Emotional Intelligence, Turnover Intention, and Commitment Among Nonprofit Employees

Employee turnover is a persistent problem contributing to financial issues and declining productivity in nonprofit organizations. Nonprofits cannot fulfill their core missions of providing services to people in need when managing staffing disruptions. Measuring employee turnover intention can determine the probability of employee turnover, and a potential predictor of turnover intention is emotional intelligence, an area unstudied in the nonprofit sector. This study was designed to explore this relationship, in addition to the employee\u27s commitment to the organization. The population consisted of 273 nonprofit employees older than 18 years, working in a nonsupervisory capacity. They completed an online survey consisting of measures of emotional intelligence, turnover intention, and commitment. The findings of this study showed no relationship between total emotional intelligence and turnover intention; however, there were significant relationships with the 4 predictors of emotional intelligence, as well as the scales of commitment. The results of this study can be used to better understand how to strengthen a nonprofit employees\u27 commitment to his or her organizations through better understanding of commitment levels themselves, as well as to the emotional intelligent that informs such commitment. With such understanding, organizations could potentially better retain the talent of their workforces, and in turn better serve their communities without as many interruptions to their services. Retaining employees is essential to organizational health to ensure consistent and excellent services are provided to those in need