Investigating Employee Turnover in the Construction Industry: A Psychological Contract Perspective
Publication: Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
Volume 142, Issue 6
Abstract
Employee turnover has long been, and will continue to be, a significant concern in the construction industry. Organizations that can retain skilled employees have a stronger competitive advantage. In two independent studies in China and the Philippines, the authors investigated the role of psychological contract breach in predicting employee turnover in the construction industry. The results reveal that psychological contract breach results in emotional exhaustion, which in turn predicts employees’ turnover intentions (Study 1) and actual turnover (Study 2). The results further suggest that younger as opposed to older construction workers who experience psychological contract breach are more likely to experience greater levels of emotional exhaustion and exit their organizations. Accordingly, to retain skilled workers, construction organizations should understand and continuously manage employees’ psychological contract expectations and provide more support to younger workers. This paper offers significant theoretical contributions because it is one of the few in the construction literature that examine both employee turnover intentions and actual turnover from a psychological contract perspective.
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Acknowledgments
It is acknowledged that the second, fourth, and sixth authors contributed equally. The authors would like to thank the National Natural Science Foundation of China for supporting Study 1 (Grant No. 71472066).
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
Volume 142 • Issue 6 • June 2016
Copyright
© 2016 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Jan 15, 2015
Accepted: Oct 9, 2015
Published online: Jan 11, 2016
Published in print: Jun 1, 2016
Discussion open until: Jun 11, 2016
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