CHAPTER – 2

JOB CHARACTERISTICS AND CAREER

STAGE MODEL: LITERATURE REVIEW

 CHAPTER 2

JOB CHARACTERISTICS AND CAREER STAGE MODEL:

LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 INTRODUCTION

Career is developed in a person all through his life span. It is a set of job attitude and
skills developed through the experiences gained from diverse jobs held by a person in his
life time. Job characteristics develop person’s attitude towards the job. Job attitude
developed with time is an outcome of the experiences on the job and lessons learnt from
life. It has been observed that there exists some pattern in the job attitude developed over
the years with age and organizational experience.

Numerous studies have focused their attention on expectations of the employees and their
influence on various job outcomes viz. performance, satisfaction commitment and
turnover. Studies show various predictors of job expectations and perceptions developed
based on various aspects like culture, personality, industry, job profile, age, experience,
generation etc.

This chapter highlights the changes in job attitude, job dimensions, job expectations and
perception with time and its impact on various job outcomes. Chapter also brings to light
various components of job expectations and its variation. Another section of this chapter
outlines the conceptual frame work of career stage model. The career stage model

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involves various measurement inconsistencies as highlighted in the chapter. It also
intends to evaluate association of organizational outcomes with various career stages.

By and large the researchers have taken on Career Stage Model (CSM) of Super D.
(1957) or Levinson, Darrow, Klein, Levinson, and McKee (1978) as a working base. A
number of studies have suggested that relationships between commitment, attitudes and
work behaviours are moderated by career stage (e.g. Gould & Hawkins, 1978; Ornstein,
Cron & Slocum, 1989; Slocum & Cron, 1985; Stumpf & Rabinowitz, 1981). Yet, there
exists considerable diversity in the results of various researchers across the literature
alleging the need to integrate the results for better understanding of variations across
career stages. Need of the hour is not necessarily collecting additional empirical data, but
instead to integrate and draw a meaningful inference from the available data (Cohen,
1993).

2.2 CONCEPT OF JOB EXPECTATIONS AND PERCEPTION

This section is on Literature review of papers done to derive relevant

variables part of job expectations of an employee.
In a research article by David E. Berlew and Douglas T. Hall (1966) the relationships
among early job challenge, early performance, and later performance and success are
studied in two companies of a large industrial organization. The careers of the two groups
of managers are studied during their first six and seven years respectively with their
companies.

Company Expectations are taken as the independent variable. It is measured by rating

each subject from 1 (Low) to 3 (High) on 18 categories viz. job responsibilities, major
sources of satisfaction or dissatisfaction, relationships with peers, subordinates, and
superiors, career aspirations, salary, major occurrences in the past year, significant
aspects of personal life, and health. Success criteria and performance criteria are taken as
the dependent variables.

The three success criteria are; 1962 Adjusted salary (It will be the seventh year for the
first company managers and sixth for the second), Global appraisal and Success index.

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The four performance criteria are; Average effectiveness (Companies appraisal of the
overall performance of the manager), Over contribution (employees contribution
compared with the company’s expectations), Cumulative contribution and Performance
index (summation of other three performance criteria)

The Hypothesis of the research for entry managers proposed that employees who were
given more demanding jobs in the initial years (i.e. challenging jobs) perform better in
the coming years and be more successful than the employees who are given less
demanding assignments initially. The results support the hypothesis indicating that First
Company managers with challenging initial jobs better over next four or five year period
than those whose initial jobs were otherwise. It is found in their research that first year of
the career is a very crucial period during which meeting company expectations imbibes
positive job attitudes and high standards.

Bruce Buchanan II (1974) in his study explores two issues firstly, organizational
experiences influencing managers’ organizational commitment attitudes and secondly
variation of the relevance of these experience, with organizational tenure, particularly at
early career stages.

Thirteen experience scales are constructed each containing four or five items. These
experience scales included Role clarity, Peer group cohesion, group attitude towards
organization, Expectations realization, Reality shock, First-year job challenge, Loyalty
conflicts, Personal importance, Self-image reinforcement, Fear of failure, Organizational
commitment norms, Work commitment norms and Organizational dependability.

Based on the survey it was found that organizational experiences effecting organizational
commitment differ with the tenure in the organization. In the first year of the career
commitment of the freshers is most affected by the attitude of the people he works with.
Challenging job in the first year is an important experience along with value conflicts
making an impact on the commitment. In the career stage from two to four years self-
image and personal importance have emerged as important determinants of commitment.
Challenging job in the first year and the attitude of the people he works with, have come

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down the priority list of experiences in the second stage. In the last stage of five years and
beyond it is surprising to find resurgence of group attitude towards organization as a
crucial determinant of commitment as in the first stage. Expectation realization
experience is also vital for determining the commitment. High degree of discrepancy is
visible in the third carrier stage than as career starters possibly because of defensive
attitude of senior managers towards the young managers. The commitment variance
explained in the stage three regression is the lowest of the three tenure groups.

Another study discusses three theoretical models from met expectations research in the
fields of organizational behavior and consumer psychology. Brown, Venkatesh,
Kuruzovich and Massey (2007) compared three models and named them disconfirmation,
ideal point, and experiences only, based on their fundamental arguments. The three
models are tested in the context of new information system implementation in an
organization. Based on the focal constructs of the Technology acceptance Model (TAM)
the researcher measured the expectations, experiences, and system satisfaction for both
ease of use and usefulness.

Disconfirmation model states that whenever experiences fall short of expectations, they
result in decline in satisfaction i.e., a disappointment effect. On the contrary, when
experiences exceed expectations, a positive impact on satisfaction is observed i.e., a
positive surprise effect. Finally, Ideal point Model proposed that difference between
expectations and experiences, regardless of the direction, will lead to decline in
satisfaction. The ideal point model anticipates negative job evaluation weather the
expectations are attained or exceeded. The Experience only model views that experiential
outcome is most influential in outcome assessment and renders expectations insignificant
to the outcome evaluation.

For the purpose of this study information system satisfaction is taken as the dependent
variable and expectations and experiences regarding ease of use and usefulness are
considered as independent variables. They assessed expectations only after training on
the system assuming experience vital to form meaningful expectations. The five

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constructs used in the analysis are ease of use (expected), ease of use (experienced),
usefulness (expected), usefulness (experienced), and satisfaction.

The results indicated expectations do not play a role in influencing satisfaction with
respect to ease of use. However, expectations play a weak moderating role in influencing
satisfaction with respect to usefulness. The current work found no support for the
disconfirmation or ideal point models. The results only supported an experiences only
model for ease of use and a modified experiences only model for usefulness.

Mir, Mir and Mosca (2002) in their study examined the employee-organization
relationship in the current industrial scenario. New age employees have substantially
different expectations from the organization as compared to the traditional employees.
The changing employee organization relationship for new age employees has been
explored through the theoretical framework of organizational commitment. Different
propositions on organizational commitment are studied to dig out the strategies to boost it
in new age employees.

Mir et al. (2002) in this article has hypothesized that employees relationship with their
employers is moving from a social contract model to an economic exchange model. The
study contended that the values associated with recruitment, training, and retention of
employees in the older paradigm will now have to give way to the emergence of newer
values and techniques. The new age employees have higher level of work commitment
but lower level of affective commitment and continuance commitment. The paper focuses
on the factors that are important for that new age in their new jobs. The article focuses on
three human resource activities that need to be addressed to enhance the affective
commitment of new age employees namely, recruitment, Training and employee
retention. The result indicates the new age employee is a driven and innovative worker,
but is far less loyal to any organizational setting. The article further explains this
relationship in public sector which supports the generalizations made in this study.

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Fonner and Roloff (2009) study is done with an objective to see the impact of
communication with parents and employed friends on the attitude towards the
organization and employees expectations for organizational support and job security and
trust towards the future employer. The research focuses on how pre-employment
information seeking with family and friends affect the building of initial psychological
contract with the employer.

Students in the final year of their under graduation are contacted for the study. 157
students participated in the study but 153 questionnaires are used for further analysis. The
different measures in the questionnaires included negative workplace trends, emotional
support provided by parents and friends, feelings toward the workplace, psychological
contract, and organizational trust. Each ‘negative workplace trends’ and ‘emotional
support provided by parents and friends’ is measured using a three item scale made by
the author. Feelings toward the workplace are measured using a five item scale made by
the author. Rests of the scales, used for the purpose are standardized scales.

The results indicated that discussing negative work place trends with parents didn’t
significantly affected the positive feelings toward the workplace though such a discussion
with friends did made a difference. Emotional support from family and friends created
positive feelings toward the workplace though discussion about negative work place
trends with them hardly influenced the initial Psychological contract with the prospective
employer. The emotional support and the feelings towards the workplace generated after
interaction with family and friends, affected the expectations of organizational support.
The ‘emotional support’ and ‘the feelings towards the workplace’ shaped after interaction
with parents influenced the job security expectations but such an interaction with friends
didn’t really made any influence on the duo. The feelings towards the workplace
generated through communication with family and friends influenced the employee’s
expectations for the organizational trust. Emotional support by family could not be used
as a determinant of employee’s expectations for the organizational trust though emotional
support by friends can be used for determining the same. Lower Expectations for
organizational support and job security decreased the employee’s expectations for the
organizational trust.

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It is expected that exposure to downsizing and increased awareness of layoffs and job
insecurity prior to entering the workplace would negatively influence the psychological
contract of prospective employees as it does veteran employees, subsequently generating
lower trust as contract breaches do. The results did not support the logic, as discussions
of negative workplace trends are not strongly related to the psychological contract.

The emotional support prospective employees receive from parents and friends during
their preparation for the workplace empowers them and raises their optimism, which in
turn generates relatively positive expectations for their employer, regardless of their
exposure to downsizing and other negative workplace trends.

Broadbridge, Maxwell and Ogden (2007) conducted a study to examine the retail
students’ employment experiences their perception and expectations of the employment
in UK retailing. This is a qualitative, exploratory research conducted on 33 generation Y
retail students from two UK universities. The study explores the expectations of Gen Y
with special reference to retailing sector. The results indicated strong relationship
between job satisfaction and perceived managerial competence. Shop floor staff is
perceived to be under lot of pressure, to meet sales targets, and are still unsupported and
undervalued by their managers. Consequently students, who have worked under more
than one retail employer, are clearly able to gauge good employers from poor ones. Some
positive aspects of retail experiences were also reported proving the presence of some
good managers.

Thus, the student informants’ experience in retailing is characterized by a number of

negative and positive features. But the negative experiences doesn’t deter them from
continuing their careers in retailing, reflects the fact that they are optimistic about a
positive change in their environmental experiences in the coming future. Still it becomes
imperative for the employers to give more of positive experiences to the students to get
more of their commitment.

Several characteristics of Generation Ys are evident in the experience line of enquiry:

high education level, confidence, desire for fair compensation and a positive company

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culture, and preference for challenging work and managerial support. Absent from the
responses on experiences are comments on the values of diversity, equality and tolerance
that are associated with Generation Ys.

Regarding expectation of initial employment held by the students is to work for

employers who are prepared to invest in their development in order to enable their career
progression. The findings of the study describe Generation Y expectations, including
their interest in challenging work and creative expression, and to sacrifice their work life
balance initially. Providing good career development opportunities may motivate Gen Y
to take careers in retail.

Eddy, Schweitzer & Lyons (2010) examined the career expectations and priorities of
millennial generation in Canada and explored differences in this region based on their
demographic factors and academic performance. The factors considered for investigating
the career expectations of millennial generation are expectations about careers, pay and
advancement, and work attributes which they consider important when making their job
choice decisions.

Career Expectation based findings indicate that women are expected to accept a less-
than-ideal job but and less probable to work with a single employer for their whole
career. More work experience results in lower probability of accepting a less-than-ideal
job or seek a career-long employer.

MANOVA results indicated that gender, visible minority status, work experience, GPA
(Grade Point Average), and year of study are all significantly related to the set of 16 work
attributes. Furthermore, a significant interaction effect is observed between gender and
visible minority. Significant differences between visible minority and non-minorities are
observed in the importance ratings of 10 of the work attributes. Women rated all the work
attributes higher in importance. People without work experience, considered health and
benefit plans, job security, commitment to social responsibility, commitment to employee
diversity, opportunities to make a personal impact, and opportunities to have a social
impact; more important.

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Harpaz, Honig and Coetsier (2002) examined the cultural variations in the socialization
process of youth, from seven different countries during their transition into the world of
work. It represents two year longitudinal study among young career starters and their
work values. Seven countries are selected for a spread of cultural differences as indicated
by Hofstede’s (1980) (as cited in Harpaz et al., 2002) measures and included: Belgium
(Flanders only), Israel, Italy, The Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom.
This finding highlights the importance of monetary and economic rewards at the initial
employment stage, with an apparent growth in the importance of other aspects of the
working environment with increased working experience.

Stefan Su and Markus Kleiner (2010), tried to explore the commitment and work related
expectations of German IT Freelancers. To start with exploratory survey is conducted
with fifteen IT freelancers to determine the factors for their commitment and work related
expectations. Thereafter a quantitative online survey is conducted with 150 freelancers
being part of the survey. The questionnaire contained questions on the personal
characteristics and commitment scale including three dimensions of commitment i.e.
affective commitment, Continuance/ Calculative commitment and normative
commitment. Scales of different work analysis techniques are also used to identify the
work-related expectations that freelancers address to a company and the actually
perceived working conditions could be judged.

The results indicated that the affective commitment is more pronounced than the
normative and the continuance commitment. However, the affective and the normative
commitment show a significant correlation. Working conditions showed the strongest
correlations with affective commitment. The strongest positive correlations existed with
the variables participating leadership and positively perceived company characteristics.

A Case Study by Erickson (2009) discusses the issues of Gen Y employees in an

Entertainment Company. This fictional case study explores a dilemma that many
companies face: How to integrate Gen Y employees, who have unconventional attitudes

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toward work, into their staffs. The case also tries to touch the conflicts that may arise
because of generational differences between a manager and a subordinate.

This case is about Josh Lewis, a young staffer at Rising Entertainment, is frustrated
because his boss, marketing chief Sarah Bennett, won't listen to his ideas about using new
media to promote films. She's trapped in the 1990s, he thinks, when people actually
watched network TV! Rushing through his assignment for a team presentation, he works
up a plan and pitches it to the CEO in the hallway. The CEO loves it, but Sarah is upset
with Josh for going over her head - and submitting subpar work on the presentation. How
can these members of two different generations work together effectively?

Lee (2006) conducted a research with an objective to investigate what kind of aspects
contribute to physical work environment satisfaction based on employees’ perceptions
and expectations and its relation with the job satisfaction. In the present scenario the
employees are considered as important as the customers. So Lee (2006) has used
SERVQUAL measure which is generally used to measure service quality perceptions and
expectations of a customer.

The study is carried out in Michigan, USA. 409 completed questionnaires are received
but 384 are used for analysis. Employees are presented with paired questions judging
their perception and expectation about the work environment. The responses are taken on
a Likert scale of 1-7. The most significant aspects related to work environment
satisfaction are quiet and undisturbed environment, quality of equipment, control over
temperature, flexible workplace, amount of storage, lighting control, etc. To test the first
hypothesis regression analysis is run and the results indicated perception measures had
larger number of predictors than gap measures. No significant differences were found
between perception measures and gap measures for explaining job satisfaction. Second
hypothesis is analyzed using correlation analysis and the results indicated a positive
correlation between the environment satisfaction and job satisfaction. Findings exhibit
physical environmental status below expectation levels leads to dissatisfaction, but
exceeding expectation levels does not increase satisfaction levels.

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Siegel (1973) tries to explore the relationship between Machiavellianism and leadership
style viz. Theory x-Theory y. To achieve the same it measured the Machiavellianism and
leadership style, among Managers, MBA students and some faculty and tried to establish
a relationship between the two.

It is hypothesized that high Machiavellians would be more favorably disposed to

participative techniques of leadership but not necessarily accept underlying assumptions
concerning the abilities of subordinates.

The two questionnaires are administered to two groups of 18 managers attending

executive programs at two Ontario business schools. The same questionnaires are also
administered to 33 full time and 40 part time MBA students. In addition, the Mach V
questionnaire is administered to 13 faculty members at one business school.

Managers are slightly more democratic and less authoritarian in leadership attitudes than
MBA students; however, this difference is not statistically significant. The results
indicated that managers tend to be more participative than MBA students on all four
dimensions in leadership scale, with the largest and statistically significant difference
occurring in the area of having faith in others. Managers and MBAs express relatively
greater agreement with the "techniques" of participation (i.e. group participation methods,
sharing information) than with under- lying faith in the capacity of subordinates.

The correlations of Mach V scores with various leadership dimensions are also generated.
The relationship between Machiavellian scores and overall leadership scores is negative
for both MBAs and managers; i.e., the more democratic the attitudes the less
Machiavellian. The relationship is negative across both managers and MBAs for two sets
of items, faith in others, and, to a lesser extent, participation. However, there appears to
be a significant difference between MBAs and managers in the correlation of
Machiavellianism to attitudes with regard to sharing information.

It is hypothesized that Machiavellianism should be related to these differences; i.e. the

manipulative individual would endorse techniques of participation but would not ascribe
to having faith in the capacity of others. The hypothesis is supported in the managerial
sample, with the resultant correlation, but not in the MBA student sample.

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Machiavellianism tends to be negatively related to participative leadership attitudes for
both MBA students and managers. Managers are less, and MBA students more
Machiavellian than the norms; faculty are most Machiavellian of all.

The study by Martin (2005) is about the challenges being faced by Gen X managers
while dealing with Gen Y. It reflects light on the characteristics of generation Y and how
Gen X managers by understanding their behavioral aspects, make them highly
productive.

The maintenance part indicates that a Gen X manager need to keep them motivated
despite the Y’ers being highly demanding, trying to learn fast, want quick feedback and
returns on their performance etc. The Gen Y is self-reliant and independent but work
better in teams. Y’ers are techno savvy and have an urgent sense of immediacy. They
want more responsibility but hate the micromanagement. They want freedom and
flexibility and don’t want to commit themselves for longer time to an organization. Study
also states guidelines on how the mangers can turn the high maintenance into high
productivity. Gen Y being a very resourceful, productive workforce; organizations
conversant with ways to energize and focus their talents have a competitive edge over
others.

Chadwick (2008) examined the engagement factors that are most important to employees
and found that although factors such as compensation are important, higher levels of
engagement result in intangible ways that depend primarily on the employees' leaders.

A total of 150 employees, who represented 16% of the organization, completed the
anonymous quantitative survey that followed. The questions are based on the themes that
emerged from the two world cafes, and the results reveal that the following four items
have the greatest impact on employees' engagement and commitment: (a) the opportunity
to provide input into decisions that affect employees' work, (b) clear work expectations,
(c) flexibility in working hours, and (d) compensation. Research methods revealed that
leadership, which refers to EUB employees' immediate or next-level supervisor, has the

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most impact on employees' commitment. In all cases the desired leadership behaviours
described is transformational leadership, which is characterized as "providing support,
encouragement, and coaching to followers. In the world cafes the participants most often
characterized leadership as (a) support for work-life balance, (b) appreciation, (c)
feedback, and (d) respect. The survey identified factors within communication and work
flexibility as having the second highest impact. Specifically, they refer to immediate
supervisors' support of employee work-life balance and encouragement of input into
decisions that directly affect the work being performed.

Additionally, this study discovered that employee expectations of engagement factors

vary by gender and generational cohort. Examining the data by generational cohort shows
that the Generation Y respondents placed a higher value on benefits than on
compensation, whereas the Generation X and baby boomer respondents rated
compensation as having the most impact.

A study by Dutta and Punnose (2010) is carried out in a leading business school, which
ranks among the top 10 business education institutes in India with a final useable sample
of 196 students of MBA final year. Mean score analysis indicates career development,
self-development and responsibility at job as the most important factors considered while
taking a job decision. On the contrary, ANOVA results show that females expect
differently with key factors being, good job title, favourable location and a company
having good reputation.

Rousseau (1989) conducted a research with 224 MBA students on their new hire
perceptions and their employer's obligations. Obligations are different from expectations
in terms of employee’s reactions towards them; whenever employer's obligations are not
met the employee’s react with a more emotional response or outcome (like employee
turnover) as compared to expectations which are more generalized. Employees likely to
stay with the organization plan to develop relational obligations with the employer.
Relational obligation on the part of the employer of job security, the employee promises

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for loyalty and minimum employment length. Canonical correlation also revealed
employers transactional obligations of high pay and career advancement in exchange for
hard work by the employee.

Nicholson and Arnold (1991) found that graduate expectations about their job roles to be
unrealistic. But soon after, with the time spent in the job they become clearer about their
job responsibilities. They expect jobs with more managerial content wherein they can
apply their intellectual and cognitive skills but they are not given such roles initially.
With socialization employees grow and their interests, needs and work activities change
with time and experience.

Woods (1993) investigated the applicability of Quality Function Deployment in

understanding and meeting the expectations of employees from the organization. QFD is
used in facilitating the relationship between customer and company. It helps in improving
the customer/ company interface. Here the researcher has tried to foresee the quality tools
application in more effective resource deployment. QFD provides a practical way to
display all data and allows data management in packages of reasonable sizes. It keeps the
expectations of the stakeholders visible consistently trough development, analysis and
implementation of the delivery vehicles which are intended to meet the indentified
expectations.

Valadez (2006) focused on experiences in 3 business processes- information systems,

operations and people- provide the business practitioner with an attitude measurement for
guidance and utilization. Forming a mathematical ratio between employee’s experiences
and their expectations in these 3 processes creates the measurement, Workplace attitude
(WPA) index. This study formulates the relationship into a simple mathematical form
[WPA Index = f (experience/ expectation)].

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The WPA index signals the readiness of the workers to undertake a new task or accept a
change in the organization. Positive attitude often lead to value creation for the
organization. When expectations are not matched by experiences, the results may lead to
negative attitudes that will affect the work environment. The purpose of this study is to
develop a heuristic attitude measurement (WPA index) that provides a useable index for
the business practitioner with the minimal time investment and expense. The research
studies the relationship between the work place attitude and WPA Index. It also explores
other relationships like job satisfaction and the WPA Index.

The research is a descriptive research using convenience sampling of 125 MBA and
undergraduate business students. The instrument measures the experiences and
expectations in three business processes namely as systems, operations and people. The
results reveal that work place attitude could be measured by ratio between employee
experiences and employee expectations.

2.3 CAREER STAGE MODEL – CRITICAL REVIEW

Career Stage Model initially developed by Super (1957) primarily focused on four career
stages namely: trial, establishment, maintenance, and decline. He (Super D., 1957;
Super, 1984) states that every employee passes through these stages in chronological
order irrespective of the age he belongs to. People re-enter these career stages when
encountered with major changes (e.g. change in job, company, and occupation) during
their career course (Stout, Slocum, & Cron, 1987; Super D. E., 1984). It is further
investigated that Super CSM is closely associated with individual’s job attitudes
(Ornstein et al., 1989; Smart, 1998). Later Savickas (2002) further substantiate similar
stages in his developmental theory of vocational behavior.

Many other researchers have also done remarkable work in this area. During the same
period, Levinson et al. (1978) identified four life areas: childhood (0-20 years), early
adulthood (20-40 years), middle adulthood (40-60 years), and late adulthood (over 60
years) that have been referred by many researchers while exploring CSM. Few
researchers have discussed career stages on different lines like; Dalton, Thompson and

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Price (1977) in his research gave four career stages namely apprentice, Self dependent,
Mentor and senior management. Crucial difference between Dalton et al. (1977) and
Super (1957) model is that Super took age as the classifying criterion whereas Dalton
found it ambiguous.

2.3.1 Operationalization Methodology differences

The methodology used by most of the studies differs from each other in some respect or
other making it difficult to generalize the results. Career Stages are operationalized
differently, as a function of variables like Organizational tenure (Ornstein et al., 1989),
occupational tenure (Aryee, Chay & Chew, 1994; Mount, 1984; Stumpf & Rabinowitz,
1981;), rank of faculty member (Peluchette and Jeanquart, 2000), positional tenure, age
etc. Some researchers have even used multiple operationalizations of career stage
including age with organizational tenure (Cohen, 1993; 2004; Kaur & Sandhu, 2010;
Singh & Singh, 2010), age, organizational tenure and position tenure (Allen and Meyer,
1993; Morrow and McElroy, 1987; Noordin, Rahim, Ibrahim, & Omar 2011a&b).
Ornstein et al. (1989) stated that career stages can be based either on age or on
organizational, positional or professional tenure. However majority of the research has
taken age (Giri & Santra, 2010; Kram & Isabella, 1985; Pogson, Cober, Doverspike &
Rogers, 2003) as the operationalization variable in CSM rather than psychological fit as
in Super’s CSM.

Different operationalizations by the researchers question the direct usage of Career Stage
Model. Morrow & McElroy (1987) cautioned that different operationalizations of CSM
show different employee reactions (eg. organizational commitment and intention to
remain) across career stages but in vain researchers continued to measure using different
methods. This further questions the reliability of the studies as the results of many of
these studies differ making it difficult for the HR professionals to rely on them. The
results seem to relate more closely, only for the organization in which the research is
executed rather than being generalized over to other organizations.

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2.3.2 Nomenclature and Time Frame differences

Situation has been further aggravated by the usage of different nomenclature and time
periods by various researchers. For example the age of different subgroups varies
considerably across different empirical studies. Some researchers (Allen & Meyer, 1993;
Conway, 2004; Giri & Santra, 2010; Gould, 1979; Morrow & McElroy, 1987; Singh &
Singh, 2010; Slocum & Cron, 1985) classified employees as being in the trial or
exploration stage for less than 30 years old, in the establishment stage for the ones
between 31 and 44, and in the maintenance stage for being over 45 years. These
classifications are also considered by many of them as early career, mid- career and late
career stages. Others like ( Cohen A. , 1993) have divided employee age into four time-
frame subgroups: (a) up to 30 years represented the trial or the exploration career stage,,
(b) 31 to 35 years, represented establishment or settling-down stage, (c) 36 to 40 years,
represented advancement stage and (d) older than 40 years represented the maintenance
stage. Another age classification has been explored by Rabinowitz and Hall (1981), in his
study where people are categorized by ages 21-35, 36-50, and over 51. Kram and Isabella
(1985) divided career into three age groups of 25-35, 36-45, and 46-65, representing
individuals in early, middle, and late career stages. Yet another sub group explored is
(Cohen A., 1991; Conway, 2004) 30 years or under, 31 to 40 years, 41 years or more.

Organizational tenure categorization by most of the researchers is like: (a) up to 2

years, (b) 3 to 9 years, and (c) More than 10 years representing trial, establishment, and
maintenance stages respectively by some and early, middle, and late career stages by
others (Allen & Meyer, 1993; Cohen A. , 1991; Conway, 2004; Gould, 1979; Gould &
Hawkins, 1978; Modi & Patel, 2012; Morrow & McElroy, 1987; Mount, 1984; Singh &
Singh, 2010; Stumpf & Rabinowitz, 1981). Gould & Hawkins (1978) proposed these
groupings as establishment, advancement, and maintenance stages. On the other hand
Cohen A. (1993) has divided Career stage into three subgroups: (a) 1 to 4 years, (b) 5 to 8
years, and (c) 9 years or more. According to Hall & Nougaim (1968) the establishment
stage lasts for one year. It has been found that first year experiences are the most
influential year in framing job related attitude (Berlew & Hall, 1966). Buchanan II (1974)
has referred to career stages as influence susceptibility stages and skewed them towards

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earlier career years assuming these years being crucial in shaping attitude towards the
organization. The groups namely initiation stage, performance and outcome stage
areundertaken with first year, second through fourth and five years and beyond as the
three influence susecptibility stages .

An altogether different classification is done by Brooks and Seers (1991) who considered
five subgroups (18-21, 22-27, 28-32, 33-40, 41 and older), namely early career stage,
mid-career and late-career. According to Greenhaus et al. (2000), there are five stages in
career development: (1) Occupational choice: preparation for work; (2) organizational
entry; (3) early-career: establishment and achievement; (4) mid-career; and (5) late-
career. So many diverse operationalizations and understanding of career stages has led to
an ambiguity in settling on groupings of CSM; there by leading to difficulty in comparing
the results of different researchers. Operationalization diversity not only affects
generalizability of results but also questions the validity of the research. This brings in
scene the need to bring in consistency in the operational definition of career stages
(Mount, 1984).

The only consistency observed in research on CSM is preponderance of Supers’

terminology (i.e. trial, establishment, maintenance, decline) (Allen & Meyer, 1993; Aryee
et al., 1994; Cohen, 1993; Flaherty & Pappas, 2002a; Hall & Nougaim 1968; Peluchette
& Jeanquart, 2000; Schein, 1971) but with different measurement criterion. This further
adds to ambiguity while comparing results as similar nomenclature have different
measurement criterion. For example can the results of occupational tenure with time
period range of 2,8 and 10 (in time period sub-groups of > 2, 3-10, >10 Yrs) and age
with time period range of different career stage 5-8, 10-15 and 5-10 (time period sub-
groups of < 30, 31-40, > 40 years and<30, 31-44, >45Yrs) be synchronized. When
employee as per age measure enters maintenance stage, as per occupational tenure
measure he is on the verge of leaving this stage or start with disengagement stage (Reilly
& Orsak, 1991). As implicit from the above, it is not advisable to compare results make
statements about the characteristics of these stages, when one is talking about different
timings of the career with similar nomenclature with different measures. Therefore it is
desirable to study and analyze the dissimilarities arising because of interaction impact

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between socialization into a new career or company or a position before comparing the
results of different studies.

2.3.3 CSM- Role as a Differentiator

Inconsistencies as stated above, in nomenclature and methodologies do not undermine the

relevance of Career Stage Theory (CST), in understanding the differences in job
expectations and attitudes at different career stages. The basic objective of any
organization is to ensure congruity between HRD policies and the needs of the individual.
A proper assessment of CST guides HR professionals in formulating polices apposite to
employees needs at a particular career stage. As rightly stated (Conway, 2004) in diverse
organizational settings correct HR practices will lead to positive performance outcomes.
Therefore an HR professional should bear in mind that Career stage influences
employees’ attitude towards HR practices thereby affecting the organizational outcomes.
Isabella (1988) established that career stage provides a frame of reference when
interpreting organizational events and thereby assigning meaning to it.

Researchers in vocational psychology and sociology in diverse occupations have shown

that one can find job attitude differences with career stage changes (Cron, 1984;
McElroy, Rodriguez, Griffin, Morrow & Wilson, 1993; Mount, 1984). Career stages
determine ones attitude towards promotion opportunities and satisfaction with one’s
supervisor (McElroy et al., 1993).

Empirical research has shown differences in job attitude, job satisfaction, corporate
culture perception and job performance across career stages (Chattopadhyay & Gupta,
2005; Cohen A., 1991; Cron & Slocum, 1986; Ornstein et al., 1989; Rabinowitz & Hall,
1981; Stumpf & Rabinowitz, 1981). Next section tries to integarte the charcteristices of
different career stages with different nomenclature with similar time periods.

2.4 CAREER STAGES VARIATIONS

Career stage theory initially developed by Super (1957) stated that every individual
experiences four stages of career concern viz. exploration, establishment, maintenance

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and disengagement during the development of their careers. Career stage model is based
on the assumption that variation in individual’s work attitude and behaviours within a
career stage is less than the variation between career stages (Mount, 1984).

Cron (1984) gave career stage model using Super’s (Super, 1957; Super, 1984) Adult
Career Concerns Inventory (ACCI). Based on the work of career stage theorists (Hall &
Nougaim 1968; Schein, 1971; Super, 1984; Super, 1957) he established four stages
through which an employee has to pass through viz. exploration, establishment,
maintenance, and disengagement. He realized that various aspects of job attitude and
behavior are influenced by the career stage employee is in. In this section an attempt has
been made to integrate different studies using different nomenclature. Characteristics of
employees have been divided into three sub sections each using different career stage
measure viz. Super’s psychometric measure, age and organizational tenure. Studies using
occupational tenure have been included in age section and the one’s using positional
tenure has been included in organizational tenure sub-section.

2.4.1 Trial/ Exploration Stage/ Early Career stage

[Link] Super’s psychometric measure

Exploration stage is the first stage in an employee’s career. Employees in this stage are
more concerned about clarifying their career interests and aptitudes so as to be able to
give their careers a right direction (Super, 1957). Cron (1984) hypothesized that
employees in this stage have lower expectations because of limited job knowledge and
information. This incomplete information creates a misleading picture about their skills,
abilities and effectiveness techniques. The process of finding a right match for
themselves and their skills, involves lot of struggle on their part at the entry level.
Therefore this stage involves highest increase in the expectancy estimates of the sales
people. This is the stage when employees explore through various occupations find one
for themselves in which they can succeed and grow in future. Due to lower occupational
commitment and inexperience there is high possibility of frequent job switches (Slocum
and Cron, 1985). The basic question hovering in their mind during this point in time is.

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"What do I want to do for the rest of my life?" (Cron, Dubinsky, & Michaels, 1988). So
the primary focus in this stage is self-discovery and developing a professional image for
themselves. This stage preferably involves developing competences and gaining peer and
organizational acceptance (Hall & Nougaim, 1968; Levinson et al., 1978).

Isabella (1988) also confirmed that in this period employees work towards learning skills
and understanding their jobs better. Task mastery is undertaken as the frame of reference
in this stage. He further established that organization plays major role in influencing the
frame of reference relevant in this stage (Schein, 1971). Therefore it is suggested that
organization plays a dominant role in career development by establishing values and
beliefs shared by organization and learning from their day today experiences.

Slocum and Cron (1985) further established that employees in exploration stage have
greater propensity to relocate and shift jobs more frequently as compared to those in
stabilization or maintenance stage (Ornstein & Isabella, 1990). Individuals make efforts
in the job that interests them or otherwise are even ready to switch in no time if they find
themselves in a wrong place. Relocation or switch overs are welcome for sales people in
this stage if it ment promotions. In trial stage performance is the lowest but if supervisor
plays the role of a mentor and help newcomers in resolving critical career issues, thereby
gearing them up for promotions. Their promotion timing expectation is similar to the
sales people in stablization stage. Nevertheless, they are more satisfied with the
promotional opportunities and less satisfied with their jobs as compared to establishment
or maintenance stage. Other satisfaction attributes like satisfaction with supervision, pay,
and co-workers are not related to career stage. They cofirmed that employees here had
least job involvement but are unable to confirm the earlier assumtions that they also
scored least on job challenge or psychological success. Employees also realized,
influence and visibility to senior management to be vital for their careers than they felt in
maintenance stage. Important career issues of this stage involved, crystallization,
specification, implementation, stabilization, and advancement.

Cron and Slocum (1986) further investigated the influence of career stage on variables
like sales performance and attitude. In exploration stage new comers lack of commitment
is visible through lower job involvement, job challenge and lack of psychological

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success. They have also been found to be less satisfied with their jobs, supervisors and
promotion opportunities available as compared to their counterparts in other stages. They
found their superiors to be less open, delegating less and putting more pressure to
produce. Their results are in congruence with Super (1957) that employees in the trial
stage are less satisfied with their work and are poor performers than individuals in the
establishment, maintenance, and decline stages (Gould & Hawkins, 1978; Stumpf &
Rabinowitz, 1981). Poor performance is primarily a result of inexperience that is the
typical of this age (Levinson et al., 1978; Super, 1957). High performing counterparts,
who are quite younger than the low performing ones viewed their bosses as more
supportive and perceived themselves as psychologically successful. They believed that
promotion and rewards are not based solely on sales performance. Overall employees in
this stage have a negative job attitude.

Chattopadhyay and Gupta (2005) also studied research literature to comprehend that
people in their exploration stage have negative job attitude and perception about
corporate culture (esp. bosses) resulting in lowered job satisfaction and there by leading
to poor performance.

Ornstein et al. (1989) found that in trial stage employees are poor performers, less
committed and are less satisfied from work and supervisors. They also found their job
less challenging and perceived themselves as less successful. Data didn’t indicate any
support to the prediction that employees in this stage are less involved. Liberal tests
indicated that the employees are less satisfied with their work and supervisors both.

Cron et al. (1988) postulated that valences for higher-order rewards and level of
challenge seeking (Flaherty & Pappas, 2002a) varied with successive career stages. He
investigated that sales personnel in exploration stage showed lower sales quota
instrumentality (linkage of performance with rewards) and this results in lowered
performance at this stage. Results indicated that age is inversely related to desire for
promotion therefore it is high for exploration stage. But because of lack of clarity on
instrumentality they show lowered performance scores. Sales people in this phase are not
only skeptical about achieving higher sales but also about the rewards associated with
them.

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Flaherty and Pappas (2002a) argued that the sales people in this stage are not only
skeptical about their performance but also about the rewards associated with it, thereby
leading to lower expectancy and instrumentality estimates. Results indicated that
salesperson in exploration stage showed higher satisfaction and lower turnover intentions
when paid fixed pay as compared to incentive pay because of lower performance results
thereby rejecting incentive based pay. New comers in the exploration stage seemed
suitable prospects for defender firms that provide them with much required training at a
fixed salary. People in this stage are indifferent towards prospectors and defender firms
mainly because they have not yet been able to understand differences between the two;
credits to their inexperience.

Miao, Lund and Evans (2009) found significant variation in challenge seeking and
compensation seeking (cognitive motivation) across career stages. Sales people
Compensation seeking (cognitive extrinsic motivation) is higher in the initial stages
compared to later stages. Therefore an appropriate compensation scheme is required for
employees in exploration and establishment stage. It is postulated that task enjoyment
(affective intrinsic motivation) is higher in exploration to later stages though the
differences are not significant. It is also found that task enjoyment and compensation
seeking are more relevant than challenge seeking and recognition seeking in exploration
stage.

Hess and Jepsen (2009) found significant differences between individuals’ psychological
contract perceptions based on career stage. It is found that in exploration stage higher
balanced fulfillment (largely related to employability, viz. career development, wide
scope of responsibility and support to learn) has a strong positive relation with job
satisfaction and commitment. Results are consistent with the ones by Super (1984) that in
early stages employees look forward to polish their skills and abilities. They could not
find significant differences for intention to leave across career stages. Lower balance
fulfillment is associated with higher intentions to leave in early career stages. Clearly,
higher the balance fulfillment, higher the job satisfaction and commitment and lower the
turnover. This negative relationship can be explained through the fact that in early career
stage employees are committed by career development.

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[Link] Age as operationalization criterion

Much empirical data has been analyzed to show job attitude variation with career stages
using age as classification criterion. Super, Crites, Hummel, Moser and Overstreet (1957)
and thereafter by many other researchers, age has been taken as a measurement criterion.
For most of them the age for employees in exploration stage, ranged from 22 to 30 years.
Initial period in this phase is spent in search of a right occupation. People after few
switchovers recognize the appropriate job for them. In this phase of uncertainty
employees are unsure about one’s occupation, competence and potential. Phase also
accompanies learning skills, building competencies and experiencing success giving
clarity and direction to the career with time. Superiors assign very basic jobs initially and
these jobs seem boring with little associated learning, to the new comers. Alternatively
they are assigned task coupled with a bigger project being worked upon by a senior.

Cohen A. (1991) found career stages using age is a better moderator between
commitment and turnover intentions in early career. Levinson et al. (1978) proposed that
in early adult stages individuals oscillate between commitment and new opportunities.
Ornstein et al. (1989) found partial support for Levinson’s life stages and stated that in
early stages employees make temporary commitments to their jobs. This is supported by
the findings that employees are low on job involvement but job satisfaction and
commitment is in no way lesser than other stages. They further added Intentions to leave
and willingness to relocate is higher here than other stages. Sales performance ratings are
also found to be higher in this stage. Employees at this point in time are more concerned
about promotions and wanted them much faster than individuals in other stages. A
replicated study by Ornstein and Isabella (1990) confirmed that organizational
commitment is lowest in the age 30 transition for female professionals. Also intention to
leave is highest in the early careers stage as compared to middle career stages.

Cohen (1993) demonstrated that Organizational commitment-age relation is relevant in

early career. According to him Organizational Commitment- age relation represents the
career model and is affected by external factors and work aspects alike.

Kaur and Sandhu (2010) in their research in banking industry found that employees in
early career scored least on all affective, continuance, and normative organizational

38 | P a g e
commitment whereas employees in their late career scored highest on all three
dimensions of organizational commitment. Age has shown to relate with all the three
components of organizational commitment viz. affective, continuance & normative
commitment. Allen and Meyer (1993) alleged that age is a significant predictor of
affective and normative commitment and Kaur and Sandhu (2010) are also in agreement
with them. But others have questioned the existence of such a relation (Conway, 2004;
Noordin et al. 2011a & b).

Conway (2004), suggested that to promote higher commitment, the organization should
exploit proper management of employee`s experiences across career stages. Results
indicate employee’s attitude towards HR practices is related with affective commitment
only for those in exploration career stage. Though all HR practices are significantly
associated with affective commitment but practices most consistently associated with
affective commitment include job design, employee involvement and career
development. It is further found that employees in this age group had more positive
attitudes towards opportunities for involvement and resourcing, teamwork and job
security.

The employees in their early career with higher commitment also showed positive
relationship with normative commitment and attitude towards HR practices. In early
career, normative commitment is affected by career development practices the most. Also
positive job design attitude positively influences the normative commitment. He
suggested that age marks real career stage influence on employee involvement, job
security and teamwork. Performance management, job security, reward and teamwork are
significant and positively. Continuance commitment has significant and positive
relationship with HR practices like performance management, job security, reward and
teamwork.

Lynn, Cao and Horn (1996) in his study on accounting professionals found that in this
stage employee (male) have lower extrinsic reward satisfaction than employees in
advancement and maintenance stages. Also organizational commitment and intrinsic
reward satisfaction for the employee is lower than the employees in maintenance stage.

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On the contrary organizational turnover intentions are higher for employees in
establishment stage (here trial stage) than the ones in the maintenance stage.

Kaur and Sandhu (2010) in their research in banking industry found that employees in
early career (using age as classification criterion) scored least on all affective,
continuance, and normative organizational commitment whereas employees in their late
career scored highest on all three dimensions of organizational commitment.

Allen and Meyer (1993) found that employees are more affectively responsive to
particular experiences during their early careers, such as well-defined and challenging
jobs. They argued that real career stage impact on affective commitment is visible with
age as measurement criterion.

Brooks and Seers (1991), showed that the effect of Self-efficacy as a predictor of
commitment is stronger in the first stage, team cohesion to predict commitment is
stronger in the second stage. These two stages covered the period in the early career stage
covered by other researchers. Between stage analysis indicated that the influence of team
cohesion larger in the second stage.

Morrow and McElroy (1987) found work commitment to be positively associated with
age in each career stage. Intention to remain, organizational commitment and job
involvement are found to be lowest for employees in trial stage. Also satisfaction with
work and satisfaction with co-workers is found to be lowest in this stage.

Singh and Singh (2010) found that Organizational Citizen Behaviour is lower in trial
stage than establishment and maintenance stage.

Gould (1979), observed that job complexity and work satisfaction indicated a strong
positive realtionahip in trial stage. This finding is contrary to the Slocum and Cron (1985)
who found that individuals in the trial stage are less satisfied. No relationship could be
established between job complexity and performance with self reported age.

Stumpf and Rabinowitz (1981) using occupational tenure as the measure found a negative
relationship between work satisfaction and performance in establishment (here trial)
stage. Reasons stated for such a result is attributed to, inapt rewards to high performers

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which thereby lead to lowered satisfaction in this case. Work satisfaction indicated
weaker relationship with research productivity in establishment stage than in maintenance
stage. The relationship between peer nominations and role ambiguity is strong and
negative in establishment stage and holds true for relationship between peer nominations
and inter-sender role conflict. Vital concern for the employees in this stage is match
between talents, skills with new role expectations (Buchanan II, 1974). A study by
Mount (1984) found employees in the establishment (here trial) stage (occupational
tenure < 2 years) to be more satisfied than other two stages.

[Link] Organizational Tenure as operationalization criterion

With longevity of relationship with the organization employees not only behaviourally
and socially get associated with the organization but with time the investment in the
organization goes up and availability of opportunities in the market decrease, thereby
leading to higher organizational commitment ( Cohen, 1993; Conway, 2004; Kaur &
Sandhu, 2010 ).

Reicher’s (1986) experience model elaborates the influence of tenure on organizational

commitment across career stages. According to her, employees in the early-career stage
have weak behavioural and structural bond with the organization and therefore influence
of psychological factors (expectations, challenges, conflict) in this stage is quite
impactful. Therefore in this stage changes in commitment explains the most variation in
employee turnover. When Kaur and Sandhu (2010) used organizational tenure as a
career stage measure, no significant differences are found between organizational
commitments of employees in their early career with those in mid-career.

Ralph Katz (1976) worked out relationship between job satisfaction and five task
dimensions namely skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback-
from-job at different career stages. They noticed new comers displayed satisfaction
relationship with only task significance and feedback. More autonomy during the initial
period on the contrary is distressing for the employee. After the initial period all the task
dimensions are significantly related with work satisfaction.

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Gould and Hawkins (1978) studied moderating effect of career stage on the relationship
between performance and job satisfaction. The study established the moderating effect of
career stage; on the influence of overall job satisfaction in judging the performance.
Moderating impact of career stage is observed for some facets of job satisfaction viz.
satisfaction with work, pay, coworkers but is not significant for satisfaction with
promotion and supervision. Performance and satisfaction with work relation is strongest
during the establishment (here exploration) stage of a person’s career. The relationship
between pay satisfaction and performance is found positive for people in the
establishment stage.

Mehta, Andersonand Dubinsky (2000) highlighted that in early career stages achieving
targets is the most important reward for the employees. Other rewards relevant for them
include attitude of superiors towards them, bonus, opportunities for promotion, salary and
commission, and retaining respect of salespeople

Conway (2004), in his study is able to establish organizational tenure’s relationship with
affective and continuance commitment. HR practices significantly related to affective
commitment includes involvement, performance management, resourcing and
integration, job design, career development, training and teamwork. He further observed
that normative commitment indicated significant relationship with HR practices viz. job
design, career development, employee involvement and performance management. It is
also found that normative commitment moderated relationship between organizational
tenure and attitudes towards career development and employee involvement. He stated
that organizational tenure proves ‘real’ career stage influence on resourcing and
integration and employee reward. He further highlighted that job design and rewards are
viewed more positively, whereas resourcing and integration practices, opportunities for
involvement, attitudes towards job security and teamwork are viewed less positively,
with increase in tenure. For example it is found that respondents with shorter service
viewed job design, reward practices more negatively and resourcing and integration
practices more positively, when compared to those with longer service.

Morrow and McElroy (1987) while examining work commitment found that with
organizational tenure as in age, Intention to remain and job involvement is lowest score

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for employees in establishment stage (here exploration stage). Organizational
commitment on the contrary depicted a curvilinear (U-shaped) relationship with higher
commitment scores in this stage. Additionally with organizational tenure measure,
satisfaction with work and satisfaction with co-workers showed curvilinear relation with
higher satisfaction in this stage. Additionally, satisfaction with promotion indicated
inverse relation with highest satisfaction scores. Satisfaction with supervision and
satisfaction with promotion are also inversely related to positional tenure measure.
Operationalization with positional tenure indicated positive relationship with all work
commitment indicators viz. Job involvement, Work ethic endorsement and intention to
remain except organizational commitment.

2.4.2 Establishment Stage/ Advancement Stage/ Middle Career stage

[Link] Super’s psychometric measure

Employees in their establishment stage work towards consolidating their career choices
(Super, 1957). Super et al. (1957) suggested that the employees of this stage are in the
ages of 31 to 44 years. Career clarity is no longer an issue; focus is towards gaining a
foothold in the professional market. Strong roots in the organization and business by
using creativity on the job is the focal point. If satisfied with the job and organization
they will not find it easy to change any of the two and prefer sticking to the present job.
Life style for stabilization stage employees is more important than other variables like
pay, higher responsibility or more challenging job. Even the job with challenges can be
handled much easily because of the proficiency in the job which has come over time.
Though job satisfaction is lower but employees are still not interested in relocating or
leaving. Building new relations is again not an important concern instead mastering tasks
is the concern in every new opportunity they look out in the market (Slocum & Cron,
1985).

In his process of confirming the findings of Super (1957), Cron (1984) stated that
employees in their establishment stage aspire for stabilization in their careers so as to
make a secure place in their specific careers. In the process they work towards adding

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structure and stability to their career, in doing so they make conscious commitment
towards their careers. This is also the time when they are also making other important life
commitments e.g. getting married, buying a home, connecting to their community (Cron
et al., 1988; Levinson et al. 1978) resulting in work life balance an important challenge to
be addressed in this phase. Cron (1984) further highlighted that, as people pass over to
establishment stage they add on to their knowledge base thereby leading to more
effective performance. The psychological success because of high performance probably
adds to greater work involvement. By this time they have already committed themselves
to a field and have also known their jobs well, so their primary concern is to utilize their
skills aptly to achieve successful careers. Other relevant concerns of this stage include
achievement, esteem, autonomy, and competition.

Isabella (1988) further confirmed that in this phase employees are concerned about
balancing both family and career concerns. Relevant frame of references included
expertise, visibility, recognition and advancement. Employees start influencing the
organization and organization’s influence starts reducing in this period (Schein, 1971).

Slocum and Cron (1985), tendency of the individuals to relocate or look for better
opportunities decreases in this phase if they are satisfied. High performers in stabilization
stage show unwillingness to relocate or shift jobs between companies even though they
find their job less challenging. They further reported that career stage is negatively
related to satisfaction with promotional opportunities and positively related to satisfaction
with work. Employees in advancement stage are more satisfied than trial stage
employees. Employees in this stage focused on innovation and updating issues.

Slocum, Cron, Hansen and Rawlings (1985) found that comers (i.e. plateaued employee
with low performance) mainly belonged to establishment stage. They are mainly
concerned about vertical mobility in their organizations. Comers are not satisfied with the
visibility to the management and are less involved too.

Cron and Slocum (1986) established that employees in establishment stage have a higher
job satisfaction, feeling of success, better performance and also higher job involvement.
By the time employees reach this stage their views towards their work environment and
supervisors see a positive change. They find their superiors as more supportive,

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delegating more and reduced pressure for results. They find themselves competent
enough to shape favorable work environment for themselves. High performers by this
stage felt themselves as successful and had developed a good rapport with their superiors
but strive for more challenging jobs to prove themselves. Peluchette and Jeanquart (2000)
further researched that having mentor in mid-career positively influenced only objective
career success.

Cron et al. (1988) stated that employees in establishment stage relate promotion as a
ladder for personal growth and higher salaries and therefore score highest for the variable
as compared to other stages. In their aspirations of getting ahead in their careers, sales
people’s desire for job success and promotion are equally vital. Other studies have
indicated that performance can be expected to increase soon (Cron & Slocum, 1986) but
will simultaneously lead high performers to switch to better opportunities (Slocum &
Cron, 1985). Therefore, promotion is crucial aspect to be given attention by the
management during this phase. Trial and establishment stage employees are more
inclined towards intrinsic rewards than maintenance or disengagement stage employees.

Flaherty and Pappas (2002a) further stated that employees in this stage are hardworking,
more involved and successful have higher expectancy and instrumentality estimates.
Therefore in establishment stage salespeople showed reduced job satisfaction and higher
turnover intentions when paid fixed salary. In this phase sales people precieve incetive
based pay as an opportunity to make mre money. Higher job satisfaction and lower
turnover intentions are visible for firms using prospector or analyzer strategy where as
the opposite is true for defender firm employees. The results indicated that during
establishment stage risk prone incentive based compensation mix of prospector and
analyzer firms is very logical at this stage.

Ornstein et al.’s (1989) established that people in establishment stage are found to be
more involved, committed, satisfied and psychologically successful as compared to trial
stage employees. People in this stage had more desire of promotions, willingness to
relocate and better performance ratings compared to other stages. Post-hoc tests also
indicated that in this phase employees found their job more challenging.

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Chattopadhyay and Gupta (2005) stated that in establishment stage job involvement and
challenge is very high but as they continue to strive for success this leads to moderate
positive feelings towards the job. Because of high job involvement and thrist for success,
their recognition need is much higher. Though they are satisfied with their job they are
dissatisfied with pay like any other stage. They showed lower dissatisfaction with
promotions as compared to other career stages. They also indicated positive perception of
the corporate culture including factors like about supervisor and co-workers, growth,
suitably rewarded, high job pressure and autonomy in decision making. This positive job
attitude, positively affects their performance.

According to Miao et al. (2009) salespeople in the establishment stage showed highest
level of challenge seeking (cognitive intrinsic motivation) though the differences are not
significantly different from other stages except disengagement stage. Therefore an
appropriate compensation scheme is required for employees in establishment stage. Also
found that in the establishment stage task enjoyment dominated challenge seeking and
recognition seeking.

Hess and Jepsen (2009) observed weak association between lower relational (open-ended
contract involving socio-emotional as well as economic terms) fulfillment and higher
intention to leave in establishment stage than in exploration stage. Results indicated that
employees in establishment stage are more concerned about job security than employees
in trial stage.

[Link] Age as operationalization criterion

Gould (1979), using age as a measure, highlighted the moderating impact of career stage
on relationship between job-performance & independently rated job complexity. Using
independent measure of Job complexity and performance he couldn’t demonstrate any
relationship in trial or maintenance stage but a positive relationship is observed in
stablization stage. Brooks & Seers (1991) showed that the predictive ability of task
challenge is stronger during the third stage; supervisory behaviour score is higher in the
fourth stage.

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Conway (2004) found a significant relationship between affective commitment and HR
practices viz. career development, job design, involvement, job security, performance
management, teamwork. Mid- career age moderated attitudes towards both job design
and employability in the prediction of normative commitment. In this phase age
moderated attitudes towards performance management in the prediction of continuance
commitment. Employees in this phase show negative relationship of both continuance
and normative commitment with employability. Availability of employment
opportunities are significantly related to lower levels of continuance and normative
commitment. This finding suggests that it becomes all the more imperative to accentuate
HR practices during early career stages to positively influence continuance and normative
commitment. Therefore it becomes crucial for organizations to improvise the structure of
the jobs by making them more interesting and optimally utilizing the skills of the
employees. In advancement stage additional responsibility; promotions, independence,
mastery, and achievement are the prime concern of any employee (Hall & Nougaim,
1968; Levinson et al., 1978).

Stumpf and Rabinowitz (1981) using occupational tenure as the measure highlighted that
employees showed higher satisfaction with promotion in advancement stage only with
instructional evaluations and peer nominations. The peer nominations with role
ambiguity displayed weak relation but with inter-sender role conflict a positive
relationship is observed. Role perceptions are not relevant determinant of performance in
this stage.

Contrary to this Mount (1984) found that employees in the advancement stage (OT 2-10
years) experienced higher satisfaction primarily because of satisfaction experienced in the
first year.

Lynn et al. (1996) in his study on accounting professionals found that in this stage
employee (male) have higher extrinsic reward satisfaction than employees in
establishment stage. Also organizational commitment and intrinsic reward satisfaction for
the employee is lower than the employees in maintenance stage. On the contrary
organizational turnover intentions are higher for these employees than the ones in the
maintenance stage.

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[Link] Organizational Tenure as operationalization criterion

Cohen (1991) indicated that commitment and outcome relationship varied with career
stage. He established that tenure moderated the relationship of commitment with
performance and absenteeism in late career stage. Gould and Hawkins (1978) while
studying moderating effect of career stage on the relationship between performance and
job satisfaction found that relationship between performance and pay satisfaction is found
slightly negative for those in the advancement stage of their career.

Conway (2004) employees with organization tenure between two and ten years’ showed
significant relationship between all HR practices (except teamwork) and affective
commitment. He also observed positive relationship between job security and
continuance commitment. Normative commitment also indicated positive relationship
with HR practices including resourcing and integration, employee reward and job
security.

Ralph Katz (1976) found significant relationship between work satisfaction and five task
dimensions namely skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback-
from-job at different career stages. He noticed relationship between satisfaction and task
dimensions, being moderated by job longevity.

Mehta et al. (2000) stated that most important reward for employees in the middle career
stage is the attitude of the superiors towards them and salary and commission. Other
rewards considered relevant in this phase include, bonus, achievement of market goals,
retaining respect of salespeople, and opportunities for promotion.

Morrow and McElroy (1987) examined Work commitment (organizational commitment,

intention to remain, job involvement, work ethic endorsement) and job satisfaction using
organizational tenure as the measure. Intention to remain and job involvement showed
positive relationship whereas organizational commitment indicated curvilinear relation
with career stage (organizational tenure measure). Therefore, organizational commitment
is found to be lowest in advancement stage. Additionally with organizational tenure
measure, satisfaction with work and satisfaction with co-workers indicated U-shaped
relation with lowest satisfaction in advancement stage.

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2.4.3 Maintenance/ Late Career stage

[Link] Super’s psychometric measure

In this stage employees try to holdon to what they have establishes since the inception of
their careers (Super, 1957). Super et al. (1957) stated that employees in this phase
generally belong to the ages 45 to 65. Focus of the employees in this phase is to maintain
and continue the achievements of the earlier stages and there is little additions made to
their list of accomplishments. Visibility to the senior management is less relevant than
relationship with the boss. They further added that employees in this phase want a more
stable life and therefore are less keen in switching jobs.

Isabella (1988) further confirmed that relevant frames of reference in this period includes
reassessing priorities and career experiences, training subordinates to better handle their
jobs, and broader organizational perspective. Findings suggested that by now employees
start influencing the organization strongly and the strength of the influence is much larger
than the organization’s influence on them.

Cron (1984) stated that during maintenance stage employee’s focus on maintaining their
achievements, status and position. Revaluation of the career decision most of the time
results in holding on to the accomplishments of the past. High positions already achieved;
negatively affect their desire for promotion but positively influences their financial
concern. Employees in organizational plateauing phase (Slocum & Cron, 1985) have to
face threats to their position because of competition from younger entrants, technological
innovations and new job assignments, making job security a concern in this phase. Other
physiological changes, part of the aging process are also characteristic of this stage
(baldness, changes in skin and muscle tone, etc.). Therefore major challenges in this age
include maintaining motivation and concerns about aging. Slocum et al. (1985) also
found that plateaued employees generally belonged to maintenance stage and had high
satisfaction and clear aspirations.

Slocum and Cron (1985) in their study found employees in maintenance stage more
involved as compared to other stages. Study indicated that employees in stabilization and
maintenance stage are more satisfied with their work than their counterparts in the trial

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stage. Focus issues in this stage are not unique from other career stages including
holding, updating, and innovating. Employees in this stage are hesitant in accepting
promotions if it meant relocation. Retirement issues have taken the place of promotion
aspirations. They do not really aspire for challenges and competition but that has is no
way influenced their job involvement. Their definition of success is to show best
performance on the job and this therefore leads to high job involvement.

Cron and Slocum (1986) employees in this phase of their career have positive job
attitudes and work environment. They are more satisfied with their job and superiors. By
this time sales people have learnt the skills of their trade and therefore showed highest
performance. In this stage employees feel highly involved, challenged and described
themselves as successful. Positive attributes characteristic of this stage resulted in higher
satisfaction in maintenance stage.

Cron et al. (1988) Employees in maintenance stage are less hard working and involved as
compared to establishment stage as they have already achieved most of what they want to
achieve. But the job attitude and performance in this phase remains similar to the
establishment stage except desire for promotion. Performance maintained in the phase is
because they can afford higher risk and creativity because of higher positions achieved by
this time. As they already had a taste of success, pay packets and sense of self fulfillment,
they prefer to work smart using their experience rather than working hard to get their
goals. They are not interested in increasing their compensation amount by putting in more
efforts and higher performance instead they are keen to just maintain what has been
achieved. Nevertheless, they need to keep themselves abreast with the latest
technological updates and learn new skills and keep up with new developments to
maintain their performance (Cron, 1984). It is also observed that since sales job involved
more disparities, sales people who are not satisfied by their achievements or are not able
to achieve success in their respective field, plan to opt out of their career.

Chattopadhyay and Gupta (2005) explored that during maintenance stage employees have
more positive job attitude. Job involvement and challenge are high but the feeling of
success is highest at this stage. Though there is dissatisfaction with promotions but work
satisfaction is no different from establishment stage. Marginal decrease is observed in the

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satisfaction from corporate culture from the previous stage. Employees showed highest
performance in this stage.

Ornstein et al.’s (1989) analysis of both Super and Levinson’s models indicated quite a
lot of similarity in establishment and maintenance stages. It is concluded that the two
stages observed similar career attitudes. Employees in maintenance stage differed from
establishment stage only in terms of being less interested in promotions. Ornstein and
Isabella (1990) in a study on women managers observed lower willingness to relocate
and reduced desire for immediacy of promotions in decline stage. Peluchette and
Jeanquart (2000) found that faculty member in their late career don’t attribute their
success to mentoring alternatives.

Hess and Jepsen (2009) observed for employees in maintenance stage transactional
(short-term contact limited to an economic focus) fulfillment is associated with higher
commitment than for those in the establishment stage. Higher transactional obligations
can be explained by the fact that employees in later stages are more concerned about
financial and job security whereas in mid-life stages family responsibility takes more
attention than employer obligations. Lower balance fulfillment is associated with higher
intentions to leave in late career stages because late career employees are committed by
employability and involvement (Conway, 2004); both part of balanced fulfillment.

Extrinsic rewards are relevant in the maintenance stage as the employees are more
concerned about maintaining their current status. Promotion is the only extrinsic reward
significant at this stage (Rabinowitz & Hall, 1981). Also, Flaherty and Pappas (2002a)
stated that in this phase sales people are indifferent to fixed or incentive pay as they are
not concerned with pay increase in general. As they are concerned in maintaining their
current position, they are found to be indifferent towards prospectors and defender firms.

[Link] Age as operationalization criterion

Levinson et al. (1978) stated that mid-life transition is the time when people start
questioning the relevance of work in their lives. Individuals start giving more attention to
their family and are less interested to leave or relocate. They are less keen in achieving
their predetermined goals as compared to establishment stage as they are not ready to

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take the pressure. However this hardly impacts their performance. By age 50 transition
employees start evaluating their achievements. This uncertainty leads to reduced
organizational commitment, job involvement, and overall satisfaction.

During this stage the focus of employees is on fostering the development of others, and
strengthening the organization rather than competing with others (Hall & Nougaim,
1968). With peer relationships and organizational concern being the priority; employees
in this stage help others to grow e.g. through mentoring relationships (Levinson et al.,
1978)

Brooks & Seers (1991), showed the predictive ability of organizational climate during the
fifth stage. Between stage analysis indicated the influence of job challenge in the third
stage, and supervisor behaviour had a larger impact in the fourth stage.

Allen and Meyer (1993) added that older employees have higher affective and normative
commitment than younger employees because of more positive work experiences of older
employees.

Conway (2004) in the late career, he is able to establish relationship of affective

commitment with performance management, employability, involvement, resourcing and
Integration and reward. Similarly positive relationship between employee reward and
continuance commitment is found. Age moderated attitudes towards both job design and
employability in the prediction of normative commitment. Older employees are found to
have a more negative attitude towards opportunities for involvement, teamwork and
employment security.

Lynn et al. (1996) in his study found that this stage employee (male) have higher
extrinsic reward satisfaction than employees in establishment stage. Also organizational
commitment and intrinsic reward satisfaction for the employee is higher than the
employees in establishment (here trial stage) and advancement stages. On the contrary
organizational turnover intentions are lower for these employees than the ones in
establishment (here trial stage) and advancement stages.

Kaur and Sandhu (2010) found that employees in their late career scored highest on all
three dimensions of organizational commitment. Also, Singh and Singh (2010), found

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that Organizational Citizen Behaviour of older executives is significantly higher than that
their younger counterparts.

Morrow and McElroy (1987) examined that Organizational commitments, intention to

remain and job involvement all are highest in maintenance stage. Job satisfaction facets
indicated similar results with age. Satisfaction with work and satisfaction with co-
workers are the highest whereas satisfaction with promotion and pay are the lowest in
maintenance stage.

Ornstein et al. (1989) found that by this phase of the career employees are less willing to
relocate and are less interested in leaving the organization and strive for stability.
Though not many contrasts with other stages are observed but this phase is seen as the
transition phase in the careers of the individuals. The study could not confirm the
contention that employees in this stage are more involved, committed and satisfied or less
interested in their work. Similar study by Ornstein and Isabella (1990) found that desire
for promotion is found to be lowest in late career stages.

Stumpf and Rabinowitz (1981) using occupational tenure as the measure stated that
faculty in maintenance stage excelled in all performance parameters except research
productivity. Work satisfaction indicated weaker relationship with research productivity
in establishment stage than in maintenance stage. They also exhibited higher satisfaction
with work but perceived higher inter-sender role conflict compared to other stages.
Satisfaction with work increased with career stage is apparent through this study but
variation for satisfaction with pay, promotions, or co-workers is not significant. Relation
of satisfaction with pay and co-workers with only peer nominations is stronger and more
positive in the maintenance stage. The relation between peer nominations and two role
perceptions viz. role ambiguity and inter-sender role conflict are moderated by career
stage. The relationship between two variables (peer nominations and role ambiguity) is
strong and positive in maintenance stage. Similar relationship of peer nominations is
observed with inter-sender role conflict also. Faculty in maintenance stage demonstrated
higher and positive relation between different facets of job satisfaction and the two role
perceptions.

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[Link] Organizational Tenure as operationalization criterion

Reicher’s (1986) stated that in later career stages, not only psychological and behavioural
factors play an important role in developing commitment, but investment made in the
organization and lack of available opportunities together determine the employees
relationship with the organization. Mehta et al. (2000) identified achievement of market
goals, retaining respect of salespeople, opportunities for promotion, and bonus as the
most important reward for employees in the late career stage. Other relevant rewards for
this category of career stage include salary and commission, attitude of superiors towards
the manager, and retirement plan. Employees in late career stage considered rewards:
achievement of market goals, opportunities for promotion, and retaining respect of
salespeople as more important than middle career stage. They also perceived retaining
respect of salespeople and retirement plan as more important than early career stage sales
men. They contradicted past researches on promotion aspect. Senior sales managers even
in the last phase of their careers are not ready to give up physically or psychologically.
Instead they wish to move up the hierarchy by working towards achieving their business
goals. Their success aspirations have in no way come down even at this stage.

Conway (2004) confirmed that longevity in the organization positively influences

affective commitment and continuance commitment primarily because with time
employees have developed stronger ties with the coworkers, have received higher levels
of extrinsic rewards and desirable positions (Meyer & Allen, 1997). He found that all HR
practices had significant positive relationship with affective commitment. But
continuance commitment is positively related only to attitude towards organizational
rewards. It is observed that longer service employees held more positive attitude towards
reward practices and negative attitude towards resourcing and integration practices.
These results are in line with the findings given by Allen and Meyer (1993). In their
study with organizational tenure measure they indicated that longer tenure employees
also indicated higher affective commitment. They are also able to establish relationship
between positional tenure and organizational commitment. They found that increase in
continuance commitment is more closely related to increase in positional tenure. Also

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Kaur and Sandhu (2010) explored that employees in their late career indicated higher
commitment scores.

Modi and Patel (2012) in their study found that late career employees demonstrated
higher brand commitment as compared to early-career stage employees. Cohen (1991)
further added that tenure moderated the relationship between commitment with
performance and absenteeism in late career stage. Cohen (1993) The OC-tenure relation
representing the job experience model and is affected more by events and factors in the
specific job and organizational factors.

Gould and Hawkins (1978) in their study established the moderating effect of career
stage; on the influence of overall job satisfaction in judging the performance. The
relationship between pay satisfaction and co-worker satisfaction with performance is
found positive for people in the maintenance stage of their career.

Morrow and McElroy (1987) also found highest scores for Intention to remain,
organizational commitment and job involvement. Additionally with organizational tenure
measure, satisfaction with work and satisfaction with co-workers is higher in this stage.
However, using positional tenure measure satisfaction with supervision and satisfaction
with promotion are the lowest in this stage.

Ornstein et al.’s (1989) reported that people at the decline stage(here maintenance stage)
did not report lesser degrees of job satisfaction, commitment and involvement with their
work— although they are less interested in promotions and relocations. Employees in
this stage are neither poor performer nor had poor attitude towards job.

Singh and Singh (2010) also found that long termed tenured executives scored
significantly higher Organizational Citizen Behaviour scores than short term tenured
executives.

2.4.4 Decline/ Dis-engagement Stage

Very few Career stage studies have included Dis-engagement stage as part of their
research. This stage is considered to be the final stage of psychological disengagement

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wherein individual’s energy and interest in their occupation comes down (Savickas,
2002; Smart, 1998; Super, 1957).

Cron (1984) states that by this stage salesperson start preparing for retirement. Frustration
from work leads to loss of self-worth in this career phase thereby resulting in lower
performance. Rewards are no longer motivators for a better performance.

Cron and Slocum (1986) questioned the relationship between job attitudes and
perceptions of the work environment with performance in this stage. People in this stage
felt more successful than their counterparts in trial stage. Much before time many of sales
people dissociate from work instead of looking in for new job opportunities.

Cron et al. (1988) adds that this phase poses serious motivational challenge for the
management. On account of low expectation of promotion and low desire for increments,
their performance gets affected. This shapes their approach of performing at minimal
acceptable levels. On the contrary Ornstein et al.’s (1989) found that people at the
decline stage did not report lesser degrees of job satisfaction, commitment and
involvement with their work— although they are less interested in promotions and
relocations.

2.5 CAREER STAGE VARIATIONS WITH JOB DIMENSIONS, JOB

ATTITUDE &JOB OUTCOMES

With time people pass through diverse career stages and at each career stage the
employees have unique career concerns, developmental tasks, personal challenges, and
psychological needs (Dalton et al., 1977; Hall & Nougaim 1968; Super 1957).

Numerous studies have been carried out to comprehend differences in job outcomes like
work satisfaction, turnover intentions, commitment and performance across career stages.
Majority of investigations have been conducted to study the impact of career stages on
organizational commitment. Founders of Career development theories Super D. (1957)
and Levinson et al. (1978) affirmed the need of development and maintenance of
organizational commitment with career stages. A number of them further researched to

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prove that commitment varies with the career (Allen & Meyer, 1993; Brooks & Seers,
1991; Cohen A. , 1991; Cohen A. , 1993; Conway, 2004; Cron & Slocum, 1986; Kaur &
Sandhu, 2010; Morrow & McElroy, 1987; Noordin et al., 2011 a & b; Ornstein et al.,
1989). Several theories support the view that the relationship beween organizational
commitment and outcomes are moderated by career stage (Cohen A. , 1993; Conway,
2004; Kaur & Sandhu, 2010; Noordin et al., 2011 a & b).

Kaur and Sandhu (2010) in their research in banking industry found that commitment
levels increased with the chronological age of the employee as he moved from early
career to mid-career to late career. When organizational tenure is used as a career stage
measure, no significant differences are found between organizational commitments of
employees in their early career with those in mid-career. But employees in their late
career still indicated higher commitment scores.

Survey conducted by Noordin et al. (2011b) for Malaysian Managers, with age as a
classification criterion found that affective commitment increases with age. A similar
study (Noordin et al., 2011a) in Australia supported their findings in Malaysia that
organizational commitment increases with age. But results indicated that calculative or
continuance commitments are significantly moderated by age of the manager not
affective commitment. The differing results here are attributed to the fact that affective
commitment being higher in collectivistic than in individualistic cultures, there by
highlighting the role of culture as a predictor of organizational commitment. In the
literature, individualism is positively associated with continuance/calculative
organizational commitment (Hofstede, 1980) [as cited in Noordin et al., 2011b]. This
may partly account for the finding that continuance commitment, rather than affective
commitment, increased with age among the Australian managers. The results showed
organizational tenure to be positively related to calculative (continuance) commitment.
Noordin et al. (2011a & b); were not able to establish any relationship between
organizational commitment and career stage using positional tenure as a measurement
criterion. The result could be assigned to the cultural differences between Australia,
Malaysia, and USA.

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Analogous to Super’s work; Thomas and Feldman (2007) found that career stage and
embeddedness are closely associated. The article discusses avenues for future research.
The effect of variables like degree of organizational socialization; the quantity and
quality of mentoring ; time spent on job; number and strength of social ties; Investment
in generalizable occupational skills; on organizational and occupational embeddedness
need to be studied in establishment stage. The effect of variables like Career plateauing;
the reconciliation of goal attainment discrepancies; the extent of management, project
leadership, and boundary-spanning, Activities; partnered or/and having children; level of
career attainment on organizational and occupational embeddedness need to be studied in
maintenance stage. During disengagement stage effect of variables like Risk aversion;
Level of leadership activity in professional and community affairs; the amount of pension
and insurance benefits on organizational and occupational embeddedness need to be
studied. The paper focus on the establishment, maintenance, and disengagement stages
only since, for many individuals, the forces that lead to embeddedness do not start
accumulating until at least the establishment stage.

Singh and Singh (2010), found ‘differences of means score’ of Organizational Citizen
Behaviour varies across career stage. Results indicated that Organizational Citizen
Behaviour of older executives is significantly higher than that their younger counterparts.
They also found that long termed tenured executives scored significantly higher
Organizational Citizen Behaviour scores than short term tenured executives. It is
important to note here that the group differences in both the results are trivial.

Modi and Patel (2012) reported that brand commitment also varies with career stages.
Out of the four brand dimensions studied customer brand as perceived by employees and
employer brand and its competitors are significant in judging brand commitment of
employees in early career in contrast customer brand as perceived by employees is the
only relevant variable for mid-career employees. They also found that employees in their
mid career reported higher brand commitment than their counterparts in early career
stage. Also, late career employees demonstrated higher brand commitment as compared
to early-career stage employees.

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2.5.1 Career Stage variations and Job outcomes

Career stage variations have been observed for various job outcomes like turnover
intentions, performance, job satisfaction etc. Flaherty and Pappas (2002a) while
investigating the compensation mix, found differences in job satisfaction and turnover
intentions. Similar results are indicated by (Hess & Jepsen, 2009) while investigating
individuals’ psychological contract perceptions. Ornstein et al. (1989) also studied higher
intention to leave their organization, and willingness to relocate. Cohen A. (1991)
supported the moderating effect of career stage on outcomes like turnover intentions,
actual turnover, absenteeism and performance.

Rush, Peacock and Milkovich (1980), in their study tried to examine Levinson et al.
(1978) career stage linkage with age. They could not establish that individuals pass
through all four stages in a chronological order as stated by Levinson et al. (1978). Only
37% of the sampled employees moved through the four stages in progression and it
mainly consisted of older employees. Discriminate analysis predicted the differentiating
ability of Overall career satisfaction, Education, Career commitment, Overall job
satisfaction, Performance and productivity and Job commitment to judge; attitudinal and
behavioral variations at different career stages. Career satisfaction contributed maximum
of the all to the discrimination. Maximum variation of career satisfaction can be seen
from stage 2 to 3, with highest point in stage 2 and the lowest point in stage 3. Desire for
upward mobility is seen to increase from stage 1 through stage 4 with the exception of
stage 2. Overall job satisfaction shows a continuous decrease all through the four stages.
Career satisfaction and job commitment is found to be highest in the initial career years.
As expected career and job satisfaction declined in Mid-life Transition but not career and
job commitment. This indicates even though employees during Mid Life transition are
dissatisfied but they don’t hesitate in putting efforts for their job or career.

Ornstein et al.’s (1989) comparison of Levinson et al.’s adult development model (age
based) and Super's career stage model indicated that employees attitude and intentions
external to work (Intentions to leave the company, willingness to relocate and promotion
aspirations) are better explained by Levinson et al.’s model on the contrary Super's model
focused on work related attitude (job involvement, satisfaction). Employees in

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maintenance stage differed from establishment stage only in terms of being less interested
in promotions. Analysis of both the models indicated quite a lot of similarity in
establishment and maintenance stages. It is concluded that the two stages observed
similar career attitudes with few contrasts as stated above. Interactions are observed
between age and variables like job involvement, job challenge, organizational
commitment, Promotion aspiration overall job satisfaction, and satisfaction with work.

Similar study by Ornstein and Isabella (1990) on professional females established that
shifting career attitudes including organizational commitment as a variable; are a function
of age rather than psychological stage. The study moderately supported Levinson’s
stages. They confirmed that organizational commitment is lowest in the age 30 transition
for female professionals. Also intention to leave is highest in the early careers stage as
compared to middle career stages. But the study found no support for super’s CSM like
Ornstein et al.’s (1989) study. The study thereby highlights another erroneous
measurement arising because of gender differences. It brings to picture that Super’s
ACCI questionnaire is not apt to measure career stage in females.

Interaction effect between age and career stage is found for satisfaction, promotion
aspiration and promotion timing. They found that women in the early years of their
careers are less satisfied than later stages. Employees in the late careers recorded highest
levels of satisfaction. Promotion aspirations depicted converging results. Employees in
the decline stage differ by age and those above 45 years differed by psychological stage;
in their desire for promotion. Employees in decline stage but aged above 45 wanted less
frequent promotions than those between ages 33-44. Promotion desired by employees
over 45 years decreased in the order of subsequent stages viz. establishment stage,
maintenance stage, and decline stage. Immediacy of promotion by the employees in the
establishment and maintenance stages is more than the ones in decline stage.

Rabinowitz and Hall (1981), in their study on Canadian transport ministry employees,
worked out relationship between job involvement and four task dimensions namely, skill
variety, task identity, autonomy, and feedback-from-job at different career stages. They
found facets of job satisfaction, task identity and feedback-from-job to be strongly and
positively related to job involvement in early career stage than middle or late career

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stages. Skill variety and feedback are found to be positively and consistently associated
with job involvement at all career stages. Results indicate job involvement is dependent
on the situation and challenging job assignments in the early career stages. Intrinsic
variables like (job characteristics) are more important for the younger, while extrinsic
factors (organizational identification, expectancy 2) are more important in the later stages
in generating job involvement. Results also point; reward variables significant
relationship with job involvement in all three stages particularly performance based
rewards (expectancy 2). In the middle career the relevant rewards are based on ability to
perform (expectancy 1) where as in the late career stage performance based rewards and
membership in the organization (i.e., organizational identification) are important for
generating job involvement.

Hess and Jepsen (2009) found significant differences between individuals’ psychological
contract perceptions based on both career stage and generational cohort. It is found that in
exploration stage higher balanced fulfillment (largely related to employability, viz. career
development, wide scope of responsibility and support to learn) has a strong positive
relation with job satisfaction and commitment. Results are consistent with the results by
Super (1984) that in early stages employees look forward to polish their skills and
abilities. They could not find significant differences for intention to leave across career
stages. Lower balance fulfillment is associated with higher intentions to leave in early
and late career stages. This negative relationship can be explained through the fact that
early career stage employees are committed by career development and late career
employees are committed by employability and involvement (Conway, 2004); both part
of balanced fulfillment. For employees in maintenance stage transactional (short-term
contract limited to an economic focus) fulfillment is associated with higher commitment
than for those in the establishment stage. Higher transactional obligations can be
explained by the fact that employees in later stages are more concerned about financial
and job security whereas in mid-life stages family responsibility takes more attention than
employer obligations. Weak association is observed between lower relational (open-
ended contract involving socio-emotional as well as economic terms) fulfillment and
higher intention to leave in establishment stage than in exploration stage. Results

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indicated that employees in establishment stage are more concerned about job security
than employees in trial stage.

Cohen A. (1991) found career stages using age is a better moderator between
commitment and turnover intentions in early career and tenure moderated the relationship
of commitment with performance and absenteeism in late and mid-career stage.
Relationship of commitment with turnover intentions and actual turnover is stronger in
early career stage. However for age and tenure both; relationship between commitment
and performance is strongest in late career stage. Career stage also moderated
relationship between commitment and absenteeism in late career stage irrespective of the
measure used. Absenteeism and Performance differences in mid and late career stage are
evident using tenure as a career stage moderator. Results indicated that commitment and
outcome relationship varied with career stage.

Reilly and Orsak (1991) in their study found affective commitment behaved differently
based on the career stage measure used. With positional tenure as a career stage measure
affective commitment remained stable across stages but with age as a measure affective
commitment increased with career stage. Employees in the latter stages of the career
stages indicated higher commitment scores. It is also found that continuance and
normative commitment increased with the career stage irrespective of whether age or
professional tenure is used as a measure.

Comparative analysis of Age, job tenure, organizational tenure and Super’s psychometric
measure is done by Flaherty and Pappas (2002b). Results indicated that psychometric
measure of career stage and attitudinal measure of job satisfaction are significant
predictors of affective commitment. Age, job tenure and organizational tenure are not
significant predictors of affective commitment. They further found that Age, job tenure,
occupational tenure, Job satisfaction and Turnover intentions are significant predictor of
Career stage. In fact career stage is combination of two dimensions personal
characteristics and attitudes of the sales people and super’s model measures both of them.

Morrow and McElroy (1987) examined Work commitment (organizational commitment,

intention to remain; job involvement, work ethic endorsement), job satisfaction, and
personal characteristics using different operationalizations. Age explained highest

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variation in work commitment and positional tenure explained the least. Work
commitment showed a positive relationship with age; with organizational commitment,
intention to remain and job involvement showing significant variation. Highest variation
is observed for Intention to remain. Results depicted Intention to remain and job
involvement is not affected by the operationalization method used and that only
organizational commitment is affected by operationalization method. It is observed that
intention to remain showed significant variation in work commitment scores, irrespective
of the operationalization method. Organizational tenure measurement didn’t show similar
relationship and organizational commitment is lowest in advancement stage.

Operationalization with positional tenure indicated positive relationship with all Job
involvement, Work ethic endorsement and intention to remain except Organizational
commitment. They found that organizational commitment dropped slightly in the growth
phase as the length of time in the job increased. It has been found that an overall amount
of explained variation is smallest under this operationalization and highest for age as the
operationalization of career stage.

Job satisfaction facets indicated similar results with different operationalization criterion.
Satisfaction with work and satisfaction with co-workers showed positive relation with
age, whereas satisfaction with promotion and pay had an inverse relation. Satisfaction
with supervision is unrelated with age. Additionally with organizational tenure measure,
satisfaction with work and satisfaction with co-workers showed curvilinear relation with
lowest satisfaction in advancement stage whereas satisfaction with promotion indicated
inverse relation. Satisfaction with supervision and satisfaction with promotion are also
inversely related to positional tenure measure.

Pogson et al. (2003) also found differences in self-reported work ethic. The most positive
attitudes toward delay of gratification are reported by those in the trial, stabilization, and
maintenance stage, respectively. Favorable attitude towards wasting time and leisure
decreased with employees in trial, stabilization, and maintenance stage, respectively.
Contrary to the expectations results indicated employees in the trial stage being hard
working than other two stages. The morality or ethics also reported positive linear trend
from trial through maintenance stage.

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A study by Mount (1984) on facets of job satisfaction reported that career stage
moderated managers' satisfaction with all facets of work. Employees in the establishment
stage (occupational tenure < 2 years) are more satisfied than other two stages. Those in
the advancement stage (OT 2-10 years) experience higher satisfaction because of
satisfaction experienced in the first year. He has also stated concern over differences in
operational definition of career stage which makes generalization difficult.

A similar research by Stumpf and Rabinowitz (1981) investigated career stage as a

moderator of performance relationships with facets of job satisfaction and role
perceptions. They used years in profession/ occupational tenure as the measure of career
stage. They found that professionals in their maintenance stage, excelled in all parameters
of performance measurement except research productivity. Work satisfaction indicated
weaker relationship with research productivity in establishment stage than in maintenance
stage. They also exhibited higher satisfaction with work but perceived higher inter-sender
role conflict compared to other stages. Satisfaction with work increased with career stage
is apparent through this study but variation for satisfaction with pay, promotions, or co-
workers is not significant. Professional in advancement stage displayed positive
relationship between instructional evaluation and most facets of job satisfaction than the
ones in maintenance stage. Most sensitive performance index of the four is peer
nominations.

Cron and Slocum (1986) also investigated the influence of career stage on variables like
sales performance and attitude. Research indicates that the performance of sales people is
affected by the firms' business strategy and territorial assignment. In exploration stage
new comers lack of commitmentis visible through lower job involvement, challenge and
lack of psychological success. Their job satisfaction is also quite low. Employees in
establishment stage scored high on all variables discussed in exploratory stage. High
performers by this stage have developed a good rapport with their superiors and strive for
more challenging jobs to prove themselves. Low market share but high growth potential
industry is the right choice at this stage as this resulted in high levels of performance.
Maintenance stage employees are highly involved, challenging work, strong feeling of
success, and positive perception of work environment, work and supervisors. All these

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factors led to higher satisfaction in this stage. High performers are employed in firm
adopting analyzer strategy i.e territories with high growth, but low company market
share. Flaherty and Pappas (2002b) also indicated that attitudinal measure of satisfaction
is a good predictor of organizational commitment.

Studies by Gould and Hawkins (1978) and Slocum and Cron (1985) indicated Job
attitudes and performance differences during three career stages. Slocum and Cron (1985)
found that employees in exploration stage have greater propensity to relocate and shift
jobs more frequently as compared to those in stabilization or maintenance stage. High
performers in stabilization stage show unwillingness to relocate or shift jobs between
companies even though they find their job less challenging. Employees in maintenance
stage are more involved as compared to other stages. Study indicated that employees in
stabilization and maintenance stage are more satisfied than their counterparts in the trial
stage. In trial stage performance is the lowest but if supervisor plays the role of a mentor
and help newcomers in resolving critical career issues, thereby gearing them up for
promotions. They further reported that career stage is negatively related to satisfaction
with promotional opportunities and positively related to satisfaction with work.

On the contrary Gould and Hawkins (1978) studied moderating effect of career stage on
the relationship between performance and job satisfaction. The study established the
moderating effect of career stage; on the influence of overall job satisfaction in judging
the performance. Significant differences are found for establishment-advancement stage
and maintenance-advancement stage but not for establishment-maintenance stage.
Moderating impact of career stage is observed for some facets of job satisfaction viz.
satisfaction with work, pay, coworkers but is not significant for satisfaction with
promotion and supervision.

In a similar study Gould (1979), highlighted the moderating impact of career stage on
relationship between job-satisfaction & perceived job complexity and job-performance
& independently rated job complexity. Job complexity is positively associated with work
satisfaction. It can be observed that job complexity and work satisfaction indicated a
strong positive realtionahip in trial stage. Though in maintenance stage it showed
negative realtionship, but the relationship is not significant. No relationship could be

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established between job complexity and performance with self reported [Link] ratings
by independent observers identified significant positive relationship between work
satisfaction and job complexity for all career [Link] Independent measure, Job
complexity and performance didn’t demonstrate any relationship in trial or maintenance
stage but a positive relationship is observed in stablization stage. This is contrary to the
findings of Slocum and Cron (1985) who stated that maintenance stage had the highest
performers.

2.5.2 Career Stage variations with job attitude&Job dimensions

Work related experiences varies with the career course (Levinson et al., 1978; Super D. ,
1957) thereby leading to different work attitudes (Allen & Meyer, 1993). Isabella (1988)
suggested that career stage provides a frame of reference when interpreting
organizational events and thereby assigning meaning to it.

Hall and Nougaim (1968) investigated, the relative importance and intensity of needs
change during the first five years of the managerial career. They concluded that only in
final career stages we find employees striving for higher order causes like commitment in
order to satisfy their self-actualization need.

Buchanan II (1974) investigated diverse expectation realization experiences on

organizational commitment attitudes and found the influence of different experiences on
commitment; at different career stages using tenure as the classification criterion

Conway (2004), suggested that to promote higher commitment, the organization should
exploit proper management of employee`s experiences across career stages. Results
indicate significant relationship between age and organizational tenure with affective
commitment whereas only organizational tenure is positively associated with continuance
commitment. Employees attitude towards HR parctices is related with affective
commitmentonly for those in exploration career stage. Study could not prove that career
stage moderated the relationship between HR practises and Commitment. But established
that employee involvement, job security and teamwork is influenced by employee age but
resourcing and integration and employee reward is influenced by organizational tenure.
The study demonstrates that job design and rewards are viewed more positively, whereas

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resourcing and integration practices, opportunities for involvement attitudes towards job
security and teamwork are viewed less positively, with increase in tenure. They
established organizational tenure, and not age, is a significant predictor of commitment.
He found that organizational tenure represents ‘real career stage’ influence on affective
and continuance commitment.

Allen and Meyer (1993) found that employees are more affectively responsive to
particular experiences during their early careers, such as well-defined and challenging
jobs. They argued that real career stage impact on affective commitment is visible with
age as measurement criterion. They alleged that age not tenure is a significant predictor
of normative commitment. But organizational tenure and positional tenure is found to
show significant relationship with continuance commitment. They further added that
older employees have higher affective and normative commitment than younger
employees because of more positive work experiences of older employees. Their study
with organizational tenure measure indicated that longer tenure employees also indicated
higher affective commitment. Allen and Meyer (1993) are also able to establish
relationship between positional tenure and organizational commitment. They found that
increase in continuance commitment is more closely related to increase in positional
tenure. They established that tenure (organizational and positional) and not age moderates
the relationship between work experiences and affective commitment. Experiences like
role clarity and challenging job to the employees new to a job or position can improve
their affective commitment scores.

Brooks and Seers (1991), showed the influence of variables like organizational climate,
team cohesion, job challenge and supervisor behaviour on commitment across career
stages. Comparison of different stages using regression indicates that the effect of Self-
efficacy as a predictor of commitment is stronger in the first stage, team cohesion to
predict commitment is stronger in the second stage, predictive ability of task challenge is
stronger during the third stage, supervisory behaviour score is higher in the fourth stage
and organizational climate during the fifth stage. Between stage analysis indicated that
the influence of team cohesion larger in the second stage, job challenge in the third stage,

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and supervisor behaviour had a larger impact in the fourth stage. Job challenge is made
up of factors like job autonomy, job variety and job complexity.

Motivation concerns of an employee at each career stage are different has been studied by
various researchers (Cron, 1984; Cron, Dubinsky & Michaels, 1988; Cron & Slocum,
1986; Flaherty & Pappas, 2002a; Miao et al., 2009). Miao et al. (2009) found significant
variation in challenge seeking and compensation seeking (cognitive motivation) across
career stages. Salespeople in the establishment stage showed highest level of challenge
seeking (cognitive intrinsic motivation) though the differences are not significantly
different from other stages except disengagement stage. Compensation seeking (cognitive
extrinsic motivation) is higher in the initial stages compared to later stages. Therefore an
appropriate compensation scheme is required for employees in exploration and
establishment stage. It is postulated that task enjoyment (affective intrinsic motivation) is
higher in exploration and establishment stage to later stages though the differences are
not significant. It is also found that task enjoyment and compensation seeking are more
relevant than challenge seeking and recognition seeking in exploration stage but in the
establishment stage task enjoyment dominated challenge seeking and recognition
seeking. No significant differences are found in maintenance stage for the four
motivation variables and recognition across various career stages. Results are in
congruance with Cron & Slocum (1986).

Mehta et al. (2000) found little differences in the importance given to rewards like early
and middle career stage sales managers. The reward given highest credit during early
stages is achievement of market goals and during middle career stage attitude of superiors
towards them is found to be the most important reward. In late career stage achievement
of market goals, opportunities for promotion and retaining respect of salespeople are
more important rewards than during middle career stage. On comparing early and late
career stage respect of salespeople and retirement plan are more relevant at later stages.
Promotion is equally relevant in early and late career stages. On the contrary few rewards
are viewed as equally important all through the career course like attitude of superiors
towards the sales manager, recognition and bonus and stock options.

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Cron et al. (1988) postulated that valences for higher-order rewards and level of
challenge seeking (Flaherty & Pappas, 2002a) varied with successive career stages.
Results indicated that age is inversely related to desire for promotion therefore it is high
for exploration stage. But because of lack of clarity on instrumentality they show lowered
performance scores. Employees in establishment stage relate promotion as a ladder for
personal growth and score highest for the variable as compared to other stages.
Employees in maintenance stage are less hard working and involved as compared to
establishment stage as they have already achieved most of what they want to achieve.
Still in this stage employees have performance scores just next to the employees in the
establishment stage.

Lynn et al. (1996) in his study on accounting professionals found significant differences
across career stages in job attitudes like job involvement and organizational commitment.
They established a positive relationship of career stage with Job involvement and
Organizational commitment. Intrinsic and extrinsic reward satisfaction also indicated a
positive relationship to occupational tenure. It is also found that organizational turnover
intentions related negatively with professional tenure. The results are further analyzed to
see for differences in above the results across genders. No differences from the above
stated results are found for the male group. But the female group supported none of the
above stated results except organizational turnover intentions negative relationship with
professional tenure. The results therefore suggest that there are not many differences in
job attitude across career stages. Few differences in job attitude across gender indicate
towards the belief that women in male dominated professions develop attitudes similar to
their male counterparts. The reasons for differences across genders are attributed to the
societal differences females have to face in their careers. Some reasons stated for the
same are discontinuous career patterns, lesser promotions and restricted career access
offered to females. As indicated by other studies; this study could not establish
relationship between overall job satisfaction and career stage.

Bedeian, Ferris and Kacmar (1992) in his study tries to explore relationship of job
satisfaction with age & job tenure. It is established through this study that organizational
tenure is a more stable predictor of job satisfaction than age. They further added that

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assessment of work environment features thereby leading to job satisfaction changes with
tenure. They supported the contention of job experience models that determinants job
satisfaction vary with tenure. On the contrary they stated that career-stage model can
better explain the effect of age. Experiential events or conditions (e.g. perceptual,
cognitive, and linguistic development) tend to vary with age. They are not able to find
many differences in components of job satisfaction across genders. Also tenure is unable
to explain significant variation in job satisfaction.

Aryee et al. (1994) study on career commitment examined [Link]

satisfaction, organizational commitment, job characteristics, supervisor support, expected
utility of present job and outcomes viz. skill development, career withdrawal intentions.
The findings supported the relevance of job characteristics and expected utility of present
job, as strong predictors of career commitment across all the three career stages. On the
analysis of career stage role as a moderator of predictors of career commitment disclosed
that supervisor support, career satisfaction and organizational commitment are significant
but weak predictors in trial, stabilization and maintenance stage respectively.
Organizational status is also a significant predictor of career commitment across career
stages but explained very little variance. Career commitment as predictor, indicated a
positive and significant relationship between career commitment and skill development
on one side and a negative and significant relationship between career commitment and
career withdrawal intentions across career stages. Expected utility of present job is found
to be a stronger and relevant predictor of career commitment.

Peluchette and Jeanquart, (2000) also reported performance changes or career success
differences across career stages because of differences in type and number of mentors.
Having a mentor in early career stage positively influenced both objective and subjective
career success. But having mentor in mid-career stage positively influenced only
objective career success. A mentor from within the profession is essential for objective
success of faculty members in their earlier career. Mentors from single or multiple
sources equally influenced subjective success in this stage. In Middle career mentors
from multiple sources and from outside the work place are crucial for objective success.
Faculty member in their late career don’t attribute their success to mentoring alternatives.

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Giri and Santra, (2010) pointed out that not only job experiences but leadership style also
differs with age and experience. Results indicated that employees with less experience
had more score for Transformational Leadership and employees with higher experience
indicated higher scores of Laissez Faire style of leadership. Employees in there middle
career stage showed highest scores on all three leadership styles viz. transformational,
transactional and Laissez Faire and scores for Advanced Career Stage came later. There
are no significant changes across career stages and age for transactional leadership style.

2.6 CONCLUDING REMARKS

This chapter studies the variations in the job attitude of the employees across career
stages and its impact on various job outcomes. Career stage model has been delt in detail
to better understant these variations at all levels. Inspite of the evidentcomplexities
associated with the operationalization and nomenclature of CSM; this section focuses on
integration of various studies for career stage measurement criterion. As most of the
researchers have explored the first three stages i.e. trial, establishment and maintenance;
and very few have considered decline stage as part of their research therefore analysis
does not include disengagement state as part of career stage in much detail.

To ascertain its validity, not many studies (Cron et al., 1988; Flaherty & Pappas, 2002a &
b; Hess & Jepsen, 2009; Miao et al., 2009) have investigated exactly on the lines of Super
model, primarily because of the lengthy questionnaire. Hardly any study has tried to
analyze the suitability of Super’s psychometric measure relationship with commitment.
Cooke (1994) stated that age and tenure are not adequate measures of career stage for
work related issues. Ornstein et al. (1989) in his findings indicated that the Levinson et al.
(1978) model which is an age based model better explains individuals' attitudes and
behavioural intentions about events external to the work itself (e.g. promotional
aspirations, willingness to leave the company), while the Super model based on
psychometric measurement focuses on attitudes relative to the work itself (e.g. job
involvement, satisfaction). Organizational commitment considered as a multi-
dimensional construct (Allen and Meyer, 1993; Conway, 2004) is influenced by job/
organizational related attitudes (HR policies, job satisfaction etc.) and intentions external
to work alike (availability of opportunities). Therefore present research is inadequate to

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establish the suitability of Super’s psychometric measure in investigating variations in
organizational commitment across career stages.

Organizational tenure determines organizational commitment for employees with longer

association with the organization. It is linked with job experience model which better
explains the influence by organizational factors on organizational commitment (Cohen,
1993). Age is an important determinant of organizational commitment in the early career
stage and is associated with career stage model which explains the influence by both
external factors and work aspects on age (Cohen, 1991; Cohen, 1993; Ornstein et al.,
1989).

Organizational tenure as a measure is used by most of the researchers (Conway, 2004;

Kaur & Sandhu, 2010; Modi & Patel, 2012; Morrow & McElroy, 1987; Noordin et al.
2011 a & b) with sub-groups as (a) up to 2 years, (b) 3 to 9 years, and (c) More than 10
years. These sub- groups represent establishment, advancement and maintenance stages
respectively by some (Morrow & McElroy, 1987) and as early, middle, and late career
stages by others. Former career stage labels seems more apt; as it also gives better view
of the characteristics associated with each stage with reference to parameters like job
satisfaction, turnover intentions, performance, commitment etc.

Age as a measure for better understanding should be preferably grouped as (a) up to 30

years, (b) 31 to 35 years, (c) 36 to 40 years, and (d) older than 40 years. The first
subgroup representing the trial or the exploration career stage, the second denotes the
establishment or settling-down stage, the third signifies the advancement stage, and the
fourth maintenance stage (Cohen, 1993). The above stated nomenclature enables better
analysis as it further bifurcates the establishment stage of 15 years, used by most of the
studies (Allen &Meyer, 1993; Kaur & Sandhu, 2010; Morrow and McElroy, 1987;
Noordin et al., 2011a & b; Singh & Singh, 2010). Period of 15 years is too long to be
assumed as not bringing major behavioural and attitudinal changes in an employee’s
career. More research is essential with the above stated categorization before any
concrete and reliable statements can be made.

Relationship of positional tenure with job attitude has been investigated by few
researchers (Allen & Meyer, 1993; Morrow & McElroy, 1987). Employees generally

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don’t change job without change in the position so positional tenure forms a sub-set of
organizational tenure. Since positional tenure is studied as a sub-set of organizational
tenure, it explains less variance as compared to organizational tenure. Perhaps, research
with a more detailed study with employees with different position experiences in an
organization is required to draw more valid inferences regarding relationship between
positional tenure and organizational commitment or other job outcomes or other career
stage measures.

Studies on organizational commitment have not used occupational tenure as the

measurement criterion and reasons behind such discrimination is not clear from the
available data, though Buchanan II (1974) in his research on building Organizational
Commitment has used the measure but he also worked it out in combination with
organizational tenure. However, researchers have used occupational tenure to study other
variables like job satisfaction, performance, turnover intentions etc. Flaherty & Pappas
(2002b) while investigating the predictors of turnover intentions found that psychometric
measures and occupational tenure are better predictors than age and organizational
tenure. More research is required to draw valid conclusions regarding occupational tenure
relation with other career stage measure, since they are interlinked to each other.

Lynn et al. (1996) investigated career stage’s (using professional tenure as measure)
impact on discrepancies across gender and found that organizational commitment is
positively related to career stages for male accounting professionals but no relationship is
significant for female counterparts. However more investigation in gender differences
using different operationalizations is essential to draw legitimate inferences because of
questions raised by other gender based studies regarding validity of the validity of some
career stage measures across genders (Ornstein & Isabella, 1990).

Over and above these operationalizations, there is a need to overlap some of these
operationalizations so that their results can be integrated and validated to some extent.
For example, occupational tenure can be integrated with age with few exceptions which
are rarely seen; like person with occupation change altogether or one who has to take a
break from work because of some personal reasons (visible preferably in case of
females). Error may arise because of people with different age in their initial job but no

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research has tried to study its impact on various job dimensions. This may be because
people generally start working at almost the same age and moreover minor variations in
the initial job is not expected to bring any major behavioural, attitudinal or performance
changes in the long run. So the impact of career starting age is not evident.

Morrow and McElroy (1987) stated that age, organizational tenure, and positional tenure
are all positively related to age as the career stage measure but age explains greater
amount of variance in commitment scores of all three measures and positional tenure
explained the least variance. Though different measurement criterion gave different
results, irrespective of the measurement criterion all confirmed the prediction that
employees in the last career stage are the most committed.

Studies implicitly point towards the existence of two models as stated by Reicher’s
(1986) -Experience model and Career stage model for better understanding of the
variations in organizational commitment across career stages. Reicher’s (1986)
experience model elaborates the influence of tenure on organizational commitment across
career stages. According to her, employees in the early-career stage have weak
behavioural and structural bond with the organization and therefore influence of
psychological factors (expectations, challenges, conflict) in this stage are quite impactful.
In later career stages, not only psychological and behavioural factors play an important
role in developing commitment, but investment made in the organization and lack of
available opportunities together determine the employees relationship with the
organization.

Further Bedeian et al. (1992) argued that one can use two separate models to understand
the impact of job satisfaction. Firstly, the career-stage model to explain the effect of age
and secondly, the experience model presented as a superior method that corresponds to
the effect of tenure. On same lines Cohen (1993) demonstrated that Organizational
commitment-age relation is relevant in early career and OC-tenure relation is relevant in
the later career stages. The OC-tenure relation representing the job experience model and
is affected more by events and factors in the specific job and organizational factors. He
further added that OC–age relation represents the career model and is affected by factors
associated with the organization and factors external to the organization and work alike.

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