Organizational commitment and career commitment: the role of individualistic values

Previous research has widely explored the relationship between organizational commitment and career commitment. However, this research has essentially focused on affective organizational commitment. The present study extends this work by examining how organizational commitment as viewed through the lens of the three-component model (Meyer & Allen, 1991) predicts career commitment. Career commitment is defined as the extent to which individuals are motivated to work toward their advancement within a chosen line of activities (Ellemers et al., 1998; Hall, 1971). We theorized that affective commitment as an emotional bond with the organization and one of the two subdimensions of continuance commitment, perceived lack of alternatives, reflecting the perception that employment opportunities would be scarce if I were to leave, would foster career commitment. Moreover, we explored whether organizational commitment components interacted with horizontal and vertical individualism, as values reflecting motivation for independence and power, respectively, in predicting career commitment. Using a sample of employees from multiple organizations (N = 150) and a time-lagged design, we investigated the relationships of organizational commitment (i.e., affective, normative, perceived sacrifice, and lack of alternatives) and horizontal and vertical individualism to career commitment measured six months later. Time 1 affective commitment, continuance commitment’s lack of alternatives dimension, and vertical individualism were associated with stronger career commitment at Time 2. In contrast, Time 1 normative commitment, reflecting a sense of perceived obligation toward the organization, and the perceived sacrifice subcomponent of continuance commitment, referring to the perceived loss of advantages in case of departure, were unrelated to career commitment at Time 2. Moreover, Time 1 horizontal individualism interacted with normative commitment to predict career commitment at Time 2 such that normative commitment was more strongly and negatively related to subsequent career commitment at lower levels of horizontal individualism. We discuss the implications of these findings for our understanding of the linkages between multiple components of organizational commitment and career commitment and the role of individualistic values.