Central European Business Review 2025, 14(1):105-123 | DOI: 10.18267/j.cebr.379

Factors Influencing Organisational Commitment in Organisations during Covid-19 Pandemic

Kamila Ludwikowska ORCID...1, Anna Koszela ORCID...2
1 Wroclaw University of Science and Technology, Faculty of Management, Wroclaw, Poland. Email: kamila.ludwikowska@pwr.edu.pl (corresponding author)
2 Wroclaw University of Science and Technology, Faculty of Management, Wroclaw, Poland. Email: anna.koszela@pwr.edu.pl

With the COVID-19 pandemic, organisations faced profound social and economic upheaval. These circumstances forced organisations to make major changes. In the face of these changes, nurturing employee engagement and fostering a sense of belonging to the company have emerged as new challenges. Organisational commitment appears to be an important factor in ensuring that employees remain in the organisation despite the crises that occur. Therefore, the objective of this paper is to investigate the determinants of the organisational commitment of employees from the level of human resource management (HRM) policy during the COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, this study aims to gain a clear understanding of the relationship between training and organisational commitment through employee engagement in HRM COVID-19 strategies. We also considered the climate of implementation of HRM strategies during COVID-19 that may moderate the effect of training on participation in HRM COVID-19 strategies. The study was carried out among 378 organisations operating in Poland. To verify the hypotheses, the SPSS program with PROCESS Macro (Model 4 and 7) analysis was used. The mediation test was used to understand the influence of training on other variables, namely employee engagement in HRM COVID-19 strategies and organisational commitment. To examine the mechanism of organisational commitment, a moderated mediation model was tested in which the organisational HRM COVID-19 strategy climate moderated the training mediation model, employee support for HRM COVID-19 strategies and organisational commitment. The results show that organisational HRM COVID-19 strategy climate accounted for significant differences in the mediation models.
Implications for Central European audience: This study bridges the gap in the literature on organisational commitment by explaining how training is associated with organisational commitment. Managers are advised to consistently offer ongoing training to help them navigate evolving circumstances. Enhancing the impact of training on organisational commitment requires a focus on improving the quality of human resource management (HRM) COVID-19 strategies, fostering a supportive environment and garnering employee support for these strategies. Individuals are likely to demonstrate greater organisational commitment when the organisation cultivates an environment that enables employees to endorse HRM COVID-19 strategies.

Keywords: training; employee engagement; organisational commitment; organisational climate; HRM strategies; COVID-19; moderated mediation
JEL classification: M12, M53

Received: February 28, 2024; Revised: May 20, 2024; Accepted: June 11, 2024; Prepublished online: November 16, 2024; Published: March 28, 2025  Show citation

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Ludwikowska, K., & Koszela, A. (2025). Factors Influencing Organisational Commitment in Organisations during Covid-19 Pandemic. Central European Business Review, 14(1), 105-123. doi: 10.18267/j.cebr.379
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