Effect of Employees Commitment on Organizational Performance

Effect of Employees Commitment on Organizational Performance

CHAPTER ONE

1.1 INTRODUCTION

In an era of limited resources, governments at all levels are pressured to produce maximum output with the least input. A great deal of attention has been given to a variety of Performance improvement strategies, including public-private partnership, and Balanced Score Card (BSC), in the hope that such strategies are a starting point for Performance improvement. It should be noted, however, that no Performance improvement strategy alone is perfect. As such, various strategies should be used at the same time. Since Performance improvement is a function of too many factors, ranging from top management support to feedback on budget based decisions, it is essential to be aware that all factors are equally important (Holzer & Callhan, 1998; Lee, 2000a).

Among others, the backdrop of Performance improvement is an employee’s desire to be maximally productive. As Guy (2002) points out, “it is the people who, in the long term, control the Performance of any organization” (p.307). Even if there might be a number of reinvention efforts and top management support, unless employees at all levels are willing to improve Performance, all efforts toward Performance enhancement will come to nothing.

Modern day Organization is concerned with the analysis and diagnosis of the factor that determine organizational effectiveness, and the planning and delivery of programmes to increase that effectiveness. Organizations want to obtain the commitment of their employees. Management would like its employees to identify with the values, norms and artefacts of the organization, hence the need for organizational culture. Management needs to explain and imbibe its culture in its employees; this will enable the employee to get familiar with the organizational system. During this process of explanation, the employee learns about the organizational culture and decides whether he can cope with it or not. This means that each organization is a learning environment. It is the proper understanding of the organizational culture that the performance of theemployee in the organization. Performance is the extent to which an individual is carrying out assignment or task. It refers to the degree of accomplishment of the task that makes up an employee’s job (Cascio, 2006).

Commitment has a rational element: Most people consciously decide to make commitments, then they thoughtfully plan and carry out the actions required to fulfill them (Meyer, et al, 2004).Because commitments require an investment of time as well as mental and emotional energy, most people make them with the expectation of reciprocation. That is, people assume that in exchange for their commitment, they will get something of value in return—such as favors, affection, gifts, attention, goods, money and property. From this perspective, this paper sheds light on the importance of a multidimensional view of employee commitment. This paper starts with an assumption that the previous concept of organizational commitment may not tell the whole story about individual performance and Performance. Identifying multiple foci of employee commitment beyond the organization helps explain various motivational bases among employees toward Performance improvement efforts.

1.2 Statement of Problem

The problem of this study bore from the fact that there is a wide discrepancy between employees’ efforts towards work and what he or she receives or get in return for that effort. In the world of work, as particularly in an organizational setting, employees and employers have traditionally made a tacit agreement: In exchange for workers’ commitment, coca cola’sgoverning bodies would provide forms of value for employees, such as secure jobs and fair compensation. But rather unfortunate, the employees irrespective of their level or ranking in Coca-cola. As a result, workers in the organization have embarked on series of protest in order protect their work conditions and improve welfare package. Reciprocity affects the intensity of a commitment. When an entity or individual to whom someone has made a commitment fails to come through with the expected exchange, the commitment erodes.This study therefore, looked into the effect of employee’s commitment on organizational Performance,a case study of staffsof the Coca-cola, Edo state.

1.3 RESEARCH QUESTIONS

It is in view of the above problems that the following questions arise:

What is the level of employee commitment in relation to job satisfaction in Coca-cola?
Does motivation improve employees’ commitment to work?
Does the level of employee’s commitment determine organizational Performance?

1.4 OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY

The main objective of this study is to examine the effect of employee’s commitment on organizational Performance. The study also aims at:

Determining the effect of employee commitment in relation to job satisfaction.

Ascertaining whether motivation improve employees’ commitment to work, and

Ascertaining whether employee’s commitment determines organizational Performance.

1.5 STATEMENT OF HYPOTHESES

The following null hypotheses will be tested in this study:

H0: There is no significant relationship between job satisfaction and employees’ commitment

H0: There is no significant relationship between motivation of employees and employees’ commitment to work

H0:There is no significant relationship between employee’s commitment and increased performance/Performance

1.6 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

The findings from this study will help to highlight those areas where there are problems among staff and thus will be of great benefit to the authorities of higher institutions and the policy makers. The results of this study would hopefully be significant in the sense that it would enable both the Management of universities to better understand how the various motivational factors could be harnessed to inspire staff to increase and sustain Performance.

The findings from this study would help to further highlight the likely problems of frustrations and how motivation can be used to either reduce or eliminate these problems amongst staff of the organization (Coca-cola).

1.7 SCOPE OF THE STUDY

This study is on effect of employee’s commitment on organizational Performance. The study will also covers the various techniques of employees commitment and theories of motivation as they impact on employees Performance in an organization. The study covers between 2010 and 2011.

1.8 LIMITATION OF STUDY

The study is limited to the employees’ commitment, and its effect of organizational Performance. The study does not consider other variables and as such is limited to only those areas specified above. Also, the study only covers the academic environment which is further confined to the Coca-cola, Ekpoma. It does not cover all sectors of the Nigerian educational system; and as such the study does not look into how commitment strategies work or influence Performance across other sectors of the Nigerian economy.

1.9 ORGANIZATION OF STUDY

For an orderly presentation of this study, this research essay has been divided into four chapter.The first gives an introduction of the study, chapter two focuses on literature review, chapter three is the presentation and analysis of data generated for this study, and chapter fourthe summarizes the study and gives useful recommendations.

1.10 DEFINITION OF TERMS

Employees’ commitment can be defined as both a willingness to persist in a course of action and reluctance to change plans, often owing to a sense of obligation to stay the course.

Morale: Moral refers to staff emotional and mental level of zeal.

Employees: Are theworkers in an organization, working for the accomplishment of the organizational goals. In this study, the employees are those staffs of the organization, the Coca-cola, Edo state .

Performance: It is the relationship between the amount of one or more inputs and the amount of outputs from a clearly identified process. That is the outcome performance of an organization or individual.

Motivation: These are factors (familiarity, concern and driving force), which exist or are provided in a work situation either physically or psychologically which determine the input and Performance level of the worker.

2.1 Concept of Commitment and its Effect on Productivity

In general, commitment is defined as the psychological attachment of workers to their workplaces (Becker, Billings, Eveleth, and Gilbert 1996, Allen and Meyer, 1990, O’ Reilly and Chatman, 1986). In fact, few empirical studies have examined a public sector employee’s commitment and its relationship to productivity variables, such as extra-role behavior, desire to remain, absenteeism, and willingness to support productivity improvement strategies. Much of the literature regarding organizational performance and productivity places the emphasis on securing the commitment of employees to organizational goals and purposes (Balfour and Wechsler, 1991, 1996, Bass 1985).

Employee commitment literature is huge and most studies have centered on organizational commitment and its relationship to job performance, turnover intent, and other motivational outcomes. The common findings and implications of those studies are that employee commitment is the key to achieving productivity and performance in any organization (Mowday, Porter, and Steers, 1982, Reichers, 1985, Becker, Billings Eveleth and Gilbert, 1996, Becker, 1992; Meyer, Allen and Smith, 1993; Reichers, 1986, Lion, 1995, Balfour and Weschler, 1991, 1996).

There have been numerous efforts to identify and divide the concept of organizational commitment among organizational behavior scholars in both public and private sectors, Mathieu and Zajac (1990) categorize the definition of organizational commitment into three types: Attitudinal Commitment, Calculative Commitment, and Normative Commitment. The most commonly studied type of OC has been attitudinal commitment (Mowday, Steers, and Porter, 1979; Steers, Mowday, & Boulian, 1974).

In the public sector, following O’Reilly and Chatman’s definition, Balfour and Wechsler (1991, 1996) have tried to see organizational commitment as multiple constructs: affiliation commitment (belongingness), compliance commitment (exchange commitment), and identification commitment (value congruence). Robertson and Tang (1995) also divide the concept of commitment into two types.

(1) Identification or involvement commitment from an organizational behavior perspective, and

(2) Exchange commitment from a rational choice perspective.

By using multiple dimensions of organizational commitment, they tried to find out some meaningful relationships between multiple commitments and key dependent variables. Those relationships, however, have varied with regard to researchers, samples, and subjects. Studies have differed regarding whether or not organizational commitment was positively associated with job satisfaction, job performance, tenure, and educational attainment.

For example, Balfour and Wechsler (2001) found that organizational commitment was significantly related to in-role behavior, while no connection was found between organizational commitment and extra-role behavior. Six years later, however, they revisited organizational commitment and found that identification commitment was connected to extra-role behavior. In fact, there have been some inconsistencies in the findings. In this regard, Lion (1995) maintains that “researchers argued that the inconsistent findings are due to the different definition and operationalizations of commitment used, and the organizations and variables analyzed”.

A conventional view of commitment has exclusively focused on commitment to organization. It should be noted, however, that, in contrast to this conventional view, a number of researchers have begun to view employee commitment as having multiple foci and bases (Becker, Randall, & Riegel, 1995; Reichers, 1985, 1986, Becker, 1992; Gorden, Philipot, Burt Thomposn, and Spiller, 1980, Meyer, Allen, and Smith 1993).

Foci of commitment are the individuals and groups to whom an employee is attached (Reichers, 1985). It has been found that employees could be committed to such foci as professions (Morrow, 1983, Gouldon, 1958) and unions (Gouldon, Beauvais, & Ladd, 1984), as well as commitment to organizations (Mowday et al., 1982). In addition, recent research has pointed out that workers could also be differentially committed to occupations, top management, supervisors, co-workers, and customers (Becker, 1992, Meyer, Allen, and Smith, 1993, Reichersi, 1986). Especially, Becker et al. (1996) pointed out that in previous research, employee commitment and job performance are largely unrelated as prior work has failed to distinguish among individual foci of commitment. Based on their empirical findings, they argued that commitment to supervisors was positively related to performance and was more strongly associated with performance than was commitment to organization (Becker, Billings, Eveleth, & Gilbert, 1996).

Becker (1992) also discovered that “commitment to top management, supervisor, and work group were important determinants of top satisfaction, intent to quit, and prosocial organizational behaviors over and above commitment to an organization. In other words, it was found that commitment to foci other than an employing organization, specifically to top management, supervisors, and work groups, were negatively related to intent to quit and positively related to satisfaction and prosocial organizational behaviors and explained variance in these dependent variables over and above that explained by commitment to organization” (p. 232).

It should be noted, therefore, that viewing employee commitment as having multidimensional constructs helps explain more variance in key dependent variables than does commitment to organization.

In relation to goal clarity, it has so often been hypothesized that compared to private sector employees, public employees perceive their organizations’ goals as less clear and less easy to measure (Dahl and Lindblom, 2003, Gortner, Nahler, and Nicholson, 1987, Lan and Rainey 1992). In other words, private sector employees are higher on goal clarity than do public sector employees. This is, in part, due to the absence of clear performance measures, such as profits and sales, in the public sector (Boyatzis, 1982). However, this hypothesis is very controversial. Unlike conventional wisdom, recent studies indicate that public managers perceive greater clarity of organizational goals and greater effectiveness in achieving those goals (Lan & Rainey, 1992; Rainey, 1983 Rainey, Pandey, and Bozeman, 1975). With regard to multiplicity of objectives, public organizations also have greater diversity and multiplicity of objectives, as well as criteria and conflict among objectives and products, compared to private ones (Banfield, 1975; Rainey, Backoff, and Levine, 1976).

REFERENCES

Cascio, J.S. (2006) The public-private distinction in organization theory: A critique and research strategy. Academy of Management Review, 13, 182-201.

Guy, M.E. (2002). Managing people. In M. Holzer (Ed.), Public Performance handbook (pp.307-320). New York: Marcel Dekker.

Cohen, A. (2003). Multiple commitments in the workplace: An integrative approach. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates

Meyer, J. P., & Allen, N. J. (2001). A three-component conceptualization of organizational commitment. Human Resource Management Review, 1, 61-89

Meyer, J. P., Becker, T. E., & Vandenberghe, C. (2004). Employee commitment and motivation: A conceptual analysis and integrative model. Journal of Applied Psychology, 89, 991-100.