The Georgia Department of Corrections: An Exploratory Reflection on Correctional Officer Turnover and its Correlates

Abstract

An exploratory study was conducted to determine the reasons for correctional officer turnover at the Georgia Department of Corrections (GDC). The results indicated that job satisfaction and organizational commitment were factors predicting turnover trend for correctional officers at the agency. Components of job satisfaction such as recognition, compensation, salaries, advancement, creativity, responsibility, moral values and achievement were significantly predictive of turnover for correctional officers. Affective and normative commitment—components of organizational commitment—were also found to be significantly predictive of correctional officer turnover. In addition, this result was achieved only when turnover was conceptualized as intention to quit. This study finds intention to quit to be a better predictor of turnover than actual turnover data.