The Relationship Between Organizational Commitment and Work Performance: A Case of Industrial Enterprises

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© Filodiritto Editore Journal of Economic and Social Development (JESD)

Vol. 5, No. 1, March 2018

The Relationship between Organizational Commitment and Work


Performance: a Case of Industrial Enterprises

KAPLAN Metin1, KAPLAN Asli2


1Nevsehir Hacı BektasVeli University, Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences, (TURKEY)
2Nevsehir Hacı BektasVeli University, The School of Foreign Languages, (TURKEY)
Emails: mkaplan@nevsehir.edu.tr, akaplan@nevsehir.edu.tr

Work code CJ02F5005

Abstract

The aim of the study is to determine the impact of organizational commitment (affective commitment,
normative commitment and continuance commitment) on employees’ work performance. The sample consists
of 329 employees working in businesses operating in Konya Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Turkey.
According to the results of the regression analysis, affective commitment had a significant and positive
impact on work performance, normative commitment and continuance commitment had no significant effect
on work performance.
Keywords: affective commitment, normative commitment, continuance commitment, work performance

Introduction

In today’s business world, as well as physical elements, human factors are also significant for enterprises to
gain sustainable competitive advantage. In this regard, organizational commitment defined as “the relative
strength of an individual’s identification with and involvement in a particular organization, as well as the
willingness to exert effort and remain in the organization” [10] has become important in the organization.
Industrial enterprises rely on human performance, this situation gains importance.
Organizational commitment yields positive outcomes for both individual and organizational consequences.
The study focuses on work performance from the positive outcomes. The aim of this study is to determine
the relationship between organizational commitment and work performance in the case of industrial enterprises.

Organizational Commitment

Organizational commitment is an important concept because it influences the commitment on employees,


organizations, and society as a whole. Employees can benefit from commitment using the intrinsic and extrinsic
rewards relevant to the organization [6]. Organizational commitment is viewed as “a tendency to ‘engage in
consistent lines of activity’ based on the individual’s recognition of the ‘costs’ (or lost side-bets) associated
with discontinuing the activity” [1]. Organizational commitment involves three factors [14]:
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,
c) a define desire to maintain organizational membership.
Although organizational commitment has different classifications, this study mentioned the affective,
normative and continuance commitment of Meyer and Allen (1997) [15].

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© Filodiritto Editore Journal of Economic and Social Development (JESD)
Vol. 5, No. 1, March 2018

Affective Commitment
Affective commitment means individuals’ contentment with the organization and being satisfied with being
a membership of the organization [4]. In other words, affective commitment refers to dedication of employees
to the organization.

Normative Commitment
Normative commitment refers to employees’ importance for the organization. Employees who have high
level of normative commitment feel that they should remain in the organization [9]. In normative commitment,
culture and work ethic lead to their staying in the organization, as a result, employees feel loyalty to the
organization and duty may influence employees’ normative commitment [7].

Continuance Commitment
Continuance commitment specifies the necessity to stay in the organization because employees can face
costs related to the organization if they leave the organization. As they do not have any other job alternatives
and do not want to change their jobs, employees prefer to stay in the organization [7]. In conclusion, employees
with strong affective commitment stay in the organization because they want to, those with strong continuance
commitment because they need to, and those with strong normative commitment because they feel they ought
to do so [1].

Work Performance
Performance refers to the fulfillment of the objectives, the functions or duties of the organization [3].
Performance is viewed as the degree of the realization of the aims and it indicates that any individuals, any
groups or work units can reach the target through the that work [8]. Bingöl (2003: 273) [5], on the other hand,
defines performance as the execution of work according to the given conditions or as identifying employees’
behavior. Work performance defined as the fulfillment or completion of the work is the success level of making
efforts that employees can perform their works [22].

Organizational Commitment and Work Performance


Commitments in the workplace can take various forms and, arguably, have the potential to influence
organizational effectiveness [16] and employees’ work performance. From an organizational perspective,
effective employee performance constitutes basic result and aim of commitment. Compared to uncommitted
people, committed people are prone to be insistent on task sets and fulfill set goals. With the regard to the
outcome of employee performance, commitment may be expressed in; (1) persistence in completing tasks and
achieving goals, (2) service quality, (3) acceptance of change and (4) assumption of extra job tasks [14].
Organizational commitment has been linked both theoretically and empirically to individual performance.
Meyer and Allen (1997) [15] have argued that both normative and affective commitment will be linked
performance, whereas continuance commitment will be unrelated or even negatively related. Considering
employees committed to the organization that show more effort at work, although intuitively and theoretically
commitment can be easily related to performance, this relationship was empirically less supported [21].
The research carried out by Uygur (2007) [20] on bank employees demonstrated that there was a positive
relationship between organizational commitment and employee performance. The research of Özutku (2008)
[18] done on factory workers revealed that there was a positive and significant relationship between affective
commitment and continuance commitment and work performance, but there wasn’t a significant relationship
between normative commitment and work performance. The study of Iraz and Akgün (2011) [12] performed
on bank employees displayed that there was a positive relationship between normative commitment and
performance. Baugh and Roberts (1994) [2] presented that organizational commitment had a significant and
direct effect on work performance.

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© Filodiritto Editore Journal of Economic and Social Development (JESD)
Vol. 5, No. 1, March 2018

In the light of the studies in the literature, the following hypothesis were tested:
H1: Affective commitment has positive effect on work performance.
H2: Normative commitment has positive effect on work performance.
H3: Continuance commitment has positive effect on work performance.

Research Methodology

Sample
The study was conducted in 329 employees working in businesses operating in Konya Chamber of
Commerce and Industry in Turkey.

Measures
Work performance was designated as the dependent variable in this study, while organizational commitment
was considered as the independent variable. To measure organizational commitment, we used the 20 items
Questionnaire developed by Meyer and Allen (1997) [15]. The items of organizational commitment were
classified in terms of three dimensions of affective commitment (6 items), normative commitment (6 items) and
continuance commitment (8 items). Participants responded on a 5-point Likert-type scale dictating to the extent
which they agreed with each statement (1= strongly disagree, 5= strongly agree). Cronbach’s Alpha Coefficient;
affective commitment: 0.93, normative commitment: 0.81 and continuance commitment: 0.85.
There is no removed item as we couldn’t find an item whose reliability is highly low.
On the other hand, work performance was measured with four items 5-point Likert scale (1=strongly
decrease, 5=strongly agree) developed by Kirkman and Rosen (1999) [13]. Then, the scale developed by Sigler have
Pearson (2000) [19] was used. The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was 0.92.

Research Findings

The regression analysis was carried out to determine the efficacy level of subdimensions of organizational
commitment (affective commitment, normative commitment and continuance commitment) on work
performance.

Table 1. The results of regression analysis for work performance


Sta
U
Independent nda VI
nstand Std. Adjus D To
variables rdiz Sig. R F
ardize Error 2 ted R 2
-W lerance
ed
d

F3325 = 38,650 ,000 ** ,263 ,256 1,905

Constant
2,536 ,174
1. Affective
,328 ,051 ,392 ,000** ,618 1,618
Commitment
2. Normative
,095 ,056 ,127 ,089 ,349 2,862
Commitment
3.Continuance
,045 ,064 ,056 ,485 ,409 2,444
Commitment
* p<0,05; ** p<0,01
Dependent variable: Work Performance

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© Filodiritto Editore Journal of Economic and Social Development (JESD)
Vol. 5, No. 1, March 2018

The results of regression analysis in Table 1 suggest that the overall model was significant (Adjusted R2=
0,256; F= 38,650; p<0,01). We can assume that multi-collinearity is not a problem in data since all significant
variables in Table 1 have much higher tolerance values than 0.10 [17] and have lower variance inflation factors
(VIFs) than 10.0 [11]. The independent variables (affective commitment, normative commitment and
continuance commitment) was taken into account, and the Adjusted R2 (0,256) was significant at the 0,01 level.
This means that 25,6% of the variance in work performance was significantly explained by the independent
variables (affective commitment, normative commitment and continuance commitment). Among independent
variables, affective commitment was found to be the most important in explaining the variance in work
performance as the highest beta value was 0,328 (p= 0,000). In this frame, the findings of research reveal that
affective commitment has positive and significant impact (=0,328; p<0,01) on work performance. In this
respect, H1 was supported. On the other hand, normative commitment (p=0,089>0,05) and continuance
commitment (p=0,485>0,05) had no significant effect on work performance. Thus, H2 and H3 were not
supported.

Conclusions

This study examined the effect of organizational commitment on work performance. Questionnaire were
administered. According to the findings, affective commitment had a positive and significant effect on work
performance. This finding shows consistency with the studies of Özutku (2008) [18] and Uygur (2007) [20].
On the other hand, normative commitment had no significant effect on work performance. This finding is
consistent with the studies of Özutku (2008) [18] and Baugh and Roberts (1994) [2] while it differs from the
study of Iraz and Akgün (2011) [12]. Moreover, the study also indicated that continuance commitment had no
significant effect on work performance. While this finding is similar to the study of Baugh and Roberts (1994)
[2], it differs from the study of Özutku (2008) [18]. These differences can be resulted from different cultures or
sectors that the research has been performed.
The findings of this study need to be interpreted with the following limitations in mind. First limitation is
that the results cannot be strictly construed to be representative of all businesses, because this study has been
conducted in a specific region of Turkey, Konya. Therefore, the study needs to be replicated in different
industries and countries to be able to generalize the findings. Secondly, the work performance of the employees’
in this survey was tested on the basis of employees’ self-report. This research aimed to investigate the
relationship between organizational commitment and work performance. For the upcoming research, it is
possible to investigate the issue of organizational commitment and work performance in different industry
settings.

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© Filodiritto Editore Journal of Economic and Social Development (JESD)
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