Originally published here.

With the goal of contributing to the growth of research on people with disabilities in employment, in particular in relation to their job satisfaction (JS), organizational commitment (OC), and turnover intention (TI), this study explores the effect of JS on TI among employees with disabilities and the moderation effect of OC and its four dimensions on this main relationship. A total of 245 Special Employment Center (SEC) employees in Spain answered a questionnaire. To analyze the results, a descriptive analysis with bivariate correlations across the variables was performed, and the moderation model was tested subsequently using macro PROCESS for SPSS by Hayes. For the significant effects, a pick-a-point approximation was used to interpret the results. The results show that OC and its dimensions have no significant effect on the direct relationship. However, some components of JS, such as the relationship with co-workers and with supervisors, play a significant role in the relationship with TI when moderated by affective and value commitment. Our results show that it is important that human resources departments create conditions favoring a work environment with positive interpersonal relationships between employees and managers in order to minimize TI at SECs.

Employees with disabilities at SECs showed medium–high levels of affective and values commitment to their organizations, medium levels of general satisfaction, and low levels of needs commitment and TI. As regards the different components of satisfaction, employees with disabilities showed medium–high levels of satisfaction with their supervisors and colleagues. Similar results were obtained in a previous study of SECs in France (Fernández de Soto, 2017). It is important to take into account that our results may be explained by the context of a sheltered work environment. Conversely, Schur et al. (2017) found that employees with disabilities who worked in ordinary companies perceive worse employee-management relations and worse treatment by management, although they report similar co-worker relations as employees without disabilities.

The results partially confirmed our hypotheses from a general perspective. First, as regards the relationship between satisfaction and TI (H1), our results are similar to those obtained by Tett and Meyer (1993) for people without disabilities. They found that greater employee JS is invariably reported as negatively related to turnover and intentions to leave. Our results confirm that this connection is significant except in the case of satisfaction with social benefits and the relationship with co-workers with respect to TI. Second, regarding the moderation effect of OC (H2), only affective commitment was found to moderate the relationship between general satisfaction and TI (H2c ). The results of the detailed analysis of JS components, and each of the four dimensions of OC showed that three interactions were significant. Affective commitment moderates the relationship between TI and satisfaction with co-workers and supervisors, while values commitment moderates the relationship between and TI and satisfaction with the relationship with supervisors. In view of the results, it may be affirmed that when there is a high level of affective commitment, satisfaction with co-workers will lead to lower TI. Regarding the second significant interaction, it can be interpreted that when there are high or medium levels of affective commitment, satisfaction with supervisors will also lead to lower TI. Regarding the third interaction, with average and high levels of value commitment, satisfaction with supervisors will result in lower TI. Our results concur with Schur et al. (2017), who affirmed that, “perceptions of better treatment by management and coworkers predict lower TI” (p. 488).

These findings can help HR departments to develop strategies to attract, engage, and retain these employees, who are a priority for organizations today, given that disabled individuals constitute an underused labor pool and can offer organizations the benefits of diversity (Shantz et al., 2018). In this context, it is important for organizations to promote an organizational culture oriented to people’s needs (Cook and Lafferty, 1986) in order to assure high levels of JS—especially with co-workers and supervisors—and, consequently, lower levels of TI. This implies that the members of organizations, managers, and employees should focus their efforts on guaranteeing positive interpersonal relationships. In this sense, it is important to have a friendly, open, and sensitive attitude to work group satisfaction, stimulating personal and professional development. All this ensures a positive work experience, which has been related to the development of affective commitment.

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