The Interconnection of Supervisor-subordinate guanxi and Psychological Contract Processes in the Context of Chinese Banking Call Center

Abstract

The broad aim of this study is to understand and model the nature of the psychological contract and its breaches within the relatively un-researched context of the Chinese banking call center industry, and uses the results to arrive at recommendations for improving supervisor-subordinate relationships in these and similar situations, with a particular focus on responding to the questions regarding how employee work attitudes remain positive when negative experience arise (i.e., breach of psychological contract) within high-quality of social exchange relationship.
The thesis builds upon two studies, each having its own objective: Study one seeks to investigate the contents and the structure of the psychological contract of banking call center employees in China; Study two contains two parts. In the first part, it first redefines the indigenous concept supervisor-subordinate guanxi (SSG) in the context of Chinese banking call center, and then to examine the relationship between SSG quality and its effects on employee work attitudes. Based on this, it develops and tests a mediation model in which perceived breaches of psychological contract (PCB) is hypothesized as partially mediating such a relationship; The second parts of Study two intends to investigate the moderating effect of SSG quality in the relationship between perceived PCB and employee work attitudes.
The main results of this investigation suggest that the structure of psychological contract in Chinese banking call center employees exhibits three-dimensions, namely, interpersonal, development, and normal. Moreover, perceived PCB is found to partially mediate the effects of SSG quality on affective commitment, organizational identification, job satisfaction, and turnover intention. Our results also reveal that SSG quality moderates the relationship between contract breach and employee work attitudes. The findings of the present study highlight the interconnection of SSG quality and psychological contract processes. Additionally, this study also shed light on several important issues for managerial practice in the same or similar contexts.