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The effects of HRM practices and antecedents on organizational commitment among university employees Smeenk, S.G.A.; Eisinga, R.N.; Teelken, J.C.; Doorewaard, J.A.C.M. Take-down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. Abstract This paper examines which factors affect organizational commitment among Dutch university employees in two faculties with different academic identities (separatist versus hegemonist, Stiles, 2004). The analyses of Web survey data reveal that in the separatist faculty decentralization, compensation, training/development, positional tenure and career mobility have significant effects. Age, organizational tenure, level of autonomy, working hours, social involvement and personal importance significantly affect the employees' organizational commitment in the hegemonist faculty. Participation, social interactions and job level are factors that are important in both faculties. The findings indicate that the set of factors affecting the organizational commitment of employees differs between the separatist and hegemonist faculties. The findings empirically support the argument that different configurations or 'bundles' of HRM practices (Delery and Doty, 1996;Guest, 1997) are suited for organizations with different identities. Explanations for the observed relationships, implications and limitations of the study are discussed.

While postdoctoral researchers (postdocs) are an increasingly important and productive group of employees in academia, they lack further career prospects and embeddedness within their organizations. This paper provides a rare glimpse into this relatively unexplored but important group. A comparative study of two Dutch universities included a survey with both closed and open questions among 225 respondents. Our study reveals that nearly all postdocs (85 %) want to stay in the academic field, but only \3 % was offered a tenure-track position. The uncertainty of their future prospects in academia lowered their job satisfaction; this is particularly true for the social sciences and humanities. Concerning alternative career paths, only few of the postdocs spent time in preparing for a career outside academia, and less than a third attempted to develop any transferable skills, although the importance of networking was recognized. Given that postdocs seem to be trapped between their own ambitions and a lack of academic career opportunities, it is very important that, on the one hand, postdocs aim for better visibility within their organizations, while on the other hand, universities provide more clarity and openness about their further career prospects inside and outside academia.Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article

Recent developments in the higher education sectors of the Netherlands, Sweden, and the UK concerning accountability and performance measurement in research have resulted in a variety of responses from individual academics. The concept of hybridity enables us to explain these developments over time. Our longitudinal data consisted of 100 interviews in 2007 and 2011. There are more managerial and performance-oriented measures at the organizational level, involving a stronger output orientation and increased formalization, leading to an altered research culture. At the individual level, the focus on output appraisal expands the potential importance of sanctions, making managerial and professional tasks more connected. The concept of hybridity at the organizational and the individual levels places our theoretically developed coping mechanisms in a more dynamic perspective. This has elaborated our understanding of how academics cope with performance management, within their institutional and national contexts.

To achieve efficient and effective quality improvement, European universities have gradually adopted organizational strategies, structures, technologies, management instruments, and values that are commonly found in the private business sector. Whereas some studies have shown that such managerialism is beneficial to the quality of job performances of university employees, others have argued that managerialism is largely counterproductive and that it results in lower performances. The latter situation is called a 'managerialism contradiction'. This paper tests two lines of reasoning underlying a potential contradiction governing the relationship between managerialism and job performances, while using university employee survey data from six European countries (Belgium, Finland, Germany, Netherlands, Sweden, UK). The results tend to support the assumption that managerialism, in these six countries at least, has a positive effect, albeit a modest one, on the quality of performances. The most important conclusion is therefore that there is no managerialism contradiction at work in European universities.