Crafting one's job to take charge of role overload: When proactivity requires adaptivity across levels

Work intensification: A systematic review of studies from 1989 to 2022

BACKGROUND

Work intensification can lead to both work-related and non-work-related outcomes that positively and negatively affect the employee, organization, and job in question. The criticality of this phenomena necessitates conducting a systematic review to capture the essence of the extant literature.

OBJECTIVE

This paper presents a systematic review of the literature on work intensification from 1989 to 2022. It reviews the conceptualization of the construct, explores the factors influencing work intensification, identifies its outcomes, moderators, and mediators, and provides a review of the theories that have been used to support the phenomena of work intensification.

METHODS

The systematic review employed the PRISMA approach to screen 2823 records from the Web of Science database and extract 74 quantitative studies for final examination.

RESULTS

Firstly, work intensification has primarily been conceptualized through various constructs such as workload, long work hours, and time pressure. Secondly, there are well-established positive and negative outcomes associated with work intensification, either directly or through mediators. Thirdly, both the conservation of resource theory and the job-demands resource theory are widely utilized to support models related to work intensification.

CONCLUSION

The study urges practitioners to enhance their efforts in effectively managing employees' intensified work demands, particularly in relation to work overload, working hours, and time pressure. By addressing these factors, organizations can minimize negative outcomes and promote positive consequences.

Does inclusive leadership foster employee psychological resilience? The role of perceived insider status and supportive organizational climate

Introduction

Employee psychological resilience correlates with individual performance and well-being, which can help employees cope with work pressure under a complex situation. Drawing upon social identity and information processing theories, this paper explores how inclusive leadership stimulates employees’ psychological resilience by integrating the cross-level mediation effect of perceived insider status. This study scrutinized the moderating function of supportive organizational climate with inclusive leadership and employees’ perceived insider status, which expanded the inclusive leadership influence boundary.

Methods

This study used a cross-sectional survey design and collected two-wave data from individuals who are currently employed in the context of Chinese organizations. Multiple linear regression was used to analyze the paired survey data of 220 employees of valid samples.

Results

Inclusive leadership was positively related to employee psychological resilience; Perceived insider status mediated the relationship between inclusive leadership and employee psychological resilience; The indirect relationship above is moderated by supportive organizational climate such that the positive relationship will be enhanced when the supportive organizational climate is high, rather than low.

Discussion

The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

How self-leadership promotes job crafting: Based on the perspective of self-determination theory

According to self-determination theory, the present study develops a moderated mediation model to investigate how and when self-leadership promotes employees' job crafting, emphasizing the mediating effect of autonomous motivation and the moderating effect of leader empowering behavior. We analyze and test the hypotheses based on 269 valid three-wave data from employees. The findings show that self-leadership has a significantly positive impact on job crafting, and a positive indirect effect on job crafting via autonomous motivation. Furthermore, leader empowering behavior not only enhances the positive impact of self-leadership on autonomous motivation, but also positively moderates the mediating effect of autonomous motivation in the relationship between self-leadership and job crafting. Practically, our study provides insights into how to promote job crafting. We also propose limitations and directions for future research.

Entrepreneurs' role overload and empowering leadership: A reciprocal relationship based on conservation of resources

Introduction

Role overload is not new, but its increasing prevalence in recent years calls for further research. This study considers empowering leadership as a means of resource investment and proposes that it is exerted by entrepreneurs to reduce their role overload. This study adds clarity by revealing how entrepreneurs' role overload is mitigated via the intermediate mechanism of empowering leadership. Hypotheses are derived from conservation of resources theory.

Methods

Data were collected from 315 entrepreneurs in China using a three-round questionnaire survey.

Results

This study finds that entrepreneurs' previous experience of role overload positively relates to their current empowering leadership behavior and their previous empowering leadership behavior negatively relates to their current role overload, which implies a mediating role of empowering leadership. Specifically, the second stage of the indirect effect of previous role overload on current role overload through empowering leadership is moderated by top management team (TMT) heterogeneity. When TMT heterogeneity is higher, the negative indirect effect is stronger.

Discussion

This study contributes to the idea of positive psychology and extends the scope of conservation of resources theory into the fields of entrepreneurship and leadership.

Work Time Control and Job Crafting as Predictors of Work Method Control Among Health Workers

Introduction

Nigerian dilapidated health sector is confronted with unprecedented work method control challenges caused by the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, which has changed the world of work, health, and well-being attainment. The COVID-19 pandemic has challenged work method control employed by the Nigerian health sector as they seek to mobilize leftover resources from embezzlement required to accomplish desired tasks and, as a result, altered the work methods, job descriptions, characteristics, and demands the attainment of organizational and personal goals.

Objective

Based on Job Demands-Resources Theory (JD-R) and Self-Determination Theory (SDT), the researchers' principal objective was to investigate the moderating role of job crafting in the relationship between work time control and work method control among Nigerian health workers during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods

The participants for this study comprised (220) health employees sampled through the purposive and convenient method. Three instruments, Breaugh's Work Autonomy Scale, Work Time Control Scale, and Job Crafting Questionnaire, were used for data collection, and hierarchical multiple regression was employed for data analysis.

Results

Results of this study showed that work time control and job crafting were positively associated with work method control of Nigerian health workers. Job crafting moderated the relationship between work time control and work method control. This research deepened the knowledge of work method control while integrating work time control, and job crafting, with other health and work challenges of health workers in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. Second, COVID-19 has turned neglected Nigerian health workers into heroes as their work time control and job crafting helped manage the pandemic despite the poor infrastructure, corruption, bigotry, and ethnocentrism.

Conclusion

During pandemics, the work method must be understood and used with work time and job crafting to improve patient recovery, health workers' well-being, the nation, and the universe.

Attachment and Work Engagement in Virtual Teams: Promoting Collaborative Job Crafting

Researchers are increasingly interested in how employee relational processes affect virtual team outcomes. Applying attachment theory and the Job Demands–Resources model, we examined the relationship between employee attachment orientations and work engagement, and the mediating role of collaborative job crafting. In a three-wave longitudinal panel study of 1,178 employees in 225 virtual teams, autoregressive and multilevel structural equation modeling showed direct negative effects of (anxious and avoidant) attachment on work engagement. Indirectly, however, attachment positively influenced engagement, partially mediated by collaborative job crafting. Implications for attachment inclusive practices that support collaborative job crafting and work engagement are discussed.

How and When Leisure Crafting Enhances College Students' Well-Being: A (Quantitative) Weekly Diary Study

PURPOSE

College students' well-being is important for their self-growth and the whole society. However, we still know relatively little about how college students could proactively, strategically improve their well-being in the leisure context. Following the self-determination theory and proactivity literature, this study examines how and when leisure crafting (ie, a proactive act whereby individuals balance their leisure resources and demands by utilizing their personal abilities and needs) can enhance college students' well-being.

METHODS

Conducting a quantitative weekly diary study of 80 Chinese students in an engineering college (320 observations), we drew a moderated mediation model.

RESULTS

We found that weekly leisure crafting behaviors (ie, seeking structural leisure resources, seeking social leisure resources, seeking leisure challenges, and reducing hindering leisure demands) were positively related to weekly intrinsic need satisfaction (ie, need for competence, autonomy, and relatedness), then resulting in higher weekly subjective well-being (ie, physical thriving, mental health, and life meaningfulness). Moreover, this indirect effect was stronger for those who had a higher level of leisure boredom.

CONCLUSION

Our study contributes to student development and well-being literature by focusing on the students' leisure context and providing a means to enhance their well-being. We unfold how the leisure crafting strategy boosts college students' well-being via increasing their intrinsic need satisfaction. We also highlight the compensating role of leisure crafting when one is in an unfavorable personal state (eg, leisure boredom).

The Mixed Effect of Role Overload on Extra-Role Performance: The Mediation Role of Behavioral Inhibition System/Behavioral Activation System Responses

The findings of existing studies of how role overload affects employees’ performance in organizations have been mixed and controversial. We draw on the hindrance–challenge framework to suggest that role overload contains both hindrance and challenge stressor components. We integrate this theory with the behavioral inhibition and behavioral activation systems (BIS and BAS) perspective to develop hypotheses about the effects of role overload on employees’ extra-role performance (voice). We suggest that although role overload is positively associated with withdrawal (a prototypical response of the BIS system) and ultimately negatively influences extra-role performance, it can also trigger job crafting (a prototypical response of the BAS system) and is, consequently, positively associated with extra-role performance. We further posit that the strength of these indirect effects is moderated by the quality of leader–member exchange (LMX). To support these hypotheses, we conducted a time-lagged study of 450 full-time pre-school teachers from various Chinese kindergartens. As hypothesized, we found that withdrawal and job crafting mediated the relationship between role overload and extra-role performance. Further, LMX strengthens the positive relationship between role overload and job crafting. Taken together, our results suggest that role overload can be a mixed stressor that activates both negative and positive behaviors, thus ultimately having an impact on extra-role performance.

A state-of-the-art overview of job-crafting research: current trends and future research directions

Purpose

In celebration of the 25th anniversary of the founding of Career Development International, a state-of-the-art overview of recent trends in job-crafting research was conducted. Since job crafting was introduced twenty years ago as a type of proactive work behavior that employees engage in to adjust their jobs to their needs, skills, and preferences, research has evolved tremendously.

Design/methodology/approach

To take stock of recent developments and to unravel the latest trends in the field, this overview encompasses job-crafting research published in the years 2016–2021. The overview portrays that recent contributions have matured the theoretical and empirical advancement of job-crafting research from three perspectives (i.e. individual, team and social).

Findings

When looking at the job-crafting literature through these three perspectives, a total of six trends were uncovered that show that job-crafting research has moved to a more in-depth theory-testing approach; broadened its scope; examined team-level job crafting and social relationships; and focused on the impact of job crafting on others in the work environment and their evaluations and reactions to it.

Originality/value

The overview of recent trends within the job-crafting literature ends with a set of recommendations for how future research on job crafting could progress and create scientific impact for the coming years.

Contextual antecedents of job crafting: review and future research agenda

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to critically review current studies on job crafting to identify contextual factors related to employees’ job crafting and to integrate the findings to help organizations improve employees’ job crafting.

Design/methodology/approach

Based on the guidelines provided by Torraco (2016), the authors reviewed 44 quantitative studies on job crafting published between 2001and 2020.

Findings

The authors identified 35 contextual antecedents of job crafting at the job (11), group (6), leadership (12) and organizational (6) levels. The findings reveal that a significant number of studies have focused on contextual aspects related to employees’ job crafting. In particular, multiple studies discussed the important role of empowering leadership, servant leadership, transformational leadership, leader-member exchange in job crafting.

Originality/value

The authors emphasize contextual factors influencing job crafting including job, group, leadership and organizational levels. Based on the review, the authors suggest a future research agenda on job crafting in terms of job, group, leadership and organizational antecedents.

A moderated moderation analysis of perceived adaptivity and organizational support for innovation in the relationship between role overload and emotional exhaustion

BACKGROUND

Collectively, an individual's ability and willingness to adjust to uncertain and complex changes in the workplace and an environment that supports employee problem-solving may facilitate individual-level adaptation to changes in the workplace and help mitigate the negative impact of work-related stressors on health care professionals' work-related behavior and mental health outcomes.

PURPOSE

This study uses an interactionist perspective to assess how resources such as perceived adaptivity and organizational support for innovation serve as contextual boundary conditions of role overload in mitigating emotional exhaustion among health care workers.

METHODOLOGY

A cross-sectional survey design was used to collect data from rural health care workers (n = 310). A moderated moderation analysis was performed to address the aims of the study.

RESULTS

The results indicate that role overload has a significant positive effect on emotional exhaustion. Furthermore, a statistically significant three-way interaction effect of perceived adaptivity, organizational support for innovation, and role overload on emotional exhaustion was observed. Organizational support for innovation was found to mitigate the negative impact of role overload on emotional exhaustion for employees with high perceived adaptivity, but not for those with low perceived adaptivity levels.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings from this study suggest that in high-stress work environments, integrating and appropriately matching personal and organizational resources could serve as a buffer against the effects of work stressors on emotional exhaustion.

PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS

Effective strategies to enhance employee emotional well-being may require the joint consideration of individual and organizational factors.

Adapting to Frequent Changes: The Roles of Job Crafting and Personal Needs

Drawing on the transactional theory of stress and self-regulation theory, we propose a conceptual framework to examine how change frequency relates to approach or avoidance adaptations. Multiwave, multisource data from a matched sample of 424 subordinates and their supervisors indicate that (a) approach and avoidance crafting mediates the negative relationship between change frequency and adaptivity, (b) the need for human connection weakens the relationship between change frequency and approach–avoidance crafting, (c) the need for control strengthens the relationship between change frequency and approach–avoidance crafting, and (d) change frequency has a weakened (strengthened) indirect effect on adaptivity via approach crafting and avoidance crafting when employees have a high need for human connection (control). This study expands the research on job crafting and adaptivity and provides practical implications for organizations undergoing or soon to undergo changes.

Perceived Overqualification and Job Crafting: The Curvilinear Moderation of Career Adaptability

Developments in direct and indirect educational systems have increased the number of individuals with competencies that are higher than the required expectations of their current jobs. This concept of overqualification is drawing interest today, while underqualification was the focus in the past. Currently, research on perceived overqualification (POQ) has focused on its negative influences; however, this study aimed to explore the positive and nonlinear influence of POQ on job crafting and the moderating effect of career adaptability on these functions. Data were collected from 257 individuals in three Korean telecom companies. The results of hierarchical regression analysis indicate that POQ had a reverse U-shaped nonlinear influence on job crafting, indicating that an appropriate level of POQ can drive job crafting, leading to performance improvements in organizations and individuals. Moreover, career adaptability moderated the relationship between POQ and job crafting. When career adaptability was at an average or high level, the reverse U-shaped nonlinear influence of POQ on job crafting strengthened. These results are expected to assist in creating both an environment to reduce the negative influence of POQ and healthy sustainability in human resources development.

How Can Work Addiction Buffer the Influence of Work Intensification on Workplace Well-Being? The Mediating Role of Job Crafting

Despite growing attention to the phenomenon of intensified job demand in the workplace, empirical research investigating the underlying behavioral mechanisms that link work intensification to workplace well-being is limited. In particular, a study on whether these behavioral mechanisms are dependent on certain type of individual difference is absent. Using data collected from 356 Chinese health care professionals, this study utilized a dual-path moderated mediation model to investigate the mediating role of job crafting behavior between work intensification and workplace well-being, and the moderating role of work addiction on this indirect path. The results demonstrated that although work intensification was negatively associated with workplace well-being, this effect was more likely to take place for non-workaholics. Specifically, compared with non-workaholics, workaholics were more prone to engage in job crafting behavior in terms of seeking resources and crafting towards strengths, and therefore less likely to have reduced well-being experience. Results are discussed in terms of their implications for research and practice.

Embracing the duality of consideration and initiating structure: CEO leadership behaviors and small firm performance

Purpose

This paper examines the relationship between chief executive officers' (CEOs') leadership behaviors (consideration and initiating structure) and firm and individual performance (i.e. profitability, affective commitment and employees' willingness to change) in small and medium-sized firms (SMEs) that need to adapt to changing environments.

Design/methodology/approach

Survey data was collected from SMEs (28 firms, 235 employees) in the accounting industry along with objective performance register data (profit and return on assets). The predicted model was tested with multilevel structural equations modeling (MSEM) using a maximum likelihood estimator.

Findings

The CEO leadership behavior of initiating structure was positively related to firms' profitability, while the CEO leadership behavior of consideration was positively related to employees' willingness to change and affective commitment.

Practical implications

Small accounting firms typically offer standard services that are now being replaced by digital solutions. These firms have an incentive to offer new services, such as business advisory services. Therefore, leaders should embrace the duality of consideration and initiating structure to gain employees' willingness to change and optimize overall firm performance.

Originality/value

The paper contributes to leadership literature by examining a novel context (CEO consideration and initiation of structure in SMEs in uncertain environments) using a combination of firm performance measures (e.g. objective outcomes at the firm level and employees' willingness to change as a new measure at the individual level). In addition, it reports a comprehensive test of the full model using MSEM, the findings of which demonstrate the importance of dual leadership behaviors for CEOs.

When career dissatisfaction leads to employee job crafting

Purpose

Career dissatisfaction can be defined as an unpleasant or a negative emotional state that results from the appraisal of one’s career. This negative affective appraisal might motivate an individual to take actions to improve the situation. This paper examines career dissatisfaction as a trigger for employee job crafting in terms of altering the task and the relational boundaries of the work.

Methodology/methodology/approach

The paper further theorizes that employee contextual resource (i.e., job social support) and personal resource (i.e., occupational self-efficacy) will interact with career dissatisfaction to result in job crafting. Two-wave data were collected from a sample of 246 Chinese employees.

Findings

As hypothesized, employees with career dissatisfaction exhibited the highest levels of task and relational job crafting when they received adequate support from coworkers and supervisors and were confident about their occupational abilities.

Originality/value

The findings suggest that under certain conditions employee career dissatisfaction could be transformed into proactive work behavior (i.e., job crafting).

Transformative HR practices and employee task performance in high-tech firms

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship of perceived transformative human resource (HR) practices and employee task performance. Drawing on evidence-based approach, the transformative HR practices intend to transform employees’ behavior to cope with organizational change. This study intends to answer how does the perceived transformative HR practices influence employees’ behavioral capability to enhance their task performance. This investigation proposes that the perceived transformative HR practices positively affect employees task performance, however, employee adaptivity mediates the relationship between them.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors used a random sample of 224 employees, from a large high-tech company in China, to test the hypotheses. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were conducted to determine the perceived transformative HR practices in the context of a high-tech firm. The authors performed multiple linear regression analysis to examine the proposed model.

Findings

The results of this study indicate that the perceived transformative HR practices positively influence employee adaptivity and task performance. Furthermore, employee adaptivity mediates the relationship between the perceived transformative HR practices and employee task performance. Therefore, employee adaptivity illuminates and explains the underlying mechanism of how the perceived transformative HR practices lead to employee task performance.

Research limitations/implications

Data collected from single firm may limit the generalizability of the findings and cross-sectional research design may raise the concern of common method bias. Future studies should test and validate the operationalization of the perceived transformative HR practices in different research contexts and with larger sample size. Organizations should design and implement transformative HR practices to cope with change. Furthermore, organizational managers should encourage and facilitate employee adaptivity to achieve better performance.

Originality/value

This study contributes to change management and the HR literature by identifying and operationalizing the perceived transformative HR practices as a predictor of employee adaptivity and task performance. Through the underlying mechanism of employee adaptivity between the perceived transformative HR practices and employee task performance, this study provides a new perspective to look at the HR-performance relationship in the change process.