Altruistic Work Values’ Relevance for Organisational Commitment in Germany

Abstract

Work values characterise employees’ goals in organisations across situations and influence employees’ work behaviour. Due to demographic change and the shortage of skilled workers in many industrialised countries, the importance of organisational commitment increases. Building on previous research on the value-commitment relation, we develop hypotheses on relationships of intrinsic, extrinsic and especially altruistic work values (which to date have seen little research) with affective, normative and continuance commitment. Based on an analysis of employee data from Germany (N=1,978), we find positive effects of the presence of altruistic work values on all types of commitment. Employees with strong altruistic work values are particularly loyal and organisation-oriented. We argue that the pure consideration of intrinsic and extrinsic work values largely and unjustifiably excludes the social orientation of employees at work, thereby squandering organisational development potential. Taking into account employees’ work values and particularly offering opportunities to live altruistic work values can be seen as a potential for increasing employees’ organisational commitment.