The relation between career management and organizational commitment: A study on the five-star establishments

Human factor is one of the most important resources within an organization. Therefore, this significant factor should be utilized in an effective way by the organizations in order to survive in the increasing competition environment. Human factor is the most prominent one which affects the productivity in the organizations and it increases the importance of such concepts as motivation, workers? satisfaction, career management and organizational commitment. Furthermore, it may be effective to determine the relations of these concepts among each other in the process of deciding organizational policies.One of the underlying factors leading to this study is the fact that no study into tourism field on the issue has been conducted and apart from tourism, the number of the study on the relation between career management and organizational commitment is quite limited both at international and national level. Hence, this study set out to explain the relation between career management system (career management, career planning and career development) and organizational commitment through an empirical study conducted at the five-star hotel establishments. In order to serve this purpose, the questionnaire form was applied to 1084 employees at the five-star hotel establishments operating in various provinces in Turkey.The questionnaire form is composed of three sections. In the first section, there are statements on career management, career planning and career development applications, in the second section statements on 42 statements aiming to identify the organizational commitment level of the employees. In the third section of the questionnaire, there are some questions on individual characteristics of the employees.In the study, to the opinions of the participants, a significant discrepancy was tested among career management, career planning and career development applications and attitudinal and behavioral commitment level, which are the sub-dimension of organizational commitment with paired-samples t-test and repeated measures anova tests. On the other hand, it has been analyzed whether the opinions on organizational commitment and career management, career planning and career development differs significantly according to individual attributes through independent-samples t-test and one way anova. In addition to this, the relation between the opinions on career management system applications and organizational commitment levels were described.In the research, it was found out that the opinions on career management systems are more positive than those on career development and career planning applications. It was observed that activities on career management system were applied at moderate level and accordingly the organizational commitment level of the employees was moderate as well. Furthermore, it was found out that there is a strong relation between organizational commitment and career management system at r=0,74 level in positive direction. Moreover, it was found out that the variables of career management, career planning and career development have an important influence on organizational commitment and the variable with the most importance is career planning.