THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN NATIONAL CULTURE AND ORGANIZATIONAL COMMITMENT TO CHANGE AND MEDIATING EFFECT OF READINESS FOR CHANGE

This paper aims to investigate the relationship between Hofstede five dimensions of national culture and commitment to organizational change (Affective commitment), and investigate the mediating effect of readiness for organizational change (appropriateness) on this relationship. No empirical research of the influence of culture dimensions based on Hofstede's dataset on organizational change represented by commitment and readiness for change was conducted. SEM employed in particular confirmatory factor analysis and path analysis procedures was used to test the hypothesized model. The results provide empirical support for the influence of Power Distance, Individualism-Collectivism, Masculinity-Femininity, and Long-Term Orientation on the individual readiness and commitment to change directly and indirectly through readiness for change. Which in turn add to the efforts to build a literature on the culture perspective of organizational change. The findings offer valuable insights on why cultural values should be differentiated as they relate to different individual readiness and commitment to change. The findings of this study will be useful to the policy makers and organizations that plan to accomplish change initiatives, particularly those in Arabic region. The study is among the first that investigates the issue of change implementation from the perspective of national cultural values.