NIA 
Topic: Organizational commitment
Problem: Commitment of the Faculty of Social Sciences students to the institution and their selected study programme
Defined problem:
These days organizational commitment is the key of successful organizations. While it is very hard for organizations to get emloyees, who are truly committed to the organization, we decided to measure which factors contribute to development of stronger organizational commitment. Due to the fact, that the faculty is the organization, which is strongly connected with our age, we decided to measure students` commitment to our faculty and two study progammes: Political Science - International Relations and Political Science - Theoretical Anlaysis. We decided for these two programmes because International Relations had the highest number of points required for enrolment (90 points) and Theoretical Analysis the lowest (55 points). With this research we are trying to find out if the commitment of students of International Relations in the first year is stronger than the commintment of students of Teoretical Anlysis in the first year and if higher affective commitment of senior students positively influences their study efficiency. We expect to confirm both hypotheses.
Hypotheses:
- Students of International Relations are already in the first study year more committed to their study programme and faculty than the students of Theoretical Analysis.
- Higher affective commitment of senior students positively influences their study efficiency.
Research questions:
- What is organizational commitment?
- Which concept of organizational commitment is the most suitable for our research problem and why?
- Which form of organizational commitment is most present at students of the Faculty of Social Sciences?
- Which factors influence on students` commitment to their study programme and faculty?
Task distribution:
We distributed the tasks among each other. Tina will interpret affective and continuance commitment, Vanja will explain the normative commitment and try to find some students from the two study programmes which we chose to study. Maša will prepare the questionnaire from Meyer and Allen and distribute it among the students of the first year. Marijana will investigate the students of the fourth year and analyse the completed questionnaires. Then we will meet again to make a conclusion.
LITERATURE:
1. Gibson, J. L. (1994): Organizations: behavior, structure, processes. Sydney: Irwin.
2. Nijhof, Wim J. et al. (1998): Employee commitment in changing organizations: an exploration. Journal of European Industrial Training 22 (6), 243-34
3. Stanojević, M. (2001): Uspešna nedozorelost. Ljubljana: FDV.
4. Richards,B et al. (1994): Predicting the Organizational Commitment of Marketing Education and Health Occupations Education Teachers by Work
5. Related Rewards. Journal of Industrial Teacher Education 32 (1)
6. Meyer, J.; Allen, N. J. (1997): Commitment in the workplace. Theory, research and application, Sage publications, Thousand Oaks.
7. Beggs M, Joyce. et. Al (2002): Dimensions of work satisfaction as predictors of commitment type. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 17 (7) 564-579.
8. Brooks R.,Gordon; Wallace P., Joseph (2006): A discursive examination of the nature, determinants and impact of organisational commitment. Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources, 44, 222.
9. Fullerton, Gordon (2003): When does commitment lead to loyalty. Journal of Service Research ; 5; 333.
10. Swailes, Stephen (2004): Commitment to change, Profiles of commitment and in-role performance. Personnel Review, 33 (2), 187-204.
GLOSSARY:
- organizational commitment (organizacijska pripadnost):
o workers` relationship with their organization,
o how those relationships are established,
o behaviour, well-being and contributions of workers to organizational effectiveness.
- affective commitment (čustvena pripadnost):
A person is emotionally attached to, involved in and identified with the organization.
- normative commitment (normativna pripadnost):
Somebody feels a moral obligation to stay in the organization and do so, because he feels that he ought to.
- continuance commitment (kalkulativna pripadnost):
Someone is aware of the costs connected with leaving the organization and remains in the organization mostly because he needs to do so,
- to retrieve (ponovno vzpostaviti):
To bring back; to cause to turn back or return
- to strive (boriti se):
To try hard to have something, to get something or somebody
- a validity (tehtnost, veljavnost):
The quality of being well-founded on fact, or established on sound principles, and thoroughly applicable to the case or circumstances
- enrolment (vpis):
The entry of official record to the faculty.
- moral obligation (moralna dolžnost):
The state of being forced to do something because it is your duty.
- socialization (socializacija):
The process by which somebody, especially a child, learns to behave in a way that is acceptable in their society.
Group members
1) Marijana Blažić
2) Vanja Frelih
3) Maša Pelko
4) Tina Ravnik
Distribution of roles
1) Chair: Maša
2) Secretary: Tina
3) Progress chaser: Marijana
4) Timekeeper: Vanja
5) Reserve person: Vanja
Discussion of issues
Issue 1: Name of the group
Maša: we haven`t discussed the name of the group yet but the time is running out so I named our group NIA. In Swahili it means purpose and because we all have some kind of a purpose (and because I liked the name and it is short) I used it as our name of the group. I believe it is better than Group 6 but if you disagree we can change it.
Vanja: Hey! I like the name, because it is short and it has a meaning. 
Good idea Maša!
Tina: Hey! The name is ok. It`s short and it`s easy to remember, which I think it`s important. Anyway, I like it!
Decision 1: NIA is the name of our group.
Issue 2: THE TOPIC
Vanja: So like we already talked in the classroom our topic will be affiliation to organization or we could say something about belonging to organization - I don´t know the right expression. Now we must just agree about what we will focus on more in this topic. I suggest that we meet in the library on Tuesday after the English lesson. And then we could write the complete decision 2.
Maša: Vanja, I agree with you 
. I also suggest that on Thuesday we ask prof. Mesner Andolšek for her opinion on the topic.
I don`t know if you saw the comment of Jana Nadoh Bergoč - the right expression for our topic is Organizational commitment. She also suggested the magazines and bases where to look for articles. Please, read what she wrote.
Tina: So, we agreed to look for some articles on the organizational commitment and tomorrow we will make our topic more specific. Good luck with finding the suitable literature :)
Decision 2: Our topic si Students` commitment to faculty and study programmes
Minutes of the 1st group meeting
Minutes of the meeting »Problem Based Learning Project«
held on 23 February, 2007 at FDV library
Present: Marijana Blažić, Vanja Frelih, Maša Pelko, Tina Ravnik
Absent: /
Agenda:
1. Defining the problem
2. Searching literature
3. Any other business
Item 1:
Professor Dana Mesner-Andolšek gave us the idea for this problem and after discussing it we decided to measure students` commitment to our faculty and two study progammes - International Relations and Teoretical Anlysis. We decided to measure commitment in the first and fourth study year.
Item 2:
Discussion:
We had a lot of problems with searching the literature because we could not find any scientific articles on our topic written by the authors we wanted.
Decision:
We agreed to visit prof. Mesner-Andolšek on Thursday so she could help us find more suitable literature.
Assignments:
Tina will find the books.
Maša and Marijan will search for articles.
Vanja will contact her friend and ask if she could bring us the book from the library in Celje.
Item 3:
Decision: Our next meeting will be on Wednesday 7/3/2007 at 11 o`clock in the computer classroom.
Minutes taker: Tina Ravnik
Chair: Vanja Frelih
Minutes of the 2nd group meeting
Minutes of the meeting »Problem Based Learning Project«
held on 7 March, 2007 at FDV library
Present: Marijana Blažić, Vanja Frelih, Maša Pelko, Tina Ravnik
Absent: /
Agenda:
1. Choosing the concept and questionnaire
2. Research questions
3. Any other business
Item 1:
Discussion: A number of viewpoints about the organizational commitment have been forthcoming in the literature. That is why we had to choose the most appropriate author, concept and the questionnaire, which we could use for our research. We could not decide between three authors: Meyer and Allen, Mowday and Porter. Our mentor prof. Dana Mesner-Andolšek suggested that Meyer and Allen`s concept of organizational commitment would be the most suitable for our research problem.
Decision: We decided to take Meyer and Allen`s conceptual framework and questionnaire which includes three forms of organizational commitment: affective, continuance and normative commitment.
Item 2:
According to the literature we formed three hypotheses and four research questions.
Item 3:
Discussion: Vanja proposed that we should hold our next meeting on 12th of March 2007.
Decision: We all agreed with the proposed date.
Minutes taker: Maša Pelko
Chair: Marijana Blažić
Minutes of the 3rd group meeting
Minutes of the meeting »Problem Based Learning Project«
held on 12 March, 2007 at FDV library
Present: Marijana Blažić, Vanja Frelih, Maša Pelko, Tina Ravnik
Absent: /
Agenda:
1. Task distribution
2. Searching for more specific literature
3. Any other business
Item 1:
We distributed the tasks among each other. Tina will interpret affective and continuance commitment, Vanja will explain the normative commitment and try to find some students from the two study programms which we chose to study. Maša will prepare the questionnaire from Meyer and Allen and distribute it among the students of first year. Marijana will investigate the students of fourth year and analyse the completed questionnaires. Then we will meet again and make a conclusion.
Item 2:
Professor Jana Nadoh Bergoč sent us an e-mail that we should find some more suitable literature so we decided that each of us will find one more article.
Item 3:
Decision: Our next meeting will be on Wednesday 20/3/2007 at 11 o`clock in the FDV library.
Minutes taker: Vanja Frelih
Chair: Tina Ravnik
Minutes of the 4th meeting »Problem Based Learning Project«
held on 20 March, 2007 at FDV library
Present: Marijana Blažić, Vanja Frelih, Maša Pelko, Tina Ravnik
Absent: /
Agenda:
1. Translation of Meyer and Allen's questionnaire
2. The begining of writing the report
3. Any other business
Item 1:
We agreed to start translating our questionnaire which we found in Meyer and Allen`s book Commitment in the workplace. Marijana and Maša will do this task. Next week they will consult with prof. Mesner Andolšek because the questionnaire is rather difficult and ask her for further advice and suggestions about questioning the students.
Item 2:
We agreed that until the end of the second week in April the theoretical part of our project must be done, so that we can begin with questioning the students. Vanja and Tina are responsible for theoretical part, Maša and Marijana for empirical part. Then we will all together do the conclusion and analyse the results. We expact that prof. Mesner Andolšek`s help will be needed.
Item 3:
Decision: Our next meeting will be on Wednesday 11/4/2007 at 12 o`clock in the FDV library.
Minutes taker: Marijana Blažić
Comments (9)
Anonymous said
at 11:21 am on May 13, 2007
Hi everyone. Good to see that you posted a glossary but please add Slovene translations. OK?
Anonymous said
at 7:24 pm on Apr 26, 2007
Hi Vanja, I am replying here because my email message keeps returning. Thank you for the report. I have taken a quick look at it and also
at all other reports that I received today and I have left my comments and suggestions for improvement to all the students in the blog. If you need to change anything, you will be able to do so until May 7.
Best regards.
Anonymous said
at 2:44 pm on Mar 19, 2007
Fine, Maša. OK.
Anonymous said
at 5:57 pm on Mar 18, 2007
Hi. I have found some writing mistakes and corected them. For other language mistakes we`ll need your help :)
Anonymous said
at 8:47 pm on Mar 17, 2007
Well done, NIA :-) <<<>>> The content in your page is getting better and the minutes are well written. <<<>>> I'll help you improve the language next week.
Anonymous said
at 10:57 pm on Mar 10, 2007
Hello, Your are progressing well, which is fine. On Tuesday we will analyse and revise your problem definition. Until then, if you have some time, visit your page and make improvements of the language and content. And you can cut the hypotheses and research questions from the minutes and paste them below the definition of your problem. Cheers!
Anonymous said
at 4:50 pm on Mar 2, 2007
And one more thing. You can copy-paste your definition and literature list right below the problem title so that it is easier for others to find.
Anonymous said
at 4:47 pm on Mar 2, 2007
Hi everyone, I have a few comments: *** I would suggest improving the title a bit to make it more precise. Saying »students' commitment'' may mean that you refer to any student and not specifically to FDV students. So consider rewriting it (e.g. Commitment of the Faculty of Social Sciences students to the institution and their selected study programme) *** The definition of the problem will need some focusing on a PROBLEM, which you can do in the following days. Try to include in it what you find problematic in the relation to your topic. You can read again the sample problem definition in the blog and remember how we analysed it. Don't worry if you cannot make it perfect straight away. You'll always have time for further refinement. *** The minutes of the meeting – well done! *** Week 3 tasks – completed :-)
Anonymous said
at 6:37 pm on Feb 19, 2007
Pozdravljeni!
Samo ena pripomba – berem, da že iščete literaturo za vašo temo in da imate pri tem težave. Verjetno bo to zato, ker je pravi izraz za pripadnost »commitment« in ne »affiliation«. Iščite pod "organizational commitment". Vendar vas moram opozoriti – že v začetku je tudi iskalne kriterije pametno zožiti, saj boste kaj kmalu ugotovili, da se vam pod terminom »commitment« pokaže malo morje rezultatov. Priporočam tudi, da začnete z iskanjem v bazi Springerlink, nadaljujete v EmeraldManagementExtra in ostalih. Pametno je prebrskati tudi sleče revije (nekatere dobite fizično v knjižnici, druge so dostopne online, prek digitalne knjižnice):
- Human Relations
- The International Journal of Human Resource Management
- Personnel Review
- International Journal of Manpower
- Journal of Human Resource Management
- Human Resource Development International
- Human Resource Development Quarterly
- Human Resource Development Review
- Human Resource Management Journal
Potem so pa tu še bolj menedžersko usmerjene revije, ki vam znajo tudi priti prav:
- Journal of Management Studies
- Journal of Management Inquiry
- Organization
- Organization Studies
- British Journal of Management
- International Journal of Organizational Theory and Behavior
- International Studies of Management and Organization
- Management and Organization Review
Za dodatne konzultacije sem vam seveda na voljo. Lp!
JNB
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