Analyzing the impacts of commitment and entrenchment on behavioral intentions

Abstract

The lack of a universal definition for the organizational commitment brings difficulties for improving knowledge about the construct. Following the commitment construct revision proposed by Rodrigues (2009) through the separation of its continuance dimension - now referred to as organizational entrenchment, this paper analyzed the relationships between organizational affective commitment and entrenchment with behavioral intentions. The study was conducted in a Brazilian information technology company with the participation of 307 people. The results show that organizational entrenchment is indeed a different construct than the organizational affective commitment. It was found that affective commitment to the organization is a predecessor of the intentions to stay, defend, and exert extra effort, while entrenchment displayed no relevant relationships with them.