Article Preview
Top1. Introduction
The concept of employee commitment was emphasized several decades ago when Katz (1964) opine that “workers behaviour, essential for effectiveness includes” joining and continuing with the firm, carrying out explicit role obligation, and engaging in innovative and spontaneous activity that goes beyond defined roles. Katz (1964) further assert that engaging good employees is imperative for an organisation but a critical and even greater responsibility is the organization’s ability to create a committed workforce thus; the need for managers to understand the concept of commitment and how it can be influenced within the work environment must be studied by managers. As a result of today’s competitive and vigorous world every firm is facing new challenges regarding competitive organizational performance and creating committed workforce (Anthony, 2017). In this global and dynamic setting, no organization can compete at the maximum level, unless its employees are committed to the objectives of the organizations. Hence, it is important to understand the concept of commitment and how it can be influenced in the work environment for optimal performance. Conceptually, an employee commitment is a psychological state that binds the employee to the organization. (Bipeledei & Rachel, 2018). This implies that employee commitment is a connection between an employee and the firm such that he/ she want to continue serving the organisation and to help it achieve its objectives. Nevertheless, Meyer, Stanley & Parfyonova (2012) used a multidimensional approach to describe commitment and consider it to have affective, continuance and normative perspectives which will be further explored in this study.
The challenge of new employees leaving the organization as a result of low commitment after they have been trained remains critical. Streams of research acknowledged that a good number of organisations are contending with issues like employee retention, job performance, productivity and various employee engagement outcomes including employee commitment (Gonzalez, Leidner, Reimenschneider & Koch, 2013 & Xiongfei, Xitong & Douglas, 2016). More so, it is indisputable that encouraging employees to discharge their duties meritoriously and be committed to firm towards achieving organizational goals and objectives is one of the weighty challenges for many firms as opine by (Akinbode, Opayemi & Sokefun, 2013).
Several studies have been done on finding the new methods to how to increase the commitment of the employees in the organization in other to achieve success (Mkhyzer& Rehman, 2012; Bipeledei& Rachel, 2018). Madu, Asawo and Gabriel (2017) assert that the quest for organizational success in this 21st century depends on the firm’s ability to promptly respond to the unpredictable work environment, having a multi-skilled workforce as well as engaging workers who will feel connected physically, cognitively and emotionally to work roles. One of the key elements of the employee engagement framework is the deep affective involvement of workers who are active in their jobs. Undoubtedly, twenty first century firms are fast embracing the use of social media in recent times as its importance cannot be overemphasized. Essentially, social media have transformed communication in people’s lives with their wide spread growth and its application (Xiongfei, et al, 2016). The usability and application of social media has even penetrated the workplace, facilitating organizational communication and knowledge work which was impossible in the past (Akinbode, et al, 2013). Recently, social media tools have provided a new tool for organizational to communicate and internal social media systems are being used by firms to help new employees learn about their jobs, their colleagues and the organization (Gonzalez, et al, 2013).