The public accounting profession in the United States faces a significant talent shortage, highlighted by high turnover rates. This study investigates the relationship between job embeddedness and affective organizational commitment among full-time professional employees at public accounting firms in the U.S., based on a sample of 136 professionals. The research employs multiple regression models to investigate how job embeddedness, particularly its organizational aspects, predicts emotional attachment to the firm. Findings show that organizational links and sacrifices are key predictors of affective organizational commitment, one of the three commitment dimensions, while community-related aspects and organizational fit are not. Control variables, job satisfaction, and job engagement also exhibit strong positive relationships with commitment. These results suggest that internal workplace factors, like team cohesion and perceived professional sacrifices, are crucial for retaining talent in public accounting. This study offers practical insights for firm leaders to enhance employee retention and lays the groundwork for future research on embeddedness and commitment in professional services.
Cooper et al. (Tue,) studied this question.