Translating Intentions to Behavior: The Interaction of Network Structure and Behavioral Intentions in Understanding Employee Turnover

This paper integrates psychological and sociological perspectives to provide a more complete explanation of the link between intended and actual turnover. Findings from two studies suggest that the translation of intentions to leave one's job into turnover behavior is attenuated by centrality in organizational advice and friendship networks. Our results demonstrate that psychological and network factors jointly impact employee turnover, and distinguish the effects of different types of networks (friendship, advice), ties (in-degree, out-degree), and levels (dyadic, triadic) in the turnover process. We discuss the implications of these findings for research and practice, and propose a two-stage model of turnover grounded in temporal construal theory that describes how psychological and structural factors variously influence the turnover decision process.