Abstract
Orientation: The South African call centre industry is growing as call centres are increasingly used as a means of service delivery to customers. Positive psychologists posit that psychological capital could lead to positive outcomes such as organisational commitment of call centre staff.Research purpose: This study investigated the relationship between psychological capital, job demands and organisational commitment and intended to determine whether psychological capital and job demands predict call centre employees’ organisational commitment.Motivation for the study: The study aimed to explore potential links between psychological capital, job demands and organisational commitment of call centre employees. It is premised on previous research that call centre job demands may be related to commitment to the organisation.Research approach, design and method: This cross-sectional study sampled 117 call centre employees from Durban, South Africa, and used a biographical questionnaire, psychological capital questionnaire, the job-demands-resources scale and the organisational commitment questionnaire to collect data.Main findings: Findings indicated a statistically significant relationship between psychological capital and work overload, as well as a practically and statistically significant relationship (medium effect) between psychological capital and continuance organisational commitment. The results showed that psychological capital has predictive value for continuance organisational commitment.Practical/managerial implications: Psychological capital has predictive value for continuance organisational commitment. Organisations can develop initiatives to enhance positive psychological states and address this relationship.Contribution: The findings could be beneficial to management and employees in considering ways to boost psychological capital in order to improve organisational commitment.
Highlights
The call centre industry in South Africa and around the world is growing at a rapid rate and has provided many job opportunities for South Africans with entry-level skills (Benner, 2006)
Confirmatory factory analysis (CFA) would have been conducted but given the common problems associated with using CFA with small sample sizes and the fact that little research has been conducted in the area with the subjects used in this study, Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was favoured
The choice of EFA was prompted by the fact that the study used a small sample of 117 employees and is designed to make an additive contribution to the body of literature useful for those refining future research in the area
Summary
The call centre industry in South Africa and around the world is growing at a rapid rate and has provided many job opportunities for South Africans with entry-level skills (Benner, 2006). The demands placed on call centre employees in relation to customer delivery may take a toll on employees and may cause them to re-evaluate their commitment to the organisation. This is consistent with findings from previous studies Holman, 2003), which have revealed that call centre work places high demands on employees. The choice of subjects for the study is built upon the nature of the call centre work environment, which is often characterised by, amongst others, emotion work, which mostly entails the need to consistently display positive emotional job-requirements (Ortiz-Bonnin, Garcia Buades, Caballer-Hernandez & Zapf, 2013). In support, Holman (2003) adds that call centre work is often associated with high http://www.sajhrm.co.za doi:10.4102/sajhrm.v12i1.599
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