LIST OF FIGURES

Page No.

Figure 3.1: Three-component Organizational Commitment Model in Two Nepalese Samples ------------------------------------------------------------55 Figure 8.1: Confirmatory Factor Analysis of Team Climate Inventory---------- 101 Figure 8.2: Structural Equation Modeling TCI Factors as Latent Predictors of Three Components of OC as Latent Criteria ---------------------- 103 Figure 9.1: Confirmatory Factor Loadings of Two-factor OCB Model --------- 109 Figure 9.2: Structural Equation Model of Three-component OC as Latent Predicator of Two Factorial OCB as Latent Criteria----------------- 111

XVII

LIST OF APPENDICES Page No. Appendix 1: Extended Literature Review on OC----------------------------- 148-281 Appendix 2: Nepalese & English Version Questionnaires----------------- 282-294 Appendix 3: Instrument for the Qualitative Data Generation-------------------- 295 Appendix 4: Test of Normality ---------------------------------------------------- 296-298 Appendix 5: Frequencies of Demographic Factors-------------------------- 299-300 Appendix 6: Item-Wise Descriptive Statistics of Each Scale-------------- 301-304 Appendix 7: Descriptive Statistics of Each Scale---------------------------------- 305 Appendix 8: Multiple Frequencies of Three-component OC Scale------------ 306 Appendix 9: Regression Analyses----------------------------------------------- 307-309 Appendix 10: Reliability Analyses ----------------------------------------------- 310-315 Appendix 11: Analyses of Structural Equation Model ---------------------- 316-351 Appendix 12: Exploratory Factor Analyses------------------------------------ 352-365 Appendix 13: Multiple Frequency of Organizational Culture Scales ---- 366-367 Appendix 14: Analysis of Variances--------------------------------------------- 368-372 Appendix 15: Formula used for the planned t test--------------------------------- 373 Appendix 16: Notes on Research Procedure--------------------------------- 374-390

XVIII

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AC CC CFI = = = Affective Commitment Continuance Commitment Comparative Fit Index Chi-Square Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst Degrees of Freedom Human Resources Human Resources Management Lagrange Multiplier Test Master in Business Administration Ma ximum Likelihood Nepal Arab Bank Limited Nepal Bangladesh Normative Commitment Organizational Commitment Organizational Citizenship Behavior Organizational Commitment Questionnaire Organizational Identification Questionnaire Organization Principal Component Root Mean-Square Error of Approximation Standard Chartered Team Climate Inventory Tribhuvan University Television

Chi-sq.= DAAD = DF HR = =

HRM = LM =

MBA = ML =

NABIL = NB NC OC = = =

OCB = OCQ = OIQ =

ORG = PC =

RMSEA= SC TCI TU TV = = = =

XIX

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

1.1. Conceptual Framework

Organizational Commitment (OC) refers as employees commitment to their respective organizations. It is employees attitude towards their organizations. It binds employees with their organization thereby they want to continue their membership there. Committed employees are believed to attend work regularly, protect organizational assets, and share organizational goals. Thus, committed employees are the essence of every successful organization because they remain and work for the organization.

Employees commitment builds naturally where the participants perceive more important domain for them. In management perspective, employees need to be committed to the organization. If they are not committed towards the organization they may channel their commitment in other domains such as career, hobbies, or volunteer groups etc. Commitment to one domain might marginalize the commitment in others. Hence, commitment outside the work might have a negative impact on the behavior that might be deleterious for the organization.

Organizational commitment might have high implication for the organizational effectiveness. Organizations having committed work force have higher

success potential than others. Thus, the need for committed employees might be a basic requisite and building employee commitment might be a major strategy of human resources management.

Conceptualization of organizational commitment has

followed different

approaches in early stage of the commitment research (see Chapter 2: Review of Literature and Appendix 1: Extended Literature Review of OC). Recently, Me yer and Allen (1991) have conceptualized organizational commitment as a multidimensional construct comprising of three components as affective, continuance, and normative commitment. Affecti ve commitment (AC) is emotional attachment, sense of belonging, feeling of pride to be a member, and feeling of psychological ownership. Continuance commitment (CC) is continued membership in the organization because of two main reasons first, perceived costs of leaving such as pay, pension, benefits or facilities, and second, due to lack of alternative job opportunities. Normative commitment (NC) is internalized pressure or feeling of obligation to continue employment due to work culture and other social norms.

Employees who hold affective commitment attitude are happy to spend rest of their career in their organization. They feel organizational problems as their own and also feel like a part of a family at their organization. They feel emotional attachment to their organization, perceive great deal of personal meaning of their organization and feel strong sense of belonging to their organization.

Employees holding continuance commitment feel very hard to leave their organization and also perceive that their life would be disturbed if they decide to leave the organization. They need to stay in organization because they feel that they have too few options to consider leaving the organization. One of the major reasons to continue membership in the existing organization is that leaving would require considerable sacrifice and other organization might not match overall benefits available in the present organization. They feel that if they had not already put so much contribution into their organization they might consider working elsewhere.

People holding normative commitment attitude feel obligation to remain with current employer. They feel better not to leave organization even if it was to their advantage. They feel guilty if they would leave their organization and they also believe that the employer organization deserves their loyalty. These employees owe great deal to the organization and do not leave organization because of strong sense of obligation to other colleagues.

It is more appropriate to consider affective, continuance, and normative commitment as components rather than types. It is, because, organization might reflect varying degree of all these three components. It is possible that an employee who might feel strong attachment to the organization might also perceive a sense of obligation to remain and economically hard to leave the organization. These three components are different in nature thus the consequences of them are assumed different for the employees as well as for the organization. Major issue for the present study is related to search of the

construct validity and theoretical process of organizational commitment concept in Nepal. It is, therefore, replication of Meyer & Allens (1991) threecomponent commitment approach has been taken as the central focus of this study.

Many earlier studies focused on low turnover as the consequence of higher commitment. But the major issue is what committed employees do at their work. Thus, new work relevant behaviors as absenteeism, job performance, and citizenship behaviors are being recognized as important consequences of organizational commitment. Similarly, many earlier studies searched

relationship of demographic factors in commitment building process but management and organizational factors are taken more pertinent in the recent works. The climate can be managed by managerial effort better than the general environmental factors and employees individual factors. Hence, the team climate has been taken as a popular construct that can predict organizational commitment (see: Review of Literature).

1.2. Statement of the Problem

The three-component organizational commitment (OC) has been taken as a popular concept in Western society but the validity of this concept is still unclear in Nepalese setting. The issue related to the validity of OC concept appeared as a major challenge of commitment research. Hence, the organizational commitment concept is to be replicated in Nepalese sample. Furthermore, the validity of OC concept is to be verified by investigating social

representation perspective.

of

organizational

commitment

concept

in

indigenous

Cross-cultural comparison of three-component commitment is

another

research issue. Most of the earlier researchers argued that normative commitment is higher in collectivist society. It is, therefore, necessary to resolve this issue by analyzing secondary data. Nepal is one of the collectivist and underdeveloped country. Hence, the nature of organizational commitment is to be investigated among Nepalese respondents.

Some

conceptual

confusions

have

appeared

between

organizational have

identification and organizational commitment. Some researchers

included identification as a component of affective commitment whereas others viewed them as distinct concepts. This issue has also provoked construct validity issues of organizational commitment. Similarly, another issue has appeared in connection to the similarities and distinctiveness between these two constructs.

Some

researchers

argued

on

theoretical

strength

of

organizational

identification (e.g., van Dick, 2001) over the commitment concept. But, effective measurement tool of organizational identification is still lacking. Thus, another issue is to search a suitable organizational identification scale that can assess the true organizational identification so that the distinctiveness of identification with commitment concepts could be explored in systematic analysis. Hence, the search of a valid organizational identification scale and its

application to judge the distinctiveness of commitment and identification concepts have appeared as some important research gaps.

Team climate has been recognized as one of the responsible factors in commitment building process in the organizational commitment literature. But it hasnt been tested yet in the Nepalese context. Thus, the construct validity o f team climate should be judged and its linkage to the OC should be explored to fulfill the existing research gap. Committed employees are expected to participate in some citizenship behaviors or in extra role behaviors. Organizational citizenship behavior is also a new concept in Nepalese organizational research perspective. Thus, the issue related to the replication of this concept and investigation to find out its linkage to OC are some other issues in the present context. In general, linkage of these two concepts team climate and organizational citizenship behavior to the three-component OC has appeared quite important to know the theoretical process of organizational commitment concept in Nepal.

1.3. Research Questions Cross-cultural applicability of three-component organizational commitment (OC) concept has appeared as a major research gap in Nepalese context. Besides, some research questions regarding to the linkage of OC to organizational identification, team climate, and organizational citizenship behavior are clearly evident in the present context. Hence, the specific research questions of this study in Nepalese contexts are identified as follows.

a) Does three-component organizational commitment concept show similar psychological properties in Nepalese context as proposed by the researchers? b) Does the nature of organizational commitment differs in different cultural context? c) What is the current nature of organizational commitment in Nepalese organizations? d) Are organizational commitment and organizational identification distinct concepts? e) Does team climate predict three-component OC concept? f) Does the OC concept explain organizational citizenship behavior?

1.4. Objectives of the Study The primary objective of this research is to test three-component

organizational commitment (OC) concept (Meyer & Allen, 1997) in Nepalese setting. Attempts are made to seek answer of the above discussed research questions. The specific objectives that the present research proposes to accomplish are specified as follows: a) To apply three-component OC concept in Nepal. b) To compare OC components in cross-cultural perspective. c) To investigate nature of OC components in Nepalese setting. d) To ascertain the similarities and distinctiveness between OC and organizational identification. e) To assess the team climate as an antecedent of OC. f) To assess the citizenship behavior as an outcome of OC.

1.5. Importance of the Study In todays context, organizations have to be more organic, flexible, and adaptive because they need dynamic and committed work force to lead the organizations towards the expected direction. Organizational commitment (OC) concept deals with how people become committed to their organization and how does it effect to the organizational outcomes. Even though, commitment concept was developed in the Western context, it is gaining popularity all over the world. Much of the empirical evidence showed its theoretical and applied value for todays

organizations (see: Review of Literature). Organizational commitment has got considerable attention in the last two decades because of its linkage with desirable organizational outcomes. It assists managers to predict many organizational outcomes such as absenteeism, turnover, and performance (cf. Me yer & Allen, 1997). Besides, human resources management (HRM) practices can also influence the nature and level of employees commitment to their respective organizations. The major issue in the OC research still lies on the conceptualization of the construct. In sum, it can be argued that if commitment could be measured and its antecedents and outcomes could be identified, some of the prominent human resources issues could be easily resolved. 1.6. Justification of the Study Todays management concepts highlight on team management (e.g., highinvolvement in self-controlled way), total quality management (e.g., quality building

in each internal aspects to match with outside opportunity), and reengineering (e.g., deconstruct earlier systems and set new one) but the vital aspect is to build employees commitment so that organizational effectiveness could be achieved through proper utilization of all the resources. Hence, the most important human resource management (HRM) aspect is to manage socio-cultural dimension of an organization and building the employees commitment seems a vital aspect in managing organization (e.g., Ouchi, 1980) Ma yer and Allens (1993) three-component organizational commitment was found the most pertinent and useful concept to assess employees commitment towards their organization after the rigorous literature review (see: chapter 2 and appendix 1). The theoretical process and the relationship of this concept with other closely related commitment and identification concept had to be assessed therefore demographic variables (see: appendix 2), identification, attitudinal commitment, team climate, organizational culture, and organizational citizenship behavior were assessed to study organizational commitment concept in Nepal. Studies on organizational commitment contribute for both of the academicians and managers. Present research attempts to fill up some research gaps appeared in the organizational commitment area. Psychometric properties of three-component commitment, its linkage with organizational identification, and its theoretical process can be of academic interest for the future researchers. Nepalese managers are interested to assess their employees commitment and to know the commitment building process. In this context, present commitment research can be a valuable milestone for academicians as well as for practitioners.

1.7. Research Methodology 1.7.1. Research Design A de velopmental type of field study research design was followed for the study that mixed diverse type of research design in a holistic framework. The research design was followed to test the organizational commitment concept in Nepal.

Organizational commitment was tested designing survey type of field research design. The semantic meaning of organizational commitment among Nepalese subjects was explored to test the validity of organizational commitment pursuing a qualitative research design. Meta analysis was made based on few selected published organizational commitment research to test the relevance of

organizational commitment in Nepalese context as well as to compare the concept with other cultural settings. Samples, variables, instruments, and tools used for the study are discussed below.

1.7.2. Participants of Questionnaire Survey Participants were selected from head office and city branches of five Nepalese organizationsStandard Chartered Bank, Nepal Bangladesh Bank, Nepal Arab Bank, Nepal Telecommunication, and Nepal Televisionfor questionnaire survey. Out of five organizations, first three are private sector banking companies and rests two are state owned communication and media companies. These organizations were selected by convenience to make a heterogeneous sample. The survey instruments were randomly administered to the participants by human resources departments of each organization. As the population of study, total number of employees working at junior assistant to manager level in head office

10

and main city branch of five selected organizations were 1240. Altogether 500 employees were selected as a sample and administered the questionnaires (see: Appendix 2.4 & 2.5). Out of them only 450 valid questionnaires were returned to the researcher. Thus, the overall response rate was 90% in the questionnaire survey. In total respondents, 79% were male, arithmetic mean age of participants was 33.6 (SD=6.29), 70% were married, 82.6% had graduate level education, 38% were at supervisory levels (officers & managers), 62% at subordinate level, and their mean professional experience was 9.47 (SD=5.97) years (see:Appendix 5). 1.7.3. Variab les and Questionnaires Used for Survey Variables used for the survey were affective commitment, continuance

commitment, normative commitment, organizational identification, attitudinal commitment, dual factor organizational citizenship behavior, four factorial team climate, organizational culture factors, and demographic factors. Latent factors were estimated based on the measured variables of the quesionnaire. Team climate factors were the latent predicators and organizational citizenship behavior were the latent criteria of three latent organizational commitment factors in survey design of the research. Data were generated in six point Likert type scale anchored by Totally Disagree=1 to Totally Agree=6. Translated Nepalese version questionnaire set (see: Appendix 2.2) was administered to the participants but an original English version questionnaire set (see: Appendix 2.3) was also used in a small sub-sample (n=78). Data generated from all these scales were found normally distributed (see: Appendix 4).

11

Questionnaire designed by Me yer, Allen, & Smith (1993) consisting of six items in each commitment component (affective, continuance, and normative) was adopted to assess three-component organizational commitment. Cheneys Organizational Identification Questionnaire (OIQ) consisting of twenty-five items was adopted to assess organizational identification. Researcher developed a short version identification scale out of Cheneys OIQ (see: Chapter 7). The Organizational Commitment Questionnaire (OCQ) of Mowday, Porter and Steers (1982) with fifteen items was used to measure attitudinal commitment. A short version Team Climate Inventory (TCI) consisting of 14 items derived by Kivimaki and Elavionio (1999) from 38 items TCI of Anderson & West (1994) was adopted to assess the team climate for innovation. The measure consists of four dimensions: vision (4 items), participatory safety (4 items), task orientation (3 items), and support for innovation (3 items). A supplementary part of the questionnaire contained a close-ended question about what participants mean by team: working unit, department, or organization. Few scales were adapted to assess organizational culture (Denison, 1990). Dimensions of the organizational culture included in the study are: (1) organization of work (e.g., goal specification, information access); (2) human resources emphasis (e.g., employee welfare, personnel policies); (3) absence of bureaucracy (e.g., lack of rule barriers); (4) general satisfaction (e.g., satisfaction with organization, leaders, peers); and (5) goal integration (e.g., agreement about goals). Organizational citizenship behavior was assessed with an adopted nine items scale from the 16 items OCB scale of Smith, Organ and Near (1983).

12

1.7.4. Participants of Qualitative Study Qualitative study was based on the contents collected from 49 convinently selected Nepalese public and private sector employees. Out of total respondents 43 had returned the usable instruments. Participants had full time work in different Nepalese organizations but continuing their university education in morning session. This sample was selected because of many reasons: a) subjects were the participants of a seminar cum work-shop during the data collection phase, thus, it became easy to approach them, b) they had comparatively better expression power in writing than the average Nepalese employees because of their dual role study and service, and c) respondents were working in different Nepalese organizations representing the heterogeneity and unbiased representation of population. 1.7.5. Qualitative Data Generation Researcher has designed a suitable instrument for simple qualitative data generation (e.g., Miles & Huberman, 1994). The instrument was supplied to the respondents to record their view on the three aspects commitment components, antecedents of commitment, and consequences of commitment (see: Appendix 3). Some basic instructions were also supplied at the top of the instrument. Respondents were requested to report their view based on their real life experience making their working organization as a salient aspect. Respondents were also allowed to respond in Nepalese language if they feel more comfortable to express their idea. Out of 43 participants, 21 responded in English, 15 responded in Nepalese language, and the rest used both languages. All the

13

Nepalese words or contents were carefully translated before the data entry b y the researcher. Nepalese version commitment questionnaire was found almost free from translation bias (see: Chapter 3), thus, the translation made by the researcher in this context can also be assumed unbiased. 1.7.6. Secondary Data for Cross-Validation and Meta Analysis Secondary data from the earlier work of researcher (Gautam, et al. 2001) has been adopted for cross-validation of three-component commitment across two Nepalese samples. Multi-sample analysis in structural equation modeling was conducted in sample of 103 subjects and 450 subjects to assess the crossvalidation of OC. Mean and standard deviation of organizational commitment scale were collected from published articles for cross-cultural comparison of organizational commitment components. For this purpose, mean and standard deviation of five North-American, two European, two East-Asian, and two SouthAsian samples were adopted for the analysis. 1.7.7. Data Analyses Methods Few analytical software were used for tabulation and analyses of data. Questionnaire survey data were entered into SPSS version 10. Test of normality and descriptive analyses were conducted to find usefulness of data. Then, reliability analysis was conducted to find out the strength of each scale. Many other methods such as principal component factor analysis, regression analysis, analysis of variance, paired t test, and general descriptive were used to analyze the data.

14

EQS version 5.7b was used for confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling. Qualitative data were tabulated and analyzed in Winmax text analysis software. Much work was manually conducted in text analysis for social representation of OC and planned t test (see formula: appendix 15) for crosscultural Meta analysis. 1.8. Limitations of the Study Cross-sectional data generated in self-reported questionnaire is a major limitation of this study. Analysis of causal relationship in such data set is another limitation. Data generated from conveniently selected few public and private organizations is not sufficient for generalization of the findings. Indigineous variables could not be properly included in the study. Comparison made on three-components of organizational commitment might be inflated due to item difficulties in some scales. Cross-cultural comparison may not be representative enough due to few number of studies integrated in the study. In this aspect, scale transformation and translation biases in Non-English speaking countries might be another limiting factor. In qualitative analysis, small sample size and descriptive design of the research are two major weaknesses. Limited time and resources available to the researcher are some other limitations in the present study. 1.9. Plan of the Study The present study comprises of ten chapters. In the first introduction chapter theoretical aspects of organizational commitment, statement of research problems, objectives of the present study, and issues regarding to the research design and limitation are discussed as presented in the previous section. Review

15

of Literature presented in chapter two highlights the empirical evidence and theoretical assumption of relevant concepts of this study. Chapter three deals the issues of applicability of three-component OC in Nepal to find out cross-validation through multi-sample analysis. Chapter four deals the social representation of OC concept in Nepal. In this way, chapter three and four are devoted to find out the applicability of commitment concept in Nepal pursuing two different approachesquantitative and qualitative approach. Chapter five investigates cross-cultural Meta analysis of three-component commitment. Chapter six deals the nature of organizational commitment in Nepalese organizations. Hence, chapter five and six are related to the quantitative measurement of commitment level in cross-cultural context and within the Nepalese sample. Chapter seven investigates the distinctiveness of identification and commitment in Nepalese context. This chapter also attempts to find a more valid organizational identification scale, which helps to find out distinctiveness of commitment and identification. Causal relationship of OC is discussed in chapters eight and nine assuming team climate as an antecedent and citizenship behavior as an outcome, respectively. Both of these concepts are new in Nepalese research context. Hence, both of these chapters deal the applicability of related concepts and directed to find their causal relationship with organizational commitment. Finally, the conclusion presented in chapter 10 summarizes the findings, resolutions, and implications of the study. Appendices provide very useful information on extended literature review, used instruments, results of analyses, and notes on research procedure.

16

CHAPTER 2

REVIEW OF LITERATURE 2.1. Background

This chapter deals general literature review on organizational commitment (OC) and other closely related concepts. The literature review presents the theoretical aspects of research question raised in this study. Literature related to organizational commitment are presented into multiple aspects such as general view of OC, nature of OC, conceptualization of three-component commitment, antecedents of OC, outcome of OC, cross cultural applicability of OC, and growing OC research in collectivist societies (see Appendix 1: for extended literature review on OC).

Many overlapping concepts are treated as the correlates of commitment. Out of them, present study attempts to distinguish organizational identification from organizational commitment concepts. For this purpose, concept of

organizational identification, distinctiveness of identification and commitment, and comment on Cheneys organizational identification questionnaire are discussed.

Attitudinal commitment has been taken as an old version of affective commitment, which needs to be distinguished from organizational attachment,

identification. Some other overlapping concepts such as

17

involvement, loyalty, and psychological contracts are discussed to find their theoretical linkage to organizational commitment.

Organizational citizenship behavior is taken as a positive outcome of committed employees. Therefore, conceptual clarity of organizational

citizenship behavior and its linkage to organizational commitment are presented in this chapter. Climate and culture are taken as antecedents of organizational commitment. Thus, team climate concept is discussed and climate research in Nepal is explored.

Furthermore, national culture might have implication on organizational commitment that is briefly discussed. Organizational culture is taken as an antecedent of organizational commitment. Thus, brief discussion is made on climate and culture in the literature review. Nepalese socio-cultural and organizational context are also discussed to present the real life situation in Nepalese setting.

2.2. Organizational Commitment

Commitment concept has followed variety of approaches differing in a) phenomenon of interest (e.g., organization, union, and career or occupation), b) focus of commitment in the certain phenomenon (e.g., organization, unit, manager, and goal), c) subjective or objective categories of commitment (e.g., attitudinal, behavioral), and d) the dimensions or components of commitment (e.g., affecti ve, continuance, and normative commitment).

18

Organizational commitment is understood as a commitment for the entire organization but at the same time can be understood as a function of multiplecommitment to organizational ideas (e.g., Goal, value, artifact) and agents (e.g., Organization, unit, team). Commitment research tradition has also followed in other domains, especially career and union. Thus, it can be adapted into other societal institutions such as family, political group, and cultural group, too. Occupational commitment (e.g., Ritzier & Trice, 1969) and commitment to unions (cf. Angle & Perry, 1981) have been discussed having positive as well as negative relationship to OC. Furthermore, employees can have multiple commitments to more than one social institution (e.g., family, organizations, profession); thus, the commitment to one institution might marginalize the commitment to the other (cf. Me yer & Allen, 1997).

In the early years, OC research emerged in attitudinal and behavioral commitment. The root of affective oriented attitudinal organizational

commitment (OC) can be traced back to the theory of Buchanan (1974) and its operationalization of Porter, Steers, Mowday, and Boulian, (1974). Buchanan defined affective commitment as a partisan, affective attachment to the goals and values of the organization, to ones role in relation to goals and values, and to the organization for its own sake, apart from its purely instrumental worth (p. 533).

The continuance oriented behavioral commitment concept was initiated from Beckers (1960) side bet theory. In the behavioral approach, employees were viewed as becoming committed to a particular course of action rather than to

19

an entity. Hrebiniak and Alutto (1972) defined behavioral commitment as A structural phenomena, which occurs as a result of individual-organizational transactions and alterations in side bets or investment over time(p 556). Salancik (1977) has defined commitment in terms of a binding of individuals to their behavioral acts. He argued that highly explicit, irrevocable, done by ones own volition, and public act will result in strong commitment of the individual.

Researchers conceptualized attitudinal and behavioral approach into single multidimensional commitment concept. They pursued attitude and behaviors compatible of each others. Mowday, Porter, and Steers (1982) hypothesized that committed behaviors can lead to commitment attitude. Reichers (1985) explained a cyclical relationship between commitment attitude and

commitment behavior. He argued that the attitude could lead to the behavior, which would, in turn, reinforce commitment attitude.

Obligation or moral responsibility based normative commitment concept came later into the existence after Wiener and Gechmans (1977) writing on Commitment: A Behavioral Approach to a Job Involvement and Marsch and Mannaris (1977) writing on Organizational Commitment and Turnover. Wiener (1982) defined normative commitment as the totality of internalized normative pressures to act in a way, which meets organizational goals and interests, (p 421). Organizational commitment research followed into diverse approaches in the early years, which was empirically synthesized by Meye r and Allen (1991) into affective, continuance, and normative components of a

20

multidimensional OC concepts. Other researchers also viewed commitment as a multidimensional construct that is discussed in the following section.

2.3. Nature of Commitment

Nature of commitment has been conceptualized into trichotomies in OC research, e.g., affective, continuance, and moral, (e.g., Jaros, Jermier, Koehler, & Sincich, 1993), affective, continuance, and normative (Meyer & Allen, 1991), and compliance, identification, and internalization (OReilly & Chatman, 1986).

Other forms of attachments have also been conceptualized into trichotomies of organizational attachment. Etzioni (1975) conceptualized organizational involvement as moral, calculative, and alienative. Ashforth and Mael (1989) specified cognitive, affective, and evaluative identification in organization. And, Virtranen, 2000 specified commitment into obligation, utilities, and emotions as the components of organizational culture.

Even though, the critical assessment of each aspect is required before pursuing one concept as the central theme of research design, limitation of the present study does not allow for the detail discussion. Thus, interested readers are referred to go through previous reviews (e.g., Beyer, Hannah, & Milton, 2000; Mathieu & Zajac, 1990; Meyer and Allen 1997; OReilly & Chatman, 1986; Virtanen, 2000).

21

2.4. Concept of Three-component Organizational Commitment

Organizational commitment is the attitude of an employee towards his or her organization. It is a psychological state that categorizes the employee' s relationship with the organization, and has implications for the decision to continue membership in organization (Meyer & Allen, 1997).

Affective commitment refers to the employees emotional attachment to, identification with, and involvement in the organization. Employees with strong affective commitment continue employment with the organization because they want to do so. Continuance commitment refers to an awareness of the cost associated with leaving the organization. Employees whose primary link to the organization is based on continuance commitment remain because they need to do so. Finally, normative commitment reflects a feeling of obligation to continue employment. Employees with a high level of normative commitment feel that they ought to remain with the organization (Meyer & Allen, 1991, p.67).

These three components of OC reflect distinct psychological states. Therefore, antecedents and outcomes of each component of OC construct might be different.

22

2.4.1. Antecedents of OC

Affective commitment (AC) develops on the basis of work experience such as job challenge, degree of autonomy, and a variety of skills which employees find rewarding or fulfilling. These jobs characteristics have been found to be strongly and positively associated to affective commitment but less related to normative and continuance commitment in a study of Dunham, Grube, and Castaneda (1994) among employees from a wide variety of organizations. Other factors are communication fairness (Konovsky & Cropanzano, 1991), and participation in decision-making (Kim & Mauborgne, 1993), which are both positively related to affective commitment. Based on the above findings, favorable team climate and organizational culture can be responsible factors in development of affective commitment.

Continuance commitment (CC) develops as a result of any action or events that increase costs of leaving the organization (Meyer & Allen, 1997). Age and tenure, therefore, can be predictors of continuance commitment (e.g., Ferris & Aranya, 1983). It means that continuance commitment develops among older employees who have longer organizational tenure, although the results are somewhat mixed in this domain and should be interpreted with caution. Based on Becker' (1960) side bet theory, many other factors have been investigated s as antecedents of continuance commitment such as employees'number of dependent family members.

23

Normative commitment (NC) develops on the basis of a collection of pressures that individuals feel during their early socialization from family and society (Wiener, 1982). Some of the organizational actions can make a person indebted toward the organization, which can build normative commitment (Gouldner, 1960).

2.4.2. Consequences of OC

Each component of commitment has its own behavioral consequences to the individual employee or the organization. Mostly, outcomes for affective commitment is seen positively for all parties involved, continuance

commitment negatively, and normative commitment in between these two. The mostly studied consequence of commitment is employee retention. It has been found that each form of commitment is negatively correlated with employees' search intention, turnover intention and actual turnover (Allen & Meyer, 1996) although correlations are strongest in case of affective commitment (cf. Mathieu & Zajac, 1990).

2.4.3. Cross Cultural Applicability of Organizational Commitment

Many empirical studies attempted to uncover the construct validity, predictive validity, and cross-cultural applicability of organizational commitment

construct. Since Meyer and Allen (1991) presented their three-component

24

model of OC synthesizing diverse approaches into a single multidimensional concept, few studies have been conducted to highlight its global applicability. The dearth of empirical evidence has been still experienced (cf. Gautam, et al. 2001; Lee, Allen, Me yer, & Rhee, 2001; Wasti, 1999)

Most of the commitment studies have been conducted in North-America, few in developed Asian and European countries, and a negligible number in the rest of the world. Recently, Meyer, Stanley, Herscovitch, and Topolnytsky (2002) conducted a meta-analysis to investigate the antecedents, correlates, and consequences of the three-component commitment concept. Findings showed that the three components were related but distinguishable. Affective and continuance commitment were found related to their antecedent and outcome factors as theoretically assumed (e.g., Meyer & Allen, 1997). Furthermore, comparisons of studies conducted within and outside NorthAmerica revealed considerable similarity. Nevertheless, the available evidence is too small to state the global validity of the OC scales and more systematic research concerning cultural differences is warranted.

2.5. Organizational Identification Identification has been adapted in organizational psychology b y Ashforth and Mael (1989) following social identity approach of Turner and Tajfel (1987). Kramer and Brewer (1984) proposed a multiple identification model of employees with various works and social groups that appeared as parallel to multiple commitments. Organizational identification merges the individuals

25

self-concept with his or her organizational concept, thus, the individual might also become attached to the organization.

Organizational identification is a specific form of social identification. Freud (1922) used the narrow meaning of identification that referred as an emotional tie with another person. Lasswel (1965) coined identification in a broader sense, which focused largely on mass identifications such as nationalism. Later on, the term was adapted for organizational identification (e.g., Patchen, 1970). Patchens identification theory consisted of three components similarity, membership, and loyalty, which led to the development of Cheneys (1983) Organizational Identification Questionnaire (OIQ). After the advent o f Social Identity Theory (Tajfel & Turner, 1986) and Self-Categorization Theory (Turner, Hogg, Oakes, Reicher, & Wetherell, 1987), new theoretical argument has been developed (cf. Ashforth & Mael, 1989; van Dick, 2001; van Knippenberg, 2000).

Ashforth and Mael (1989) did some pioneering work on transferring the ideas of Social Identity Theory (Tajfel & Turner, 1986) into organizational identification. Social identification was derived from the concept of group identification (cf. Tolman, 1943). An organization, team, or work group can represent a social category with which individuals can identify themselves. According to Hogg and Terry (2000), an organization is one of the most important social category for an individual (cf. Bergami & Bagozzi, 2000).

26

Organizational identification is defined as the shared characteristics, loyalty, and solidarity of employees (Patchen, 1970). Employees who identify with their organization have self-images that are reconstituted in the organizations image and values (Cheney, 1983). OReilly and Chatman (1986) characterized identification as involvement based on the desire for affiliation. Ashforth and Maels (1989) approach of organizational identification deals with the perceived oneness of an employee with his or her organization. The more individuals identify themselves with their organization the more they think and act from an organizations perspective (cf. Dutton, Dukerich, & Harquail, 1994).

2.5.1. Distinctiveness of Identification and Commitment in Organization

The concepts of identification and commitment have had considerable importance in organizational research in recent years. Both concepts are related to attitudes of employees towards their organization. Cheneys (1982) Organizational Identification Questionnaire (OIQ) was the first

operationalization of the organizational identification concept that paved the way of new conceptualizations of this concept based on the Social Identity Approach (cf. Ashforth & Mael, 1989; Pratt, 1998).

A particular problem of theoretical and empirical work in the present domain is the frequent confusion of organizational identification with the concept of organizational commitment. Some theorists equate identification with

commitment while others view these two as distinct concepts (cf. van Dick,

27

2001; van Dick, Wagner, & Gautam, 2001; van Knippenberg & Sleebos, 2001; Wiener, 1982).

Affective commitment is taken as a construct closely related to identification (e.g., Bergami & Bagozzi, 2000). It has been, however, empirically demonstrated that identification and affective commitment are distinct concepts (van Knippenberg & Sleebos, 2001). Dearth of literature has been experienced which compared the relationship of identification to continuance and normative commitment.

There are strong theoretical arguments for the distinctiveness of organizational identification and organizational commitment. First, there is a certain overlap between organizational commitment and organizational identification, Ashforth and Mael (1989), however, theoretically differentiated these two concepts. According to them, organizational identification is self-referential or selfdefinitional, whereas commitment is not. Organizational identification

contributes to the individuals definition of Who am I? and thus reflects "the perception of oneness with or belongingness to an organization, where the individual defines him or herself in terms of the organization(s) in which he or she is a member" (Mael & Ashforth, 1992, p.104).

Secondly, according to predictions of Social Identity Theory (Tajfel & Turner, 1986) and particularly Self-Categorization Theory (Turner et al., 1987) organizational identification is highly flexible and depends on the salience of the group and on the context of interactions with other groups (see Pratt,

28

2001; Wagner & Ward, 1993). In contrast, commitment is seen as an attitude, which once established, is relatively stable and enduring.

Finally, identification and commitment develop on the basis of different sources (Pratt, 1998). Identification is seen as contingent on the basis of perceived similarity and shared fate with the organization (Mael & Ashforth, 1992), while commitment develops because of exchange-based factors, such as the relationship between the individual and the organization (cf. Tyler & Blader, 2000).

2.5.2. Comments on Cheney's Organizational Identification Questionnaire.

Organizational identification was first time operationalized by Cheney (1982), which was adapted by many other researchers to assess the organizational identification. The reliability coefficient in terms of Cronbach' Alpha showed a s high score (0.95) in the 25 item version of Organizational Identification Questionnaire (OIQ) in Cheney' (1983) study. Furthermore, factor analyses of s the instrument showed 73% and 86% variance explained by the first factor in a 30-item version OIQ scale, and the revised 25 item version, respectively (Cheney, 1983). Based on these primary findings most of the other studies have used the 25 items OIQ as a unidimensional scale. Its reliability was reported 0.95 by Bullis and Tompkins (1989), and 0.94 by Sass and Canary (1991).

29

Nevertheless, an instrument with a high number of items has a greater likelihood of having a higher alpha coefficient than an instrument with fewer items (Nunnally, 1978). It is, therefore, not sufficient to refer a high alpha to state a precise instrument. Previous research relied primarily on tests of internal reliability and rarely addressed the issue of its validity (cf. Miller, Allen, Casey, & Johnson, 2000). Most of the studies did not provide any information regarding the validity of the OIQ (cf. Barge & Schlueter, 1988). Thus, the need of more valid organizational identification scale is required in the present context.

2.6. Attitudinal Commitment

The affective commitment concept was derived from the OC concept of Porter, Steers, Mowday, and Boulian, (1974) which has been referred as "attitudinal commitment" by other researchers (cf. Mathieu & Zajac, 1990; Meyer & Allen, 1997). An influential operationalization of the attitudinal commitment concept was made in the Organizational Commitment Questionnaire (OCQ, Porter et al. 1974).

Attitudinal commitment is characterized by at least three factors: (1) a strong belief in and acceptance of the goals and values of the organization; (2) the readiness to exert considerable effort on behalf of the organization; and (3) a strong desire to maintain a membership in the organization (Mowday, Porter, & Steers, 1982). Attitudinal commitment focuses on the processes by which people come to think about their relationship with the organization. The

30

findings reveal strong commitment to be associated with desirable outcomes such as lower absenteeism and turnover (e.g., Mathieu & Zajac, 1990), and higher productivity (DeCotiis & Summers, 1987). However, the concept has also been criticized because of methodological problems. For example, it was stated that some of the OCQ items are confounded with possible criteria (e.g., turnover intentions, cf. Allen & Meyer, 1990).

2.7. Attachment

Social scientists within various disciplines addressed the question of how individuals become attached to the social groups. Beyer, Hannah, and Milton (2000) classified these theories into three broad categories of social process that contribute the attachment affective and cognitive process, social interactions, and symbolism and behaviors. Homans (1950) argued that three factors lead to social cohesion interaction, shared activities, and shared sentiments.

Lawer (1992) explained that valued and repetitive behavior maintain social group by fostering attachment. Focusing on the cognitive element, Mannheim (1936) emphasized the way in which ideology binds communities together and provides a sense of a collective identity with those who share the same beliefs. Similarly, anthropologist Geertz (1973) saw ideology as promoting social solidarity by knitting social groups together and creating a sense of community. Furthermore, Anderson (1983) recognized that people are bound together by sense of shared identity (cf. Be yer et al. 2000).

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Social psychologists emphasized individual attachment as one of the major social influence factor. Kelman (1958) stated three levels of social influence compliance, based on reward; identification, based on valued identity; and internalization, based in attitude agreement. Self-categorization and

identification process explains attachments to social groups. Individuals develop their own group-based self-categorizations by internalizing the social categories or memberships involved and thereby coming to identify with them (Tajfel & Turner, 1987). Psychological theories focused on affective process, cognitive process and social interactions as the bases of employees attachment.

In diverse concepts, organizational researchers have addressed the question of how individuals attach themselves to the social groups. Beyer and colleagues (2000) have included six concepts involvement, commitment, loyalty, identification, psychological contracts, and citizenship behavior to discuss attachments in organizations. Affective commitment has been defined as the employee attachment to, identification with, and involvement in organization. Thus, attachment can be taken as a constituent of affective commitment. But, other way around, attachment in organization pervades many other concepts including commitment.

2.8. Involvement

Involvement has been used to refer individuals attachment to organization or job. Degree to which a persons work performance affects his or her self-

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esteem is job involvement. Highly involved persons in their job can be expected highly involved in their organizations, too (e.g., Lodahl & Kejner, 1965). Etzioni (1975) classified involvement into moral, accepts goals and identify in organization; calculative, exchange agreement with organization; and alienative involvement, negative feeling and antagonist group attachment. First two are closely related to affective and continuance commitment but antagonist group attachment is related to concept of the work alienation

2.9. Loyalty

Loyalty in organization has been taken widely divergent and overlapping conceptual approaches as silence in the face of problems, constructive behaviors, emotional attachments, and willingness to follow leadership and directives of organizations. Hirschman (1970) explained loyalty as an attitude that decreases the likelihood to exit behavior and increases the likelihood of voice, thus, encompasses both attitudes and behaviors. Emotional attachment and willingness to follow directives are essence of affective commitment that decreases exit behavior. Thus, loyalty in organization seems to be reflected in terms of affective commitment and normative commitment.

2.10. Psychological Contract

Psychological contract refers how employees perceive mutual obligations between themselves and their employing organizations (e.g., Argyris, 1964; Levinson, 1962). Obligation can be both relational and transactional that

33

affects employees attachment towards their organization (cf. Rousseau, 1988). Employees marginalize the attachment when they perceive that their employers failed to meet their obligation (Morrison, 1994). Violations of psychological contract or failure to meet obligation diminish the employees attachment towards the employer. Hence, the obligation stated in

psychological contract seems to be reflected in normative commitment concept of Meyer & Allen (1991) who defined normative commitment as obligatory feeling of employees to continue membership in their organization.

2.11. Team Climate

Organizational climate and culture have got considerable importance in industrial and organizational psychology during these days. Organizational climate research arose from a confluence of field theory studied on individuallevel phenomenon in 1930s whereas organizational culture is assumed to rise in late 1970s focusing on observation and qualitative studies based on grouplevel conceptualization. It is hard to find agreement among the researchers whether both constructs are interchangeable, parallel, or complementary. Nevertheless, different intellectual heritage in the disciplines of psychology, sociology, and social anthropology ensure their different theoretical,

epistemological, and methodological biases, which are still sharply visible (Pettigrew, 2000).

Strength of culture research is the complete specification of such deep psychological attributes as values and belief system to understand behavior at

34

the work place. Climate research, in turn, is still promising because of strategic focus on identifiable organizational imperatives (e.g., safety, service,

innovation) and statistical documentation of degree to which climate is shared by organizational members. Both constructs seem to be overlapping yet distinguishable in the psychological life of organization (Schneider, 2000). Present research equate climate with cultural artifacts followed by Schein' s (1992) theoretical assumption.

Research initiated since the late 1960s produced a lot of empirical work that have been summarized in earlier reviews (e.g., Rousseau, 1988; Schneider, 2000). Two different notions, the cognitive schema approach and the shared perceptions approach, are still evident in climate research. Climate attempts to uncover individuals'sense-making of their work environment in cognitive schema approach whereas climate refers the shared perception of the way things are around there in shared perception approach (Anderson & West, 1998). Both approaches are not mutually exclusive but they are compatible. Nevertheless, shared perception approach has received substantial patronage among social scientists in recent years. The present study also follows the shared perception approach.

Some disagreement also lies in the appropriate level of analysis at which to examine shared perceptions of climate. Most of the researchers followed the organization as the level of analysis but proximal work group level of analysis is getting growing popularity with advent of the team management approach (e.g., Anderson & West, 1998).

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In the recent years, some researchers followed facet specific operationalization (e.g., Anderson & West, 1994; Schneider & Reichers, 1983) of such climate constructs as team climate for innovation or team climate for safety whereas others (e.g., Guion, 1973; Payne, 1990) are following a more generalized operationalization as organizational climate or team climate.

West (1990) proposed a four-factor (vision, participatory safety, task orientation, and support for innovation) team climate model of work group innovation to predict innovation in organization deriving theoretical

assumptions from earlier available works. Vision comprises importance, clarity, attainability, and sharedness of goals. Participatory safety means interaction between team members in a participative and interpersonally nonthreatening climate. Task orientation is a shared concern with excellence of quality of task performance. Support for innovation is approval and practical support in improving work environment (cf. Anderson & West, 1998).

2.12. Organizational Culture

Culture tends to bundle sets of beliefs, values, and norms, which develops a sense of collective identity. It attaches a member to others who think and feel similarly (Trice & Beyer, 1984). Social and economic sharing positively affects the perceived cohesiveness of relation, which strengthens the attachment. In organizational point of view, members share a belief that their work is critically important. Hence, the organizational culture helps to overcome the differences and enhances employees attachment.

36

In the other words, cultural forms foster commitment because they communicate shared meanings through value, symbols, and behaviors, therefore, attaches employees affectively and cognitively to the organization. Beyer and colleagues (2000) argued that culture begets attachment and attachment beget culture. According to Virtanen (2000), the concept of commitment can be best connected to organizational climate and culture. He argued that OC should be viewed as an instrument of organizational climate and constituent of organizational culture.

Organizational culture can be defined as the collective beliefs of employees, which distinguish the members of one organization from another. Culture consists of values and practices. Shared perceptions of daily practices are considered as the core of an organization' culture (Hofstede, 1991). Culture is s manifested at different levels: (1) artifacts (i.e., visible organizational structures and processes), (2) values, (i.e., strategies, goals, philosophies), and (3) underlying assumptions (i.e., taken for granted beliefs, habits of perceptions, thoughts and feelings, cf. Schein, 1991).

Organizational culture is a system of values and management practices, which can be one of the most important assets or most destructive liabilities for organizations members (Denison, 1990). Furthermore, the emphasis on human resources management plays a major role in the development and shaping of the organizational culture in an organization. It is, therefore, different aspects of management and organization are taken as possible cultural predictors of commitment and identification.

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2.13. Climate Research in Nepal

Limited available studies indicate that organizational climate is not conductive to performance, productivity and job satisfaction in Nepalese organizations. Most of these studies are descriptive and they describe only the on going situation. They speak almost nothing about how organizational climate builds in Nepalese context. Nevertheless, they are few valuable milestones for the future research (e.g., Pradhan, 1999; Upadhyay, 1984).

Dearth of such research is still experienced which could speak on the application of team climate inventory and its predictive validity in Nepal. Theoretically, it is less important to compare the climate of one organization to another but to answer what climate does really mean, and what kind of climate builds certain kinds of attitude or behavior in the Nepalese context. Hence, the present study attempts to minimize the existing gap in this connection.

2.14. Organizational Citizenship Behavior

Thinking about performance has been found frozen in a machine age mentality that equated organizational effectiveness with the algebraic sum of the task productivity of individual workers (Organ & Paine, 1999). Hard performance indices are the collective outcome of the resources, skills, employees efforts, and the organizational context. Therefore, researchers and practitioners have to think not only how much has been produced but also to what extent individuals show extra role-behavior on behalf of their

38

organization. In this regard, the emerging research on organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) can help to understand how people contribute to organizations.

Organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) are work related behaviors beyond those required by formal job descriptions (Organ, 1988). Employees who engage in such behaviors are known as "good soldiers", acting selflessly on behalf of their organizations. In sum, citizenship behaviors help the organization to be better off and to fulfill their goals more efficiently. It is, therefore, taken as an outcome of committed and identified employees (Organ & Ryan, 1995; van Knippenberg & van Schie, 2000). Employees attitudes such as satisfaction, commitment, and perceived fairness are robust predictors of OCB (Organ & R yan, 1995) and it has direct outcomes for peers and indirectly for the organizational performance (Willams & Anderson, 1991).

The roots of OCB can be traced from Banards (1938) writing: the essential condition of organizations is a willingness of persons to contribute efforts to the cooperative system (p.83). Ma yo and Lombards' (1944) Hawthorne experiment and Roethlisberger and Dicksons'(1964) research showed the importance of informal organization as the essence of collaboration. Katz and Kahn (1966) argued that innovative and spontaneous activity that goes beyond role prescriptions is a necessary condition for the functioning of an organization. Smith and colleagues (1983) defined OCB as the individual contributions in workplace beyond the role requirement and contractually rewarded job achievements.

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Borman and Motowidlos'(1993) research on contextual performance has been found very close to the OCB concept. Task-related performance refers to in-role and contextual performance refers to extra-role behavior. There are many related research areas of extra-role behaviors such as OCB, pro-social behavior, whistle blowing, and principal organizational dissent (cf. Van Dyne, Cummings, & Parks, 1995). Task-related knowledge, skills, and abilities are expected to determine task performance, whereas attitudes or dispositional factors would better predict contextual performance. The analysis of Organ and Ryan (1995) confirm such employees attitudes as job satisfaction and OC positively correlated to OCB to a greater extent than measures of in-role performance.

Much attention was paid on distinct components of OCB: (1) Altruism, representing those forms of OCB that provide aid to specific persons as, e.g., immediate team members, and (2) compliance, which pertains to more impersonal contributions to the organization as a whole (cf. Organ & Ryan , 1995). Some authors also proposed a five factorial model of OCB: 1) conscientiousness, 2) altruism, 3) civic virtue, 4) sportsmanship, and 5) courtesy (Organ, 1988; Podsakoff, Ahearne, & MacKenzie, 1997). Van Dyne , Graham, and Dienesh (1994) included all positive community-relevant behavior, including obedience, loyalty, and various forms of participation in civic citizenship concept.

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2.14.1. Citizenship Behavior Linkage to OC

Variables such as job satisfaction, perceived fairness, affective commitment, and leader supportiveness were most studied as attitudinal predicators of organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). Therefore, OCB is taken as a desirable outcome of committed employees (cf. Organ & Paine, 1999). OCB might have consequences on the individual level, such as how OCB affects supervisors'rating on employees performance evaluation; and on the group level, such as how OCB affects group performance. Koys (2001)

demonstrated in longitudinal analyses that OCB indeed causes organizational effectiveness.

Empirical analyses revealed positive relationships of OCB with affective commitment in self reported measures (Meyer et al. 1993; Pearce, 1993) and supervisors ratings (Gregersen, 1993; Munene, 1995; Shore & Wayne, 1993). Furthermore, OCB was found positively correlated with normative commitment and uncorrelated with continuance commitment (Meyer et al., 1993). Shore and Wayne (1993) found even a negative linkage between OCB and continuance commitment.

Recently, Me yer, Stanley, Herscovitch, and Topolnytsky (2002) conducted a meta-analysis and found affective and normative commitment substantially related to OCB (.32 for AC, and .24 for NC), whereas continuance commitment as unrelated to OCB (-.01). Thus, the present study assumes positive relations between OCB and affective and normative commitment

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whereas a negative or zero correlation between OCB and continuance commitment.

2.15. Relevance of National Culture in OC Research

The concept of individualism versus collectivism may have particular relevance for OC researchers (Boyacigiller & Adler, 1991). People from individualistic and collectivist cultures are likely to hold idiocentric and allocentric beliefs, respectively (e.g., Earley, 1989; Triandis, 1995). One would anticipate that employees in collectivistic cultures would reflect higher levels of OC than employees in individualistic cultures.

Individualism pertains to societies in which everyone is expected to look after himself or herself and his or her immediate family. Collectivism as its opposite pertains to societies in which people from birth onwards are integrated into strong, cohesive in-groups, which throughout people' lifetime continue to s protect them in exchange for unquestioning loyalty (Hofstede, 1991). Tendencies toward individualism and collectivism exist within every individual and in every society (Triandis, 1995). However, in the earlier empirical research Western world is found near the individualism and East to the collectivism (e.g., Hofstede, 1980)

The dimension individualism versus collectivism of Hofstede' Value Surve y s Module relate directly, but other dimensions may relate indirectly with OC concept (Randall, 1993). Hofstede (1980) identified individualism, power

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distance, uncertainty a voidance, and masculinity among the four different cultural factors in terms of work values. He included Indian sample in his work. Moreover, Nepalese culture is similar to Indian therefore one can assume low individualism, high power distance, uncertainty avoidance, and femininity in Nepalese context, too.

Power distance refers to individuals beliefs that those at the top of a social structure are very different from those at the bottom (Trandis, 1995). It is a belief in inequality and in the inaccessibility of superiors (Hofstede, 1980). Highly negative correlations (r = -.70) were observed between power distance and individualism in Hofstede' (1980) findings. s

Uncertainty

avoidance

behavior

is

little

tolerance

of members

for

environmental uncertainty. In collectivistic cultures, organizations commonly seek to reduce internal uncertainty by rules and regulations (Hofstede, 1980). Thus, positive continuance commitment can be expected in high uncertainty avoidance cultures because of propensity to taking less risk. A tendency to stay with the same employer and view loyalty to the employer as a virtue is another characteristic of an uncertainty avoidance culture (Hofstede, 1980). Hence, it might also build positive normative commitment, too.

Masculinity-femininity (Hofstede, 1980) reflects the relative strength of a concern with earning and advancement versus a concern with managersubordinate relation, cooperation, and atmosphere. In Nepalese context, there is lack of empirical research in this regard. Nevertheless, Nepalese subjects

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expect high return and fast promotion but at the same time they also invest much time to satisfy their boss. In public sector, employees involve them in private affair for their supervisors and seniors. Employees take part in private activities to satisfy friendship circles and their families during office hour (Adhikari, 1992). Thus, in this context, there might have less predictive validity of femininity in Nepal.

2.16. OC Research in Collectivist Societies

Much of the OC research work has been conducted in North-America and other economically developed countries. Few attempts have also been made to empirically test the OC concept in collectivistic Asian countries. Considerable attention has been devoted to Pacific Rim countries because of their significant economic success (cf. Besser, 1993). Ko, Price, and Mueller (1997) found poor construct validity of continuance and normative commitment in two Korean samples.

Aryee, Wyatt, and Min (1991) interviewed 245 accountants in Singapore and found OC as a main predictor of turnover intentions. In a sample of 147 employees in the United Arab Emirates Abdulla and Shaw (1999) found relationships between gender and marital status for continuance commitment and relations between marital status, age, and tenure on the one hand and affective commitment on the other. Cohen (1999) compared Arab and Jewish nurses in Israel and found that commitment had more favorable effects on work attitudes and behaviors among Arabian than among Jewish nurses. Alvi

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and Ahmed (1987) investigated more than 1000 male and female employees in Pakistan. Their results indicated that different from the findings in most studies in industrialized countries women were more committed to their organizations than men.

In a study among 200 managers in India, Sharma and Pandey (1995) found that the quality work of life perceptions positively related to OC.

Venkatachalam (1998) reviewed OC concept and Daftuar & Anjuli (1997) found positive correlation between commitment and Sattva type personality (a good type personality among tri-dimensional Indian type personality).

Gautam, van Dick, & Wagner (2001) identified only the affecti ve commitment as the predictor of search intension and turnover intension among threecomponents of OC. Positive job characteristics were found related to continuance and normative commitment but insignificant to the affective commitment. Other demographic factors showed equivocal linkage to the commitment components. Still, the dearth of empirical evidence can be

experienced to validate the three-component concept in Nepal.

2.17. Nepalese Socio-cultural Context

Nepal is a landlocked country with a total population of 23.2 million. It is classified as one of the least developed country on account of low annual per capita of around USD $ 220 per annum (CBS, 2002). Nepal is the 12th poorest country in the world and the poorest in South Asia. In the last two decades,

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average economic growth was found in 2.2 percent. About 42 percent of the Nepalese population were living under the poverty line (World Bank: 2002). The population living under the poverty line comprised 49% male and 39% female out of 9.9 million economically active population over 10 years age group (CBS, 2002).

Out of more than 60 ethnic groups, Chettri comprised 3.6 million, Brahman 2.9 million, Magar 1.6 million, Tharu 1.5 million, Tamang 1.3 million, Newar 1.2 million, and rest below 1 million. Nepal is the only Hindu Nation in the world with 87% Hindu, 8% Buddhist, 4% Muslim, and 1% others. Literacy rate of total Nepalese population was observed 53.74% following by 68% in male group and 42.5% in female group (CBS, 2002).

There are some studies in Nepal that highlight the common attitudes and belief of Nepalese peoples. Agrwal (2001) provided some examples of widely held attitudes and believes among Nepalese people. He argued that time is not important for Nepalese people, pace of change is slow, there is lack of achievement orientation, and they believe in working for government rather than private sector. Nepalese managers are more concerned with being good with the boss. The overwhelming belief among Nepalese decision-makers is that the more power you hold, the more you are recognized in society (Adhikari, 2000)

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In this context, it might be worthy to view the OC from a cultural point of view. This cursory view might help to find out some more issues related to cultural biases in the universal applicability of OC if there are any. Without looking at the cultural influence, implications of this concept might be misleading for the Nepalese context.

2.18. Nepalese Organizational Context

In general, similarities were observed among public and private Nepalese enterprises on organizational climate. Few such climate factors as security, participation, warmth, and support explained job satisfaction in Nepalese context (Pradhan, 1999). Adhikari (2000) characterized Nepalese human resources management handicapped by the prevailing management norms and culture. Paudel (1992) reported that management is almost feudalistic and decision-making even on minor issues is centralized in Nepalese public sector. Upadhyay (1981) found a low level of employees morale and Koirala (1989) found the poor state of employees participation in Nepalese organizations.

Panta (1984) observed tradition bound, unilateral and authoritative system of management in Nepalese organizations. Agrawal (1977) characterized the Nepalese management environment as the art and science of avoiding decisions, blocking the job through delaying, do nothing and mismanaging. Similarly, Rana (1971) stated the limitation factor as management not the capital in Nepal.

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Pradhan (1988) reported that management professionalism has not yet been seen in neither of the sectors because of lack of awareness and sense of commitment in the public sector and lack of initiative in the private sector. These findings reveal some clues on the average situation of Nepalese organizations. The main reason for the poor Nepalese organizational atmosphere might be vulnerable socio-economic and political-legal situation of the country.

2.19. Some Existing Research Gaps

In the literature review, researcher has identified some major research gaps that should be discussed. Organizational commitment research was found almost untouched by other researchers in Nepal. Thus, organizational commitment study in a large sample is required to replicate the threecomponent commitment in Nepal. Such a data can be used for crossvalidation of OC concept in Nepal. Lack of qualitative research was experienced to investigate organizational commitment concept in indigenous perspective in Nepal. A qualitative research can be an effective measure to cross validate the findings of questionnaire survey. Thus, indigenous view of Nepalese subjects should be analyzed to find out the semantic meaning of organizational commitment in Nepalese context. Such an alternative qualitative method might be social representation of organizational commitment in Nepal.

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There was lack of cross-cultural comparison of organizational commitment components over different cultural groups. Thus, a cross-cultural comparison seems important to view the nature of organizational commitment in different cultures. Organizational commitment concept was conceptualized in Western culture, which might follow different nature in Eastern culture. For this purpose, a Meta analysis would be interesting to compare nature of organizational commitment in diverse cultural groups. Some research gap was experienced in distinguishing organizational

commitment and organizational identification. Need of a valid organizational identification scale in social identity approach was experienced, which could assess organizational identification more precisely. Content analysis of Cheneys (1982) organizational identification questionnaire might provide the basis to design a more valid organizational identification scale. Moreover, comparison of organizational identification and commitment components can provide very important findings in the present context. Further, an investigation of antecedents and outcomes of these concepts might provide some other clues regarding to the distinctiveness of these concepts. Citizenship behavior and team climate concepts were also found untouched in Nepalese research context. Thus, the replication of team climate and organizational citizenship behavior can be some important steps to show the construct validity of these concepts in Nepalese setting. Thereafter, attempts to find the linkage of these concepts to three-component OC in structural equation modeling might be very interesting to assess the theoretical process of organizational commitment concept in Nepalese setting.

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