Newcomer retention – an investigation on Indian IT industry

Abstract

Purpose Understanding attrition in this VUCA world has become imperative for organizations to ensure they are able to sustain themselves. While focus on understanding attrition is important, it is equally important to retain acquired talent, at the same time add value to the human side of business. The purpose of this paper is to explore the factors which play crucial role in retention of newly hired employees working in Indian IT industry. The study has considered factors, namely, supervisor support behavior, feedback-seeking behavior (FSB), affective commitment (AC) and empirically verified their impact on new recruit’s intention to quit (IQ). Design/methodology/approach The survey was conducted among 524 newly hired employees working in 58 different companies listed in National Association of Software Services Companies member directory in Indian IT industry. All the scales used in the study are reliable and validated. Confirmatory factor analysis was carried out to test the validation of scales. The data were analyzed to test the proposed structural model using structural equation modeling. Findings The present study has successfully blended and verified the effect of supportive behavior of supervisor and new recruit’s FSB on the AC and IQ of newly hired employees. The study highlighted that supportive supervisors can encourage the newly hired employees to seeking feedback and enhance their commitment toward the organization. Further, this reduces the turnover intention of employees. Research limitations/implications The theoretical contribution of the study is in successful amalgamation of two major streams of studies on new recruits by assessing the effect of supervisors’ supportive behaviors and new recruits’ proactive FSB on their IQ. The study has also looked at the newly hired employees’ behavioral reactions during uncertain entry period and throughout the adjustment process. The limitations of the study are in the focus on one industry and cross-sectional data. In the future researchers can explore the relationships in a longitudinal study. Also, other variables like perceived organizational support and job satisfaction can be considered. Practical implications The present study demonstrates that supportive supervisors can motivate newly hired employees to seek feedback, and help them to “fit in” the organization. This study verifies that supervisors are considered as an important source of information for new recruits and the new recruits’ FSB positively influences their commitment toward the organization. Based on these results it is imperative for managers to be approachable and available to offer feedback to the new recruits in their initial days to ensure their adjustment, commitment and retention in the organization. This adds to sustaining the business and social well-being of the employees. Originality/value The present study offers a critical insight about the retention of newly hired employees in the organization. In the quickly changing VUCA world, these newly hired employees can be an asset for companies to build competitive advantage. However, to construct a strong future team for the organization, it is imperative that companies focus on augmentation of commitment among newly hired employees to further retain them. The present study proposes the path of empowerment among the new recruits to make them committed to the organization and to make sure that they stay with the organization in long run.

Organizational career management and turnover intentions: mediating role of trust in management

“…This becomes more important in our case as 66% of our sampled population were below 32 years. Prior research on young IT professionals has shown negative effect of supervisory support behaviours on employees' intention to quite (Deshpande and Gupta, 2019). The informal support extended by managers as well as friendly colleagues help youngsters get firmly embedded in the organization and mature in their domain expertise.…”

The influence of supervisor proactivity on perceived job demands and job outcomes among information technology subordinates in IT-related service projects

“…As a result, promoting experiences that lead to mastery, achieving work goals, stimulating self-growth, and achieving superior job performance is possible when job demands are efficiently optimized or dealt with (Bakker and Demerouti, 2017; Bakker and de Vries, 2021). Additionally, continuing training/coaching, communicating the company vision, and supporting supervisors may lead to positive social interactions and relational networks in the context of IT projects (Deshpande and Gupta, 2019; Jiang et al , 2020). Thus, supervisors still need to inspire and encourage their subordinates to take personal responsibility for their performance or to craft their own working conditions.…”

“…Similarly, global business activities are rapidly increasing, where there is heavy dependence on electronic devices to record every transaction and increased reliance on IT-related service projects provided by professional service firms to cope with the complexity of the business environment. It is reasonable to infer that improving IT employees' job satisfaction and organizational commitment is a strong determinant of project success (Deshpande and Gupta, 2019; Park et al , 2020). Therefore, supervisors should provide needed support to their subordinates to reduce perceived job demands and increase job resources.…”

“…A proactive supervisor may successfully recruit and retain qualified IT subordinates who provide high-quality services and increase the likelihood of successful project outcomes (Deshpande and Gupta, 2019). For example, Certified Public Accounting (CPA) firms, a knowledge-intensive industry and a good representation of specialized temporary organizations or teams, usually are project-based organizations that heavily rely on the knowledge economy to provide their unique project services.…”

Igniting work innovation: performance pressure, extraversion, feedback seeking and innovative behavior

“…So, their inclination towards social interactions (Huo and Jiang, 2023) simplifies seeking feedback in the workplace. Through feedback seeking, employees can gather information to adapt their behavior, considering their job and personal characteristics, for optimal performance and motivation (Deshpande and Gupta, 2021). FSB not only helps individuals cope with job demands and challenges but also mitigates burnout (Bouckenooghe et al, 2022).…”