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IMPACTThis article's conceptual model provides a holistic lens for exploring the work environment of emotional labour (EL). Research has demonstrated high levels of burnout and mental health issues among EL workers. The negative outcomes associated with EL work are even more pronounced in the present Covid-19 landscape. By understanding EL workers' cognitive processes, organizations stand a better chance of promoting work engagement, well-being, and effective organizational functioning. Practically, organizations may have to provide training and support to line managers to enable them to evolve within the same mindset as EL workers. Senior managers also have to exhibit visible support to workplace initiatives to allow for consistent implementation of job resources.
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Once the major threat of the COVID-19 pandemic diminished, schools reopened, and teachers once again had to cope with unprecedented challenges. The impact of these challenges on the emotional well-being of Arab teachers, who have a unique set of challenges within the Israeli school educational system, has received little attention in the recent literature. In this cross-sectional study, we examined 300 Arab teachers' well-being in Israel in May 2021, three months after schools were reopened. All study hypotheses were confirmed. Findings indicate the need to promote a sense of well-being among Arab teachers in stressful conditions and to design solutions specifically tailored to support them in accordance with their cultural and social characteristics. Israel's Ministry of Education should encourage school administrators to seek ways to provide a supportive environment for Arab teachers in school environments in order to improve their performance and retention, and maintain their well-being.
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PurposeDue to the fact that most employees have been forced to work remotely during the lockdown resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, there is great concern about how to alleviate increased stress among employees through human resource (HR) practices. Drawing upon the job demands-control (JDC) model and the job demands-resources (JDR) model, this study empirically investigated the direct effect of HR practices on employee stress in enforced remote work and the mediating role of sources of stress (SoS) and sense of control (SoC).Design/methodology/approachData were collected through an online survey platform called Wenjuanxing from March 15 to 22, 2020 in Hubei, China and from April 22 to 29, 2022 in Shanghai, China. Respondents scanned the QR code on WeChat to enter the platform. A total of 511 valid questionnaires were received with a response rate of 75.4%. After controlling demographic variables, the authors used the mediation modeling and PROCESS tool to test the proposed hypotheses.FindingsHR practices negatively affect stress in enforced remote work among employees. Both SoS and SoC partially mediate the relationship between HR practices and stress. HR practices can alleviate stress via decreasing SoS and enhancing SoC, respectively. Moreover, employee care and training are found to be two key factors of HR practices to help employees alleviate stress in enforced remote work.Originality/valueLockdown as an extreme external condition has brought great challenges in employee work arrangement as well as HR practices. Although the relationship between HR practices and job stress was studied previously, there is a lack of research on the effects of HR practices on stress in enforced remote work due to lockdown. It advances knowledge on HR practices' stress-reducing effect in the context of remote work and provides suggestions for HR practitioners on ways of alleviating employee stress in remote work.
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PurposeEven after COVID-19 pandemic, several organizations intend extending work-from-home (WFH), to the extent of making it permanent for many. However, WFH's impact on productivity remains uncertain. Therefore, this paper aims to study personal and job factors determining the likelihood of amount of work done at home being same/more vis-à-vis office.Design/methodology/approachEmployees' basic psychological needs and job crafting tendencies;job-related aspects of task independence, technology resources and supervisory support;and several demographic factors are examined as determinants. Firth logistic regression analysis of data from 301 Indian white-collar employees is performed.FindingsDemographically, longer exposure to WFH, greater work experience and being a support function worker increased the likelihood of same/greater amount of work done at home. Being a woman or married reduced the likelihood, while being a manufacturing/services worker was non-significant. Among psychological needs, greater needs for autonomy and relatedness decreased and increased the likelihood of same/greater amount of work done at home, respectively. Regarding personal and job resources, job crafting to increase structural job resources and supervisor support increased the likelihood of same/greater amount of work done at home versus office.Originality/valueThis paper adds to the limited India-centric literature on WFH;uniquely examining influences of individual personal attributes on amount of work done by combining job demands-resources (JD-R) model and basic psychological needs theory.
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The Corona crisis and the lockdown in the spring of 2020 had various effects on working life in Europe. In this three-wave study, we assessed the trajectories of job demands and resources of 302 employees 2 weeks before the lockdown, over 1 week after lockdown start, and 6 weeks following the beginning of the lockdown. We applied a pre-post follow-up design with 129 employees who switched to telecommuting and a control group of 173 employees who remained in their on-site workplace. Results from the repeated-measures MANCOVA indicate that, despite various general changes to job characteristics because of the Corona crisis, telecommuting changes contributed to significant changes only in communication opportunities and-before Bonferroni correction-in physical job demands. These results may imply that the most visible massive switch to telecommuting of many employees during the first phase of the Corona crisis is only one explanatory factor for general changes to job characteristics. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved) (German) Die Corona-Krise und der Lockdown im Fruhjahr 2020 waren mit vielfachen Veranderungen im Arbeitsleben in Europa verbunden. In einer 3-Wellen-Langsschnittstudie wurden die Verlaufe von Stressoren und Ressourcen von 302 Beschaftigten zwei Wochen vor dem Lockdown, eine Woche nach Lockdownstart und sechs Wochen nach Lockdownstart erfasst. Die Studie folgte einem Pre-post- Follow-up-Design mit 129 Beschaftigten, die zu Homeoffice-Arbeit wechselten und einer Kontrollgruppe von 173 Beschaftigten, die weiter vor Ort arbeiteten. Ergebnisse einer MANCOVA mit Messwiederholung zeigen, dass trotz vielfaltiger allgemeiner Veranderungen in den Arbeitsbedingungen durch die Corona-Krise der Wechsel ins Homeoffice nur zur Veranderung von zwei Arbeitsmerkmalen beitrug (Reduktion von Kommunikationsmoglichkeiten und-vor einer Bonferroni Korrektur-physische Arbeitsplatzstressoren). Das deutet darauf hin, dass die sehr sichtbaren Wechsel ins Homeoffice in der ersten Phase der Pandemie nur ein erklarender Faktor fur vielfaltige Veranderungen in den Arbeitsbedingungen im Zuge der Corona Krise darstellt. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)
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Introduction: As a special vulnerable group, the physical and mental health of elderly cancer patients has attracted much attention. However, few studies have focused on the impact of nurses' mental state on the mental health of elderly cancer patients during the COVID-19 pandemic. In response to this literature gap, this study aims to explore the impact of nurses' psychological capital on the satisfaction of elderly cancer patients. The job demands-resources model (JD-R) is used to further investigate how work engagement and job resources of nurses affect this relationship. Methods: The questionnaire survey was used to collect data, participants included 230 elderly cancer patients and their nurses from a tertiary first-class cancer hospital in China. Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was conducted with SmartPLS 3.3.9. Results: Nurses' psychological capital has a significant positive impact on the satisfaction of elderly cancer patients during the COVID-19 pandemic. Nurses' work engagement is an important mechanism for their psychological capital to affect the satisfaction of elderly cancer patients. In addition, nurses' job resources positively moderate the relationship between their psychological capital and work engagement. The positive relationship between psychological capital and work engagement of nurses is stronger when they have abundant job resources. Discussion: These findings suggest that healthcare organizations should take the psychological capital of medical staff as an important means to improve their competitive advantage. It can improve the quality of medical services to obtain good performance by effectively developing and managing the psychological capital of medical staff. In addition, healthcare organizations should recognize the importance of providing adequate job resources for medical staff.
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PurposeAs empirical insights into when salespeople should integrate information and communication technology (ICT) into their sales tasks are limited, the purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of salespeople's ICT orientation on role stress by considering the interplay of individual salesperson characteristics and the complexity of the selling environment, differentiating between customer and supplier complexity.Design/methodology/approachThe authors develop an empirical framework based on the Job Demands-Resources model and previous research in the area of technology in sales. They test their hypotheses by means of a survey of 255 business-to-business salespeople which is analyzed using ordinary least squares regressions.FindingsThe results of this study show that ICT orientation generally helps salespeople to reduce role ambiguity. However, the benefits salespeople derive from ICT orientation to reduce role conflict depend on an interplay of both their job tenure and the average relationship duration with customers as well as the complexity of the selling environment.Originality/valueThis study contributes to research on the impact of technology use on salespeople by enhancing the understanding of contexts that make ICT valuable for them. In particular, the findings of this study demonstrate that the impact of ICT orientation on salespeople's role stress depends on an interplay of individual salesperson characteristics, that is, resources, and environmental complexity characteristics, that is, demands.
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BACKGROUND: As we live in the era of technology, it is clear that employees' technical skills and savviness are important to their work performance. With the COVID-19 pandemic, these qualities have become a "necessityâ¿ for many employees as they have switched to remote working. Less attention, however, has been given to empirical evidence regarding how employees' technological competencies influence their work outcomes during a forced shift to remote work. Integrating the theories of Job Demands-Resources and Conservation of Resources, this study sought to provide evidence regarding the joint effect of job/personal resources and technological competency on levels of employees' remote work engagement and performance. METHOD: A total of 131 teachers working in Turkey completed an online survey during the initial months of the COVID-19 pandemic. SPSS Process Macro (Model 7) was used for hypotheses testing. RESULTS: We found partial support for the proposed moderated mediation model. Specifically, psychological resilience (as a personal resource) increased the level of work performance through work engagement and this relationship was stronger among employees with high levels of technological competency. However, the results did not provide support for the hypothesized interaction effect of workplace support (as a job resource) and technological competency on work performance through work engagement. CONCLUSION: This research advances the theoretical and empirical understanding of the role of technological competency in the motivational process of the Job Demands-Resources model. Our findings suggest that providing training activities aimed at promoting employee learning in the domain of online work tools can accelerate the effect of personal resources on work outcomes, especially during enforced remote working, as in the case of COVID-19.
CONTEXTE: Comme nous vivons dans l'ère de la technologie, il est clair que les compétences techniques et le savoir-faire des employés, sont important pour leur rendement au travail. Avec la pandémie de COVID-19, ces qualités sont devenues une "nécessitéâ¿ pour de nombreux employés qui sont passés au télétravail. Cependant, moins d'attention a été accordée aux preuves empiriques concernant la façon dont les compétences technologiques des employés influencent leurs résultats au travail pendant l'adaptation forcé au télétravail. En intégrant la théorie d'exigence ressources de l'épuisement professionnel et conservation des ressources, cette étude a cherché à fournir des preuves concernant l'effet conjoint du travail/ressources personnel et des compétences technologiques sur les niveaux d'engagement et rendement des employés au télétravail.Méthode: Un totale de 131 professeurs travaillant en Turquie ont répondu à un sondage en ligne pendant les premiers mois de la pandémie de COVID-19. Pour tester les hypothèses, le SPSS Process Macro (Model 7) a était utilisé.Résultats: Nous avons trouvé un soutien partiel pour le model de médiation modérée propose. Plus précisément, la résilience psychologique (en tant que ressource personnelle) a augmenté le niveau de rendement au travail grâce à l'engagement au travail, et cette relation était plus forte chez les employés ayant des niveaux élevés de compétence technologique. Cependant, les résultats n'ont pas démontré l'hypothèse de l'effet d'interaction du soutient en milieu de travail (en tant que ressource professionnelle) et des compétences technologiques sur le rendement au travail par le biais de l'engagement au travail. CONCLUSION: Cette recherche fait progresser la compréhension théorique et empirique du rôle de la compétence technologique dans le processus du modèle d'exigences-ressources de l'épuisement professionnel. Nos résultats suggèrent qu'offrir des activités de formations visant à promouvoir l'apprentissage des employés dans le domaine des outils de travail en ligne peut accélérer l'effets des ressources personnelles sur les résultats au travail, particulièrement pour le télétravail forcé, comme ce fut le cas durant la pandémie de COVID-19.
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(Spanish) Este estudio examino el impacto de la pandemia de COVID-19 entre personal esencial no sanitario mediante el examen de la percepcion de demandas y recursos laborales en los conflictos entre el trabajo, familia y bienestar psicologico. Usamos el modelo Recursos Trabajo-Demandas para examinar las variables de estudio. Este es la fase inicial de un estudio longitudinal aun en proceso. Un total de 161 participantes han participado de la primera fase base presentada en este trabajo. Examinamos: demandas laborales relacionadas con COVID-19, recursos organizacionales y personales, malestar psicologico general, ansiedad y depresion. Usamos PLS-SEM para probar la hipotesis del estudio. Los resultados preliminares de la primera fase de este estudio aun en curso sugieren que las demandas laborales de COVID-19 tuvieron relaciones positivas y significativas con el conflicto trabajo-familia, ansiedad y depresion, pero una relacion negativa y significativa con el malestar psicologico general. Mientras tanto, los recursos personales solo mediaron significativamente la relacion entre demandas laborales relacionadas con COVID- 19 y depresion (EI = -.061, p = .028). Las demandas relacionadas con COVID-19 tuvieron efectos significativos en todas las variables del estudio, particularmente en el conflicto trabajo-familia. Los recursos personales solo mediaron la relacion entre las demandas laborales de COVID-19 y depresion. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)
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OBJECTIVE: Long-term changes in burnout and its predictors in hospital staff during the COVID-19 pandemic were investigated in an international study. METHODS: Two online surveys were distributed to hospital staff in seven countries (Germany, Andorra, Ireland, Spain, Italy, Romania, Iran) between May and October 2020 (T1) and between February and April 2021 (T2), using the following variables: Burnout (emotional exhaustion and depersonalization), job function, age, gender, and contact with COVID-19 patients; individual resources (self-compassion, sense of coherence, social support) and work-related resources and demands (support at the workplace, risk perception, health and safety at the workplace, altruistic acceptance of risk). Data were analyzed using linear mixed models repeated measures, controlled for age. RESULTS: A total of 612 respondents were included (76% women). We found an increase in burnout from T1 to T2. Burnout was high among personnel with high contact with COVID-19 patients. Individual factors (self-compassion, sense of coherence) and work-related factors (support at the workplace, risk perception, health and safety at the workplace) showed associations with burnout. Low health and safety at the workplace at T1 was associated with an increase in emotional exhaustion at T2. Men showed an increase in depersonalization if they had much contact with COVID-19 patients. CONCLUSION: Burnout represents a potential problematic consequence of occupational contact with COVID-19 patients. Special attention should be paid to this group in organizational health management. Self-compassion, sense of coherence, support at the workplace, risk perception, and health and safety at the workplace may be important starting points for interventions. REGISTRATION: Müller, M. M. (2020, August 30). Cope-Corona: Identifying and strengthening personal resources of hospital staff to cope with the Corona pandemic. Open Science Foundation.
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Burnout, Professional , COVID-19 , Male , Humans , Female , Pandemics , COVID-19/epidemiology , Burnout, Professional/epidemiology , Burnout, Professional/psychology , Personnel, Hospital , Surveys and Questionnaires , Longitudinal Studies , Job SatisfactionABSTRACT
Purpose Drawing from the conservation of resource theory and the job demands-resources model, this study examines the bi-directional conflicts of work and family during COVID-19, and investigates the online teaching work-related antecedents and the mechanism shaping emotional exhaustion of teachers in Taiwan. Moreover, this study explores mindfulness in teaching as a possible moderator. Design/methodology/approach Data for analysis were collected from elementary school teachers via an online survey using a questionnaire comprising well-developed scales. The hypotheses were validated using structural equation modeling. Findings Results show that only family interfering with work conflict mediates the positive relationship of online teaching job demand with emotional exhaustion and negative relationship of online teaching job resource with emotional exhaustion. Results also evidence that mindfulness practiced by teachers can help them perceive their own feelings and thoughts non-judgmentally in face of job demands. Originality/value With the growing work-from-home trend, the current study revisits the impact of work demands and resources on work-family conflict, and examines whether Taiwanese teachers' perception towards online teaching would lead to different observations. The path that JD -> WIF conflict -> EE is well established in the literature, while COVID-19 brings to light another path JD -> FIW conflict -> EE, revealing insight into teachers' cognition and plight during the pandemic.
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The COVID-19 pandemic caused school systems to adapt very quickly to a variety of demands for change, and teachers, as frontline workers in the education system, were tasked with rapidly implementing new teaching practices in ways that promoted student learning while maximizing student safety. The aim of this study is to investigate how Italian teachers experienced the first Covid-19 lockdown in 2020, managing the difficult balance between job demands and personal resources to reduce the negative effects of this condition in terms of stress and burnout. Following the J-D/R model, the study analysed the role of personal resources, such as resilience and self-efficacy as components of Psychological Capital, in the relationship between job demands (work-life interface), job resources (principal's leadership support and participative decision-making), and emotional exhaustion. Participants were 606 Italian teachers working in different educational ranks. Results showed that personal resources play an important role to reduce the effects of job demands on emotional exhaustion and to buffer the effects of job resources on emotional exhaustion
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Purpose Due to the fact that most employees have been forced to work remotely during the lockdown resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, there is great concern about how to alleviate increased stress among employees through human resource (HR) practices. Drawing upon the job demands-control (JDC) model and the job demands-resources (JDR) model, this study empirically investigated the direct effect of HR practices on employee stress in enforced remote work and the mediating role of sources of stress (SoS) and sense of control (SoC). Design/methodology/approach Data were collected through an online survey platform called Wenjuanxing from March 15 to 22, 2020 in Hubei, China and from April 22 to 29, 2022 in Shanghai, China. Respondents scanned the QR code on WeChat to enter the platform. A total of 511 valid questionnaires were received with a response rate of 75.4%. After controlling demographic variables, the authors used the mediation modeling and PROCESS tool to test the proposed hypotheses. Findings HR practices negatively affect stress in enforced remote work among employees. Both SoS and SoC partially mediate the relationship between HR practices and stress. HR practices can alleviate stress via decreasing SoS and enhancing SoC, respectively. Moreover, employee care and training are found to be two key factors of HR practices to help employees alleviate stress in enforced remote work. Originality/value Lockdown as an extreme external condition has brought great challenges in employee work arrangement as well as HR practices. Although the relationship between HR practices and job stress was studied previously, there is a lack of research on the effects of HR practices on stress in enforced remote work due to lockdown. It advances knowledge on HR practices' stress-reducing effect in the context of remote work and provides suggestions for HR practitioners on ways of alleviating employee stress in remote work.
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The current study explores patterns of intraindividual demands and resources of ECE professionals in Austria during covid-19 by adopting a person-centred analytic approach. Latent Profile Analyses reveal three distinct subgroups (high demands/low resources vs. moderate demands/high resources vs. high demands/moderate resources). Results show that individuals assigned to the subgroup, which is characterized by moderate demands and high resources are less exhausted and show higher work engagement, than individuals assigned to the other subgroups. Individuals classified in the high demands and moderate resources are also less exhausted and more engaged than the individuals in the high demands and low resources group. © 2022 the authors. License.
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Since the outbreak of COVID-19, community workers' proactive behavior has played a noteworthy role in the crisis response. Previous research has not highlighted this group and their proactive behavior. To address this important gap, drawing upon the job demands-resources (JD-R) model, this study explores how red tape affects proactive behavior and investigates the mediating role of lack of goal progress (LOGP) and the moderating role of public service motivation (PSM) in this relationship. Based on a two-wave survey with a sample of 656 community workers in China, we found a negative relationship between red tape and proactive behavior. Moreover, this study showed that LOGP mediated this relationship. Contrary to our hypothesis, PSM did not moderate the relationship between LOGP and proactive behavior. These findings have important theoretical and practical implications and can better inform community work during COVID-19.
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Based on the job demands and resources model, this study assumes that remote work, supervisory behaviours and employee job crafting are leveraged by work engagement to increase individual goal attainment. This mediating relationship was tested using survey data collected from 500 Japanese remote workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Multivariate hierarchical regression analyses were conducted separately by two groups: workers who started remote work before the pandemic and those who started after. Among the post-COVID-19 remote workers, employees' goal attainment was improved by discretionary task crafting but was directly decreased by relational crafting. Furthermore, cognitive crafting increased goal attainment partially through the mediation of work engagement. Among the pre-COVID-19 remote workers, it was only frequency of remote work that influenced goal attainment.
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The Corona crisis and the lockdown in the spring of 2020 had various effects on working life in Europe. In this three-wave study, we assessed the trajectories of job demands and resources of 302 employees 2 weeks before the lockdown, over 1 week after lockdown start, and 6 weeks following the beginning of the lockdown. We applied a pre-post follow-up design with 129 employees who switched to telecommuting and a control group of 173 employees who remained in their on-site workplace. Results from the repeated-measures MANCOVA indicate that, despite various general changes to job characteristics because of the Corona crisis, telecommuting changes contributed to significant changes only in communication opportunities and – before Bonferroni correction – in physical job demands. These results may imply that the most visible massive switch to telecommuting of many employees during the first phase of the Corona crisis is only one explanatory factor for general changes to job characteristics. © 2021 The Author(s).
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The purpose of this study was to examine job burnout of medical providers in outpatient clinics. Job burnout is a psychological syndrome resulting from job interpersonal stressors;it is measured using three dimensions: (1) emotional exhaustion-feelings of being emotionally overextended and exhausted by one's work, (2) depersonalization-a unfeeling and impersonal response toward patients, and (3) personal accomplishment-feelings of competence and achievement in one's work (Maslach & Jackson, 2020). Using a convenience sample, healthcare providers in Southern Nevada were asked to participate. The study was approved by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Internal Review Board (IRB). After an initial Maslach Burnout Inventory Human Services Survey for Medical Personnel (MBI-HSS (MP)) was administered virtually (due to COVID-19), healthcare providers were presented with a job burnout educational in-service regarding how to identify and define job burnout, a summary of research and findings regarding employee stress, information of when to seek help, and a discussion of how job burnout affects patient care. After a 60-day period, the MBI-HSS (MP) was re-administered, voluntarily, to the same employees. This project's aim was to improve job burnout subscale scores in a 60-day period using a job burnout educational intervention. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)
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The time-intensive work of publishing in scientific journals is an important indicator of job performance that is given much weight during promotion procedures for academic positions. The current study applied the job demands–resources model and analyzed whether family supportive supervisor behaviors (FSSB) moderated associations between work stress and feelings of exhaustion as a job resource and whether feelings of exhaustion ultimately mediated the link between work stress and academic employees’ publication activity. The current online cross-sectional questionnaire study was conducted in 133 academic employees (65.4% women, 34.6% men;Mage = 41.9, SD = 10.1) at an Austrian medical university and assessed employees’ numbers of publications, H-index, work stress, feelings of exhaustion, FSSB, and work–family services used. Manifest path models revealed that FSSB moderated the link between experiencing high levels of work stress and strong feelings of exhaustion, especially in employees who had at least one child below the age of 18. Part-time employment was most strongly linked with lower numbers of publications and lower H-index levels. The finding that FSSB acted as a job resource mostly for employees with at least one child below 18 underlines the fact that FSSB is different from other forms of supervisor support. The current study supports recommendations to increase the amount of work–family services and to change organizational norms to be supportive of the successful management of family and work obligations.
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The present study provides evidence for a valid and reliable tool, the Academic Quality at Work Tool (AQ@workT), to investigate the quality of life at work in academics within the Italian university sector. The AQ@workT was developed by the QoL@Work research team, namely a group of expert academics in the field of work and organizational psychology affiliated with the Italian Association of Psychologists. The tool is grounded in the job demands-resources model and its psychometric properties were assessed in three studies comprising a wide sample of lecturers, researchers, and professors: a pilot study (N = 120), a calibration study (N = 1084), and a validation study (N = 1481). Reliability and content, construct, and nomological validity were supported, as well as measurement invariance across work role (researchers, associate professors, and full professors) and gender. Evidence from the present study shows that the AQ@workT represents a useful and reliable tool to assist university management to enhance quality of life, to manage work-related stress, and to mitigate the potential for harm to academics, particularly during a pandemic. Future studies, such as longitudinal tests of the AQ@workT, should test predictive validity among the variables in the tool.