Individual Differences in Reactions to Socialization Tactics

While newcomer socialization is largely considered to provide benefits to organizations, less is known how individual psychological differences impact the effectiveness of socialization tactics. Adopting a purposeful work behavior perspective, we hypothesize that newcomers’ work locus of control has moderating effects between individualized and institutionalized socialization tactics and job embeddedness and work adjustment. We also hypothesize that job embeddedness and work adjustment reduce newcomers’ voluntary turnover. Results from data collected from 683 newcomers at four points in time over a 12- month time period in a wide range of organizations confirmed that work locus of control moderated the positive relationship between socialization tactics and turnover, such that newcomers with an internal work locus of control showed higher degrees of embeddedness and social integration under individualized rather than institutionalized socialization tactics, and in turn, were less likely to turnover. This research lays a foundation for the wider study of understanding how individual psychological differences affect success in newcomer socialization and retention.