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Abstract

Of the many women that are a part of the Informational Technology (IT) workforce, very few make it to senior roles. Occupational commitment measured as affective (AC), normative (NC), and continuance (CC) as well as career satisfaction (CS) are considered to be crucial in understanding this pattern of women not making it to senior roles. AC explains one's emotional attachment to their career, NC is the obligation to stay the course in a career, and CC explains the opportunity cost to transfer from one career to the next. This study aims to understand the role of individual determinants (career identity, career adaptability) and occupational culture fit (the concept of screening potential candidates that is focused on aligning employees and employers with shared values, beliefs, and attitudes). This study also focuses on forms of organizational support (managerial support, job autonomy) that either act as enablers or barriers to sustaining commitment and satisfaction in IT occupations. Data collected from 200 IT women with at least 5 years of experience working in top 20 NASCOM companies were regressed to test the hypotheses. The result indicated that women with high scores in occupational culture (i.e., greater congruence with IT occupational demands) show higher career satisfaction (CS), affective commitment (AC), and normative commitment (NC). This indicates that there is a chance for organizations to actively improve women’s occupational demand of long, late, and erratic work schedules by looking at their safety and providing flexi-timing to help them manage a work-life balance. A performance evaluation system that focuses on results, rather than hours of effort, and that allows women flexibility to attend to certain late-night commitments at home could go a long way in helping them achieve a better culture fit. Women with strong career identities show higher AC and CC. Women that have high career identities are intrinsically motivated and place a high value on their work; hence, they continuously seek skill improvement opportunities. Employers can utilize this knowledge to proactively identify female employees with high career identities early in their professional journey then engage them in tasks that are meaningful and aligned with their interests and values. Further, results indicated that job autonomy—a person's ability to have an influence over what happens in their work environment, in particular, the ability to influence matters that are relevant to their personal goals—led to higher CC; higher managerial support leads to career satisfaction, thereby indicating that managers can provide support by providing a participative decision-making mechanism and flexible timing for better work-life balance.

Author Biography

Dr. Swati Alok is an Assistant Professor of Management in the Department of Economics and Finance in BITS Pilani- Hyderabad Campus, India. She is involved in teaching, research and consultancy at the institute from last 10 years. She holds a Doctorate degree in Management from BITS-Pilani in the field of Organizational Behavior. Her research interests include behavioral studies, especially conflict management, gender studies, career management and health economics. She has handled projects of a number of agencies. Her present projects relate to career persistence of women, women empowerment and health of rural women. She has participated and presented papers in a number of International conferences and has a number of research publications in refereed journals. swati@hyderabad.bits-pilani.ac.in

Dr. Sudatta Banerjee is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Economics and Finance in BITS Pilani- Hyderabad Campus, India. She is involved in teaching, research and consultancy from last 7 years. She received her Ph.D. in Economics from Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi, India. Her research and publication areas include empirical developmental issues, gender studies, education, health, applied econometrics, human capital and growth theory. She has published in the above areas, handled sponsored projects and given various talks in India as well as in other countries. Her present research relates to women empowerment, especially rural women, women’s health and career persistence of women. sudatta@hyderabad.bits-pilani.ac.in

Mr. Mohammed Abdul Rahman Khan is a M.Sc Economics and B.E Mechanical Engineering student in BITS Pilani Hyderabad Campus. He loves reading books and writing. He is an avid debater and automobile enthusiast. He is aiming to pursue a degree in management. 10abdulark@gmail.com

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