Employee Engagement and Organizational Commitment among Employees of Hospitals in Nepal

Background: Employee engagement and organizational commitment are critical factors in the relation of an employee with his/her work and organization. Since hospitals are service organizations characterized by difficult working conditions, there are many benefits of examining their relationships and the possible differences in these variables according to ownership (government or private) and tenure of an employee. Purpose: The objective of this research was to examine the relationship between employee engagement and organizational commitment among hospital employees in Nepal. The differences between employee engagement and organizational commitment by hospital ownership and commitment by tenure were also investigated. Method: Quantitative research design involving cross-sectional survey was adopted. Primary data were collected through a structured questionnaire from employees of selected hospitals that were purposively sampled as either government or private hospitals. Data analysis was performed using descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation, independent samples t-tests, and simple linear regression. Results: Employees' engagement had positive and significant correlation with their organizational commitment and significantly predicted it by explaining a considerable amount of variance. The engagement level of government hospital employees was found to be significantly higher than the engagement level of private hospital employees, with a moderate-to-large effect size. Commitment of government hospital employees was found to be the same as that of private hospital employees. Employees with long tenures were found to have significantly higher levels of commitment than short tenured employees, whereas no such differences were found regarding engagement. Conclusion: Engagement is a robust predictor of organizational commitment for hospital employees in Nepal. Engagement is more related to ownership, whereas tenure is more related to organizational commitment. Hospital management can use the tool of engagement in order to enhance their employees' organizational commitment. Novelty: This research adds to the existing literature by examining employee engagement and organizational commitment of hospitals in Nepal, in addition consider differences related to employee tenure.