The Role of Embeddedness Factors in Predicting the Paths of the Unfolding Model of Voluntary Turnover

A great deal of research has been conducted to determine the relationship between the job satisfaction of employees and the likelihood of their leaving or intending to leave an organization. However, research addressing other reasons why employees may leave their organizations has been lacking. Lee and Mitchell (1994) created the unfolding model of turnover to better define and classify the process employees go through in making decisions to leave their organizations. This model suggests that many people decide to leave their jobs/organizations for reasons other than job dissatisfaction. In a separate stream of research, Lee and Mitchell and their colleagues also began to examine a concept of embeddedness. They described embeddedness as the attachment employees have to the organization and surrounding environment (e.g., church, community organizations). Although Lee and Mitchell had not integrated their two lines of research, there was adequate evidence to indicate that the connections should be made. As a result, the goal of this dissertation was to extend the unfolding model of turnover by including embeddedness factors as predictors of how individuals decide to quit their jobs and organizations. Three studies were conducted in order to examine several hypotheses related to this goal. The findings indicated that conscientiousness was the embeddedness factor that was most consistently related to the way in which participants decided to leave their jobs. The implications of these findings and considerations for future research are discussed