 1.008 244
-1.21811 1.16999 .00094 .43848 244-2.847 2.665 .001 1.013 2441.944 37.039 10.955 7.226 244
.000 .065 .006 .011 244
.008 .152 .045 .030 244
Predicted ValueStd. Predicted ValueStandard Error ofPredicted ValueAdjusted Predicted ValueResidualStd. ResidualStud. ResidualDeleted ResidualStud. Deleted ResidualMahal. DistanceCook's DistanceCentered Leverage Value
Minimum Maximum Mean Std. Deviation N
Dependent Variable: AOCa.
104
Observed Cum Prob1.00.80.60.40.20.0
Expe
cted
Cum
Pro
b
1.0
0.8
0.6
0.4
0.2
0.0
Normal P-P Plot of Regression Standardized Residual
Dependent Variable: AOC
Regression Standardized Predicted Value420-2
Reg
ress
ion
Stan
dard
ized
Res
idua
l
3
2
1
0
-1
-2
-3
Scatterplot
Dependent Variable: AOC
105
Appendix 9: The survey questionnaire
106
107
108
109
Recommended
