The use of the psychological contract to explain turnover intentions in the hospitality industry: a research study on the impact of gender on the turnover intentions of highly educated employees

Abstract

The subject of this study is the psychological contract approach to the employment relationship within the hospitality industry with special reference to highly educated employees. The purpose was to research the differences in the psychological contract and its relation to the intention to leave between highly-educated male and female employees. The research study conducted among this specific group worldwide provided a corpus of 247 respondents. The results show that psychological contract measures, and in particular job content, can explain why there is a substantial amount of variance among highly-educated employees regarding their intention to leave an organization, especially if the mediating role of affective commitment is taken into account. Moreover, it would appear that for women in particular, promotion opportunities and work-family balance were related to turnover intentions while for men the clarity of the job description was an important predictor for leaving. We suggest that the results of this study should be considered when developing gender-specific HRM policies to retain highly-educated staff. Considering the limitations of this study, we suggest that it be followed by research studies which concentrate on the job aspects which may be related to employee turnover. A longitudinal study concentrating on the relation between the psychological contract, turnover intentions and actual turnover behaviour should also be carried out.

Keywords:

• affective commitment
• gender
• job content
• psychological contract
• turnover intentions

Notes

1. The sample was based on the situation in December 2005.