Career adaptability as protagonist on contemporary rural migrant workers’ turnover intention: The mediating effect of organization embeddedness and organizational identification

Abstract

BACKGROUND:

Contemporary migrant workers from rural areas demonstrate high turnover behaviors in China and pose substantial threats to China’s economic growth.

OBJECTIVE:

This study aimed to explore the causes of this short-term employment from the perspective of individual dispositions in terms of career adaptability. This study investigated organization embeddedness and organizational identification as underpinning mechanisms linking career adaptability to turnover intention. The hypotheses explanations were provided according to the Conservation of Resources theory.

METHODS:

Survey data were collected from 379 migrant workers from rural areas in the manufacturing sectors of China, and the structural equation modeling technique was used to find the range of outcomes.

RESULTS:

The empirical results demonstrate that career adaptability does not meaningfully predict turnover intention but is positively and significantly related to organization embeddedness and organizational identification. Organization embeddedness and organizational identification both negatively and significantly predicted turnover intention and also played as a conciliator in the association between career adaptability and turnover intention.

CONCLUSION:

Our results suggest management and human resource specialists can directly influence the turnover intention of contemporary rural migrant workers via paying attention to these two critical factors, namely, organization embeddedness and organizational identification.

Keywords

Turnover intention career adaptability organization embeddedness organizational identification contemporary rural migrant workers

1 Introduction

With the industrialization process in China, the demands for manufacturing jobs and the conditions for complex production provisions are augmenting. As a result, manufacturing experts must be prepared to acclimate to technological advances, acquire a cohort of skills, and participate in career self-management. This leads to a number of industry workers, called contemporary rural migrant workers, facing significant challenges in their career, and resulting in high turnover behavior [1], as it has been reported that the job duration is only 11 months for those born after the 1990s [2].

The short-term employment among rural migrant workers has attracted the attention of practitioners and scholars [3 –7] because the rural migrant workers provide a low-cost labor force supporting China’s industrialization [1, 8] and economic development, and it has been estimated that they contributed roughly 21% of GDP growth between 1978 and 1999 [9]. According to a review of the literature, scholars have conducted studies to investigate the causes of this high job mobility [3 –6]. However, previous studies have neglected rural migrant workers’ ability in career self-management. As such, we posit career adaptability to be one critical personal characteristics factor affecting contemporary rural migrant workers’ turnover behavior. We examine contemporary rural migrant workers’ turnover intention because turnover intention has been proved to be the most precise forerunner of real turnover behavior [9].

Career adaptability is defined as “people’s internal career-related psychosocial resources of career concern, career control, career curiosity and career confidence that enable people to manage their occupational transitions, developmental tasks, and work traumas [10].” Career adaptability is a valuable notion of assessing employees’ asset that enables self-preparation for future career changes and challenges that facilitates their fitting to the workplace conditions. The psychosocial resources can effectively signify contemporary rural migrant workers’ ability to manage career-related transitions in the context of the increasing requirements of China’s industrialization process and facilitate their mobility. Prior studies have scrutinized the significant effect of career adaptability and turnover intention [11]. In recent studies, career adaptability negatively predicted turnover intention [12, 13] while other research revealed career adaptability positively predicted turnover intention [11, 14]. It seems that the association between turnover intention and career adaptability remains unclear, which we aim to study in this paper.

In spite of the recent findings uncovering the negative impact of career adaptability on turnover intention [12, 13], doubts on the roles of intermediaries in the career adaptability-turnover intention model continue to remain unclear [12]. Few details are established regarding organization embeddedness and organizational identification, which may have an impact on an employee’s choice to quit. Very few studies explore the connection between career adaptability and adaptation outcomes [15, 16] or the mediation role of organization embeddedness and organizational identification on the association between career adaptability and turnover intention.

Conservation of resources theory (CoR) may provide a theoretical underpinning for this mediation proposition. Conferring to CoR, people make every effort to develop, maintain, and protect valued resources and will engage with and value activities that support these goals [17]. Resources are “those objects, personal characteristics, conditions, or energies that are valued by the individual or that serve as a means for the attainment of those objects, personal characteristics, conditions or energies” [17]. As such, we contend that an individual’s career self-management skills can be seen as personal characteristics resources that energize employees by altering their organization integration, as specific in embeddedness and identification with their working organization, and thereby facilitate retention. The mediation effects of organization embeddedness and organization identification on the link between career adaptability and turnover intention have not been a focus of much consideration, which this study aims to explore.

Additionally, although [13] has revealed that career satisfaction negatively predicted turnover intention and career satisfaction reconciles the connection between career adaptability and turnover intention, their findings did not target contemporary rural migrant workers. Previous studies related to career adaptability were also predominantly conducted in the Western context. Although the context validity of the Career Adapt-Abilities Scale (CAAS) has been demonstrated in China [10], most studies on career adaptability in China primarily focus on students [18, 19] and skill workers [20]. As such, in drawing from a sample of low-skill workers of rural migrant workers in China, this research provides a further contribution to the career adaptability literature by exploring a context that remains uncharted.

2 Literature review and hypotheses development

2.1 Career adaptability, organizational embeddedness, turnover intention

Career adaptability describes an individual’s internal psychosocial resources for managing their existing and projected transitions, tasks, and ordeals in their occupation [21]. Adaptable individuals possess a set of “attitudes, competencies, and behaviors” that enable them to deal proactively and adjust to an unstable working situation, employment requirement and tie themselves to jobs that suit them [13]. An employee’s career adaptability may affect their longing towards an organization and, therefore, maintaining their retention in the organization. Although career adaptability is a critical skill that can enhance employees’ employability within or outside the organization [11], the relationship between career adaptability and turnover intention is inconclusive. Some studies have revealed that employees with high scores in career adaptability have a high yearning to leave [11, 14], while other studies reported a negative relationship, indicating that employees with increased amounts of career adaptability have less turnover intention [12, 13].

Based on [17] conservation of resources theory (COR), people strive to develop, maintain, and protect valued resources and will engage with and value activities that support these goals [17]. Career adaptability can be seen as personal characteristics resource that energizes employees and builds embeddedness foci in the organization. In this research, organization embeddedness is defined as “the cumulative work-related forces that keep an employee from leaving his/her job/organization, which includes fit, links, and sacrifice - three sub-dimensions [22]” Organization embeddedness implies the resources (e.g., fit, links and sacrifice) that support employees performing a job in the organization [23]. Employees accrue embeddedness to the degree that they perceives compatibility or contentment with the organization, feel the connection within the workplace, and feel a substantial loss of material, psychological, or social benefits if they quit. Once employees’ career values, goals, and plans of the future match with the broader corporate culture and demands of their current jobs, they may feel fit with the organization [22], thereby leading to professional and personal ties to the organization, and feel a high cost of quitting their current job. In other words, well-developed psychosocial career resources may increase employee’s organization embeddedness fit and enable them to build strong job-related links and enhance their perceptions of a loss (or sacrifice) of psychological benefits when considering quitting their current jobs. Hence, the higher the levels of career adaptability of the employees, the more likely they are to develop embeddedness in the organization.

Since organization embeddedness is characterized as a set of retention-related dispositions that act “like a net or a web in which an individual can become stuck”[22], The more strains and important an individual’s connect to the web, the more possible it is that an individual might be embedded in his/her job and organization [22]. Embedded employees may thereby display proactive attitudes and behaviors in the organization, such as job satisfaction [24], organizational commitment [25], organization trust, and several in-role performances [26]. Research has demonstrated that employees who are rooted in their organizations are likely to stay at the present job [22, 27]. Furthermore, studies have also demonstrated that organization embeddedness has additional explanation variance in turnover intention or actual turnover beyond traditional attitude variables (i.e., job satisfaction and organizational commitment) and job alternatives [22]. Prior empirical studies also have indicated that high levels of organization embeddedness are linked with low turnover intention or actual turnover [28, 29].

According to the above literature review, we propose that career adaptability and organization embeddedness will have negative effects on turnover intention, and career adaptability will have a positive influence on organization embeddedness. We also argue that employees who can deal successfully with the demands, challenges, and conditions of their jobs will have more embeddedness with the organization and then prefer to remain in their current jobs. Since previous literature has not revealed the mediation effect of organization embeddedness on the impact of career adaptability on turnover intention, based on the contention that organization embeddedness is an influential factor in boosting the relationship between career adaptability and turnover intention, we propose that organization embeddedness mediates the link between career adaptability and turnover intention. The proposed hypotheses as follow:

Hypothesis (1): There is a negative relationship between career adaptability and turnover intention.

Hypothesis (2): There is a positive relationship between career adaptability and organization embeddedness.

Hypothesis (3): There is a negative relationship between organization embeddedness and turnover intention.

Hypothesis (4): Organization embeddedness will mediate the effect of career adaptability on turnover intention.

2.2 Career adaptability, organizational identification, and turnover intention

Based on a career construction model of adaptation]10, 30], individuals’ career adaptability could positively affect adaptation results [15]. Successful adaptation should positively lead to development, satisfaction, commitment, and work success [10, 30]. Prior studies have demonstrated that career adaptability is positively related to job satisfaction [31], work engagement [32], as well as organizational commitment [11]. Given the sound findings that career adaptability is positively related to the kinds of job attitudes, we argue that employees who hold more exceptional transactional capabilities and additional psychosocial properties, which can facilitate them to adapt to and deal successfully with career tasks, transitions, and traumas should perceive more identification toward their organization.

We define organizational identification as “an employee’s organizational membership identification based on their social identity and self-classification; it defines employee’s perception of self-concept and belief [33].” Organizational identification describes an employee’s perception of similarities between their self-concept and their organizational identity [33]. An employee’s identification with the organization is actually his/her self-concept incorporation with the organization’s values, norms, and interests [34, 35]. Dealing successfully with career-related tasks and challenges should facilitate employees to enhance interpersonal competencies and group decision-making skills, therefore developing socialization within an organization and increasing networks [11]. This, in turn, may influence employees to accumulate a positive sense of membership with the organization. Hence, high career adaptability may facilitate employees to develop identification with their organization. Given the discussion above, we anticipate that career adaptability is correlated to organizational identification.

In essence, identified employees tend to perceive the organization’s goals as their own goals and motivate themselves to work hard to facilitate the organization achieves these goals, which results in high emotional attachment and psychological intertwines with the organization. It was found in the literature that organizational identification has a constructive effect on employees’ job fulfillment [36], organizational commitment [37], organizational citizenship behavior [38], as well as voice behavior [39]. Since organizational identification can help enhance employees’ positive attitudes and behaviors, increasing their identification toward their organization should mitigate their intention to leave [40, 41]. Following prior research, we anticipate an adverse connection concerning organizational identification and turnover intention.

Further to the discussion, career adaptability, organizational identification, and turnover intention, according to the conservation of resources theory [17], career adaptability may serve as a personal characteristics resource that facilitates employees to develop the incorporation between their self-concept and the organization’s values, norms, and interests, thereby mitigating their intention to leave. Given that prior studies have not investigated the mediation effect of organizational identification concerning career adaptability and turnover intention, we propose that organizational identification mediates the impact of career adaptability on turnover intention. The proposed hypotheses are as follow:

Hypothesis (5): There is a positive and significant relationship between career adaptability and organization identification.

Hypothesis (6): There is a negative and significant relationship between organizational identification and turnover intention.

Hypothesis (7): Organization identification will mediate the influence of career adaptability on turnover intention.

2.3 Research framework

With the help of a thorough literature review, this study has finally come up with the research framework shown in Fig. 1.

Fig. 1

Research framework.

2.4 Respondents and data collection procedure

We targeted contemporary rural migrant workers who operate in the manufacturing sectors in Guizhou province as the respondents. This was because the turnover ratio of rural migrant workers in manufacturing sectors is most pressing, reported as high as 20.4% [42]. Guizhou Province was chosen as it is one of the top ten provinces in China that provide contemporary rural migrant workers [43], reported as a total of 0.96 million in the year of 2018 (Guizhou Provincial People’s Government). As such, a multi-level nonprobability sampling approach was employed to obtain the final sample. Judgment sampling was first used to determine the manufacturing location. Guiyang city, Zunyi city, and Bijie city were chosen because they are the top three cities contributing to Guizhou Province’s GDP.

Second, seven manufacturing types, including mining, agriculture products, liquor, tobacco, mechanical, electronic, and biological manufacturing, were selected because the total gross output value accounted for more than 60% of Guizhou province’s industry gross output value over the years. Among these manufacturing companies, 33 companies –16 in Guiyang city, 10 in Zunyi city, and 7 in Bijie city –were selected because these companies’ tax payment is among the top within each manufacturing sector respectively. Third, the respondents were chosen based on four criteria: (1) Born after January 1st, 1980, (2) Having moved across towns for work and holding rural hukou; (3) Highest education level up to college qualification; and (4) Working in the current manufacturing for at least three months.

Therefore, 500 questionnaires were circulated to the respondents from the 33 selected companies in Guiyang city, Zunyi city, and Bijie city in Guizhou Province, China. With the managers’ assistance from the human resource department in the factory, we described the purpose of this study to the contemporary rural migrant workers, and the respondents finished the questionnaire willingly and anonymously within one week. If they could not return the surveys within the given time, they were considered as non-respondent. Overall, the data were collected between December 2017 and April 2018. 379 questionnaires with a 75.8% respondent rate were finally selected for this study due to respondent bias.

2.5 Measurement

Turnover Intention. Five items taken from [44] were employed to assess turnover intention. Sample items include “I will probably look for a new job in the near future” and “At the present time, I am actively searching for another job in a different organization.”

Career Adaptability. Career adaptability was assessed with 24 items from the Career Adaptability Scale (CAAS) [10], including four sub-dimensions, namely concern, control, curiosity, and confidence. A sample item is “Realizing that today’s choices shape my future,” “Making decisions by myself,” “Looking for opportunities to grow as a person,” “Performing tasks efficiently.”

Organizational Embeddedness. Organizational embeddedness was operationalized from [45] off- the-job (organizational) embeddedness scale including three dimensions of organization embeddedness fit, links, and sacrifice, and 18 items. Sample items are “I feel good about my professional growth and development” and “I feel personally valued by this company.”

Community Embeddedness. We assessed community embeddedness with 14 items from [45] off-the-job (community) embeddedness scale, including three sub-dimensions of community embeddedness fit, links, and sacrifice. Sample items are “I really love the place where I live”; “How many of my close friends live nearby?”; “Living outside the countryside helps me acquire more knowledge and skills than staying in my countryside.”

Organizational Identification. We adapted [46] six-item organizational identification scale as the final measurement of organizational identification in the current study. Sample items are “When someone criticizes my firm, it feels like a personal insult,” “I am very interested in what others think about my firm.”

The scales of these variables were initially written in English and translated into a Chinese version through a multistage translation and back-translation procedure. To ensure the face validity of the translated questionnaire, this study invited a panel of 2 academic experts from the School of Management, Guizhou University China, to review the design of the questionnaire. The layout, wording, sequencing, along language used in the questionnaire, were examined. At the same time, cognitive interviewing was conducted to avoid the lack of content validity. In this procedure, concurrent and retrospective interviews, as well as semi-structured and in-depth interviews, were employed among the respondents, and the translated questionnaires were identified as well perceive and interpret by the respondents. The measurement scale was measured based on a 7-point Likert-scale, where 1 = strongly disagree; 7 = strongly agree.

2.6 Data analysis

Data received from the respondents consist of 214 male (56.5%) and 165 female (43.5%) workers. 125 (32.9%) of these respondents are 16 to 26 years old, and 254 (67.1%) of them are 27 to 37 years old. In terms of education, only 148 (39%) graduated secondary technical school and higher education, and 231 (61%) of them are graduated high school or lower level. With respect to organizational tenure, 156 (41.2%) of them have more than 3-year tenures, 40 (10.6%), 47 (12.4%), 72 (19%) and 64 (16.9%) of them have been working in their current companies for 18 to 36 months, 12 to 18 months, 6 to 12 months and less than 6 months respectively. The data consists of 95 (25.1%) respondents who have not changed their jobs before. However, 111 (29.3%), 92 (24.3%) and 81 (21.4%) of them have quit jobs once, twice, and thrice, respectively.

Data were loaded into the Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Model (PLS-SEM) - a technique of variance-based structural equation modeling to assess the measurement model and the structural model. The PLS-SEM approach is a bootstrapping and blindfolding procedure that aims to maximize the predictive accuracy of endogenous variables while allowing the retention of more indicators for each construct. This technique is selected for two reasons. First, it is capable of both reflective and formative measurement models and does not cause identification problems, unlike other covariance-based structural equation modeling methods such as LISREL or Amos [47]. Career adaptability and organization embeddedness were targeted as formative second-order constructs. Organizational identification and turnover intention were considered as reflective first-order constructs. Second, PLS-SEM is adequate for predictive purposes, which is consistent with the research objective of the current study. Therefore, the use of PLS-SEM was considered an appropriate approach for data analysis.

2.7 Assessment of measurement model

To evaluate the measurement model, A-type II, the second-order reflective-formative hierarchical model, was examined because career adaptability and organization embeddedness are second-order constructs formed by four first-order and three first-order constructs, respectively. In the reflective measurement model, internal consistency reliability, convergent validity, and discriminant validity of the variables used in this study were investigated. Cronbach Alpha and composite reliability (CR) values were assessed to examine the internal consistency, while factor loadings were tested to examine indicator reliability (see Table 1). As shown in Table 1, Cronbach Alpha and composite reliability (CR) values ranged from 0.78 to 0.95 and 0.85 to 0.96, respectively, and both were above the threshold value of 0.70 [47]. The factor loadings of each item in the measurement were all over 0.65 [47]. Thus, the constructs had high internal reliability.

Table 1
Findings of the measurement model (First-Order, Reflective)

Constructs Item Loadings Cronbach’s Alpha CR AVE

CACF CACF1 0.87 0.91 0.93 0.69

CACF2 0.91

CACF3 0.82

CACF4 0.88

CACF5 0.73

CACF6 0.76

CACO CACO1 0.89 0.95 0.95 0.78

CACO2 0.82

CACO3 0.91

CACO4 0.89

CACO5 0.89

CACO6 0.88

CACON CACON1 0.87 0.94 0.95 0.77

CACON2 0.85

CACON3 0.88

CACON4 0.86

CACON5 0.91

CACON6 0.89

CACU CACU1 0.89 0.95 0.95 0.79

CACU2 0.87

CACU3 0.91

CACU4 0.93

CACU5 0.91

CACU6 0.79

OID OID1 0.87 0.94 0.95 0.76

OID2 0.86

OID3 0.83

OID4 0.91

OID5 0.89

OID6 0.85

OEF OEF1 0.86 0.92 0.93 0.68

OEF2 0.85

OEF3 0.85

OEF4 0.71

OEF5 0.86

OEF6 0.83

OEF7 0.79

OEL OEL1 0.68 0.78 0.84 0.53

OEL2 0.75

OEL3 0.81

OEL4 0.65

OEL5 0.72

OES OES1 0.80 0.90 0.92 0.71

OES2 0.84

OES3 0.84

OES4 0.85

OES5 0.87

TI TI1 0.92 0.94 0.95 0.82

TI2 0.91

TI3 0.90

TI4 0.89

TI5 0.88

Constructs	Item	Loadings	Cronbach’s Alpha	CR	AVE
CACF	CACF1	0.87	0.91	0.93	0.69
	CACF2	0.91
	CACF3	0.82
	CACF4	0.88
	CACF5	0.73
	CACF6	0.76
CACO	CACO1	0.89	0.95	0.95	0.78
	CACO2	0.82
	CACO3	0.91
	CACO4	0.89
	CACO5	0.89
	CACO6	0.88
CACON	CACON1	0.87	0.94	0.95	0.77
	CACON2	0.85
	CACON3	0.88
	CACON4	0.86
	CACON5	0.91
	CACON6	0.89
CACU	CACU1	0.89	0.95	0.95	0.79
	CACU2	0.87
	CACU3	0.91
	CACU4	0.93
	CACU5	0.91
	CACU6	0.79
OID	OID1	0.87	0.94	0.95	0.76
	OID2	0.86
	OID3	0.83
	OID4	0.91
	OID5	0.89
	OID6	0.85
OEF	OEF1	0.86	0.92	0.93	0.68
	OEF2	0.85
	OEF3	0.85
	OEF4	0.71
	OEF5	0.86
	OEF6	0.83
	OEF7	0.79
OEL	OEL1	0.68	0.78	0.84	0.53
	OEL2	0.75
	OEL3	0.81
	OEL4	0.65
	OEL5	0.72
OES	OES1	0.80	0.90	0.92	0.71
	OES2	0.84
	OES3	0.84
	OES4	0.85
	OES5	0.87
TI	TI1	0.92	0.94	0.95	0.82
	TI2	0.91
	TI3	0.90
	TI4	0.89
	TI5	0.88

(Noted: CACF: Career Adaptability Confidence; CACO: Career Adaptability Control; CACON: Career Adaptability Concern; CACU: Career Adaptability Curiosity; OEF: Organization Embeddedness Fit; OEL: Organization Embeddedness Link; OES: Organization Embeddedness Sacrifice; OID: Organizational Identification; TI: Turnover Intention)

The convergent validity was measured by the average variance extracted (AVE). The AVE value of the constructs in this study is much higher than the criterion of 0.50 (see Table 1), indicating the constructs have convergent validity [48]. To evaluate the discriminant validity, we investigated Fornell-Larcker. Table 2 indicates that the square root of AVE (diagonal) is higher than the correlations (off-diagonal) for all reflective constructs. Therefore, the discriminant validity of the measurement in this study all achieved the requirement. In the formative measurement model, the significance of the outer weights of each indicator was assessed (see Table 3). The results showed that indicators of organizational embeddedness fit, career adaptability confidence, career adaptability control, and career adaptability concern were significant to their formative construct organizational embeddedness and career adaptability, respectively, while indicators of organizational embeddedness links, organizational embeddedness sacrifice, and career curiosity were not significant to their formative construct. However, we still retain indicators of organizational embeddedness links, embeddedness sacrifice, and career curiosity because their outer loadings are above 0.50 [47]. The potential collinearity was tested by assessing variance inflation factor (VIF); as seen in Table 3, these ranged from 1.61 to 2.11, which is below the common cut-off threshold of 5.00 [48]. Therefore, multicollinearity did not induce a significant influence on the estimation results of this study.

Table 2

Table2

	CACF	CACO	CACON	CACU	OEF	OEL	OES	OID	TI
CACF	0.83
CACO	0.61	0.88
CACON	0.43	0.57	0.88
CACU	0.53	0.59	0.55	0.89
OEF	0.34	0.39	0.30	0.38	0.82
OEL	0.43	0.38	0.32	0.36	0.65	0.72
OES	0.21	0.12	0.15	0.18	0.57	0.55	0.84
OID	0.25	0.34	0.36	0.27	0.43	0.30	0.43	0.87
TI	–0.21	–0.26	–0.22	–0.21	0.51	–0.31	–0.44	–0.59	0.90

Table 3

Findings of measurement model for formative constructs

	Outer Loadings	T-Values	Outer weights	T-Values	VIF
CACF	0.76	10.69^**	0.26	2.28^*	1.69
CACO	0.88	17.80^**	0.39	2.75^*	2.09
CACON	0.82	12.11^**	0.37	2.70^*	1.67
CACU	0.77	8.36^**	0.21	1.19(NS)	1.79
OEF	0.91	29.12^**	0.52	5.86^**	1.90
OEL	0.81	16.79^**	0.27	2.88^*	1.87
OES	0.82	18.49^**	0.38	4.18^**	1.62
CEF	0.85	22.59^**	0.54	7.86^**	1.45
CEL	0.76	16.72^**	0.27	3.63^**	1.56
CES	0.78	16.25^**	0.44	6.15^**	1.32

(Noted: ^*: p < 0.05, ^**:p < 0.01).

3 Results of the studies

A bootstrapping procedure with a two-tailed test of 5% significant level and 5000 resample was applied to assess the statistical significance of the path coefficients by determining t-values and standard errors [47]. The model results indicated that career adaptability did not significantly predict TI, rejecting Hypothesis 1; career adaptability positively predicted organizational embeddedness and organization identification, supporting Hypothesis 2 and Hypothesis 5; OE and OID both negatively related to TI, supporting Hypothesis 3 and Hypothesis 6. Career adaptability, organizational embeddedness, and organization identification totally can explain 43.5% of the variance in turnover intention.

To determine the mediating effects, we followed the steps of the mediator analysis procedure suggested by [47] through the evaluation of the direct and indirect effects of the mediation model from PLS-SEM. As shown in Table 5, we found that career adaptability had a significant impact on TI when introducing the mediator of organizational embeddedness, supporting Hypothesis 4. Thus, organizational embeddedness fully mediates the influence of career adaptability on turnover intention because career adaptability did not significantly relate to turnover intention directly (see Table 4). Table 5 also indicates that the indirect path effect of career adaptability on turnover intention through organization identification was significant, supporting Hypothesis 7. Therefore, organization identification also fully mediates the influence of career adaptability on turnover intention.

Table 4
Results of the structural model path coefficient

Hypotheses Relationships Std Beta Std Error T-Values Decisions R²

1 CA⟶ TI 0.05 0.05 0.95 Not Supported TI: 43.5%

2 CA⟶ OE 0.45 0.05 8.44^ Supported OE: 20.5%

3 OE⟶ TI –0.32 0.06 5.56^ Supported OID: 14.8%

5 CA⟶ OID 0.39 0.05 8. 48^ Supported

6 OID ⟶ TI –0.47 0.04 11.22^ Supported

Hypotheses	Relationships	Std Beta	Std Error	T-Values	Decisions	R²
1	CA⟶ TI	0.05	0.05	0.95	Not Supported	TI: 43.5%
2	CA⟶ OE	0.45	0.05	8.44^**	Supported	OE: 20.5%
3	OE⟶ TI	–0.32	0.06	5.56^**	Supported	OID: 14.8%
5	CA⟶ OID	0.39	0.05	8. 48^**	Supported
6	OID ⟶ TI	–0.47	0.04	11.22^**	Supported

(Noted: ^**: p < 0.01).

Table 5

Indirect Effects in the mediation model

Hypotheses	Path	Std.Beta	Std Error	T-Value	Confidence Interval (BC)		Mediating Decision
					LL (2.50%)	UL (97.5%)
4	CA⟶ OE⟶ TI	–0.15	0.03	5.25^**	–0.21	–0.09	Supported
7	CA⟶ OID⟶ TI	–0.18	0.03	6.65^**	–0.24	–0.13	Supported

(Noted: CA: Career Adaptability; OID:Organizational Identification; OE: Organization Embeddedness; TI: Turnover Intention; ^**: p < 0.01).

4 Discussion

This present study examines how career adaptability reduces turnover intention via increasing organization embeddedness and organizational identification in the context of contemporary rural migrant workers in the manufacturing sector of China. Career adaptability does not directly affect turnover intention. Still, this relationship becomes significant when introducing the mediators of organization embeddedness and organizational identification. These findings suggest that management and HR specialists could influence contemporary rural migrant workers’ turnover intention by paying attention to these three critical factors, namely, career adaptability, organization embeddedness, and organizational identification.

Contemporary rural migrant workers who can cope with the problems and challenges arising from the increasing skill requirements in the manufacturing sector are more likely to perceive fit with the current job and generate ties to the organization. This further enables them to build job-related links and enhance their perceptions of psychological benefits loss (or sacrifice) when considering quitting their current jobs [49].

Similarly, having high career self-management skills, contemporary rural migrant workers are more likely to participate in various organizational socialization activities [3, 5]. As such, they are good at communicating with their managers and colleagues and group decision-making skills. This, in turn, facilitates contemporary rural migrant workers to develop an interpersonal network in the organization and then develop self-concept and membership with the organization.

However, as low-skills floating population in urban cities [50, 51], contemporary rural migrant workers have limited social network resources to obtain alternative employment in metropolises [3, 6]. Because of that, contemporary rural migrant workers feel better to keep struggling at current jobs in urban factories than go back to a farming life in villages. Thus, it is difficult to leave the current jobs, although they are problematic to adapt to the increasing requirements for complex production skills in manufacturing sectors.

On the contrary, these low skills floating workers would be more likely to stay at current jobs if they received the necessary support from manufacturing, such as promising career growth opportunities, interpersonal relationships, justice remuneration, etc. In these organizations’ arms, contemporary rural migrant workers are more likely to develop integration and resemblance of values and goals with the organization and finally embedded and identified with the organization.

4.1 Theoretical implications

This study adds value by extending three aspects of the literature. First, this study extends career adaptability literature by including organization embeddedness and organizational identification. The results indicate that employees who have high career adaptability are more likely to establish embeddedness and identification with the organization. To our knowledge, it is one of the first studies to incorporate individual psychological capitals into embeddedness and identification to show that individual career adaptability resources can embed and identify themselves in the organization. This study reinforces the arguments made by on the calls for elaborate on linkages between career adaptability and adaption results [15, 52]. Second, this study provides empirical evidence of emphasizing the additional effects of career adaptability on preventing turnover intention through the intermediary role of organization embeddedness and organizational identification. It thereby establishes the relationships among career adaptability, organization embeddedness, organizational identification, and turnover intention. To our knowledge, this is the new effect to address the mediation effect of organization embeddedness and organizational identification on the relationship between career adaptability and turnover intention. Third, the construct of career adaptability is predominantly a Western concept typically introduced in China. Current studies about career adaptability in China primarily focused on students [18, 19] and skill workers [20]. This study extends the participants to low-ranking and low-skilled workers of contemporary rural migrant workers. It answers the call for further examination of the Career-Adapt-Abilities Scale’s (CAAS) validity for use in a different context [10].

4.2 Practical implications

Furthermore, the findings of the present study bear a vital role in government policymakers’ implications at large. First, the current research suggests the government policymakers provide various social supports (e.g., offering vocational education) to enhance contemporary rural migrant workers’ ability to deal with varieties of problems and challenges arising from their current jobs. The government might also consider establishing social justice welfare system for contemporary rural migrant workers [5]. This policy could increase contemporary rural migrant workers’ integration in urban cities, facilitate China’s urbanization process, and influence economic development, social harmony, and stability development [3, 5]. Second, this study provides a novel view for managers to offer various organizational supports (e.g., offering job-related skill training and career counseling. Varieties of administrative supports could help contemporary rural migrant workers shape their ability in problem-handling tactics and coping behaviors and synthesize their vocational self-concepts with their work-roles and negotiating the person-environment fit harmonics [10]. Simultaneously, the firms also need to improve their management systems by implementing a humanized management, such as establishing an employee-oriented and caring corporate culture concerning migrant workers’ thoughts and feelings and helping them identify who they are in the manufacturing setup [53 –56].

5 Limitations and recommendations for future research

It is one of the first studies that empirically reveal the relationships between career adaptability, organization embeddedness, organizational identification, and turnover intention. This research was exploratory and subject to several limitations. First, this study used turnover intention rather than actual turnover behavior. It largely ignored people who do not plan to quit a job but leave because of internal or external events. Therefore, this study recommends that future studies include other objective measures, such as actual turnover, thereby making the research framework more comprehensive. Second, the empirical investigations are examined using the data collected through a self-administered survey. The techniques and procedures notwithstanding, there may still be some bias element as the respondents are low-level workers, who may have found it challenging to answer the questionnaire perfectly. Therefore, future studies might consider employing professional investigators to collect data among these respondents to avoid the potential sampling bias. Third, the variance explained (R²) of this study’s model is recorded as 43.5% for turnover intention. Invariably, therefore, there is an indication that other factors outside the model account for the remaining balance. Thus, future studies can expand the model of the study to improve the R². This recommendation might help future researchers increase the examination and predict turnover intention and the variables influencing it. Finally , in this research, the correlation between career adaptability and turnover intention appears to be insignificant. Therefore, this study recommends that future studies test the relationship in a similar context and confirm this study’s findings.

Conflict of interest

None to report.

Funding

This study was funded by (1): Guizhou University Higher Education Research Project, No: GDGJYJ2020009, YEAR: 2020. Project Title: Research on the Promotion Mechanism and Realization Path of Guizhou Green Agriculture Innovation and Entrepreneurship Talent Training from the Perspective of AMO; (2): National Natural Science Foundation of China: Research on the Influence Mechanism of Employability on Turnover Intention of the New Generation Employees and Organization Intervention Strategy (No.71862007); and (3): The National Natural Science Foundation of China“Social Class Imprinting of Family Enterprise’s Allocation of Control Rights and Corporate Investment Shifting from Real Economy to Virtual Economy” (71862006).

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