Decoding Employee Turnover: How Job Satisfaction, Commitment, Work-Life Balance, and Compensation Shape Intentions in Malaysia’s Service Industry

Abstract

The demanding nature of the service sector in Malaysia, which involves long hours and pressure at work, causing a significant percentage of employees either leave or change occupations. It creates disruptions due to the constant hiring and training of new staff, which lowers business profitability. Thisstudy investigates the role of job satisfaction, organisational commitment, work-life balance, compensation and benefits on employee turnover in the services industry of Malaysia. Data were collected from 400 respondents who were fulltime employees from high turnover rate industries such as finance, tourism, food and beverage, telecommunication and ICT firms.  The study used Social Exchange Theory (SET) as an orientation because it considers how workers weigh their contributions against the experiences that they have had with their organisations underlining that motivation or commitment underpins low levels of employee turnover. The data were analysed usingmultiple regression analysis in order to investigate the association between the independent variables and employee turnover. This study exhibits how retention strategies can be improved with respect to job satisfaction, organisational commitment, work-life balance, andcompensation. The findings of this study iscontributing to the understanding of the strategies that can be effectively applied in managing the retention of human resources, thereby enhancing organisational efficiency and reducing turnover in the service sector.