Work Commitment and Job Satisfaction over Three Career Stages.

Abstract Four measures of work commitment (job involvement, organizational commitment, work ethic endorsement, and intention to remain), five job satisfaction facets, and six personal characteristics were examined under three career stage operationalizations: age, organizational tenure, and positional tenure. Results from a sample of 2200 public agency employees indicated that the selection of a career stage operationalization influences findings related to organizational commitment and intention to remain while job involvement, work ethic endorsement, job satisfaction, and personal characteristics are relatively unaffected by the operationalization chosen. Age was observed to explain more variation in the variables studied, when compared to the tenure measures. However, the overall levels of explained variation are low. Additional research designed to validate the concept of career stage is advocated.

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