ANTECEDENTS OF ALTRUISTIC BEHAVIOR AMONG MARRIED WORKING WOMEN IN IT SECTOR: A COMPARATIVE STUDY BETWEEN USA AND PAKISTAN

Abstract

Women today have contributed in almost all sectors of the world. They not only strive to show commitment to their organizations but also try to fulfill their family responsibilities. Organizations on the other hand demand best and equal performance both from men and women. The best performances now a days do not appear in isolation but in teams where members provide help and support to each other. Literature suggests that such collaborative behavior among employees also known as altruistic behavior demands supportive environments. This expectation from the organization has been high among women as compared to men. Keeping in view, this study investigates antecedents (Family Friendly Psychological Climate and Work-Life Balance) of altruistic behavior among married working women in one of the most team-oriented industry i.e. IT sector. Considering cultural differences between USA and Pakistan, a comparative analysis was also performed on the data collected from 340 respondents (half from each country). The Social Exchange Theory (SET) was used to evaluate that how organization give FFPC to the married working women and then they show altruistic behavior to their co-workers. A quantitative method was used, employing SPSS for the data screening and Smart PLS to test the proposed hypothesis. The results indicate the causal relationship between FFPC and altruistic behavior was significant in both countries. In Pakistan WLB partially mediated between FFPC and altruistic behavior whereas no mediation was found in USA. The fmding showed that FFPC is an important for married working women and companies should provide support to her so that their perforthance in teams should enhance.