Job embeddedness theory : can it help explain employee retention?.

Job embeddedness;Extension service;Extension agents;University of Kentucky;Kansas State University

Jeffery A. Young

University:University of Louisville

Department:Department of Leadership, Foundations, and Human Resource Education

关键词: Job embeddedness;    Extension service;    Extension agents;    University of Kentucky;    Kansas State University;   

Others  :  https://ir.library.louisville.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2624&context=etd

美国|英语

来源: The Universite of Louisville's Institutional Repository

【 摘 要 】

Job embeddedness theory, as introduced by Mitchell, Holtom, Lee, Sablynski, andErez (2001), offers a method of discovering why people stay in an organization. Byanalyzing the construct's three dimensions (links, fit, and sacrifice) within communityand workplace contexts, an overall level of embeddedness was determined and then usedto examine retention among Extension agents (N = 454) in the Kansas and KentuckyExtension Services systems. An Internet-based survey was used to gather backgrounddata and responses to various scales (embeddedness, job satisfaction, organizationcommitment, engagement, intent to stay, and discretionary effort). Research questionswere examined through the use of correlations, analyses of variance, and linear regressionanalyses. This dissertation is divided into five chapters. Chapter 1 gives a historicaloverview of the problem of retention. Chapter 2 examines the major theories that scholarshave used to explain retention and the factors that influence it; particular attention isgiven to job embeddedness theory. Chapter 3 contains a discussion of the researchdesign, study population and sample, sampling procedure, instrumentation, and datacollectionprocedures. Chapter 4 presents the results of the study. The chapter presentsthe main analysis and more specific analyses by the study population's demographics (including comparisons of nonrespondents, respondents, and late respondents). Chapter 5provides a summary of the study; a discussion of the results; implications for theory,research, and practice; and a discussion of the study's limitations. In summary, Kansas and Kentucky Extension agents reported significantly different levels of job embeddedness over the study period. Regression analyses showed that job embeddedness was significantly correlated with and predicted unique variance in intent to stay. An examination of the participants' background characteristics showed that age, education level, and geographic state of employment significantly influenced certaincomponents of job embeddedness.