This article reports the results of a comprehensive meta-analysis of turnover antecedents, extending an earlier one by Hom and Griffeth (1995). As such, this updated meta-analysis represents the most wide-ranging quantitative review to date of the predictive strength of numerous turnover antecedents. Importantly, the present investigation identifies various moderators of antecedent-turnover correlations. The implications of these findings for both theory and practice are discussed.
We reconceptualize employee turnover to promote researchers' understanding and prediction of why employees quit or stay in employing institutions. A literature review identifies shortcomings with prevailing turnover dimensions. In response, we expand the conceptual domain of the turnover criterion to include multiple types of turnover (notably, involuntary quits) and multiple types of staying. Guided by the premise that "everyone eventually leaves; no one stays with an organization forever," we also suggest considering where leavers end up-or post-exit destinations, such as another job, full-time parenting, or educational pursuits. We propose "proximal withdrawal states" that motivate members to participate or withdraw from organizations as an expanded criterion. These motivational states precede turnover and are derived from 2 overarching dimensions: desired employment status (whether employees want to stay or leave) and perceived volitional control (whether quit or stay decisions are completely up to them or at least partially under external regulation). Crossing these dimensions yields 4 prime states: enthusiastic leavers and stayers and reluctant leavers and stayers. We further subdivide these mind-sets into subtypes by differentiating employer from other forms of external control (e.g., family). Focusing on more common subtypes, we explain how they arise from particular motivational forces and profile how they differ by attitudes, behaviors, and turnover speed and destinations. We further discuss ways to measure this expanded criterion and proximal states (and subtypes) and investigate the latter's profiled differences. Finally, we discuss scientific and practical implications and future research directions.
We review seminal publications on employee turnover during the 100-year existence of the . Along with classic articles from this journal, we expand our review to include other publications that yielded key theoretical and methodological contributions to the turnover literature. We first describe how the earliest papers examined practical methods for turnover reduction or control and then explain how theory development and testing began in the mid-20th century and dominated the academic literature until the turn of the century. We then track 21st century interest in the psychology of staying (rather than leaving) and attitudinal trajectories in predicting turnover. Finally, we discuss the rising scholarship on collective turnover given the centrality of human capital flight to practitioners and to the field of human resource management strategy. (PsycINFO Database Record
Horn, Griffeth, and Sellaro's (1984) theoretical alternative to Mobley's (1977) turnover model was investigated in two studies. In Study 1, conceptual distinctions among model constructs and operationalizations of those constructs were validated. 206 nurses were surveyed, and constructs were assessed with multiple indicators. Although discriminating most constructs, structural equation modeling (SEM) identified a more parsimonious conceptualization in which a general construct underlies withdrawal cognitions. Other SEM analyses supported the indicators' construct validity and Horn et al.'s structural network. In Study 2, a longitudinal analogue of Horn et al.'s model was tested. A survey of 129 new nurses measured model constructs on three occasions. SEM disclosed that some causal effects in this model materialized contemporaneously, whereas others emerged after a lengthy time. Moreover, these causal effects systematically changed during newcomer assimilation. Implications for future research of turnover models are discussed.
The present study combined meta-analysis with structural equations modeling (SEM) to validate Mobley, Homer, and Hollingsworth's (1978) turnover theory as well as alternative structural networks proposed by Dalessio, Silverman, and Schuck (1986), and Bannister and Griffeth (1986. We aggregated correlations from 17 studies (N = 5,013 employees), correcting for unreliability and sampling error. Then we used SEM to assess the models, comparing their relative fits to data. SEM analyses corroborated Mobley et al.'s model better than did past research, but these analyses also showed that Dalessio et al.'s and Horn et al.'s theories explained sample data more plausibly. Additional SEM tests found that turnover base rates, time lags between turnover and model assessments, unemployment rates, and occupational differences moderated the models' pathways. The present findings suggest various implications for these theories and for turnover research.We thank Dennis Laker, Robert Steel, Jeffrey Sager, Richard Mowday, and Tom Lee for supplying additional information about their studies. We also thank Angelo Kinicki,
Integrating the expanding job embeddedness (JE) literature, in this article we advance a multifoci model of JE that is theoretically grounded in conservation of resources (COR) theory. From COR theory, we posit that employees' motivation to acquire and protect resources explains why they become embedded and how they behave once embedded. Our COR-based JE model highlights contextual antecedents that clarify how employees become embedded within different foci. Its multifoci theoretical lens also illustrates how different forms of work-focused embeddedness differentially affect work outcomes and how they interact with nonwork foci to influence those outcomes. Along with directions for further research, we further discuss theoretical and practical implications of our integrative formulation.
The research reported in this article clarifies how employee-organization relationships (EORs) work. Specifically, the authors tested whether social exchange and job embeddedness mediate how mutual-investment (whereby employers offer high inducements to employees for their high contributions) and over-investment (high inducements without corresponding high expected contributions) EOR approaches, which are based on Tsui, Pearce, Porter, and Tripoli's (1997) framework, affect quit propensity and organizational commitment. Two studies evaluated these intervening mechanisms. Study 1 surveyed 953 Chinese managers attending part-time master of business administration (MBA) programs in China, whereas Study 2 collected cross-sectional and longitudinal data from 526 Chinese middle managers in 41 firms. Standard and multilevel causal modeling techniques affirmed that social exchange and job embeddedness translate EOR influence. A second multilevel test using lagged outcome measures further established that job embeddedness mediates long-term EOR effects over 18 months. These findings corroborate prevailing views that social exchange explains how mutual- and over-investment EORs motivate greater workforce commitment and loyalty. This study enriches EOR perspectives by identifying job embeddedness as another mediator that is more enduring than social exchange.
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