The drivers of work engagement: A meta-analytic review of longitudinal evidence

The effects of psychological capital, work engagement and job autonomy on job performance in platform flexible employees

The performance of platform flexible employees is a core element that contributes to the rapid growth of the sharing economy platform. It is crucial to explore strategies to improve employees' performance with the growing competition among these platforms. Only a handful of research evidence has been found evaluating platform flexible employees' psychological capital and work engagement to improve their performance. In order to remedy the gap, we draw on self-determination theory to develop a moderated mediation model, which examines how psychological capital affects platform flexible employees' job performance. We employed hierarchical regression analysis to test the theoretical model and carried out two rounds of surveys, resulting in 474 valid paired questionnaires. The questionnaire assessed the psychological capital, work engagement, job performance, and job autonomy of flexible platform employees. The results indicate that work engagement plays a mediating role between psychological capital affects platform flexible employees' job performance. Moreover, job autonomy moderates the mediating effect. The findings not only contribute to the literature on employees' psychological capital and job performance, but also broaden the research scope of self-determination theory, and provide new ideas for improving the job performance of platform flexible employees.

Relationship between job challenge and job performance in the Korean Army: The mediating effect of learning agility and the moderating effect of job autonomy

This study aims to identify the relationship among job challenge, learning agility, job autonomy, and job performance based on job demand-resources model. In particular, this study examined the mediating role of learning agility in the relationship between Job challenge and job performance, which has rarely been conducted. Furthermore, the moderating effect of job autonomy as job resource was explored. The data collected were from army officers and noncommissioned officers (NCO) of the Korean Army (N = 425). We hypothesized that there is a positive relationship among Job challenge and learning agility, Job challenge and job performance, the mediating role of learning agility in the relationship between Job challenge and job performance, and the moderating role of job autonomy. As predicted, we found that Job challenge was positively related to learning agility and job performance. We also found a mediating effect of learning agility on the relationship between Job challenge and job performance. Furthermore, job autonomy moderated the positive relationship between Job challenge and learning agility, although the moderating effect of job autonomy between Job challenge and job performance was not significant. Finally, the indirect relationship between Job challenge and job performance, via learning agility, was stronger for the higher job autonomy group than for the lower job autonomy group. The, theoretical and practical contributions and suggestions for future studies on learning agility and job characteristics are discussed.

Social support from manager and co-workers in relation to registered nurses' work motivation in three healthcare settings: A cross-sectional study of a Swedish national sample

BACKGROUND

Having more registered nurses (RNs) leave their workplace, with a shortage of RNs in healthcare as a consequence, might pose a risk to patient safety. According to the Job Demands Resource model, social support is a resource that can enhance work motivation, and if RNs are motivated at work, their willingness to remain in the workplace may increase.

OBJECTIVE

The aims were to explore (1) differences in RNs' experiences of social support from their immediate manager and co-workers between different healthcare settings, (2) associations between RNs' experiences of social support and aspects of work motivation, and (3) if these associations differed in strength between healthcare settings.

DESIGN

A cross-sectional study design.

METHODS

A stratified population of Swedish RNs, n = 2290, working in either hospitals, primary care, or home healthcare, responded to a survey in 2022. Chi-squared tests and linear and logistic regression analyses were used to analyze the data. Interaction was measured by adding an interaction term to the fully adjusted regression models. The findings' generalizability was strengthened by including calibrating weights in all analyses.

RESULTS

RNs in primary care reported higher social support from their immediate manager than RNs in hospitals and home healthcare. RNs in home healthcare reported lower social support from co-workers than RNs in hospitals and primary care. There were statistically significant associations between higher levels of social support from the immediate manager and co-workers, respectively, and higher ratings in all aspects of work motivation: work engagement (manager: beta coefficient [b] = 0.08, confidence interval [CI] 95% = 0.05; 0.10; co-workers: b = 0.12, CI 95% = 0.08; 0.16), job satisfaction (manager: b = 0.24, CI 95% = 0.21; 0.27; co-workers: b = 0.22, CI 95% = 0.16; 0.28), opportunities to provide high-quality care (manager: b = 0.15, CI 95% = 0.11; 0.18; co-workers: b = 0.19, CI 95% = 0.13; 0.24), satisfaction with the employer (manager: b = 0.46, CI 95% = 0.42; 0.50; co-workers: not statistically significant) and intention to remain at the workplace (manager: odds ratio = 1.89, CI 95% = 1.69; 2.13; co-workers: odds ratio = 1.42, CI 95% = 1.17; 1.72). The associations differed in strength between hospitals, primary care, and home healthcare.

CONCLUSIONS

Strengthening social support from the immediate manager and co-workers appears to be a way to increase RNs' work motivation, including their intention to remain at the workplace. This may be important, particularly in primary care and home healthcare.

CLINICAL RELEVANCE

To strengthen RNs' work motivation and willingness to stay in the workplace, it appears important for healthcare organizations to provide RN social support.

General versus domain-specific grit in the work context

Researchers have questioned whether grit should be conceptualized and measured as a global (i.e., domain-general) or domain-specific construct. Although evidence is beginning to appear that grit in educational and sport contexts may be measured as domain-specific, it has not yet been explored in the organizational context. The objective of this research was to study the psychometric properties of grit as domain-specific for subsequently analyzing if such domain-specific grit (labor grit) improves the predictive validity of different organizational results. A sample of 326 active workers was used (Myears = 37.52; SD = 9.85). Their grit levels in the general domain and specific domain were evaluated, as well as their main personality traits and other organizational results such as work engagement and work performance. The grit instrument as domain-specific showed excellent reliability (ω = 0.92), and the unidimensionality of the instrument was confirmed. The results point to the fact that giving an organizational connotation to the grit items does not improve the predictability of the results. However, labor grit adds incremental validity over personality traits and work engagement to predict task and contextual performance (Δr2 = 0.13), but not to predict counterproductive behavior.

Hair dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate as biomarker of employees' well-being? A longitudinal investigation of support, resilience, and work engagement during COVID-19 pandemic

Introduction

Building on the motivational process of the job demands-resources (JD-R) theory, in the current research we investigated the longitudinal association between supervisor support/resilience as job/personal resources, work engagement (WE) and hair dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate, or DHEA(S), as a possible biomarker of employees' well-being.

Methods

In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, 122 workers completed two self-report questionnaires (i.e., psychological data): the former at Time 1 (T1) and the latter three months afterwards, at Time 2 (T2). Participants also collected a strand of hair (i.e., biological data) at T2.

Results

Results from path analysis showed that both SS and resilience at T1 were positively related to WE at T2, which, in its turn, was positively related to hair DHEA(S) at T2. Both SS and resilience at T1 had a positive indirect effect on hair DHEA(S) at T2 through WE at T2, which fully mediated the association between job/personal resources and hair DHEA(S).

Discussion

Overall, results are consistent with the motivational process of the JD-R. Furthermore, this study provides preliminary evidence for the role of hair DHEA(S) as a biomarker of WE, a type of work-related subjective well-being that plays a central role in the motivational process of the JD-R, leading to favorable personal and organizational outcomes. Finally, the article outlines practical implications for organizations and professionals to foster WE within the workplace.

Multidimensional analysis of schoolteachers' occupational stress by the New Brief Job Stress Questionnaire: focusing on gender differences

This study investigated teachers' occupational stress using a comprehensive job stress questionnaire, or the New Brief Job Stress Questionnaire, while considering gender differences. A total of 1,825 elementary and junior high school teachers participated in the study. The results revealed that female teachers significantly exhibited more psychological and physical stress reactions and perceived less job resource availability than did male teachers. Moreover, multiple regression analyses demonstrated that support from family and friends was a larger factor associated with mental health outcomes among female teachers than among male teachers. The impacts of marital status also differed between male and female teachers. Job demands were strongly associated with psychological and physical stress reactions among teachers. Meanwhile, job resources were more strongly associated with positive workplace outcomes, such as workplace engagement and social capital, than were job demands. Administrators should consider the distinctive nature of teachers' occupational stress in addition to its gender specific influence. Organizational support, such as securing teachers' autonomy, encouraging their career development, and acknowledging diversity, should be considered to foster teachers' work engagement and create a cohesive environment in the school workplace.

Exploring the impact of workload, organizational support, and work engagement on teachers' psychological wellbeing: a structural equation modeling approach

Introduction

This study delves into the intricate relationships among workload, perceived organizational support, work engagement, and psychological wellbeing within the context of 572 secondary school teachers in China.

Methods

Utilizing structural equation modeling (SEM), this research rigorously examined construct validity and the intricate interrelationships among latent variables. The data were collected and analyzed to determine the associations between workload, perceived organizational support, work engagement, and psychological wellbeing.

Results

The findings unveiled compelling negative associations between workload and perceived organizational support, workload and work engagement, and workload and psychological wellbeing among the secondary school teachers. Conversely, positive correlations emerged between perceived organizational support, work engagement, and psychological wellbeing. The structural equation modeling analysis demonstrated strong fit indices, affirming robust alignment with the anticipated models.

Discussion

Mediation analyses further elucidated the significance of work engagement as a mediator in the relationships between workload and psychological wellbeing, as well as between perceived organizational support and psychological wellbeing. These results underscore the pivotal role of work engagement in shaping the impact of workload and organizational support on the psychological wellbeing of secondary school teachers in Chinese educational settings.

Antecedents and outcomes of work engagement among nursing staff in long-term care facilities-A systematic review

AIM

To determine antecedents and outcomes of work engagement (WE) among nursing staff in long-term care (LTC) using the Job Demand-Resources model.

DESIGN

A systematic review following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis statement and Synthesis Without Meta-analysis in systematic reviews guideline. A study protocol was registered in PROSPERO (registration number CRD42022336736).

DATA SOURCES

The initial searches were performed in PsycInfo, Medline, Academic Search Premier, CINAHL and Scopus and yielded 3050 unique publications. Updated searches identified another 335 publications. Sixteen studies published from 2010 to 2022 were included.

REVIEW METHODS

The screening of titles and abstracts, and subsequently full-text publications, was performed blinded by two author teams using the inclusion/exclusion criteria. When needed, a mutual consensus was obtained through discussion within and across the teams. A descriptive and narrative synthesis without a meta-analysis of the included studies was performed.

RESULTS

The extent of research on WE in LTC facilities is limited and the factors examined are heterogeneous. Of forty-two unique antecedents and outcomes, only three factors were assessed in three or more studies. Antecedents-in particular job resources-are more commonly examined than outcomes.

CONCLUSION

Existing literature offers scant evidence on antecedents and outcomes of WE among nursing staff in LTC facilities. Social support, learning and development opportunities and person-centred processes are the most examined factors, yet with ambiguous results.

IMPACT

Antecedents and outcomes of engagement among nursing staff in LTC facilities have not previously been reviewed systematically. Engagement has been correlated with both more efficient and higher-quality service delivery. Our findings suggest opportunities to improve health and care services by enhancing engagement, whilst at the same time better caring for employees. This study lays the groundwork for more detailed research into the contributing factors and potential results of increasing caregivers' engagement. No patient or public contribution.

Resilience, organizational support, and innovative behavior on nurses' work engagement: a moderated mediation analysis

Objectives

To investigate the status of nurses' work engagement and the relationship among resilience, organizational support, and innovative behaviors.

Methods

In this cross-sectional study, we investigated 496 nurses in Hunan, China, from July 2022 to December 2022. A descriptive statistical approach, Pearson's correlation analysis and Hayes' PROCESS Macro Models 4 and 14 were used to analyze the available data.

Results

The level of work engagement among nurses was found to be moderate. Resilience positively predicted work engagement among nurses. Organizational support played a partially mediating role in the association between resilience and work engagement. Furthermore, innovative behavior played a moderating role in the association between adaptive resilience and work engagement.

Conclusion

Based on the results, greater attention needs to be paid to nurses' work engagement. A high level of resilience, organizational support, and innovative behavior may increase work engagement among nurses. Nursing leaders can take measures to increase work engagement among nurses by improving nurses' resilience and organizational support, and cultivating innovative behavior.

The influence of challenge research stressors on research creativity among Chinese doctoral students: a mediated moderation model

The research creativity of doctoral students is not solely fueled by their intrinsic motivation, but also thrives in an environment that offers challenging research opportunities, substantial support, and feedback from significant others. Based on the job demands-resources model, this study aims to explore the impact of challenge research stressors on the research creativity of Chinese doctoral students. A mediated moderation model was constructed to examine the mediating effect of achievement motivation and the moderating effect of supervisor developmental feedback on the relationship between challenge research stressors and research creativity. A total of 538 valid questionnaires were collected from doctoral students using convenience sampling and snowball sampling. The questionnaires included the Challenge Research Stressors Scale, the Research Creativity Scale, the Achievement Motivation Scale, and the Supervisor Developmental Feedback Scale. Regression analyses, bootstrap testing, and simple slope analyses were used to estimate the various relationships. The findings indicated that challenge research stressors had a positive effect on doctoral students' research creativity. Supervisor developmental feedback positively moderated the impact of challenge research stressors on the achievement motivation and research creativity of doctoral students. Achievement motivation partially mediated the influence of challenge research stressors on doctoral students' research creativity, and further fully mediated the interaction effect of challenge research stressors and supervisor developmental feedback on doctoral students' research creativity. These findings contribute not only to our understanding of the mechanisms and boundary conditions through which challenge research stressors impact the research creativity of doctoral students, but also provide valuable insights into how to stimulate and maintain their research creativity.

The essential impact of stress appraisals on work engagement

This paper explains the contradictory findings on the relationship between stress and work engagement by including appraisals as a driving mechanism through which job stressors influence engagement. In doing so, it explores whether stressors categorised as either challenging or hindering can be appraised simultaneously as both. Second, it investigates whether stress mindset explains not only how stressors are appraised, but also how appraisals influence engagement. Over five workdays, 487 Canadian and American full-time employees indicated their stress mindset and appraised numerous challenging and hindering stressors, after which they self-reported their engagement at work. Results showed that employees rarely appraised stress as uniquely challenging or hindering. Moreover, when employees harbored positive views about stress, stressors overall were evaluated as less hindering and hindrance stressors were particularly more challenging. Stress mindset appears to be critical in modulating the genesis of stress appraisals. In turn, appraisals explained the stressor-engagement relationship, with challenge and hindrance stressors boosting and hampering engagement, respectively. Finally, positive stress mindset buffered the negative effect of hindrance appraisals on engagement. Our findings clarify misconceptions about how workplace stressors impact engagement and offer novel evidence that stress mindset is a key factor in stress at work.

Perceived organisational support and work engagement among health sector workers during the COVID-19 pandemic: a multicentre, time-lagged, cross-sectional study among clinical hospital staff in Pakistan

OBJECTIVE

Workplace engagement is associated with several significant positive organisational outcomes. The COVID-19 pandemic has emphasised the importance of workplace engagement, particularly for front-line healthcare workers. Drawing on the conservation of resources theory, this study examines the impact of personal and job resources in a workplace that help in resource conservation for work engagement. In view of the high burnout rates reported among health professionals during the COVID-19 pandemic, this study aims to investigate the impact of perceived organisational support (POS) on work engagement through the mediating effect of well-being and the moderating role of employees' resilience.

DESIGN

Time-lagged, cross-sectional, split questionnaire-based survey study.

SETTING

Data were gathered from 68 hospitals in Pakistan, of which 45 were public and 23 were private hospitals.

PARTICIPANTS AND ANALYSIS

Simple random sampling techniques were used and data were collected from 345 healthcare professionals (ie, doctors, nurses and allied health professionals) using split questionnaires, in two waves with a 3-week interval, with a response rate of 80%. For analysis of data, the study used the PROCESS macro by Hayes.

RESULTS

Engagement at work was positively correlated with POS, well-being and resilience. POS significantly predicted work engagement through well-being (β=0.06, SE=0.02, 95% bias-corrected CI 0.021, 0.10). Further analysis of the strong effect of resilience on subjective well-being shows the significant value of the mediated moderation index (β=0.06, SE=0.02, 95% bias-corrected CI 0.03, 0.11).

CONCLUSION

The findings suggest that well-being may be an important pathway through which healthcare workers' POS may influence work engagement, particularly when their resilience capability is high. To maintain engagement at the workplace, hospital administrators should consider strengthening organisational and individual resources that build a supportive environment to meet the demands of challenging times.

Lessons on the COVID-19 pandemic: who are the most affected

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to significant changes in work and lifestyle, impacting occupational mental health. This study examines the time and individual heterogeneity in the pandemic's effects on occupational mental health using panel data from job stress checks spanning 2018 to 2021. On average, there was an initial alleviation of high-stress risk in 2020, followed by a deterioration in 2021. Based on the job demand-resource theory, we identify the group of employees most affected by the pandemic. The findings highlight that employees in unfavorable workplace conditions are more likely to experience substantial adverse impacts. Adequate workplace support, including factors like interpersonal relationships, managerial support, job meaning, control, and work-life balance, is crucial for mitigating high-stress risk. Additionally, during the early phase of the pandemic, engaged employees experienced a slight decline in occupational mental health, while those lacking job resources at their worksite faced higher levels of occupational stress in the subsequent year. These findings offer practical suggestions for person-centered coping strategies to mitigate the pandemic's adverse impact.

Examining regulatory focus in the acceleration and deceleration of engagement and exhaustion cycles among nurses

BACKGROUND

Given that emotional exhaustion and nurse engagement have significant implications for nurse well-being and organizational performance, determining how to increase nurse engagement while reducing nurse exhaustion is of value.

PURPOSE

Resource loss and gain cycles, as theorized in conservation of resources theory, are examined using the experience of emotional exhaustion to evaluate loss cycles and work engagement to evaluate gain cycles. Furthermore, we integrate conservation of resources theory with regulatory focus theory to examine how the ways in which individuals approach work goals serves as a facilitator to the acceleration and deceleration of both of these cycles.

METHODOLOGY/APPROACH

Using data from nurses working in a hospital in the Midwest United States at six time points spanning over 2 years, we demonstrate the accumulation effects of the cycles over time using latent change score modeling.

RESULTS

We found that prevention focus was associated with the accelerated accumulation effects of emotional exhaustion and that promotion focus was associated with the accelerated accumulation effects of work engagement. Furthermore, prevention focus attenuated the acceleration of engagement, but promotion did not influence the acceleration of exhaustion.

CONCLUSION

Our findings suggest that individual factors such as regulatory focus are key to helping nurses to better control their resource gain and loss cycles.

PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS

We provide implications for nurse managers and health care administrators to help encourage promotion focus and suppress prevention focus in the workplace.

Employees’ connectedness to executives predicts job attitudes and quitting

Purpose

Against the backdrop of a competitive hiring market and historically high rates of quitting, the current research examines a factor that could support talent retention in organizations: employees’ feelings of connectedness to their top executives. The authors examined the relationship between workers’ feelings of executive connectedness and job attitudes relative to other antecedents and its predictive power for quitting over and above manager and team connectedness.

Design/methodology/approach

In Study 1, the authors measured the relative predictive power of executive connectedness, along with 14 other antecedents, for the outcome of job attitudes in ten samples totaling over 70,000 observations, including two longitudinal samples. In Study 2, the authors used path analysis to test the relationship between executive connectedness and actual quitting, controlling for workers’ feelings of connectedness to their manager and teammates, in two (related) longitudinal samples.

Findings

Executive connectedness was robustly related to concurrent and future job attitudes, and it outranked manager variables in all samples. Executive connectedness predicted quitting, even when controlling for manager and team connectedness; this effect was mediated by job attitudes in one of two samples.

Practical implications

Executive connectedness could be an underutilized resource for understanding and possibly improving employee attitudes and retention. Executives should not delegate all responsibility for employee attitudes and retention to managers.

Originality/value

This research is to the authors' knowledge the first to systematically test the unique predictive validity of employees’ feelings of connectedness to executives for important outcomes. The results suggest that executive connectedness may be an important factor in employees’ workplace experience.

Building Work Engagement in Organizations: A Longitudinal Study Combining Social Exchange and Social Identity Theories

Starting from the insights of social identity theory and social exchange theory, the present study aimed to understand how social support and organizational identification relate to work engagement. Moreover, it sought to verify if social support and organizational identification interact with each other to explain work engagement three months later. A longitudinal study was conducted on a sample of 150 employees, in which organizational identification, social support, and work engagement were measured through a questionnaire. The results show that when employees can count on their supervisors' and colleagues' support, they will be more engaged in their work. In addition, when an employee strongly identifies with their organization, the employee's evaluation of the social support received from colleagues and supervisors becomes less critical in determining their work engagement. These results confirm our hypotheses and extend the findings of previous research on withdrawal behaviors. From a practical point of view, it seems important for organizations to invest in increasing identification, as well as in building a high-quality social exchange relationship, especially when levels of organizational identification are low or decreasing.

Authentic leadership and personal and job demands/resources: A person-centered approach and links with work-related subjective well-being

The job demands-resources theory considers an open group of personal and job demands and resources. Thus, it allows us to include personal resources not yet covered (i.e., vigor at work) or less explored (i.e., emotional abilities), as well as personal demands not yet explored (i.e., overcommitment). Additionally, from this theory, it is proposed that leaders may influence employee wellbeing. Therefore, of particular interest is to analyze positive leadership styles, such as authentic leadership (AL). This study addresses three research objectives: 1) to identify profiles of employees from a person-centered approach, combining personal resources (self-perception of emotional abilities, vigor at work and self-efficacy) and personal demands (overcommitment) with job resources and demands; 2) to analyze the relation of the identified profiles with indicators of work-related subjective well-being; and 3) to acknowledge whether the AL style determines the pertaining to a profile probability. A large heterogeneous sample of Spanish employees (N = 968) responded to a questionnaire. Data were analyzed by adopting a person-centered approach using latent profile analysis. The results revealed five patterns of job and individual characteristics: Profile 5 (very low personal resources, and low job resources and demands); Profile 4 (low resources and high demands); Profile 3 (mid-level personal resources, high job resources and low demands); Profile 2 (high personal resources, mid-level job resources and high demands); and Profile 1 (high resources and low demands). Analyses showed that workers differed significantly in well-being depending on their profile membership, with Profile 1 having the highest well-being. Profiles that yielded the worst outcomes were Profile 4 and Profile 5, especially the latter. Finally, the results indicated that AL increased the probability that a profile would show a high well-being level.

Getting crafty: Examining social resource crafting's relationship with work engagement and social support

Social resource crafting is a job crafting strategy in which employees proactively increase their social resources (e.g., feedback from coworkers, coaching from supervisor). We examined social resource crafting's relationships with work-related social support (perceived supervisor and coworker support) and work engagement. Specifically, as there has been growing interest in understanding resource crafting and work engagement, we investigated the directionality of this relationship. Using a two-wave study and structural equation modelling, we tested the dual pathways between resource crafting and work engagement as well as resource crafting's relationship with each type of support. The results suggested social resource crafting was associated with higher levels of coworker support-but not supervisor support - over time and supported a unidirectional path from social resource crafting to work engagement. Our findings provide valuable insight into the power employees have to craft their own positive experiences at work.

Crafting work-nonwork balance involving life domain boundaries: Development and validation of a novel scale across five countries

Ongoing developments, such as digitalization, increased the interference of the work and nonwork life domains, urging many to continuously manage engagement in respective domains. The COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent home-office regulations further boosted the need for employees to find a good work-nonwork balance, thereby optimizing their health and well-being. Consequently, proactive individual-level crafting strategies for balancing work with other relevant life domains were becoming increasingly important. However, these strategies received insufficient attention in previous research despite their potential relevance for satisfying psychological needs, such as psychological detachment. We addressed this research gap by introducing a new scale measuring crafting for a work-nonwork balance and examining its relevance in job-and life satisfaction, work engagement, subjective vitality, family role and job performance, boundary management and self-rated work-nonwork balance. The Work-Nonwork Balance Crafting Scale was validated in five countries (Austria, Finland, Germany, Japan, and Switzerland), encompassing data from a heterogeneous sample of more than 4,200 employees. In study 1, exploratory factor analysis revealed a two-factorial scale structure. Confirmatory factor analysis, test for measurement invariance, and convergent validity were provided in study 2. Replication of confirmatory factor analysis, incremental and criterion validity of the Work-Nonwork Balance Crafting Scale for job and life satisfaction were assessed in study 3. Study 4 displayed criterion validity, test–retest reliability, testing measurement invariance, and applicability of the scale across work cultures. Finally, study 5 delivered evidence for the Work-Nonwork Balance Crafting Scale in predicting work-nonwork balance. The novel Work-Nonwork Balance Crafting Scale captured crafting for the challenging balance between work and nonwork and performed well across several different working cultures in increasingly digitalized societies. Both researchers and practitioners may use this tool to assess crafting efforts to balance both life domains and to study relationships with outcomes relevant to employee health and well-being.

Importance of work engagement in primary healthcare

Background

Work engagement is crucial for quality care at the primary healthcare level. This is especially true during the Covid-19 pandemic, as it has effects on the community from both a health and economic point of view. For example, inadequate work engagement can lead to fewer referrals to the secondary healthcare level. This study aims to examine the work engagement level in a public healthcare organisation at the primary healthcare level to further explore the role of work environment characteristics. The study addresses a research gap in the field of primary healthcare and emphasises the importance of managing the factors promoting work engagement. The future of healthcare will be strongly shaped by population ageing and Covid-19 disruption, which have created unpredictable and unfavourable working situations.

Method

A descriptive, cross-sectional, correlational design was used including the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale with a non-probabilistic availability sample of 630 employees of the Community Health Centre Ljubljana, Slovenia, in 2018. The role of the work environment was observed by applying the job resources concept adapted to the context of the observed organisation.

Results

Work engagement in the observed organisation is higher compared to previous research. The research confirmed that job resources play an important role in employees’ work engagement. The high level of work engagement of the home care nursing employees coupled with the significant proportions of unengaged in the management of the organization also caught our attention. This difference highlights the importance of the leadership style, career choices and employment process that exist in an institution.

Conclusion

The study has important implications for healthcare management at the primary level for unlocking the work engagement by ‘managing’ the factors stimulating work engagement. The hidden potential is especially large in so called ‘soft areas’, such as leadership style, communication and organisational climate, which are also less expensive to manage than other aspects of the work environment.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12913-022-08402-7.

The relationship between delay of gratification and work engagement: The mediating role of job satisfaction

Undoubtedly, teachers remain at the forefront of implementing rural education. This indicates the significant impact their job involvement has on the overall achievements of schools in rural areas. Studies have found that teachers in rural areas often face more difficulties and fewer opportunities in their work. In general, they need a stronger ability to tolerate delay of gratification if they want to have higher job involvement. However, there is currently insufficient research on the impact of career delay of gratification on teachers' job involvement. This study has been conducted to explore the relationship between the delay of gratification and the level of job involvement among physical education (PE) teachers in rural areas, as well as the mediating effect of job satisfaction. 530 PE teachers in the rural areas of Hunan Province, China, have been selected through random sampling as the participants of this study. They have been required to anonymously fill in a Delay of Gratification Scale, Job Involvement Scale and Job Satisfaction Scale to collect the data for investigation and analysis. The study found positive correlations among delay of gratification, job satisfaction, and job involvement among PE teachers in rural areas (P < 0.01), with job satisfaction playing a partial mediating role and intervening variable in the relationship between delay of gratification and job involvement (P < 0.01). Ultimately, delays in gratification directly and, through job satisfaction, indirectly promotes the job involvement of the teachers. The findings of this study reveal the impacts of delaying gratification on the job involvement of PE teachers in rural areas and provide a theoretical basis for increasing the job involvement of PE teachers in rural areas.

Profiles of Work Engagement and Work-Related Effort and Reward Among Teachers: Associations to Occupational Well-Being and Leader–Follower Relationship During the COVID-19 Pandemic

This study examined teachers’ occupational well-being by identifying profiles based on teachers’ self-ratings of work engagement as well as work-related effort and reward. It also did so by examining whether the identified subgroups differed with respect to teachers’ self-reported occupational stress and emotional exhaustion as well as with respect to work-related resources such as the individual resource of work meaningfulness and the leader-level resource of the leader–follower relationship. The participants in the study were 321 Finnish elementary school teachers. The data were collected in spring 2021, that is, at the time when the COVID-19 pandemic was present, yet there were no national school closures. Three groups of teachers were identified with latent profile analysis: (1) teachers recognized as being poorly engaged with the highest effort and lowest reward (4.7%); (2) teachers recognized as being averagely engaged with higher effort than reward (32.1%); and (3) teachers recognized as being highly engaged with higher reward than effort (63.2%). The subsequent analyses examining the differences among the profile groups revealed, for example, that each profile group differed with respect to the individual resource of work meaningfulness and profile groups 2 and 3 differed with respect to the leader-level resource of the leader–follower relationship. Thus, the findings indicate that there are differences in the ways in which teachers are able to benefit from the work-related resources and how they cope with job-related demands during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Spiritual Leadership and Job Engagement: The Mediating Role of Emotion Regulation

Big data era has brought big challenge for firms in human resource management, especially in employees' emotion. Drawing on emotion regulation and leadership theories, this study tests the mediating roles of emotion regulation for cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression in the relationship between spiritual leadership and job engagement. We made a field survey with 203 full-time employees to test our hypotheses. Empirical results show that the mediating effects of both cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression in accounting for the relationship between spiritual leadership and job engagement. Our study is among the first to examine whether and why spiritual leadership predicts job engagement. Our study contributes to the literatures on job engagement and emotion regulation.

The Whole Is Greater Than the Sum of Its Parts: Exploring Attributes of Team Work Engagement Climate

Despite growing interest in the concept of team work engagement (TWE), relatively little is known about the conditions that allow it to emerge. Based on the literature on work engagement and team climate, this study introduces the concept of TWE climate and examines its conceptual attributes. Based on a one-and-a-half-year qualitative investigation of eight Dutch self-steering project teams, we discovered that TWE climate comprises eight attributes, both (a) personal and (b) shared. Personal attributes include team members' commitment and drive toward the team and a personal feeling of being respected within the team. Shared attributes include a shared ability to overcome challenges and a shared sense of accomplishment, community, drive, and focus. Our findings indicate that personal and shared attributes are both critical elements of a team climate conducive to team work engagement. We conclude this paper by discussing what these findings mean for the concept of TWE climate in light of future research and practice.

The effects of relational and psychological capital on work engagement: the mediation of learning goal orientation

Purpose

This paper proposes a research model in which learning goal orientation (LGO) mediates the impacts of relational capital and psychological capital (PsyCap) on work engagement.

Design/methodology/approach

Data obtained from 475 managers and employees in the manufacturing and service industries in Poland were utilized to assess the linkages given above. Common method variance was controlled by the unmeasured latent method factor technique.

Findings

LGO mediates the impact of PsyCap on work engagement. More specifically, employees high on PsyCap are more learning goal-oriented, and therefore are work-engaged at elevated levels. Employees also exhibit higher work engagement as a result of their relational capital.

Research limitations/implications

This study extends the research stream on the interrelationships of relational capital, PsyCap, LGO and work engagement to Poland. It fills a void in the relevant literature. Yet, the authors collected cross-sectional, self-report data in a single country.

Practical implications

Manufacturing and service companies in Poland should create and maintain a work environment where managers and employees develop trust and high-quality relationships with their managers and coworkers and invest in their personal resources. In addition, management should arrange continuous training programs so that employees can continue developing themselves. Such practices are critical in an organization where employees' work engagement is triggered by relational capital, PsyCap and LGO.

Originality/value

This paper enhances the current literature by exploring relational capital, PsyCap and LGO simultaneously as the predictors of work engagement, which have been subjected to limited empirical inquiry. The paper also extends the research stream about the above-mentioned predictors of engagement to Poland, which is an underrepresented country in the field of human resource management.

Basic Psychological Needs Satisfaction Mediates the Link between Strengths Use and Teachers' Work Engagement

Work engagement is a core indicator that reflects the quality of teachers' occupational lives and the development of students, but few studies have explored the connection between strengths use and work engagement of teachers and the mechanisms underlying this relationship. This paper aimed to investigate how the relation of strengths use with work engagement is affected by a teacher's satisfaction of basic psychological needs. For this purpose, 648 teachers in China completed questionnaires. The results revealed that strengths use exhibited a positive correlation with work engagement and needs satisfaction. Furthermore, autonomy, competence, and relatedness satisfaction mediated the effect of strengths use on work engagement for teachers. The results suggest that autonomy, competence, and relatedness satisfaction serve as factors that mediate the effect of strengths use on work engagement. The significance and limitations of the study are discussed.

The social psychology of work engagement: state of the field

Purpose

Research on work engagement is flourishing and shows important links between work engagement and career success. However, a systematic account of the social-psychological origins of engagement is largely lacking. In the paper, the author develops a theoretical model and discusses how employees actively influence and are influenced by employees' leader's, colleagues' and partner's work engagement.

Design/methodology/approach

The author integrates literatures on emotional contagion, team work engagement, leadership, proactive work behavior and work-to-family spillover. This results in a model of the social-psychological processes involved in work engagement.

Findings

Work engagement is the result of various social-psychological processes. First, work engagement is contagious – colleagues, leaders and the intimate partner can be important causes of engagement. Second, work engagement emerges at the team-level when team members collectively experience high levels of vigor, dedication and absorption. Team members of engaged teams synchronize their activities well and perform better. Third, leaders may influence employee work engagement through fast (unconscious) and slow (conscious) influence processes. Fourth, employees may use social forms of proactive behavior to stay engaged in their work, including job crafting and playful work design. Finally, work engagement may spill over and enrich the family domain. The social-psychological model of work engagement shows how leaders, followers and family members provide, craft and receive (i.e. exchange) resources and facilitate each other's work and family engagement.

Practical implications

Organizations may increase work engagement by using social-psychological interventions, including training sessions that foster fast and slow leadership, team-boosting behaviors and (team-level) job crafting and playful work design.

Originality/value

Whereas most previous studies have focused on job demands and resources as possible causes of work engagement, the present article outlines the state of the field regarding the social-psychological processes involved in engagement.

Commitment is the key: a moderated mediation model linking leaders' resources, work engagement, and transformational leadership behavior

The present study aims at gaining insights into the underlying mechanisms leading from leaders' resources to their transformational behavior. Based on the Job Demands-Resources theory, we hypothesized that leaders' personal (self-efficacy) and job (role clarity) resources eventually enhance their performance, more specifically their transformational leadership, through fostering work engagement. Further, we proposed that the link between work engagement and transformational behavior is moderated by leaders' affective commitment, drawing on Social Identity Theory. Data was collected from N = 216 German leaders in 2020 via an online survey. Hypotheses were tested by applying a moderated mediation model linking resources, engagement, commitment, and leadership behavior. The problem of potential endogeneity was further addressed. As predicted, both self-efficacy and role clarity enhanced leaders' transformational behavior, mediated through work engagement. The relationship between leaders' work engagement and performance was stronger when they felt a strong belonging and emotional attachment to their organization, that is, high affective commitment.

People Performance Scales (PPS): A multi-company, cross-sectional psychometric assessment

This study aims to test the nomological validity of the People Performance Scales (PPS) using the job demands-resources (JD-R) model. All employees at two large companies in Norway (a governmental agency and a worker's union) were invited to complete the PPS questionnaire electronically. A total of 2,469 respondents completed the questionnaire, resulting in an 87 percent response rate. Data was analyzed Structural Equation Modelling. First, all 15 scales included in the PPS showed excellent internal and construct validity. PPS was also found to have configural-, construct-level metric- and scale-level metric invariance across age groups and genders. Second, findings indicate that the PPS can be used for both research and consultancy based upon the JD-R model, while simultaneously assessing constructs of particular importance in Norwegian and Scandinavian legislation. The PPS represents a short and efficient questionnaire which measures the most relevant working environment constructs in a reliable and distinct way. The questionnaire has great psychometric characteristics and is well suited for use in organizations to measure employees' experience of working environment factors, allowing organizations to identify areas of improvement and to support organizational development.

Digitalisation and work well-being: a qualitative study of techno-work engagement experiences related to the use of educational technology

Purpose

The study explores techno-work engagement, which is a positive and fulfilling state of well-being with respect to the use of digital technology at work. It provides insight into the circumstances in which the educational use of ICT enhances work well-being.

Design/methodology/approach

A total of 60 Finns from the education sector wrote descriptions of situations in which they experienced techno-work engagement related to the use of educational technology. The responses were analysed qualitatively.

Findings

Participants experienced techno-work engagement not only when educational technology facilitated work, enabled progress and produced novelty value but also when working in collaboration and in a positive climate.

Originality/value

This first qualitative study of techno-work engagement deepens the understanding of positive well-being experiences associated with the use of educational technology. It also provides suggestions for leading technology-related work well-being in educational sector.

Engaging to innovate: an investigation into the implications of engagement at work on innovative behaviors in healthcare organizations

PURPOSE

Organizational innovation relies on the employees' active participation in improving extant processes and practices. In particular, it has been argued that employees' engagement triggers innovation-oriented behaviors at work. Nevertheless, there is a paucity of evidence of the implications of work engagement on the health professionals' innovation propensity. The article intends to push forward what we currently know about this issue, providing some food for thought to scholars and practitioners.

DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH

A path analysis based on ordinary least square (OLS) regression and 10,000 bootstrap samples was designed to investigate the direct and indirect implications of employees' engagement on innovative behaviors at work in a large sample of health professionals operating in Europe. The quality of employee-manager relationships and the organizational climate were included as mediating variables affecting the relationship between work engagement and propensity to innovation-oriented behaviors.

FINDINGS

The research findings highlighted that being engaged at work fosters the willingness of health professionals to partake in the improvement of organizational processes and practices. The positive implications of employees' engagement on innovative behaviors at work are catalyzed by good employee-manager relationships and a positive organizational climate.

PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS

Healthcare organizations should uphold the health professional's engagement to enhance their innovation potential. Targeted interventions are needed to merge work engagement with the enhancement of the organizational environment in which health professionals accomplish their activities. A positive organizational climate enacts an empowering work environment, which further incentivizes innovation.

ORIGINALITY/VALUE

The article adopts a micro-level perspective to investigate the triggers of innovative behaviors among healthcare professionals, providing evidence which is relevant for theory and practice.

Creating a Work Environment Conducive to Organizational Learning

Through organizational learning, health care teams can consistently provide excellent patient care in a complex and changing environment. Nurse managers, educators, and other leaders can facilitate organizational learning within their teams by promoting certain contextual factors in the clinical work environment. This article provides an overview of contextual factors associated with organizational learning, includes practice-based examples of these factors, and offers evidence-based recommendations for creating a learning-focused work environment. [J Contin Educ Nurs. 2021;52(6):281-285.].

Meaningful Work, Job Resources, and Employee Engagement

Meaningful work and employee engagement have been the subject of increasing interest in organizational research and practice over recent years. Both constructs have been shown to influence important organizational outcomes, such as job satisfaction, wellbeing, and performance. Only a limited amount of empirical research has focused on understanding the relationship within existing theoretical frameworks. For this study, meaningful work is proposed as a critical psychological state within the job demands-resources (JD-R) model that can therefore, in part, explain the relationship between job resources and employee engagement. Survey data collected from 1415 employees working in a range of organizations, across a number of industries, were analyzed with confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation modelling (SEM). In support of expectations, job variety, development opportunities, and autonomy, each had a significant and positive direct association with meaningful work. These job resources also had a significant and positive indirect effect on employee engagement via meaningful work. Although job variety, development opportunities, autonomy, and feedback had significant positive direct associations with engagement, contrary to expectations, supervisor support had a negative association with engagement. The final model explained a sizable proportion of variance in both meaningful work (49%) and employee engagement (65%). Relative weights analyses showed that job variety was the strongest job resource predictor of meaningful work, and that meaningful work was more strongly associated with employee engagement than the job resources. Overall, the results show that meaningful work plays an important role in enhancing employee engagement and that providing employees with skill and task variety is important to achieving that goal. Practical implications, study limitations, and future research opportunities are discussed.

The Effects of Green Transformational Leadership on Adoption of Environmentally Proactive Strategies: The Mediating Role of Green Engagement

To explore key antecedents of environmentally proactive strategies, this work uses upper echelons theory to examine a novel concept-green engagement with its antecedents (green transformational leadership) and consequence (environmentally proactive strategies). This work employed a potential growth curve model with 501 CEOs and top management teams of technology manufacturing businesses in Greater China at three times over eight months to analyze the theoretical model. The results of this work showed that the green transformational leadership of CEOs significantly predicts positive changes of green engagement of top management teams, which consequently predicts environmentally proactive strategies. These findings provide theoretical insights for the field of environmental development that can advance the literature on environmentally proactive strategies.

Psychological Flexibility and Its Relationship to Distress and Work Engagement Among Intensive Care Medical Staff

Intensive care settings place specific work-related demands on health care professionals that may elicit stress and negatively influence occupational health and work engagement. Psychological flexibility has emerged as a promising construct that could help explain variation in reported health. Understanding the role of psychological flexibility in occupational psychological health among intensive care medical staff may potentially guide the development of effective interventions. Thus, the present study evaluated the relationships between psychological flexibility (Work-related Acceptance and Action Questionnaire), distress (Perceived Stress Scale, General Health Questionnaire) and work engagement (Utrecht Work Engagement Scale) in a sample of 144 health care professionals from one adult (ICU, N = 98) and one pediatric (PICU, N = 46) intensive care unit. In addition to cross-sectional analyses, a subset of data (PICU, N = 46) was analyzed using a longitudinal design. Results illustrated that higher levels of distress were associated with lower levels of work engagement. Furthermore, psychological flexibility was related to greater work engagement, and psychological flexibility had a significant indirect effect on the relationship between distress and work engagement. Lastly, increased psychological flexibility over time corresponded with increased work engagement. Although tentative, the results suggest the importance of psychological flexibility for work engagement in health care professionals within intensive care settings.

Same Involvement, Different Reasons: How Personality Factors and Organizations Contribute to Heavy Work Investment

The academic literature has drawn a clear distinction between a positive form (i.e., work engagement) and a negative form (i.e., workaholism) of heavy work investment (HWI). Nevertheless, the different weight of individual and situational factors contributing to their development was not thoroughly explored. This study aims to investigate the role of individual variables (i.e., obsessive-compulsive traits, achievement orientation, perfectionism, and conscientiousness) and situational factors (i.e., job demands and overwork climate) regarding engagement and workaholism simultaneously. Hypotheses were tested using a sample of 523 Italian employees. Results of structural equation modeling revealed that overwork climate and job demands were conversely related to engagement and workaholism, with job demand reporting the strongest association with workaholism. Furthermore, fear of failure was the only individual factor showing a significant and opposite relationship with workaholism and engagement. In contrast, perfectionism was positively associated with both forms of HWI. These results shed light on the potential effectiveness of intervention strategies focused on the employees and organizations in preventing workaholism and promoting engagement.