Motivational Cultural Intelligence As A Driver For Employee Engagement

This thesis analyzes the relationship between motivational CQ and employee engagement.Both of these concepts are relatively new and received a significant amount of attention by researchers and academicians in the past few years.Researchers have so far mainly focused on studying the relationship between CQ and its outcomes,such as job satisfaction and job involvement.It seems that to this date no published research paper has aimed to provide understanding on the relationship between CQ and employee engagement.Further,this paper's research sample includes only expatriate respondents with work experience in China.First,CQ is the independent variable in this model.It is perceived as a formative construct composed of several dimensions: metacognitive,cognitive,behavioral,and motivational.This thesis focuses on the motivational dimension.Next,employee engagement is the dependent variable in this thesis research model as explained in chapter 3.Engagement is a work-related state of mind which is positive and fulfilling.It is hypothesized that this state of mind among expatriates is affected by their CQ(see chapter 3.4).Engagement is also considered as a multidimensional construct,composed of three separate dimensions: vigor,dedication,and absorption.The effects of motivational CQ on each dimension of engagement are analyzed as part of this thesis(hypotheses are presented in chapter 3.4 and data analyzed in chapter 5).It is hypothesized that motivational CQ shares positive association with each dimension of engagement.The research model includes two constructs: motivational CQ and engagement(see chapter 3).In total,four hypotheses are presented in this thesis.Further,primary data were collected from expatriate workers in China to find empirical support for the presented hypotheses.To this end,a questionnaire was created by including measures for motivational CQ and engagement from renowned research papers(see chapter 4.2).Several control variables were added to ensure the accuracy of data.The research sample numbered 121 respondents(see chapter 4.3 for sample description).Data analysis(see chapter 5)was conducted using IBM SPSS and SmartPLS 3 software.Partial least squares analyses were mainly taken advantage of because of the nature of variables.Based on the results of data analysis,it was found that the hypothesis 1 can be accepted because the level of motivational CQ was positively associated with the level of engagement at significantly high probability level(see chapter 5.5).Further,it was found that the dedication and absorption dimensions of engagement were both positively associated with the level of engagement;therefore,their two associated hypotheses were accepted as well.Although vigor was also positively associated with motivational CQ based on SmartPLS analysis of its weight,it was not possible to prove that this relationship was statistically significant in the context of this study.As such,this hypothesis was rejected.