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Introduction
Contemporary organizations are facing an unprecedented sweep of change characterized by complex and ambiguous environment, volatility and incessant advancements (Boyne and Meier, 2009; Jamali et al., 2009). This escalation of change is evinced in many industries, but perhaps none are as discernible as the information technology (IT) industry, which is undergoing ceaseless technological cataclysms. Spurred by rapid pace of innovation, disruption, consolidations, and expansions, the technology industry is experiencing a wave of progression (Aon Hewitt, 2015). Due to these complexities, organizations cannot rely on traditional competency-based strategies and the key to sustainable competitive advantage lies in the ability to adapt rapidly to the changing environment (D’Aveni, 1998; Senge, 1990). Given this fact, commitment to change initiatives has become more salient for organizations (Herscovitch and Meyer, 2002; Neves, 2011; Jaros, 2010). Consequently, the success of change efforts is growingly dependent on organizations capability to stimulate employees support for change, since the key challenge lies in gaining employees willingness to commit to change (Armenakis and Harris, 2002). A profound knowledge of factors affecting change is crucial for developing strategies that can fortify employees’ participation and avert failures of change implementation programmes. Research has shown that without employees change supportive responses, transitions are likely to be unsuccessful (Maheshwari and Vohra, 2015; Shin et al., 2012). Since, employees willingness or resistance impacts successful change implementation (D’Ortenzio, 2012; Siddiqui, 2011); therefore firms need to recognize the factors that affect employees commitment to change (Van Dam et al., 2008).
Over the decade, affective commitment to change has become a leading construct among researchers (Ritz et al., 2012; Choi, 2011; Rogiest et al., 2015), which has been significantly related to higher job satisfaction, lower turnover intentions (Rafferty and Restubog, 2010), enhanced coping with change and increased supportive behaviour during organizational change (Cunningham, 2006; Jaros, 2010). The researchers till date have typically focussed on its antecedents such as charismatic leadership and trust in management (Michaelis et al., 2009), organizational climate, quality change communication and employee participation (Rogiest et al., 2015). However, as the pace of change escalates, contemporary organizations can not only focus on formal arrangements for creating transient moments of safety or pleasure for their workforce, but need to engender employees capabilities such as...