How happiness mediates the organizational virtuousness and affective commitment relationship

Recent moral and financial collapse of high profile organizations around the world led the business community, the popular and business press, and researchers to rediscover the worthiness of organizations' virtues. Aiming to contribute to this momentum, this empirical study investigates how perceptions of organizational virtuousness (OV) predict affective well-being (AWB) and affective commitment (AC). Two hundred five individuals participate. The findings show that perceptions of OV predict AC both directly and through the mediating role of AWB. The study suggests that fostering organizational virtuousness (e.g., through honesty, interpersonal respect, and compassion; combining high standards of performance with a culture of forgiveness and learning from mistakes) improves employees' AWB and promotes a more committed workforce. Considering these findings and mirroring the growing contributions of the positive psychology, positive organizational behavior, and positive organizational scholarship movements, the study suggests that a "positive-people-management" perspective should be considered, both by practitioners and scholars. (C) 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.