Dynamics of Organizational Identification, Psychological Contract Breach and Prestige During Early Socialization

Abstract

Though it is well accepted that employees have multiple identities which change over time, little is known about how organizational identification changes and the factors that cause these changes. The study reported in this paper examined the dynamic relationships of organizational identification with psychological contract breach, and perceived organizational prestige during the period of early socialization of newcomers in an organization. This longitudinal research used data from 1346 newcomers in an Indian IT services organization over their early-socialization journey consisting of organizational orientation, technical training and initial project work. Using random coefficient modelling and regression analyses the study shows that change in psychological contract breach is significantly related to change in organizational identification and change in perceived organizational prestige is significantly related to change in organizational identification. The study also shows that psychological contract breach change and perceived organizational prestige change impact organizational identification changes independently. These findings provide new insights to researchers on the lesser known dynamics of organizational identification, psychological contract breach and perceived organizational prestige, while informing practitioners about improving identification through higher focus on fulfilling psychological contracts, and maintaining the perceived prestige of the organization.