The Incremental Validity of Perceived Goal Congruence

Person–organization (P–O) fit has attracted much attention as an important workplace and career variable, but there is little consensus regarding conceptualization, operationalization, and the criteria used to measure it. Values congruence, personality congruence, knowledge–skills–abilities, and goal congruence are recognized as separate aspects of P–O fit, and have been identified as predictors of work attitudes and behaviors. The present study reports on the development and initial validation of a perceived goal congruence scale that can be used to measure perceptions of similarity between employee and organizational goals, which has not been studied previously. Initial items were administered to 895 employees of a manufacturing company in Indonesia. Exploratory factor analyses identified a single factor, which was confirmed on a holdout sample using confirmatory factor analysis. Construct validity was demonstrated by testing correlations between the new scale and attitudinal variables of job satisfaction, intention to quit, and organizational commitment. Structural validity was demonstrated by showing that perceived goal congruence was independent from, and explained additional variance over and above, the other measures of fit.