Examining the Relationship Between Organizational Social Capital, Burnout, and Intent-to-Leave: Modeling a Multi-Group Analysis of Age-Based Turnover

Purpose: Although a myriad of concerns plague the practice of child protection, two of its most significant challenges are voluntary employee turnover and burnout. Research suggests that individual characteristics and organizational factors are linked with turnover and burnout. Age is one of the individual characteristics consistently associated with turnover and burnout. On average, younger employees are more likely to leave child protection work than older employees. Due to the voluntary departure of younger workers and the retirement of an aging workforce, the field of child protection is faced with having to deal with significant staffing issues. Despite these trends, little research has examined how paths to burnout and intent-to-leave may differ between younger and older workers based on employment-based social capital. There is a need for an investigation that provides a better understanding of the complex interaction of multiple organizational factors that contributes to the genesis of intent-to-leave and burnout. This study responds to this need by conducting a multi-group structural equation analysis that identifies organizational sources of social capital, job stress, burnout, and intent-to-leave among two age groups.

Method: This study employed a cross-sectional research design and utilized a statewide purposive sample of 209 respondents from a public child welfare organization in a New England state. Two age groups were created based on the mean age of participants (µ = 37). One group consisted of workers younger than 37, while the other group included workers 38 years and older. The main analysis of this study utilized Structural Equation Modeling, which was computed in AMOS 7. The model was tested in two stages. None of the direct paths were constrained in the model.

Results: Final model results suggest that the paths to burnout and intent-to-leave differed by age group. Social capital dimensions were more influential in safeguarding against job stress for older workers compared to younger workers, which may partially explain why job stress was experienced more by younger workers. Job stress was significant for both groups, but it had a stronger effect on older workers' intent-to-leave. Burnout was also significant for both groups, but its influence on intent-to-leave was experienced more by younger workers. The model accounted for a greater variance of job stress (71%) and intent-to-leave (52%) for older workers, but it explained less of the variance in burnout (19%). Among younger workers, the model explained the greatest amount of variance in job stress (44%), followed by intent-to-leave (41%) and burnout (32%).

Conclusion: These results may justify creating workplace interventions for younger workers that target areas of the organization where relational support could enhance the moral fiber of social relations within the organizational context. Our findings suggest that when various dimensions of employment-based social capital are present, they act as direct protective factors in decreasing job stress and indirectly shape burnout and intent-to-leave. Organizations may need to establish intervention efforts aimed at younger workers by creating different structures of support that can assist them better deal with the pressures and demands of child protection work.