Abstract:

State-owned enterprises (SOEs) play an essential role in sustaining national infrastructure and public service delivery, particularly in emerging economies where SOEs are mandated to maintain operations even in politically unstable or conflict-affected regions. In Thailand’s crisis-prone areas, especially the deep south, SOEs face persistent security threats, operational disruption, and elevated employee turnover risks. Given that frontline continuity depends heavily on workforce stability, this study investigates how employee welfare and benefits and internal organisational factors shape employee commitment in crisis areas. Drawing on the three-component model of commitment—affective, continuance and normative commitment (Allen and Meyer, 1990; Meyer et al., 2002)—and crisis-relevant perspectives including social exchange and resource-based coping, the study argues that internal organisational mechanisms may buffer uncertainty and strengthen commitment under sustained threat (Rhoades and Eisenberger, 2002; Hobfoll et al., 2018).

A quantitative cross-sectional design was employed. Data were collected via an online survey from 316 SOE employees working in crisis areas (population = 1,707). Measures captured welfare and benefits (financial support, physical and mental health support, living quality and fairness) and internal organisational factors (decentralisation, supervisor relationship, training and development and organisational policy), assessed on five-point Likert scales. Multiple regression analysis was used to estimate the predictive effects of these variables on employee commitment.

Findings show that welfare and benefits explain 37.9% of the variance in employee commitment (R² = 0.379). Physical and mental health support is the strongest welfare predictor, followed by fairness and living quality, while financial support is not statistically significant—suggesting that non-financial protections are more salient than hazard pay under crisis conditions (Galanaki, 2020; Kniffin et al., 2021). Internal organisational factors explain a larger share of variance (R² = 0.434), with training and development as the strongest predictor, followed by supervisor relationship, decentralisation and organisational policy. These results indicate that capability development and high-quality supervisory support are pivotal levers for sustaining commitment in crisis environments (Dulebohn et al., 2012; Kehoe and Wright, 2013; Palma-Moreira et al., 2024).

The study contributes to the literature by integrating welfare-benefit provision and internal organisational mechanisms within sustained crisis operations, extending commitment research into high-risk public-sector contexts. Practically, SOEs should prioritise health and psychological support, strengthen training for crisis readiness, enhance supervisor communication capability, and implement fair decentralised policies to sustain commitment and operational continuity.

Please choose your submission type: Full Paper

Primary Track: Human Resource Management

Keywords: Strategic HRM;Organizational behaviour and psychological state;International HRM;Performance;Stress and well-being

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Dr. Suthiporn Truktrong