Relational commitments in employee–supervisor dyads and employee job performance

We investigated employee commitment to the supervisor and supervisor commitment to the employee within employee–supervisor dyads. We examined the relationships among four commitment mindsets (affective, normative, continuance-sacrifices, and continuance-alternatives) across members of the dyads and their relationships to employee job performance. Using a sample of 300 employee–supervisor dyads from health care organizations, HLM analyses revealed that supervisor positive commitments (i.e., affective, normative, continuance-sacrifices) generally related significantly to employee positive commitments. Moreover, supervisor commitment moderated the relationship of employee affective commitment to job performance, such that when supervisor affective, normative, and continuance-sacrifices commitments were high, the relationship between employee affective commitment and performance was weaker. We discuss the implications of these findings for the understanding of employee–supervisor relationships.