Impact of change readiness on commitment to technological change, focal, and discretionary behaviors

Abstract

Purpose – Commitment to change (C2C), focal and discretionary behaviors are under-researched areas in the context of developing countries such as Pakistan. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the impact of change readiness on employee’s C2C, focal and discretionary behaviors when controlling for gender, qualification, experience, and marital status. In addition, the goal of this study is to determine whether the three-component model of Herscovitch and Meyer (2002) may also be applied in the private manufacturing companies of Karachi (Pakistan). Design/methodology/approach – A sample of 205 fulltime employees having administrative and managerial responsibilities in the manufacturing operations is drawn from the manufacturing companies of Karachi undergoing major technological change. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses are used to evaluate the reliability and validity of the measurement model. Besides, hypotheses are tested using structural equation modeling in AMOS version 22. Findings – The standardized estimates of SEM revealed a very good model fit between the structural model and the sample drawn using different modification indices. The results show that appropriateness has significant positive impact on affective C2C and negative impact on continuance C2C when controlling for gender, qualification, and experience. Moreover, affective C2C has significant positive impact on compliance behavior. However, the continuance C2C has significant negative impact and normative C2C has significant positive impact on cooperation when controlling for marital status. The findings may be generalized on other private manufacturing organizations of Karachi. Originality/value – This study is one of the first to empirically establish a relationship among change readiness, C2C and active/passive change-related behaviors in the private manufacturing companies of Pakistan. One of the important theoretical contributions of the study is that the three-component model which has been empirically tested in various socio-economic settings in the Western context and in a Pakistani public sector organization may also be employed in the private manufacturing organizations of Pakistan. In particular, with respect to research instrument of “readiness for change” scale, it is also argued that the scale of the fourth dimension (i.e. personally beneficial) needs major revision by adding five to seven Likert-scale items having good content validity and high internal consistency of the measuring scale in the Pakistani context.