An Empirical Assessment of Org Commitment_angle_perry_ASQ1981

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An Empirical Assessment of Organizational Commitment and Organizational

Effectiveness

Harold L. Angle; James L. Perry

Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 26, No. 1. (Mar., 1981), pp. 1-14.

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An Empirical Assess-merit of OrganizationalCommitment and Or-ganizationalEffective-nessHarold L. An gle andJames L. Perry

@ 1981 by Cornell University.0001-8392/81/2601-0001$00.75

Support for this research wa s provlded byth e U.S. Departm ent ofTransportat ion. O f-f ice of U niversity Research, th e GraduateSchool of Management, and th e Inst i tuteof Transportat lon Studies. Universi ty o fCal if ornla. I ~ l n e .he authors are indebtedto a num ber of their col leagues, particularly

Thestudy attempts to relate he organizational commitmentof lower-level employees to organizational effectiveness inorganizations offering bus services. Organizational com-mitment was found to be associated with organizationaladaptability, turnover, and tardiness rate, but not withoperating costs or absenteeism. Two subscales were con-structed to measure value commitment and commitment tostay in the organization. Few significant differences werefound between the subscales, as they relate to variousindicators of organizational effectiveness, and the overallpattern suggested the need to avoid simplisticassumptionsabout the impact of commitment on organizationally rele-vant behavior:

In a widely accepted paradigm in organization theory, organiza-tions and their members are seen in an exchange relationship.Each party makes certain demands on the other while providingsomething in return. March and Simon (1958) characterizedsuch an exchange in terms of organizational inducements andindividual contributions. They pointed out that employees'contributions to the organization take two general forms-production and participation -and they described some impor-tant differences in the antecedents of an employee's decisionto produce in contrast to the decision to participate.Students of organizational behavior have attempted to estab-lish reliable linkages between employee attitudes and organiza-tionally relevant behaviors, though wi th mixed results (Vroom,1964). Substantial attention has been directed recently towardorganizational commitment as the attitudinal component of thisrelationship (Hrebiniakand Alutto, 1972; Buchanan, 1974;Porter et al., 1974; Porter, Crampon and Smith, 1976; Steers,1977a; Stevens, Beyer and Trice, 1978).Some have proposedthat the concept of commitment may disclose reliable linkagesbetween attitudes and behavior, because commitment is pre-sumed to be a relatively stable employeeattribute (Porter et al.,1974; Koch and Steers, 1978).Commitment has been studied from so many different theoret-ical perspectives, however, that Hall (1977) remarked that w emight better abanaon the term altogether and deal instead wi tha set of concepts, each focused on one or another aspect ofcommitment. The term "commitment" has been used, forexample, to describe such diverse phenomena as the willing-ness of social actors to give their energy and loyalty to socialsystems (Kanter, 1968), an awareness of the impossibility ofchoosing a different social identity or of rejecting a particularexpectation, under force of penalty (Stebbins, 1970a), thebinding of an individual to behavioral acts (Kiesler, 1971Salancik, 1977), or an affective attachment to an organizationapart from the purely instrumental worth of the relationship(Buchanan, 1974). Some commitmentlike concepts, such asorganizational identification or organizational nvolvement, havealso appeared in the literature (Patchen, 1970; Hall andSchneider, 1972).The commitment framework adopted in the present researchhas been called the "organizational behavior approach" (Staw,


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(Port er and Sm ith, 1970; Porter et al., 197 4; Porter, Cramponand Smith, 1976; Steers, 1977a; Mowday, Steers and Porter,1979) and a similar conce pt is foun d in other research by Hall,Schneide r and Nygren (1970), Hall and Schne ider (19 72) andBuchanan (I74).Organizational co m m itm en t as defin ed by Porter et al. (1974)has thre e major com pon ent s: (1 ) a strong belief in and accep-tance of th e organization's goals, (2) a willingness t o ex ertconsiderable ef fo rt on behalf o f th e organization, and(3)adefin ite desire to m aintain organizational m emb ership. Re-search conducted with in this f ramew ork has indicated thatcom m itme nt is not only a predictor of employee retent ion(Porter et al., 1974; Koch and Steers, 1978), but may also be apredictor of em ployee eff ort and performance (M owd ay, Por-ter, and Dubin, 1974; Mo wd ay, Steers, and Porter, 1979 ).Organizational Commitment and OrganizationalEffectivenessOrganizational the orists see m t o agree that organizational ef -fectiveness is mult idime nsional (Campbell et al., 1974; Steers,1977b), and there is also reason to believe that th e d etermi-nants of organizational effe ctiven ess vary (Steers, 1977a; Ste-vens, Beyer, and Trice, 19 78).Although general organizationaltheory holds that th e structural features of an organizationshould f i t th e dem ands of environment and technology (Burnsand Stalker, 196 1; Wo odwa rd, 1965; L awren ce and Lorsch,196 7), organizational design, alone, wil l n ot ensure organiza-tional effec tiven ess . Even w he re th e structural prerequisiteshave been m et, the re remains a crucial requirem ent-that th eme mb ers of t he organization beha ve in a manner supportive o forganizational goals.Katz (1964) suggested three types of me mb er behaviors,reminiscent of Ma rch and Simon's (1958) participation andproduction framew ork, essential for a fu nctioning organization.No t only m us t th e organization induce m emb ers to join andremain (i.e., participate), but it m us t also m otivate tw o kinds ofproduction: dependable role behavior, as prescribed by th eorganization, and spontane ous and innovative behaviors wh ic hgo beyon d explicit behavioral prescriptions.Some parallels can be drawn b etw een th e elements of organi-zational co m m itm en t according to t he organizational behaviorschool (Porter et al., 1974) and the motivational taxonom ies ofMa rch and Simon (1958 ) and Katz (1964). A com mittedme mb er's de finite desire to m aintain organizational mem ber-ship wo uld have a clear relationship to th e m otivation toparticipate. Will ingness to exert considerable eff or t on behalf o fth e organization and the belief in and acceptance of th eorganization's goals, in combination, have imp lications for th eme mb er's m otivation to produce for th e organization- inaccordance wi th explicit organizational m andates, as well as inter m s of Katz's (1964) spontaneous and innovative behaviors.Expected RelationshipsIn the present research, it had bee n anticipated tha t severalmeasures of organizational effec tiven ess wou ld b e sensit ive todi f ferences in th e levels of com mitm ent of th e m embers of the


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Organizationa l Co mm itmen t and Effectivenessbo th high participation and high pro duction. Such organizationswe re therefore expected to sh ow relat ively low levels ofabsente eism, tardiness, and voluntary turnover, and h igh levelsof operating eff iciency. In addit ion, in keeping w it h the vi ewthat co m m itte d employees will engage in spontaneous, innova-tive behaviors on be half o f th e organization, it was anticipatedthat, w ith in l imits, organizational com m itm ent among th eme mb ers wo uld facilitate t h e ability of an organization to adaptto contingencies. The a daptability-comm itment relationshipwo uld not actually be expected to be mo notonic over allposs ib le levels of com mitm ent . Ext reme com mitm ent wouldprobably lead to fanatical behavior, suspen sion o f individualjudgment and the l ike, i .e. , the syndrome that Schein (1968)ter m ed "failures o f socialization." H oweve r, th e relationshipwas presumed to be posit ive and m onotonic over the range ofvalues actually encountered. W hile th es e outcom es are notexhaust ive, the y are typical of t he measures of ef fect ivenesstha t have appeared in the literature based on th e goal model oforganizations (C amp bell et al., 1974; Steers, 197713).Itwa s ant icipated th at t he relat ive strength o f t he relat ionshipbe tw ee n organizational com m itm en t and organizational effe c-t iveness mig htva ry depending upon the behaviors to wh ich theemployees w ere com mitted. Harr is and Eoyang (1977), buildingupon Steers' (1977a) notion of "active" and "passive" com -mitment , o f fered a four fo ld typology of com mitm ent as aconstruct having tw o bipolar dimensions: (1) com mitm ent, orlack of com mitm ent, to remain wi th t he organization, and(2)com mitm ent, or lack thereof, to wo rk in support o f organiza-tional objectives. W ith in such a framew ork, turnover me asuresshould b e m ost sensi tive t o the extent to whic h employeeswe re c om m itte d to remaining in th e organization. Conversely,tho se measures that m ore nearly reflec ted a decision byorganizational me mb ers to produce (M arch and Simon, 1958)should be more clearly related to their c om mitm ent to exertef fo rt on behalf o f th e organization. The latter category ofindicators includes no t only su ch perform ance dim ensions asservice eff icie ncy and adaptability, bu t absenteeism and tardi-ness, as well . Although th e term "part ic ipat ion" in com m onusage includes em ployee behaviors opp osite to absenteeism,as we ll as to turnover, Ma rch and Simo n (1958) defined th eterm solely wit h respect to turnover.METHODS a mp l e and Research SitesA total of 24 organizations, wh ic h operated f ixed-route busservices in wes ter n U nited States, participated in the study.Archival and transit manager questionnaire and interv iew dataw er e colle cted at all participating organizations, and employe equestionnaires w ere administered to mem bers of t he busdrivers' bargaining un it. Conseque ntly, a majority (91 percent ) o fthe respondents we re bus drivers; however, at a fe w o f theparticipating organizations, me cha nics andlor clerical personnelwe re included in the drivers' bargaining u nit and so we resampled along wi th the dr ivers. The total employee sample was1244, wh ile th e transit manager sample was 96.


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of t he e ffectiv ene ss of the ir em ploying organizations. D riving abus is one of th e m ore controlled yet one of the moreautono mou s blue-collar occupations. On th e one hand, driversm ust adhere r igorously to minute-by-minute schedules keyedto a f ixed route that mu st be fo l lowed exactly, and deviancefro m th ese schedu les has a high probability of discovery. Onth e other hand, wi thi n the constraints o f t ime and route, th ebus driver is like a ruler of a mino r kingdom . W he the r intend edby th e organization or not, a great deal of t he driver's be havior,w it h respect to passenger relations, is discretionary.For th e pa ssengers, th e driver is the organization. The netw orkof drivers tha t th e organization pu ts out on the road constitutesth e organization's public face. U lt imately, public att itudestow ard th e organization, and public util ization and support o f th etransit operation, may com e to depen d in large part on h o w wel lth e drivers represent th e organization to th e public. Thus, as atrue boundary-role person (Adams, 1976), he bu s driver may bein a unique posit ion to nfluence organizational outcome s, by heror his job-relevant beha viors. If these behaviors are, in any way,a function o f organizational comm itm ent, the n organizationalco m m itm en t and organizational performa nce m igh t be related.MeasuresOrganizational commitment. Employee comm itment w asmeasured by the 15-item Organizational Comm itment Ques-tionnaire (OCQ) (Porter et al., 1974), w hi ch has demonstratedgood psycho metr ic propert ies and has been used w it h a widerange of job categories (M ow day , Steers, and Porter, 1 979). Inthe present study, C ronbach's alpha w as .90. Tw o subscaleswe re also created, based on the results o f a factor analysis:value com mitm ent (alpha=.89) and com mitm ent to stay (al-pha=.72) , wh ich appear to d i f ferent iate betw een the respon-dents' co m mitm ent to support thego als of t he organization andtheir co mm itme nt to retain their organizational mem bership.Table 1 indicates th e factor loadings and sho ws w hi ch item swe re included in each of the subscales. As Table 1 indicates,the re wa s also a third factor extracted under the conventionalrule th at e igenvalues equal or exceed a value of on e (Nunnally,1978); how ever, only one ite m had its highest loading on tha tfacto r. Becau se single -item scales are notoriously unreliable,only th e t w o subscales m ent ioned were used.In order to assess the stability of th e factor structure obtained,cross validation wa s achieved by randomly dividing th e sam pleand conducting a n ew pair of factor analyses. The factor-loadingpatterns for the se analyses were virtually identical w it h thosefor th e overall sam ple; thus, t h e factor structure appears quitestable.The observation that th e ite m s loading on factor 2 we re allreverse-scored, while none of th e reverse-scored i tems w ereloaded on factor 1, gave rise, init ially, t o th e concern th at th estructure obtained mig ht have resulted from an artifact ofmeasurement. Althou gh it is l ikely that such an art ifact m ighthave contr ibuted to the separat ion of factors, the tw o clustersof questionnaire item s appear to be conceptually distinct.


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Organizational Com mitm ent and EffectivenessTable 1Rotated Factor Loadings fro m Factor Analysis for the O rganizational Comm itme nt Questionn aire*

I a m willing to put in a great deal of ef f ort beyond that normal ly expected in order to help thls organization be successful. I talk up thi s organization to m y frlends as a great organlzation to work fo r. I feel very l i t tle loyalty t o this organlzation (reverse d). I would accept almost any type of job assignment in order to keep wor king fo r thls organization. I f ind that m y values and the organization's values are very simllar I am proud to te l l others that I am part of t his organization. I could just as well b e working for a differen t organization as long as th e type of wor k we re simi lar (reversed). This organizat ion really inspires the best in m e n the wa y of job performance. I t would take very l i t tle change in m y present ci rcumstances to cause m e o leave this organization (reversed). I am extrem ely glad I chose this organizat ion to work for over othe rs I was considering at th e tim e I joined. There's not m uc h to be gained by st icklng wi th th is organization ~ n d e f i n ~ t e l y reversed). Often, I f ind i t d i f f icul t to agree w i th th is organizat ion's pol icies on important matters relat ing to i ts employees (reversed). I real ly care about th e fa te of this organization. For me, th is is the best of a ll organizations fo r wh ich to work. Deciding to wo rk for th is organizat ion was a def in i te mistake on m y part (reversed).

Eigenvalues* Only factor loadings above .30 are sho wn .** Factor 1 -value commitment; Factor 2 -commitment to stay.t I tem s included in value co mm itme nt subscale.* I tem s included in comm itmen t to stay subscale.

ness to perform for the organization, concern for the fate of theorganization, and congruence of personal values wi th those ofthe organization. Although three of the nine items relate toattitudes toward organizational membership, their wordingtends to imply that attachment is based on the member'spositive regard for the organization. In the aggregate, theseitems indicate a form of organizational involvement, whichEtzioni (1975) termed "moral" and which is clearlyanalogous toStebbins' (1970b) notion of value commitment.The commitment to stay scale includes a cluster of question-naire items that pertain to membership in itself. Unlike themembership-related items that load on factor 1, these items donot connote an affective bond to the organization. On thecontrary, the wording of this set of items conveys a generalimpression of Etzioni's (1975) "calculative involvement."Organizational effectiveness. Several aspects of overall or-ganizational effectiveness were tapped by the use of selectedperformance indicators. The rationale for the selection of thespecific indicators is discussed in an earlier paper (Perry andAngle, 1980b).Employee turnover (separation rate) was measured by compila-


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has received substantial research support, as doc um ente d in arecent review by Muchinsky and Tutt le (1979).Employee tardiness wa s com pute d as the ratio of recordedtardiness incidents to t he mean num ber of employees duringth e preceding f iscal year. Unfortun ately, adequate tardinessrecords had been m aintained by only 14 of t he 24 organizationsfor wh ich other performance data w ere avai lable.Absenteeism wa s obtained by self-report (Appendix).Liketardiness, reliable absence statist ics had not been maintainedby several o f th e participating organizations, b ut th e alternativemeasure was avai lable throu gh th e employee questionnaire.Operating expense was another measure of ef fect iveness . Ageneral not ion of ef f iciency seems to be comm on in m osttaxonom ies of th e dimens ions of organizational effectiveness.The broad concept of ef f ic iency involves the com putat ion ofratios of inputs to outputs, or of costs to bene f i ts. In public masstransit , ef f ic iency may be def ined in terms of t he extent tow hi ch t h e organization is able to m inimize operating costs,relat ive bot h to th e am ount of t ransit service provided and to th eoverall scope of t h e operation. Tw o perform ance indicatorswere, th erefore, selected for this purpose: operating expenseper revenue vehicle-hour, com put ed by dividing total operatingexpenses for th e preceding f iscal year by the total num ber ofoperating hours for th e revenue vehicles, and operating ex-pense per employee, using the total num ber of employees asthe measure of input .Organizational adaptability wa s mea sured by se lf-report, using amodi f ied vers ion of M ot t 's (1972) questionnaire. A four-ite mscale wa s constructed and incorporated in bo th th e e mployeequestionnaire and th e transit manager questionnaire (Appe n-dix). Th e adaptability of each organization wa s th us measuredt w o ways, i.e., by averaging th e responses to t h e adaptabilityscale separately for transit managers and for oth er em ployees.Procedures fo r Data Col lect ionArch ival d ata a nd q uest ionn aires. Archival data were col-lected and questionnaires adm inistered during two-day sitevisits. Em ployees had been m ade aware of the survey inadvance of each visit throu g h the internal comm unicationsyste m s of th e organizations. All questionnaires we re pre-sented direct ly to participating employees by a m emb er of theresearch team . In mo st cases, completed questionnaires,wh ich we re f il led ou t anonymously, we re returned direct ly toone of t he researchers before th e conclusion of th e sitevisit . Ina f ew cases, respondents w ere unable to complete question-naires in t ime, and so were furnished w it h preaddressed,postpaid envelopes for direct m ail return to th e university. In nocase did persons in th e chain of authority in th e organizationbec om e involved in adm inistering questionnaires. The re-sponse rate for th e primary me tho d of adm inistration (i.e.,on-site return) wa s 71 percent; howe ver, the overall responserate dropped to 64 percent w he n persons wh o w ere providedmail-return envelopes we re included in the computat ion. Theresponse rate from mail returns alone was 32 percent.Sampling goals we re established separately for each site, in


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Organizational Commitment and Effectivenesswa s 100 percent. At organizations having m ore than 1,000el igible employees, th e target was only 10 percent. In mo stcases, the targeted sampling objectives w ere achieved, theexceptions tending to be in tho se organizations for wh ich th etarget was 100 percent sampling.Since participation wa s voluntary, true random sam pling wa snot possible. Researchers attem pted judgmentally, howeve r,to d istribute ques tionnaires across categories of race and sex,and across th e apparent range of age and tenure. Analysis o fquestionnaire returns, ho wev er, disclosed some discrepanciesin proportional representation o f certain groups. Blacks w er eunderrepresen ted (14 percent in sample, 31 percent in popula-t ion); as were employees having mo re than f ive years' tenure inth e organization (3 0 percent in sample, 38 p ercent in popula-t ion); wo m en we re ove rrepresented (18 percent in sample, 6percent in population). Other groups ma tched sampling targetsreasonably we ll. R etrospectively, it appeared th at th e devia-tions fro m ideal proportional representation ma y have resulted,at least in part, from population difference s during th e wo rkshi f ts in whic h m ost of th e sampl ing ef fo rt had been concen-trated.

RESULTSOrgan iza t iona l Com mi tme nt : Sub group D i ffe rencesPersonal factors accou nted for several subgroup differen ces.Com mitm ent wa s positively correlated w ith age (r=.17,p


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we re older and had longer organizational tenure th an females.There w ere no signif icant sex differe nce s in educational levels.Measures o f Organ iza t iona l E f fec tivenessCorrelational analysis was th e principal m eth od used to assessorganizational-level relationships. P earson correlation co ef fi-c ients we re co mp uted wh ere marginal distr ibut ions we resymme tr ical and unimodal; however, forvariables wi th ske weddistributions, nonparametric correlations were substituted forPearson correlations. lntercorrelations am ong th e eff ective -ness ind icators are provided in Table 2 . All variables in Table 2we re mea sured at the organizational level; thus, t he self-reportmeasures consisted of th e ar i thme tic mean of responses toquestionnaires w ith in each participating organization.

Table 2lntercorrelations among Indicators of Organizational EffectivenessInd ica tors*1 Manager-perceived adaptabi li ty2 . Employee-perceived adaptability3. Absenteeism4. Intent to quit5. Separation rate6. Tardiness7. Operat ing expenselrevenuevehicle hour8. Operat ing expenselemployee

- ~ -*Pearson correlation coefficients are underlined; all othe rs are Spearman rho.*p


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- - -

Organizational Comm itmen t and EffectivenessTable 3Correlations betw een Co mm itmen t Variables and Indicators of Organizational Effectiveness*

Total difference betweencorrelations for valueOrganizational Value Commitment commitment and commitmentIndicator N commitment commitment to stay to stay?

Manager-perceived 24 -I 6 -I5 -I7 02adaptabilityAbsentee ism 24 .27 .26 .I5 . I 1Intent to qui t 24 -.36* -.28 -.60e** ,320Separation rate 24 -.48* -.44* -. 64* * .20Tardiness rate 14 -.48* -.46* -.35 . I 1Operating expense1 22 -.28 -.34 -.06 ,280revenue vehlclehourOperating expense1 20 -.21 -.35 .05 .40employee* Pearson correlation co efflclen ts are underl ined; othe rs are Spearman rho.t Statistical signif icance is indicated fo r the d i f fe rence betw een correlations between va lue com mi tment andco mm itm en t to stay. All signif icance tests are one-tai led.*~< . 05 ; *~< .01 ; **~< .001 .

adaptability, absenteeism, and intent to quit) were derived fromthe same employee questionnaires as the commitment mea-sures. In order to avoid the inherent single-source bias, analternative technique was used for the correlations betweenthese three indicators and the commitment measures. Thesample of respondents was randomly divided so that, for eachorganization, the measures of employee-perceived adaptability,absenteeism, and intent to quit were obtained from half of theemployees, while organizational levels of overall commitment,value commitment, and commitment to stay were obtained bytaking the arithmetic means for t.he remaining half of theemployees. Since the other performance measures were freeof single-source bias, they were all correlated with commit-ment scores that were based on the entire employee sample.Organizational commitment was significantly related to organi-zational adaptability, based on employee questionnaire data, butwas not significantly related based on manager questionnaires.This disparity was consistent wi th the low correlation betweenthe two adaptability measures (Table2).Turnover, that is, separation rate and intent to quit, wassignificantly related to organizational commitment, as was thearchival measure of tardiness rate. However, neither absen-teeism nor the two operating-expense ratios showed a statisti-cally significant association with commitment.When the two commitment subscales, value commitment andcommitment to stay, were substituted for the 15-item measureof organizational commitment, turnover appeared to be morestrongly associated wi th commitment to stay than with valuecommitment. This difference was statistically significant for


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1It is acknowledged that the significance ofthe difference between two correlationcoefficients, neither of which is statisticallysignificant, is difficult to interpret. How-ever, the fact that a correlation could haveoccurred by chance does not mean hat thecorrelation equals zero. In his instance, thelarger of each pair of correlations related tooperating expense is nearly significant(p


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Organizational Com mit me nt and Effectivenessoperating costs, and the probable reasons for this have beendiscussed in an earlier paper (Perry and Angle, 1980a).The overall pattern in Table 3 seems consistent with Harris andEoyang's (1977) notion that commitment to stay and commit-ment to work are Independent constructs and, in combination,have complex implications for organlzatlons. However, thetable shows fewer statistically significant relationships thanmight be desired, and there are some anomalies. For instance,although there is no significant difference between the correla-tions for employee-perceived adaptability and the two com-mitment subscales, the trend IS in a counterintuitive direction.Indeed, the largest correlation in Table 3 is betweenemployee-perceived adaptability and commitment to stay.It would seem unlikely that a linear relationship should existbetweenany form of commitment and organizational adaptabil-ity. At the extreme, commitment would appear to milltateagainst the individual's (and herefore the organization's) abilityto adapt to change (Salancik, 1977). It is more likely that, withrespect to adaptability, there is some optimal level of commit-ment-sufficient to evoke needed employee behaviors be-yond expliclt role stipulations, but not so strong as to incur thesuspension of individual judgment In favor of organizationalpreceptsAs an additional note on the number of nonsignificant relation-ships in Table 3, it should be recognized that this studyrepresents an attempt to find systematic relationships in a"noisy system." As is often the case wi th field research, thereare a number of uncontrolled variables. In particular, suchperformance measures as operating expense ratios are subjectto many influences besides the motivation of lower-levelemployees. Management competence, structural andtechnological variables, and various contextual factors combineto place limits on any potential effort-performance relationship.Two cautions are required. The first is about the cross-sectionalnature of the research. To the extent that Table 3 does showrelationships between commitment and indicators of organiza-tional effectiveness, the directionality of the causal arrow hasstill not been established. For example, however logical a casemight be made that some optimal level of employee commit-ment might foster organizational adaptability, there is thepossibility that organizations that are adaptable either inducecommitment in their members or tend to attract and retain adisproportionate share of committed types of employees.The second caution is about occupational specificity. As Salan-cik (1977) pointed out, the impact of employee commitment onan organization depends, not only on what the employees arecommitted t o do, but also on what the potential is for thosespecific behaviors to influence organizational outcomes. In thepresent research, for example, commitment to stay was shownto have a more clear-cut relationship to voluntary turnover thanto such indicators as operating costs. This may reflect the readyavailability of a replacement labor pool and relatively modesttraining costs in the transit industry. In an industry wherelabor-pool and technological considerations would combine to


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CONCLUSIONThe present research offered an opportunity to uncover acommitment-performance relationship, if such a relationshipexists, through cross-organizational comparison of commit-ment levels relative to performance measures within a singletype of service organization. Furthermore, there were reasonsto expect that the role of bus operator was such that abehavior-performance link might, indeed, exist.What the research most clearly accomplished was a construc-tive replication of a relatively large body of earlier work, showinga definite negative relationship between organizational com-mitment and voluntary turnover. Beyond that issue, the resultswere rather mixed. The statistics that could most nearly beconsidered bottom-line indicators fort he organizations thatparticipated in the research were the two operating expenseratios, yet these aspects of organizational performance werenot significantly associated wi th organizational commitment.Although employee-perceived organizational adaptability wasassociated with commitment, manager-perceived adaptabilitywas not. The relationship between tardiness and commitmentwas significant; however, employee tardiness rate was notsignificantly associated wi th organizational operating costs.The overall pattern of relationships between various perform-ance indicators and the two commitment subscales, thoughinconclusive, suggests follow-up research. The relationshipbetween commitment and behavior very likely depends on theform that commitment takes. Ratherthan assuming a simplisticrelationship between commitment and positive performanceoutcomes, organizational researchers will have to begin to dealwi th more complex factors.

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APPENDIX: Self-Report Performance IndicatorsInd icator Wo rd ing o f i tem Intent to quit Wh at are your plans for staying wlth this organization? 1. I intend to stay unti l I retire.2. 1 will leave only if an exceptional oppo rtunity turns up.3. 1 will leave if something better turns up.

4. 1 intend to leave as soon as possible.Absen tee ism How many workdays were you absen t f rom work in the last yea r (do no t count v a c a t l o n ) ? d a y s .Adaptability A scale was constructed from the following four questions (Alpha =.80). Responses were obtalned on a7-point summated rating scale wi th anchor words ranging from "strongly disagree" (1) o "stronglyagree" ( 7 ) :1. People In this organization do a good job anticipating problems.2 . People in this organization doa good job in keeping up w lth changes in ne w equipment and ne w waysof doing things.3. Wh en changes are m ade in routlnes and equipment, people adjust to these changes qulckly.

4. People in this organization do a good job coping w ith emergency situations brough t on by accidents.equipm ent and labor problem s, or other factors th at m ight cause temporary w ork overloads.


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You have printed the following article:

An Empirical Assessment of Organizational Commitment and Organizational Effectiveness

Harold L. Angle; James L. Perry


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References

Review: [Untitled]

Reviewed Work(s):

Prediction of Organizational Behaviorby Norman Frederiksen; Ollie Jensen; Albert E. Beaton;

Bruce BloxomPaul C. Buchanan

Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 19, No. 2. (Jun., 1974), pp. 287-289.

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Central Life Interests and Organizational Commitment of Blue-Collar and Clerical Workers

Robert Dubin; Joseph E. Champoux; Lyman W. Porter

Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 20, No. 3. (Sep., 1975), pp. 411-421.

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Correlates of Organizational Identification as a Function of Career Pattern andOrganizational Type

Douglas T. Hall; Benjamin Schneider

Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 17, No. 3. (Sep., 1972), pp. 340-350.

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Personal Factors in Organizational Identification

Douglas T. Hall; Benjamin Schneider; Harold T. Nygren


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Personal and Role-Related Factors in the Development of Organizational Commitment

Lawrence G. Hrebiniak; Joseph A. AluttoAdministrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 17, No. 4. (Dec., 1972), pp. 555-573.

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Commitment and Social Organization: A Study of Commitment Mechanisms in UtopianCommunities

Rosabeth Moss Kanter

American Sociological Review, Vol. 33, No. 4. (Aug., 1968), pp. 499-517.

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Investments and Involvements as Mechanisms Producing Commitment to the Organization

Mary E. Sheldon


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On Misunderstanding the Concept of Commitment: A Theoretical Clarification

Robert A. Stebbins

Social Forces, Vol. 48, No. 4. (Jun., 1970), pp. 526-529.

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Antecedents and Outcomes of Organizational Commitment

Richard M. Steers


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Assessing Personal, Role, and Organizational Predictors of Managerial Commitment

John M. Stevens; Janice M. Beyer; Harrison M. Trice

The Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 21, No. 3. (Sep., 1978), pp. 380-396.

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