Working Poor Organization Behavior: Mediating Role of Mentorship and Supportive Supervisory Feedback

One-third of US workers fall in the low-wage category, concentrated in the service sector. Unfortunately, few employment interventions and training programs are aimed at the population referred to as the working poor. We utilized social cognitive theory (SCT) to understand two mechanisms (mentorship and supportive supervisor feedback) organizations can use to support the working poor and deal with challenges that many in this group face. Data were collected from 180 US employees who meet the criteria for the working poor. Our findings indicate that mentorship and supportive supervisor feedback directly impacted affective commitment, and job satisfaction mediated the relationship between mentorship and supervisor feedback and affective commitment. These findings suggest employers could change or implement new HR systems or policies to assist the working poor to improve how they interact with their organization. This study highlights the importance of employment interventions and human resource systems for the working poor, which is not a highly targeted population in the literature. This research has implications for organizations and HR as the number of people who fall into the working poor demographic continues to rise.