Breach or bridge your career? Understanding the relationship between career plateau and internal employability
| Pages | 986-1002 |
| Published date | 06 August 2018 |
| Date | 06 August 2018 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/PR-04-2017-0101 |
| Author | Yi-chun Lin,Angela Shin-yih Chen,Yu-ting Lai |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour,Global HRM |
Breach or bridge your career?
Understanding the relationship
between career plateau and
internal employability
Yi-chun Lin
Graduate Institute of International Human Resource Development,
National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, Taiwan
Angela Shin-yih Chen
Department of Business Administration, National Taipei University,
New Taipei City, Taiwan, and
Yu-ting Lai
Graduate Institute of International Human Resource Development,
National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, Taiwan
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to identify the impact of career plateau (hierarchical and job-content
plateau) on internal employability, and to investigate psychological contract breach as a moderator on the
relationship between career plateau (hierarchical and job-content plateau) and internal employability.
Design/methodology/approach –Data were collected by distributing paper-based questionnaires to 521
workers in private banking sectors in Taiwan. Hierarchical regression analysis was used to examine the
results of the relationships.
Findings –The results supported the idea that career plateau (hierarchical and job-content plateaus) could
be a significant antecedent of internal employability. Psychological contract breach significantly moderated
the negative relationship between career plateau (hierarchical and job-content plateau) and internal
employability. Specifically, the negative relationship between career plateau and internal employability will
be stronger for employees who perceive a higher level of psychological contract breach.
Practical implications –These findings can help human resource practitioners gain a better
understanding of the value of applicable approaches as an influence on a plateaued employee’s perception of
internal employability, and to facilitate a positive employer–employee relationship, which could foster both a
successful career for an individual and a prosperous performance for the organization that employs them.
Originality/value –Career plateau have been aroused variety issues in HR practice, but employability and
psychological contract breach have barely been discussed with career plateau. This study empirically
establishes the correlation between career plateau and internal employability as well as shown that
psychological contract breach would decrease the plateaued individual’s willingness to stay in the current
organization. Thus, the career plateau may provide organizations with a helpful perspective on one’s career
development. Building substantial relationships between employees and employers lead to better human
capital for organizations as it deals with rapidly changes in the real world.
Keywords Careers, Quantitative, Employability, Career progression
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
At the present time, the business world is subject to dramatic changes as a result of
technological advances and fluctuating markets. This economic transition has a direct
influence on business operations. As Peter Drucker (2003), considered the father of
modern management, stated, “On the inside (organization) there are only costs”( p. 79).
Personnel Review
Vol. 47 No. 5, 2018
pp. 986-1002
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0048-3486
DOI 10.1108/PR-04-2017-0101
Received 4 April 2017
Revised 4 January 2018
Accepted 21 April 2018
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0048-3486.htm
This work was fully supported by funding from the Ministry of Science and Technology of Taiwan
(MOST 106-2410-H-003-132 -SSS).
986
PR
47,5
Most businesses choose to downsize and streamline in order to reduce internal costs.
The organizational structure becomes flatter and more horizontal and also results in
decreasing commitments with employees, which does not guarantee long-term employment
relationships (Arthur and Rousseau, 1996; Greenhaus et al., 2008; Sullivan, 1999).
These changes inevitably mean that promotional opportunities for employees are
reduced, which makes it exceedingly difficult for employees to advance (Allen et al., 1998;
Chao, 1990; McCleese and Eby, 2006). Employees perceive a hierarchical plateau in the
company, where the possibilities of higher advancement are limited (McCleese and Eby,
2006). In addition, there is a distinct possibility that employees experience a job-content
plateau, where they perceive that their jobs are boring when they remain at the same
position for a long period of time (Bardwick, 1986; Allen et al., 1998). Job-content plateaued
employees might consider exploring other options if they are unable to increase challenges
in their jobs (Wang et al., 2014). Consequently, a career plateau becomes an unavoidable and
crucial issue for employees’career limitation (McCleese and Eby, 2006).
Organizations must heed the destructive effect that the perception of a career plateau can
exert on employees (Rosen and Jerdee, 1974). One of the effects is that employees begin to
think of the possibility of new positions only by changing jobs. The concept of
employability has been described as the ability to retain the job one has or to get the job one
wants (Rothwell and Arnold, 2007). According to the human capital theory (Berntson et al.,
2006), education and training increase the worker’s employability at other tasks/jobs or
departments (Groot and De Brink, 2000). In other words, internal employability in practice is
likely to invest in company-financed employee development to make sure that employees’
skills are up to date and marketable if they unexpectedly find themselves out of work.
Therefore, as long as an organization can reduce the job uncertainty, employees are more
likely to remain within the organization rather than find another job outside the
organization (Galunic and Anderson, 2000; Rothwell and Arnold, 2007).
In fact, the vast majority of employers nowadays break out the promissory obligations
with employees (Rousseau, 1989, 1990) such that future vertical (hierarchical) or horizontal
mobility are the inevitable result of their hard work (Lee, 2002; Near et al., 1980), are
assigned longer durations in the same position with few chances for upward mobility in
organizations, and their job lack challenge over time, which increases the frequency of
hierarchical and job-content plateau (Bardwick, 1986; Allen et al., 1998). Obviously, those
conditions affect employees’expectations that might feel offended at the one-sided breaking
of a psychological contract even though such an obligation may not really exist (Rousseau,
1995). In other words, they perceive a psychological contract breach with their employers
(Herriot et al., 1997; Robinson and Morrison, 2000).
Based on the predictions offered by social exchanged theory (Blau, 1964), employees react to
psychological contract violation in a number of negative ways (Rousseau, 1995) such as
absenteeism (Near et al., 1980), dissatisfaction with supervisors (Chao, 1990; Ettington, 1998;
Lentz and Allen, 2009; Near et al., 1980), intention to leave (Burke, 1989; Tremblay et al. 1995;
Kim and Kang, 2013; Hofstetter and Cohen, 2014; Wen and Liu, 2015; Xie et al., 2015, 2016),
psychological burnout (Burke, 1989), low organizational commitment (Chao, 1990; Davenport,
1993; Ettington, 1998; Gerpott and Domsch, 1987; Milliman, 1992a, b; Orpen, 1983; Patterson
et al., 1987; Tremblay et al., 1995), low job performance (Ettington, 1998), and withdrawal
behavior or consideration of termination (Davenport and Russell, 1994).
However, aforementioned studies have rarely considered one’s internal employability as
a crucial antecedent of work outcomes. Internal employability, which relates to individuals’
potential to retain their positions within an organization, could help an organization improve
its development of employees’careers (Bloch and Bates, 1995; Rothwell and Arnold, 2007;
Van der Heijden, 2002). Previous study showed that individuals with protean talents prefer
to learn by setting goals and taking a “developmental”approach to the accumulation of
987
Career plateau
and internal
employability
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