The moderating effects of perceived threat to valued job features on career commitment among university professors

Abstract

This article studies the relationships between perceptions of threats to valued job features, total job (job insecurity), and career commitment among university professors, using the context of post-tenure review policy. It surveys professors from a randomly selected sample of 74 universities that have implemented post-tenure review policies and processes and analyzes their responses using structural equation methods. It tests hypotheses about relationships between perceptions of threats to job features, the total job as a result of post-tenure review policy, and career commitment. It finds that when post-tenure review is perceived as a threat to valued job features such as job autonomy and the total job, it negatively affects measures of affective, continuance, and normative career commitments. The implications of these findings for university administrators, regents, and boards of governors contemplating the development and implementation of post-tenure review policies are discussed.

Keywords

Post-tenure review career commitment career choice academic freedom job autonomy job insecurity affective career commitment psychological contract

Perhaps the most attractive and valued feature of a career as a university professor is job autonomy or academic freedom implied in permanent academic tenure. Even though academic tenure is not considered a guarantee of lifetime employment, one who had been granted permanent tenure cannot be dismissed without due cause. As such, a certain degree of economic and job security is associated with academic tenure. Therefore, it is considered, by many, to be a psychological contract between one who is tenured and the institution that granted it. By definition, psychological contract is one’s beliefs about the terms and conditions of a reciprocal exchange agreement involving perceived obligations and expectations (Morrison & Robinson, 1997). Even though psychological contract, in the context of employment, focuses on an individual’s beliefs and interpretations, it is a component of what employees expect to receive and it forms the premise of employee’s organizational and career commitments (Robinson, Kraatz, & Rousseau, 1994; Rousseau, 1989, 2001). In this context, tenure can be construed to mean that, for all practical purposes, all faculty performance evaluations after tenure is granted are only for salary and promotion decisions and not for employment decisions as some post-tenure review policies require.

In the past two decades, however, post-tenure review requirements appear to have changed this view because they introduce a more expansive process of evaluating the performance of tenured faculty beyond what is required in annual performance review processes (Fry, 2000). In many institutions, post-tenure review involves a separate systematic and comprehensive process aimed at assessing faculty members’ performance, growth, and development (Licata & Morreale, 1997). Therefore, it is claimed that its purpose is to ensure continuous improvement of faculty performance and development in terms of teaching and research. However, a survey of institutions that have implemented or are contemplating post-tenure review processes shows variation and lack of understanding regarding purpose, expectations, and whether reviews are formative or summative (Licata, 1999; Wilson, 2001). In some university systems, the governing bodies have proposed post-tenure review processes that would lead to termination (summative) of tenured professors who fail to meet a set of performance improvement objectives. Yet, in other university systems, the post-tenure review process does not have the threat of personnel actions (Kelley, 2000).

An additional complication is that even in university systems where post-tenure review is mandated, the methods of implementation and the definition of what constitutes an acceptable teaching and research performance is not clearly defined and is generally left to administrators (e.g., academic deans) and faculty groups such as the faculty senate to negotiate what it should be. These negotiations often lead to inconsistencies in the definitions of acceptable research productivity, effective teaching, and outright incompetence across and within schools or colleges in the same university (Licata & Morreale, 1997). As a result, many faculty members are uncertain whether the real objective of post-tenure review is to improve faculty performance or to eventually abolish academic tenure as it exists now.

These uncertainties have potential to adversely affect the attractiveness of university teaching as a career to current and aspiring professors. Similarly, these changes have the potential to impact affective, normative, and continuance career commitments of those who chose to pursue academic careers based on the premise of economic security and job autonomy (academic freedom) implied by academic tenure.

To date, how post-tenure review policies, processes, and associated consequences affect academic freedom, job autonomy, and career commitment of university or college professors have not been sufficiently studied. Therefore, the objective of this study is to add to the literature by determining the impact, if any, of post-tenure review policies and processes on job insecurity and job autonomy implied by tenure and on career commitment of professors in universities and colleges that have post-tenure review policies. It is hoped that the findings of this study will help university and college administrators formulate and implement post-tenure review policies and processes that are more likely to protect the principles of academic tenure while ensuring that tenure does not provide a cover for faculty members who continuously underperform.

The meaning of academic tenure

The major purpose of academic tenure is to guarantee and defend academic freedom. As such, one who had been granted tenure cannot be dismissed, arbitrarily or without cause, because of views expressed in a classroom and in scholarly publications. However, one who is tenured could be dismissed for adequate cause such as demonstrated incompetence or dishonesty, substantial neglect of duty, personal conduct, and moral turpitude that impair performance (Braxton & Bayer, 1999).

Therefore, for all normal purposes, academic tenure implies some form of job and economic security. Hence, one who is tenured considers it a form of psychological contract that involves a reciprocal input and outcome exchange. Tenured faculty members consider their services to their institutions as inputs that should be reciprocated with certain organizational rewards (outcomes), among which is job security. In return, the employer can expect from employees, organizational commitment, loyalty, productivity, and other desirable work behaviors (Whitener, Brodt, Korsgaard, & Werner 1998; Whitener & Walze, 1993). Thus, the transactions do not involve economic payoffs but implicit rewards that require an employer to be committed to employees’ job security in return for their organizational commitment (Baruch, 1998; Eisenberger, Fasolo, & David-LaMastro, 1990; Eisenberger, Huntington, Hutchison, & Sowa, 1986).

Job insecurity

One of the most frequently referenced conceptualization of job insecurity is offered by Greenhalgh and Rosenblatt (1984). They conceptualize it as a function of perceived threat to one’s total job or (valued) job features and perceived powerlessness or not having control over events that threaten one’s total job, valued job features, or work situation. A review of accumulated research on job insecurity shows a consistent conceptualization of it as feelings of uncertainty and anxiety about the prospect of keeping one’s job during times of impending organizational restructuring and downsizing, cyclical unemployment, etc (De Cuyper, De Witte, Vander Elst, & Handaja, 2010; De Witte, 2005; Garst, Frese, & Molenaar, 2000; Lee, Carswell, & Allen, 2006).

In a mandated post-tenure review environment, the potential exists for some faculty members to perceive it as a threat to the traditional concept of academic tenure and as an indirect approach to ending academic tenure and its implied academic freedom, a valued job feature, and job security. This is particularly true where the consequences of unsatisfactory post-tenure review include termination and restrictions such as supervised teaching, modified teaching assignment, reduction of academic rank, and outright termination. If this perception of threat is high, then, as Brockner, Grover, Reed, and Dewitt (1992) argued, the level of job insecurity would be high; if it is low, the feeling of job insecurity would also be low. In the context of psychological contract, job security is often considered as employer obligation in return for employees’ loyalty, increased job performance, and organizational commitment.

A number of studies have examined the organizational and personal consequences of job insecurity and found that it negatively impacted job performance (De Cuyper et al., 2010; Greenhalgh, 1982). Taber, Walsh, and Cooke (1979) associated stress induced by perceived job insecurity with health problems including somatic complaints, hypertension, and withdrawal responses. Ugboro (2006) and Ashford, Lee, and Bobko (1989) found that job insecurity led to attitudinal reactions such as intention to quit, reduced organizational commitment, and reduced satisfaction. In this study, we measure job insecurity by perceived threats to valued job features and the total job.

Career choice and career commitment

Austin (1984) presented a sociopsychological model in which career choice is influenced by expectations about access to alternative vocations and the ability to satisfy an individual’s need for survival, pleasure, and contribution. These needs are formed by early socialization with family, childhood environment, experiences, and work opportunities. Lindholm (2004) found empirical support among university professors for Austin’s model. Those in his study pointed to the pleasures they derived from the work itself as what motivated them to be committed to both understanding and contributing to the development of the knowledge content of their chosen fields. The participants in Lindholm’s study also pointed to the opportunity to satisfy their survival needs as one reason they chose academic careers. Additionally, they pointed to job autonomy and the opportunity to earn academic tenure as other reasons for choosing academic careers even though it is not as financially rewarding as other professions with similar training requirements.

Blau (1988, 1989) defined career commitment as an individual’s attitude toward one’s vocation or profession. Even though most of the earlier studies on commitment (Mowday, Porter, & Steers, 1982; Wiener, 1982) used the organization as the object of commitment, a generic view indicates that commitment can be extended to an occupation or a career (Lee et al., 2000; Meyer, Allen, & Smith, 1993). A commitment to a career, an occupation, or an organization is based on the premise that people choose a career or join an organization with certain expectations and their decisions to remain in a particular occupation, career, or an organization are influenced by whether or not their expectations are fulfilled by the realities they experience. Commitment, according to Meyer and Allen (1991), takes three forms, namely, affective, normative, and continuance. Affective commitment, results from one’s attachment to an object of commitment (career or occupation). It shows one’s strong desire to be identified with that object such as a career or occupation, and it is induced by an individual’s emotional attachment to, identification with, and involvement with the object of commitment, primarily because of value congruency or agreement (Mowday, Steers, & Porter, 1979). Drawing from these definitions, affective career commitment is an attachment to a profession, occupation, or career that goes beyond reward considerations to the desire to be identified with an occupation or career based on intrinsic motivation, where the reward is the successful performance of career functions or activities and the resulting psychological satisfaction (Deci & Ryan, 1985; Kidd & Green, 2006; Meyer et al., 1993; Mowday et al., 1982). Therefore, career commitment is context free and influenced by what motivates individuals to pursue a particular career, profession, or occupation.

On the other hand, normative commitment reflects an individual’s generalized value of loyalty as a result of primary socialization in a culture which emphasizes loyalty to institutions or other objects of commitment including a career (Wiener, 1982). An individual with normative commitment feels obliged to remain with a career despite better employment opportunities elsewhere. Since value systems shape normative commitment, it is resistant to changes in career context, and it may take a long time to change or not change at all. Consequently, individuals with normative commitment may remain attached to a career longer because they feel a sense of obligation to do so (Meyer et al., 1993). Finally, continuance commitment results from one’s decision to remain in a career because of personal investments (e.g., retirement benefits, seniority, etc.) one has made as a result of years in it and perceived difficulty in finding a comparable career or job elsewhere.

Common to these types of commitment is the desire to identify with a career, the willingness to stay with it, and, perhaps most importantly, the willingness to exert considerable effort and make personal sacrifices to remain in it. In fact, career commitment has been found to affect positively an individual’s willingness to engage in further career skill development and reduced propensity to leave or change careers (Aryee, Chay, & Chew, 1994) and organizational commitment and associated positive work behaviors (Aryee & Tan, 1992; Bedeian, Kemery, & Pizzolatto, 1991).

Conceptualization and hypotheses

A number of studies have identified work characteristics (i.e., challenge, autonomy, freedom, independence, and opportunity for individual expression) as the dominant reasons people are attracted to academic careers and teaching (Dey, Ramirez, Korn, & Astin, 1993; Lindholm, 2004; Lindholm, Astin, Sax, & Korn, 2002; Sax, Astin, Korn, & Gilmartin, 1999). Others found positive effects of these job characteristics on job performance because they induce intrinsic incentives, which in turn elicit commitment to work (Johnson, 1990). Therefore, not surprisingly, research on career commitment has focused on the characteristics that make a job or work intrinsically motivating and satisfying. For example, intrinsic incentives have been found to be especially rewarding to teachers (Johnson, 1990; Kottkamp, Provenzo, & Cohn, 1986). In the university teaching profession, academic tenure protects these job characteristics that are associated with career commitment, and a threat to them poses a threat to an individual’s commitment to academic life, particularly, those attracted to it by these job characteristics. Therefore, we hypothesize that:

Hypothesis 1: A post-tenure review policy that threatens job features (characteristics) will be negatively associated with perceptions of tenure (academic freedom and job autonomy).

Hypothesis 2: A post-tenure review that threatens a person’s job will have negative association with career commitment.

Hypothesis 3: A post-tenure review policy that threatens “the traditional concept of tenure” (job autonomy) will have negative association with career commitment.

Hypothesis 4: A post-tenure policy that is overall threat to tenure will have negative association with overall career commitment.

Based upon these hypotheses, Figure 1 is a conceptualized diagram relating threats from post-tenure review to career commitment. On the left-hand side, the small ellipses show constructs of threats from post-tenure review, which are threats to valued job features (job autonomy or academic freedom) and the total job. These together form the construct, overall threats to tenure from post-tenure review. To the right of threats from post-tenure review is the overall career commitment whose dimensions are affective, normative, and continuance. These constructs are latent variables and the labeled arrows are the effects that allow the four hypotheses to be tested. Thus, the first three hypotheses are the products (H)(H1), (H)(H2), and (H)(H3), respectively, and the fourth hypothesis is (H).

Figure 1.

A conceptual model.

This diagram also shows the possible effects of post-tenure review on career commitment if it is perceived as a threat to the total job and valued job features (job autonomy or academic freedom). For example, if post-tenure review threatens job autonomy because it affects freedom to make curricula decisions, it could make faculty members feel that tenure and what it represents are threatened. Further, if this threat is considered serious, it could negatively affect overall career commitment. The links from overall threats to tenure to its dimensions are expected to be positive, thus confirming the hypotheses. Similarly, the links from overall career commitment to its dimensions are expected to be positive.

Support for this conceptualization are in Chang (1999) and Firestone and Pennell (1993). In Chang’s (1999) model, employees’ perceptions of a company’s career-related practices were related to organizational commitment, which in turn was related to turnover intention with career commitment moderating these relationships. In Firestone and Pennell (1993), incentive policies (organizational factors) influenced commitment by shaping working conditions. If post-tenure review is a disincentive because it reduces assigned tasks (task variety) and affects the psychological states of individuals, then it too could affect career commitment. This effect on career commitment would be consistent with what earlier literature exemplified in the works of Hackman and Oldham (1980) and Mowday, Porter, and Steers (1982).

Methodology

Context

The focus of this research is on tenured college professors in institutions that have post-tenure review policies and processes. An Internet search of colleges and universities with post-tenure review was conducted and their faculty directories requested. Using these directories, a random sample of 220 faculty members were selected to be a part of the study from the business schools of 74 institutions, with not more than 3 from any school. This was to avoid data clustering effects, so that responses from the faculty of one school would not dominate the data. Initial contacts were established through mail with those selected, informing them of our research and requesting that they complete and return the questionnaire in a prepaid envelope. After an initial waiting period to receive responses, the study participants were contacted by postcards to increase the response rate. Additionally, 60 copies of the questionnaire were distributed at professional business conferences to increase participation giving in total 280 questionnaires distributed.

Scales

To maintain anonymity, the questionnaire was developed with no identifying information about the universities where participants worked or whether the universities were private or public. General demographic information about the participants such as age, tenure status, gender and rank, years of college teaching, years at their universities, marital status, dependents, and salary were requested. Information was also sought about the primary missions of the universities, if the universities had post-tenure review policies or had implemented one. In addition, the questionnaire included statements about perceptions of tenure and post-tenure review, the features of a professor’s job they value and changes in these features, if any, as a result of their respective post-tenure review policies. Other information sought were the participants’ perceptions of the threat and severity of threat which post-tenure review poses to the job features they value and the total job and how it affects their feelings of commitment or attachments (affective, continuance, and normative) to their university teaching careers.

Threats to tenure

Seventeen statements from the job insecurity literature (Ashford, Lee, & Bobko, 1989; Greenhalgh, 1982; Greenhalgh & Rosenblatt, 1984; Kraimer, Wayne, Lidem, & Sparrowe, 2005) are used in this study to measure threats from post-tenure review. The item statements form a scale (α = 0.94), which asks respondents to indicate how likely certain events could occur to them on their jobs: how likely post-tenure review would negatively affect their opportunities for promotion, tenure, pay increases, freedom to determine course content and carry out research, and course delivery. These events included losing their ranks and being forced to take lower ranks, promotion to a higher rank, losing their positions and being fired, losing their positions and being forced to accept early retirement, and being pressured to accept lower salaries or salary increases. Responses to the statements were based on a Likert-type scale coded as, 1 = very unlikely, 2 = unlikely, 3 = neither likely nor unlikely, 4 = likely, and 5 = very likely.

Career commitment

Five-point item scales (1 = strongly disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = neither agree nor disagree, 4 = agree, 5 = strongly agree) were developed to measure affective, normative, and continuance commitments. Each commitment was measured by six-item statements drawn from the works of Mowday et al. (1982), Wiener (1982), Blau (1985), and Meyer, Allen, and Smith (1993). These works used psychological attachment to measure organizational commitment. Even though Ismail, Mohamed, Sulaiman, Mohamad, and Yesuf (2011) and Khandelwal (2009) have suggested including attitudinal measures of organizational commitment, the earlier works considered psychological attachment to be a better indicator of organizational commitment. Hence, we use psychological attachment measures in this study. The statements for affective career commitment (α = 0.70) include identification with college teaching, enthusiasm about college teaching, the importance of college teaching to self-esteem, and being proud to be in the teaching profession. Continuance career commitment includes item statements dealing with having invested too much time into college teaching to consider changing professions, the difficulty of changing professions, lifestyle disruptions and emotional costs of changing professions, and costs and personal sacrifices involved in changing professions (α = 0.82). Finally, the item statements in normative career commitment include feeling an obligation to remain in the college teaching profession, feeling it is not right to leave the profession, and being in the profession because of a sense of loyalty to it (α = 0.85).

Descriptive statistics

Table 1 provides statistics about the respondents. A total of 150 of the 280 distributed questionnaires were received in usable form giving a response rate of 53.57%. All the respondents had tenure, 12%, 29.33%, and 34.67% held ranks as the assistant, associate, and full professor, respectively, with the rest, 24%, holding tenured administrative or nonteaching positions or not reporting their ranks. The respondents on the average had 20.11 years teaching experience, had been at their institutions for 14.16 years, and earned US$69,890 per year. More than 76% were over 45 years old, 78% were married, and 97.26% had doctoral degrees. In 27.33% of the universities represented, the primary mission was teaching; in 6%, it was research; and in 66.67%, it was teaching and research. Finally, 90.97% of the universities had implemented post-tenure review policies.

Table 1.

Descriptive statistics.

Variable	M
Tenure	100.00%
Administrator	24.00%
Assistant professor	12.00%
Associate professor	29.33%
Full professor	34.67%
Years in university	14.16
Years of college teaching	20.11
Primary mission: teaching	27.33%
Primary mission: research	6.00%
Primary mission: teaching and research	66.67%
Post-tenure review policy in university	90.97%
Post-tenure policy implemented	100.00%
Terminal degree: PhD	97.26%
Married	78.00%
Single	10.67%
Divorced	8.67%
Number of dependents	1.24
Age < 35	10.67%
35 ≤ age < 45	12.67%
45 ≤ age < 55	35.33%
55 ≤ age < 65	34.00%
Age > 65	7.33%
Salary ($)	69,890

Analytical methods and rigor

Two analytical methods were used in this study. The first, factor analysis, can be used to identify the number of latent constructs and the underlying structures in variables or to test relationships between a set of variables and their constructs. When used to identify latent constructs or as a variable reduction tool, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) is appropriate, and when used to test known relationships between constructs and variables, confirmatory factor analysis is appropriate. Because we adapted organizational commitment and job security scales to measure career commitment and job threats, respectively, it is assumed that the underlying constructs are unknown. This allows us initially to use the EFA method to identify correctly the item statements defining the underlying constructs and to use them in a second stage structural equation model. Maximum likelihood EFA with orthogonal rotation was used to identify the factors and Eigenvalues, SCREE plots, the Tucker–Lewis’ reliability index (TLI), chi-square statistic and its associated probability were used to test for factor sufficiency. A statistically significant chi-square indicated that more factors were needed and the initial number of factors was increased until a statistically insignificant probability was obtained. Kenny (2013) suggests TLI of 0.9 for model acceptance and this served as a threshold to select the correct number of factors. In Table 2, the lowest TLI is 0.93 showing high reliability of the results. As regards job threats from post-tenure review, consistent with the literature reviewed earlier, the maximum likelihood EFA method gave three factors that were threats to job features, threats to total job, and threats to job autonomy and confirmed the three factors of career commitment (TLI = 0.9951, χ²= 105.29, p = 0.39), which, respectively, are continuance, normative, and affective.

Table 2.

Factor analysis results.

Likelihood of following events occurring to you because of post-tenure review in your school
Principal component analysis	Factor 1	Factor 2	Factor 3
Lose your rank and be forced to accept a lower rank in your university	−0.0269	0.7945	0.2659
Lose your permanent position and be offered an adjunct position	0.0700	0.8397	0.1713
Lose your position and be fired from your university	0.0005	0.8343	0.2001
Find you department and school/college’s future uncertain	0.2744	0.6640	0.0405
Lose your job by being pressured to accept an early retirement	0.3692	0.6513	0.0209
Be pressured to accept a lower salary than you presently receive	0.2245	0.7743	0.1220
Your opportunity to be promoted in your university negatively affected	0.2411	0.1680	0.7500
The traditional tenure provision in colleges and universities negatively affected	0.4495	0.2689	0.6059
Your opportunity to attain pay increases negatively affected	0.4326	0.1030	0.7165
Opportunity to work toward and be granted permanent tenure negatively affected	0.1923	0.1527	0.7552
The status that comes with you position as a tenured professor in your university negatively affected	0.4409	0.2078	0.7168
The freedom to determine course content and delivery mechanisms negatively affected	0.7324	0.1804	0.4878
Freedom to determine and carry out a research agenda as you see fit negatively affected	0.8964	0.1489	0.2445
Freedom to determine curriculum content negatively affected	0.9120	0.1570	0.2679
Freedom to determine curriculum delivery mechanisms negatively affected	0.8981	0.1649	0.2579
Tour current access to resources (people, materials, information) in the university negatively affected	0.7812	0.1995	0.2986
The significance of your job in your university and community negatively affected	0.7365	0.0921	0.3837
Career commitment: feelings about attachment to career
Maximum likelihood common factor method	Factor 1	Factor 2	Factor 3
The teaching profession is important to my self esteem	0.2193	0.1362	0.3264
I like having entered the teaching profession	−0.0750	0.1406	0.6879
I am proud to be in the teaching profession	0.0486	0.1809	0.7456
I like being a college professor	−0.0779	0.1017	0.8061
I identify with the college teaching profession	0.1195	0.2358	0.6613
I am not enthusiastic about college teaching	−0.0317	−0.0867	−0.6749
I have put too much into the college teaching profession to consider changing profession now	0.5008	0.3679	0.0154
Changing professions now would be difficult for me to do	0.7130	0.1057	−0.1138
Too much of my life would be disrupted if I were to change my profession now	0.8827	0.1582	−0.0017
It would be too costly for me to change my profession now	0.8909	0.0622	0.0490
There are pressures keeping me from changing my profession	0.4415	0.0637	0.1346
Changing professions now would require considerable personal sacrifice	0.7044	0.1971	0.0391
I believe people who have been trained in a profession have a responsibility to stay in that profession for a considerable period	0.2877	0.5424	0.0743
I feel an obligation to remain in the college teaching profession	0.1016	0.5354	0.1558
I feel a responsibility to the college teaching profession to continue in it	0.0373	0.7119	0.2996
Even if it were to my advantage, I do not feel it would be right to leave college teaching now	0.1754	0.8002	0.0648
I would feel guilty if I left college teaching	0.1420	0.7120	0.1530
I am in the college teaching profession because of my sense of loyalty to it	0.0958	0.6614	0.2181
Fit statistics
Hypothesis 0: three factors are sufficient	Chi-square = 105.29 Probability = 0.3920
Tucker–Lewis reliability index	0.9951

Note: Bold entries show variables that load most heavily on a factor.

The second analytical method is structural equations modeling which was used to test the hypotheses in Figure 1. The constructs of overall career commitment (affective, normative, and continuance) and overall threats from post-tenure review (threats to total job, threats to job features, and threats to autonomy) are those identified in the EFA stage, and the equations associating them with their respective item statements are measurement equations. On the other hand, the equations linking the three constructs of career commitment to overall career commitment and the three constructs of threats from post-tenure review to overall threats from post-tenure review are construct equations. These equations include some independent variables reflecting respondent and institutional characteristics that could affect perceptions of threats from post-tenure review and career commitment. Another construct equation links overall threat from post-tenure review to overall career commitment and is critical to testing the hypotheses. The resulting set of measurement and construct equations, variances, and covariances were estimated using the EQS.2 software with convergence achieved in 52 iterations.

Results

The indices in Table 3 show the models fit the data very well. For example, Bollen’s (incremental fit index) fit index is 0.98, chi-squared statistic is 414.38 with a probability of 0.42, Cronbach’s α of 0.89, and reliability coefficient (Rho) of 0.88. Besides these results, Table 4 shows detailed information about the estimated coefficients. With few exceptions, a clear result is that many of the estimated coefficients are statistically significant at the 0.05 level of probability, and many of the coefficients of determination of the measurement and construct equations are high. Other results are that personal characteristics have statistically insignificant coefficients in the equations for post-tenure review threatening job features and job autonomy. Thus, faculty perceptions that post-tenure review threatens job features and job autonomy are unrelated to respondents’ personal characteristics. However, professorial rank and having tenure have statistically significant relationships with the perception that post-tenure review threatens the total job, with the relationship negative for the former (−0.92) and positive for the latter (0.13) where the terms in parentheses are the estimated coefficients. Similarly, while continuance and normative commitments have statistically significant relationships with overall career commitment (their estimated coefficients are 1.09 and 0.26 to be exact), the results indicate that they are not related to individual characteristics. However, affective career commitment is related to professorial rank positively (0.54) and negatively to age (−0.85).

Table 3.

Fit indices.

Bentler–Bonett normed fit index	0.057
Bentler–Bonett nonnormed fit index	0.97
Comparative fit index (CFI)	0.098
Bollen’s incremental fit index (IFI)	0.99
McDonald’s fit index (MFI)	0.98
Joreskog–Sorbom’s goodness of fit index (GFI)	0.85
Joreskog–Sorbom’s adjusted goodness of fit index (AGFI)	0.74
Root mean square residual (RMR)	0.24
Standardized RMR	0.16
Root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA)	0.01
90% Confidence interval of RMSEA	(0.00, 0.03)
Reliability coefficients
Cronbach’s alpha	0.89
Reliability coefficient rho	0.88

Table 4.

Parameter estimates (B).

Dependent variable	Predictor	B	Beta	SE	R ²
Measurement equations
A. Threats to total job
Lose your job and be forced to accept a lower rank in your university
	Total job	.49*	.83	.00	.68
	Error variance	1.000	.565
Lose your position and be fired from your university
	Total job	.52*	.84	.00	.71
	Error variance	1.000	.538
Find your department and school/college’s future uncertain
	Total job	.49*	.67	.00	.45
	Error variance	1.000	.739
Lose your job by being pressured to accept early retirement
	Total job	.44*	.63	.00	.39
	Error variance	1.00	.78
Be pressured to accept a lower salary than you presently receive
	Total job	.47*	.80	.00	.64
	Error variance	1.00	.61
B. Threats to job features
Threats to your opportunity to be promoted in your university
	Job features	.41*	.78	.06	.61
	Error variance	1.000	.624
Threats to the traditional tenure provision in colleges and universities
	Job features	.52*	.95	.00	.91
	Error variance	1.000	.307
Threats to your potential to attain pay increases
	Job features	.43*	.76	.06	.58
	Error variance	1.000	.650
Threats to opportunity to work toward and be granted permanent tenure
	Job features	.32*	.62	.06	.38
	Error variance	1.00	.79
Threats to the status that comes with your position as a tenured professor in your university
	Job features	.60*	1.00	.06	1.00
	Error variance	1.00	.00
C. Threats to job autonomy
Threats to the freedom to determine course content and delivery
	Autonomy	.55*	.81	.00	.65
	Error variance	1.00	.59
Threats to freedom to determine and carry out a research agenda as you see fit
	Autonomy	.64*	.87	.05	.75
	Error variance	1.000	.50
Threats to freedom to determine curricula content
	Autonomy	.61*	.86	.05	.74
	Error variance	1.000	.506
Threats to freedom to determine curriculum content
	Autonomy	.62*	.86	.05	.74
	Error variance	1.000	.512
Threats to your current access to resources (people, materials, information) in the university
	Autonomy	.55*	.88	.05	.71
	Error variance	1.000	.478
Threats to the significance of your job in your university and community
	Autonomy	.55*	.86	.09	.74
	Error variance	1.00	.51
D. Affective commitment
I would be very happy to spend the rest of my career with this university
	Affective	.151*	.665	.000	.442
	Error variance	1.000	.747
I really feel as if this university’s problems are my own
	Affective	.115*	.489	.000	.239
	Error variance	1.000	.872
I feel a sense of belonging to my university
	Affective	.209*	.900	.000	.810
	Error variance	1.000	.436
I feel emotionally attached to this university
	Affective	.202*	.860	.000	.740
	Error variance	1.000	.510
I feel like a part of the family at my university
	Affective	.215*	.875	.000	.765
	Error variance	1.000	.485
This university has a great deal of personal meaning for me
	Affective	.163*	.736	.000	.541
	Error variance	1.000	.677
E. Continuance commitment
At this time staying with my university is matter of necessity as much as desire
	Continuance	.026*	.051	.230	.003
	Error variance	1.000	.999
It would be very hard for me to leave my university right now even if I wanted to
	Continuance	.453*	.851	.000	.724
	Error variance	1.000	.525
Too much in my life would be disrupted if I decided I wanted to leave my university at this time
	Continuance	.383*	.725	.173	.526
	Error variance	1.000	.688
I feel that I have few options to consider leaving my university
	Continuance	−.308*	−.629	.351	.395
	Error variance	1.000	.778
One of the few negative consequences of leaving my university would be the scarcity of available alternatives
	Continuance	−.042*	−.081	.252	.007
	Error variance	1.000	.997
F. Normative commitment
I do not feel any obligation to remain with my current employer (university)
	Normative	.309*	.795	.069	.631
	Error variance	1.000	.607
Even if it were to my advantage, I do not feel it would be right to leave my university now
	Normative	.237*	.693	.000	.480
	Error variance	1.000	.721
I would feel guilty If I left my university now
	Normative	.275*	.766	.040	.587
	Error variance	1.000	.642
This university deserves my loyalty
	Normative	.147*	.679	.000	.461
	Error variance	1.000	.734
I would not leave my university right now because I have a sense of obligation to the people in it
	Normative	.370*	.976	.069	.952
	Error variance	1.000	.219
I owe a great deal to my university
	F3 (F3)	.166*	.817	.000	.668
	Error variance	1.000	.576
Construct equations
Normative commitment
	Career commitment	1.086*	.709	.313	.505
	Tenure	.471	.014	2.452
	Rank	−.004	−.001	.343
	Dependents	−.125	−.051	.217
	Error variance	1.000	.704
	Career commitment	.264	.242	.153	.059
	Tenure	.058	.002	1.629
	Rank	.034	.014	.169
	Error variance	1.000	.970
Affective commitment
	Career commitment	2.500*	.974	.000	1.000
	Rank	.540*	.096	.000
	Age	−.850*	−.208	.000
	Error variance	1.000	.000
Overall career commitment
	Overall threat	−.189*	−.191	.000	.037
	Error variance	1.000	.982
Threats to job features
	Tenure	2.227	.089	2.421	.959
	Teach/Res	.204	.067	.260
	Overall threat	1.117*	.973	.000
	Error variance	1.000	.203
Threats to job autonomy
	Tenure	2.269	.114	2.177	.693
	Teach/Res	.229	.095	.245
	Overall threat	.746*	.819	.000
	Error variance	1.000	.554
Threats to total job
	Tenure	−.916*	−.053	.000	.374
	Rank	.126*	.071	.000
	Overall threat	.483*	.605	.000
	Error variance	1.000	.791

Note: Beta = standardized coefficient.

Significant at 0.05 probability level.

Figure 2 shows the estimated statistically significant coefficients relevant to testing the four hypotheses. Using these coefficients, the multiplication of −0.19 by 1.12 gives −0.21, and it shows that a post-tenure policy that is perceived as threatening job features negatively affects career commitment and supports the first hypothesis. Similarly, the results support the second hypothesis which is that a post-tenure review policy that threatens the jobs of professors will be negatively related to career commitment (−0.19 × 0.48 = −0.09). Support for the third hypothesis that a post-tenure review policy that threatens “the traditional concept of tenure” (job autonomy) will have negative association with career commitment is provided by our results (−0.19 × 0.74 = −0.14). The final hypothesis that a post-tenure policy that threatens tenure will have negative association with career commitment is supported by our finding of a statistically significant negative relationship between overall threats from post-tenure review and overall career commitment of −0.19.

Figure 2.

Estimated model. Note: The measurement equations are not shown in this diagram.

Discussion

The purpose of this study is to determine on one hand the effects and relationships between perceived threats to job features, job autonomy, and total job and on another, career commitment among university professors in institutions that have post-tenure review policies. The results show that post-tenure review policies that pose threats or are perceived as threats to the total (overall) jobs are negatively related to affective career commitment (−0.19 × 2.5 = −0.48). This finding supports that of De Cuyper, De Witte, Vander Elst, and Handaja (2010) showing positive association between objective threat of unemployment and perceived job insecurity. This is also true whether or not the perceived threats affect job autonomy, job features in terms of reducing the ability of faculty members to determine curriculum content, course delivery, research stream and tenure, or the total job. For those who chose academic careers because of job autonomy in terms of academic freedom and economic security, the results show that the threats posed by post-tenure review weaken the premises of their career choices and this explains the negative relationship with affective career commitment. Considering our finding that faculty rank is positively related to affective career commitment, higher ranked faculty members are more likely to perceive post-tenure review as threatening, particularly that it threatens job features as we found. Comparatively, because we found that older faculty members have less affective career commitment, they are likely to perceive post-tenure review as less threatening. Further, because older faculty members are likely to be tenured and the results show that having tenure is negatively related to the perception that post-tenure review threatens job features, older faculty members are likely to perceive post-tenure review as less threatening to job features.

The negative relationship between affective career commitment and perceived threats from post-tenure review is important because consistently, the commitment literature links affective commitment to job performance, turnover, and employee involvement in organizational extra roles (Blau, 1985; Clugston, 2000; Kidd & Green, 2006; McFarlene-Shore & Wayne, 1993; Meyer, 1989; O’Reilly and Chatman, 1986). Those with affective career commitment identify with their organizations and are willing to work to protect them. Meyer (1989), for example, found statistically significant relationships between affective commitment and organizational performance. They reasoned that employees who intrinsically value their associations and identify with their organizations are more likely to remain with them and work toward their success. Even though this performance–affective commitment relationship is for organizational commitment, Meyer et al. (1993) extended it to occupational or career commitment. Extending this relationship to this study, our findings suggest that the performance levels of faculty members with strong affective career commitment such as those of higher rank as we found could suffer because post-tenure review is perceived as threatening. Therefore, though post-tenure review may be formative for the purposes of providing the basis of needed faculty development and a continuous improvement process, it may have unintended consequences of reducing performance and attachment to university teaching careers. If the unintended consequences persist, they could negatively affect efforts to attract men and women of ability to academic careers as university professors. On the other hand, from the performance–affective commitment literature, because we found that older faculty members have less affective commitment, their performance levels could be affected negatively. This coupled with the study’s finding that threats from post-tenure review are negatively related to overall career commitment could reduce job appeal and further reduce the performance of older faculty.

Another result is that continuance career commitment is unrelated to overall career commitment. Therefore, perceptions of post-tenure review as a threat to valued job features, job autonomy, and the total job do not appear to affect continuance career commitment in this study. However, there is a positive relationship between normative career commitment and overall career commitment. Since perceived threats from post-tenure review are negatively related to overall career commitment as found, perceptions of post-tenure review as a threat to valued job features, job autonomy, and the total job will reduce normative career commitment. These negative impacts though unexpected are explainable and could be what to expect anyway. Normative commitment is an attachment based upon loyalty to an object such as an organization or a career and it is based upon the socialization and cultural processes to which an individual has been exposed and accustomed. As a result, it is sometimes referred to as blind loyalty (Wiener, 1982). Among the three types of career commitment, it is that for which we expected no impact of threats from post-tenure review because cultural values are stable. Further, it is unrelated to personal characteristics. Notably though, because our results imply negative relationships between overall threats from post-tenure review and normative career commitment, this implies that individuals with such commitment may perceive threats from post-tenure review as negatively affecting what they have been socialized to do, thus affecting their job performances levels.

Conclusion

This paper’s objective was to test four hypotheses about the effects and relationships between perceived threats to valued job features (job autonomy and academic freedom), total job that result from post-tenure review policy, and career commitment among university professors. Using data for randomly selected universities with post-tenure review policies and processes, it related measures of career commitment to measures of perceived job insecurity. It found that post-tenure review is perceived as a threat to jobs, job autonomy, and job features, and negatively affects affective, normative, and continuance career commitments. Its effect on affective career commitment is primarily due to perceptions of it as a threat to the job security implied by the traditional academic tenure system, especially job autonomy and academic freedom. The implication, therefore, is that university administrators should endeavor to craft post-tenure review policies and processes that are perceived to protect job features and values essential to the preservation of academic freedom, particularly where there is the need to attract men and women of ability to fill the positions of retiring baby boomers. Other findings are decreases in continuance and normative career commitment. For those with continuance commitment, it could increase their performance which they find necessary to maintain their jobs, and for those with normative commitment, it could result in less performance and a break in their psychological ties to their institutions.

Limitations

A limitation of this study is that the respondents work in institutions that have implemented post-tenure review policies. Therefore, the results may not apply to professors in universities without such policies. Thus, we are unable to compare job insecurity, career commitment, and perceptions of tenure in universities and colleges with and without post-tenure review policies. Another limitation is that faculty members from other disciplines and institutions that do not offer tenure were not included. These limitations provide directions for future research. Specifically, future research should broaden the context by using any institutional or organizational policy changes that threaten valued job features and the total job as surrogate for post-tenure review. Finally, future research should consider the inclusion of measures of organizational commitment that reflect changes in employees’ work values and attitudes toward career and organizational commitment in addition to psychological attachment measures. Such research design should provide for analysis of the effects of triangulation.

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