Gendered implications of organizational gender diversity for voluntary turnover: human resource practices as strategic levers

Abstract

Listen

Translate article

Organizational gender diversity may not be as well received among male employees as among female employees, particularly in countries characterized by gender inequality. Through the lens of intergroup threat theory (intergroup threat is experienced when members of one group perceive that another group is in a position to cause them actual or symbolic harm), we conceptualize organizational gender diversity as a threat to male employees, which evokes male employees’ voluntary turnover, but as a support (threat mitigation) to female employees, which reduces female employees’ voluntary turnover. We also investigate whether certain types of human resource (HR) practices can moderate the gendered implication of organizational gender diversity for voluntary turnover. By analyzing data from South Korea, we found that while collective incentives negatively moderated the positive relationship between organizational gender diversity and male employees’ voluntary turnover, childcare benefits strengthened the negative relationship between organizational gender diversity and female employees’ voluntary turnover.