High Commitment HR Practices and Top Performers: Impacts on Organizational Commitment

Both scholars and practitioners have paid much attention to the impact of retaining top-performing knowledge workers on organizational effectiveness. This study hypothesizes and analyzes how a bundle of high-commitment human resource practices (HCHRPs) influence affective organizational commitment, a strong predictor of employee turnover, of top performers versus ordinary employees. This study suggests that HCHRPs may enable organizations to retain not only ordinary employees but also top performers through their positive impact on employees' organizational commitment. Using a sample of middle level managerial and R& D workers in 11 subsidiaries of a multinational conglomerate located in East Asia, this study showed that a bundle of high commitment human resource practices was positively related to the affective organizational commitment of top performers more than that of lower performers.