Impact of Organisational Culture, Trust and Participation in Decision Making on Multiple Commitments

Abstract

Employees are considered as an important asset to any organisation. The present study aimed at understanding the impact of variables such as organisational culture, trust, and participation in decision making on multiple commitments in employees such as group commitment, job involvement, normative commitment and continuance commitment. A research instrument was administered to each of 712 managerial employees working in Indian public sector undertakings (PSUs). Structural equation modeling was used as a statistical tool to verify the proposed relationships. The results of the analysis revealed that age was positively related to continuance commitment and job involvement. Education was positively related to continuance commitment and normative commitment. Tenure was observed to be positively related to continuance commitment, normative commitment, group commitment and job involvement. The findings revealed that supportive culture and bureaucratic culture significantly predicted group commitment. Normative commitment was only predicted by innovative culture. All three forms of organisational culture significantly predicted organisational learning. Apart from organisational culture, organisational learning is predicted by cognitive trust and participation in decision making. The findings revealed that affective trust significantly related to group commitment. Cognitive trust significantly predicted job involvement, normative commitment and organisational learning. Participation in decision making significantly predicted job involvement, normative commitment and organisational learning. The findings of this study also revealed that organisational learning significantly predicted group commitment and job involvement. This study presented the interrelationships among the commitment forms. It was observed that job involvement predicted group commitment, normative commitment and continuance commitment. Normative commitment predicted continuance commitment. In addition, organisational learning acted as a mediator between supportive culture and group commitment. The implications of these findings for people holding responsibility in PSUs have been discussed in this study.