Understanding the factors that promote employability orientation: The impact of employability culture, career satisfaction, and role breadth self‐efficacy

TLDR

The authors investigated how individual factors (career satisfaction, role breadth self‑efficacy) and organizational employability culture influence employees’ employability orientation, turnover intention, and push/pull motives for leaving in a Dutch health‑care and welfare workforce. They surveyed 702 Dutch health‑care and welfare employees, measuring employability culture, career satisfaction, role breadth self‑efficacy, and push/pull motives to assess their relationships with employability orientation and turnover intention. A strong employability culture significantly predicts higher employability orientation and lower turnover intention and push motives, while pull motives are driven only by individual factors, suggesting that fostering such a culture can enhance orientation and reduce turnover.

Abstract

This study among 702 Dutch employees working in the health care and welfare sector examined individual and organizational factors that are related to workers' employability orientation and turnover intention. Additionally, push and pull motives were examined of employees who aimed to leave their job. Results indicated that a strong employability culture adds extra variance over and above individual factors such as career satisfaction and role breadth self‐efficacy in the explanation of employability orientation, turnover intention, and push motives of employees who aim to leave their job. That is, employability culture is positively related to employability orientation, but negatively related to turnover intention and to push motives of those who aim to leave. Pull motives of employees who want to leave are explained by individual factors only, such as career dissatisfaction and role breadth self‐efficacy, but not by employability culture. These findings suggest that organizations that need to adapt to changing environments should implement a strong employability culture, because such a culture stimulates employability orientations among their employees while simultaneously decreasing turnover intentions.