The Mediating Impact of Goal–Role Clarity on the Relationship between Feedback–Seeking Behavior and Goal Orientations with Job Satisfaction Intrinsic Cognitions and Person–Organization Fit

Abstract

This study aims to offer a design for the cognitive calibration of employees’ work behaviors. The study focuses on fostering sustainable behavioral patterns in the workplace by arguing that, to sustain the cognitive maintenance of workplace behaviors, the nexus between self-efficacy behaviors, ability beliefs, job–role clarity, and employees’ perceived alignment should be considered during human resource (HR) processes and events, such as feedback conversations and performance reviews. The tool used to collect our data was a questionnaire administered both in paper format and digitally through an online platform compliant with European data protection regulations, to 210 professionals from two IT companies in northeastern Romania (n = 116 for the first sample and n = 94 for the second sample). The series of questions included Likert scales addressing frequency, (dis)agreement, and clarity. The model was tested using SPSS v.27 and SMART-PLS v.4 software, and the study used partial least squares structural equation modeling to examine the proposed hypotheses. Findings for Study 1 indicated that role clarity partially mediated the relationship between feedback–seeking and job cognitions whilst fully mediating the effect on person–organization fit. Results from Study 2 indicated that role clarity partially mediated the relationship between goal orientations and job cognitions and fully mediated the effect on person–organization fit. Therefore, it is possible to aid employees’ in storing their employment narratives in coherent cognitive schemas while elevating their assessment of work values’ alignment and meaningfulness. On this basis, effective tools and methodologies should be made available to employees, at the individual and team level, to help them understand the cognitive processing endorsing workplace behavioral patterns, compatibility, and causality for them to sustainably transform their workplace behavior.