Organizational commitment among Dutch public sector employees

Organizational commitment has become a much researched subject over the past three decades. This article focuses on the relatively understudied public sector. On the basis of a large public-sector-wide survey, organizational commitment and its antecedents are assessed, including the contribution made by HRM practices. The findings are, to a large extent, in agreement with earlier studies in that they indicate the relatively major importance of job and organizational characteristics and the relatively minor importance of personal characteristics for affective commitment. Further, there is evidence of an effect of employees' perception of HRM practices on organizational commitment, which is relevant for orienting management action. However, the findings with respect to normative commitment differ from previous studies. It is suggested that further research should be done that includes both organizational commitment and public service motivation as the latter could have an effect on normative commitment of public sector employees.