Abstract:
Employee commitment has been established as a determinant of career development
both in public and private firms. Notably, studies on employee commitment and career
development practices have not been exhaustively investigated. There is, therefore,
inadequate knowledge on rewards system as a potential moderator between career
development and employee commitment, thus the need to interrogate these
relationships. Therefore, the focus of this study was to examine the moderating effect
of rewards system on career development and employees’ commitment in selected
manufacturing firms. The objectives of the study were to determine the effect of: career
planning on employee commitment, career training on employee commitment, career
mentoring on employee commitment and career succession planning on employee
commitment; and the moderating effect of rewards system on these relationships. The
study was underpinned on Herzberg’s Two Factor theory as the main theory, supported
by Controlled Commitment Continuum and Greenhaus Model of Career Development.
The study was guided by post-positivist paradigm and adopted the explanatory research
design. The study targeted 25 manufacturing firms in Uasin Gishu County which had
7893 employees. Out of these, 4 firms were selected thus a study population of 3617.
A sample size of 435 respondents was selected based on Slovin’s formula of sample
size determination. To pick the sample from the population, stratified and simple
random sampling techniques were employed using the table of random digits. The data
for the study were collected using a structured questionnaire. In data analysis,
descriptive statistics such as standard deviations, means and frequencies were used
while inferential statistics were obtained by carrying out hierarchical regression
analyses. The findings of the study revealed that career planning has a positive and
significant effect on employee commitment (β 1 =.419, p<0.05). Career training, career
mentoring and career succession planning were found to have positive and significant
effects on employee commitment (β 2 =.285, p<0.05, β 3 =.189, p<0.05 and β 4 =.252, p<
0.05). The findings further revealed that there was positive and significant effect of
rewards system on employee commitment (β 5 =.451 p<0.05). Additionally, the findings
revealed that there was positive and significant moderating effect of rewards system on
career planning, career training, career mentoring and career succession planning on
employee commitment (β 6 =.78, p<0.05), (β 7 =.93, p<0.05), (β 8 =.67, p<0.05) and
(β 9 =.51, p<0.05) respectively. The study concludes that career planning, career training,
career mentoring and career succession planning affect employee commitment. It is
also concluded that rewards system is an enhancing moderator on the relationship
between career planning, career training, career mentoring and career succession
planning and employee commitment. The study recommends that manufacturing firms
should allow their employees to embrace career planning prospects in fast tracking their
career goal progress, self-management and professional abilities. Management should
also ensure that there is continuous skills improvement and acquisition of knowledge
through training. Career mentoring should be encouraged to allow retention of talent
and continuity while mechanisms should be devised in the identification of successors
to high posts for future leader jobs by assisting employees to grow in their careers.
Future studies should be carried out on the same topic using longitudinal research
design which would mitigate these constraints by exploring more methods to obtain
more data.