Development and validation of a commitment to organizational career scale: At the crossroads of individuals’ career aspirations and organizations’ needs

Abstract

This paper introduces the construct of commitment to organizational career (COC). Conceptualized as a specific form of goal commitment, COC reflects an individual's commitment to the goal of pursuing a long and successful career in an organization. We developed a 5‐item measure of COC and examined its validity and reliability in four studies involving employees from diverse organizations and occupations (Ns = 312, 187, 199, 309). We explore COC's distinctiveness from related constructs, including organizational commitment components (i.e., affective, normative, and continuance subdimensions) and career commitment, as well as its ability to predict turnover intention and voluntary turnover. Finally, we examine COC's antecedents and specify boundary conditions to its relationship to turnover. Overall, results support the reliability and validity of the COC measure. We discuss how COC contributes to generate promising research avenues for the career and commitment literatures.Practitioner points We introduce the commitment to organizational career (COC) construct. Four studies provide reliability and validity evidence for a COC measure that can be used in future research. COC adds to the career and commitment literatures and directs attention to organizational career goals as a common ground linking individuals’ and organizations’ interests. This common ground may provide a basis for both parties to build mutually beneficial relationships.