Antecedents to Change and Moderating Role of Organizational Culture

Abstract

In the prevailing era of technology diffusion and globalization, firms worldwide are changing their work process, policies, and procedures for growth and sustainability. However, implementing change management is challenging for organizations as they receive resistance from the employees. Many factors promote resistance to change, including job security, uncertainty, and losing rewards and benefits. Banks' employees believe in following conventional practices and often have negative attitudes toward organizational change. Given its importance, we identified the antecedents that positively or negatively affect attitude toward change. The study focused on the leading banks in Karachi. Based on purposeful sampling, we collected a sample of 387 employees of local banks. The study found affective commitment insignificantly affects job satisfaction. Job stress negatively affects job satisfaction, and social influence stimulates job satisfaction. Job stress negatively affects attitudes toward change, but job satisfaction and social influence positively affect attitudes toward change. The study also documents that organizational culture insignificantly moderates affective commitment and job satisfaction. The study recommends that organizations implementing change management must share the change management programs with all the stakeholders. Additionally, organizations must find out why employees are against change management. By addressing employees' concerns about change management, organizations may face little resistance from them.