Social Context of Turnover-Mixed Methods Study of Indian IT Professionals

Abstract

This paper examines the social context of turnover, defined by the influence of supervisors, peers, and family. Using a mixed-methods research design, data were collected by two rounds of semi-structured interviews with 75 IT professionals working in the IT outsourcing industry in India. After a span of 10 months, the respondents were contacted again to longitudinally measure actual turnover behavior. Using structured equation modeling, the study shows that family and supervisory justice play a critical part in the turnover process. The model has sufficient explanatory power and explains 37% of the variance in turnover intentions and 27% of the variance in actual turnover behavior. In addition, we used logistic regression to show the effect of various antecedents on the dependent variable. The detailed qualitative analysis offers insights into the dichotomy between intentions and behavior. Finally, implications for practice and research are discussed.