Who Seeks Job Resources,and Who Avoids Job Demands? The Link Between Dark Personality Traits and Job Crafting

Although job crafting has been linked repeatedly to positive employee and organizational outcomes, its detrimental side has not been well explored. To understand the way dark personality traits affect the type of crafting in which employees engage, this research focuses on two frameworks: the PEN (psychopathy, extraversion, and neuroticism) framework and the Dark Triad (narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism). In Study 1, we collected data on the PEN traits and job crafting from 155 individuals in various occupations. We found that neuroticism was negatively related to seeking structural job resources, whereas psychoticism was negatively related to seeking social job resources. We also found that extraversion was positively related to seeking structural and social job resources and to seeking challenging job demands. In Study 2, we examined how the Dark Triad traits predicted job crafting among police officers (N = 135). The results showed that narcissism was positively related to seeking social job resources and challenges, whereas psychopathy was negatively related to seeking social resources. Age and narcissism were positive predictors of reducing job demands. We conclude that personality plays an important role when choosing how to craft one's job. We discuss the practical implications of these findings.     

Can job crafting reduce job boredom and increase work engagement? A three-year cross-lagged panel study

Building upon the Conservation of Resources (COR) theory, this longitudinal study examined whether job crafting behaviors (i.e. increasing structural and social job resources and increasing challenges) predict less job boredom and more work engagement. We also tested the reverse causation effects of job boredom and work engagement on job crafting and the dynamics between the three job crafting behaviors over time. We employed a two-wave, three-year panel design and included 1630 highly educated Finnish employees from a broad spectrum of occupations in various organizations. Our results indicated that seeking challenges in particular negatively predicted job boredom and positively predicted work engagement. Seeking challenges fueled other job crafting behaviors, which, in their turn, predicted seeking more challenges over time, thus supporting the accumulation of resources. Job boredom negatively predicted increasing structural resources, whereas work engagement positively predicted increasing both structural and social resources. These findings suggest that seeking challenges at work enhances employee work engagement, prevents job boredom, and generates other job crafting behaviors. Conversely, job boredom seems to impede job crafting.     

From prevention focus to adaptivity and creativity: the role of unfulfilled goals and work engagement

ABSTRACT

Whereas promotion focus is consistently linked to high adaptivity (i.e., adjustment to changes) and creativity (i.e., generation of useful and original ideas), prevention focus is commonly associated with low adaptivity and creativity. The present study uncovers the conditions under which prevention focus may also have positive effects on adaptivity and creativity. First, we hypothesize that trait-level promotion focus positively relates to day-level adaptivity as well as creativity. More importantly, we hypothesize that trait-level prevention focus positively relates to day-level adaptivity and creativity when day-level goal fulfilment is low (i.e., two-way interactions) and that these effects are stronger when day-level work engagement is high (i.e., three-way interactions). To test our hypotheses, we conducted a daily diary survey among 209 employees from different occupational sectors, over five working days. As expected, trait promotion focus was positively related to adaptivity and creativity. Furthermore, trait prevention focus positively related to both adaptivity and creativity when day-level goal fulfilment was low andday-level work engagement was high (3-way interactions). None of the two-way interaction effects of trait prevention focus and goal fulfilment was significant. Our findings suggest that prevention focus and unfulfilled goals jointly should not only be seen as threats, but also as opportunities for adaptation and creativity.     

Antecedents of daily team job crafting

This study investigated potential antecedents of team job crafting defined as the extent to which team members engage together in increasing (social and structural) job resources and challenges, and decreasing hindering job demands. Mindful of the teamwork literature, we hypothesized that individual employee factors (self-efficacy for teamwork, daily affect), team features (team cohesion, climate) and the organizational context of teams (engaging leadership and organizational resources for teamwork) relate positively to daily team job crafting behaviour. Data were collected among 46 multi-professional rehabilitation teams whose members completed two daily surveys after their weekly meetings. Multilevel regression analyses showed that self-efficacy for teamwork and team members’ positive affect were positively associated with team job crafting behaviour at the individual (within-team) level. In addition, a team climate characterized by a clear vision of the teams’ targets, supportiveness and innovation and connecting leadership were positively related to daily team job crafting at both the within- and between-team levels of the data. Overall, the study offers novel insights into the antecedents of teams’ daily job crafting behaviours. For practice, the results suggest that actions and interventions conducive to positive team processes offer the most promising route to enhancing team job crafting behaviour.     

The effects of a job crafting intervention on the success of an organizational change effort in a blue-collar work environment

The current study in a blue-collar context investigates whether a job crafting intervention may facilitate employee adaptation to organizational change, while decreasing exhaustion and increasing positive attitudes towards change and safety behaviour. It was hypothesized that the intervention would increase job crafting behaviours (i.e., seeking resources, seeking challenges, and optimizing demands) resulting in decreased employee exhaustion, and improved change attitudes and employee safety behaviour (i.e., adherence to organization’s standard operating procedures). The quasi-experimental study revealed that, after the intervention (consisting of a workshop, four weeks of job crafting implementation, and an evaluative session), employees reported an increase in two of the three trained job crafting strategies (i.e., seeking challenges, optimizing demands). Moreover, those who participated in the intervention reported lower levels of exhaustion, improved cognitive and behavioural attitudes towards change, and increased safety behaviour. The intervention was found to improve the affective, cognitive, and behavioural components of a change attitude due to increases in seeking challenges. Results were similar after controlling for quality information and leadership behaviour during the change. It is concluded that a job crafting intervention and resulting job crafting behaviour can be an effective way to achieve successful adaptation to organizational change.     

The value of job crafting for work engagement,task performance,and career satisfaction: longitudinal and quasi-experimental evidence

We examine how job crafting (i.e. seeking resources, seeking challenges, decreasing demands) increases the person-job fit of employees. In Study 1, we studied job crafting’s effects over time. 111 employees filled out a questionnaire at two time points with 6 months in between. We found that seeking resources behavior at Time 1 positively affected work engagement, task performance, and career satisfaction at Time 2. Decreasing demands at Time 1 negatively affected work engagement, task performance, and career satisfaction at Time 2. In Study 2, we tested a job crafting intervention using a quasi-experimental design (i.e., intervention group, N = 60, and a control group, N = 59). The intervention was successful, as participants in the intervention group increased seeking resources and decreasing demands behaviors. Furthermore, seeking resources behavior was the main driver of increased participants’ work engagement, task performance, and career satisfaction.     

Eyes on the road,hands upon the wheel? Reciprocal dynamics between smartphone use while driving and job crafting

Smartphones are essential tools for communications and information management in organizational settings. However, smartphone use is a risky behavior when used while driving to and from work. As work experiences have been found to influence risky commuting behaviors, we hypothesized that job crafting, i.e., a set of proactive work behaviors through which employees change their job demands and resources, influences and is influenced by risky commuting behaviors. We argued that employees' smartphone use during driving commutes is related to how employees proactively choose to transform their demands and resources at work. A quantitative diary study was designed to investigate the process linking smartphone use during driving commutes to and from work and job crafting. A sample of 128 office employees completed two short daily questionnaires for five consecutive workdays (N = 627 observations). Results from multilevel analyses showed that daily talking on the phone while driving to work was positively associated with the proactive optimization of job demands, while daily proactive pursuing of challenging stimuli at work (i.e., seeking challenges) was positively related to looking at the phone when employees drove back from work. Furthermore, on days when employees reduced their hindering job demands, they reported less frequent talking on the phone while driving back from work. Results provide practical implications for the prevention of distracted driving and other risky driving behaviors.     

Does job crafting assist dealing with organizational changes due to austerity measures? Two studies among Greek employees

In this paper, we focussed on Greek employees that are heavily affected by austerity-led organizational changes, and studied whether job crafting (defined as seeking resources, seeking challenges, reducing demands) helps them deal with these changes. In the first, cross-sectional study we examined whether job crafting relates to adaptive performance, and whether individuals’ assessment of changes moderates this relationship. The results showed that the relationship between reducing demands and adaptive performance was positive for those assessing the changes more positively, and negative for those assessing them more negatively. This interaction was replicated in the second, quasi-experimental field study, where we examined the effects of an intervention designed to help employees deal with organizational changes and increase their well-being, adaptive performance and openness to such changes by stimulating job crafting behaviours. Participants received training and worked for 3 weeks on self-set job crafting goals. The intervention was effective in increasing reducing demands, positive affect and openness to change. Moreover, it had a positive effect on openness to change and adaptive performance through positive effect, but a negative effect on adaptive performance through reducing demands. Thus, the intervention facilitated to some extent employee functioning under unfavourable working conditions that result from austerity measures.     

Evidence on the Hierarchical,Multidimensional Nature of Behavioural Job Crafting

While to date job crafting has been conceptualised as consisting of behaviours aiming at seeking more resources, decreasing hindering demands, and seeking more challenges, recent research suggests that individuals may restore the fit between their demands and preferences also by optimising their demands. Accordingly, optimising demands has been introduced in the resource-based perspective to job crafting as an additional strategy that aims at making the work processes more efficient, simplifying procedures and eliminating obstacles. In this paper, we explore and provide evidence for the validity of a four-factor, hierarchical structure of behavioural job crafting constituted by increasing resources, seeking challenges, decreasing demands, and optimising demands. Moreover, our results provide initial evidence suggesting that overall job crafting may be more strongly characterised by effortful actions to expand the work characteristics rather than to reduce them.     

Divergent effects of detachment from work: a day-level study on employee creativity

Detachment from work during non-work time is generally related to a decrease in work-related strain. However, it might also hamper employees’ generation of new and useful ideas about work by completely shutting off work-related thoughts and/or feelings outside of work. In this day-level study, we used a within-person design to investigate the role of cognitive and emotional detachment from work during non-work time in relation to equivalent types of job demands and job resources, in the prediction of employee creativity. Cognitive detachment from work refers to mentally disconnecting from work and no longer thinking about job-related issues, whereas emotional detachment from work refers to affectively disconnecting from work and no longer experiencing job-related emotions. Survey data were gathered over the course of eight consecutive days from 151 health care employees. Multi-level analyses revealed that: (1) cognitive detachment was positively related to creativity, irrespective of the level of cognitive job demands and resources; (2) high emotional job demands in combination with either low levels of emotional detachment or high levels of emotional job resources were positively related to creativity. This day-level study provides insight into the relation between detachment from work and creativity from a process perspective, by showing specific conditions under which different types of detachment from work benefit employee creativity.     

A diary study on the role of psychological detachment in the spillover of self-control demands to employees’ ego depletion and the crossover to their partner

This study examined whether daily self-control demands at work deplete one’s self-control resources (i.e., ego depletion) at work and whether these demands have prolonged effects by spilling over to the home domain via a lack of psychological detachment. Moreover, we investigated the daily crossover of ego depletion at home between partners and its influence on spousal interactions. Results of our dyadic diary study revealed that daily self-control demands at work are positively related to ego depletion experienced at work and at home, and negatively related to psychological detachment. Psychological detachment is directly negatively related to ego depletion experienced at home and mediates the positive relationship between self-control demands at work and ego depletion at home. With regard to crossover mechanisms, we found support for a direct positive crossover of ego depletion of the actor to the ego depletion of the actor’s partner. In addition, the ego depletion of the actor’s partner related directly negatively to providing spousal support and positively to spousal conflict and moreover mediated the relation between ego depletion of the actor and both spousal interactions. Implications for practice and suggestions for future research are discussed.     

Daily fluctuations in teachers' well-being: a diary study using the Job Demands–Resources model

Abstract

The study tests the dynamic nature of the Job Demands–Resources model with regard to both motivational and health impairment processes. It does so by examining whether daily fluctuations in co-workers' support (i.e., a typical job resource) and daily fluctuations in work/family conflict (i.e., a typical job demand) predict day-levels of job satisfaction and mental health through work engagement and exhaustion, respectively. A total of 61 schoolteachers completed a general questionnaire and a daily survey over a period of five consecutive work days. Multilevel analyses provided evidence for both the above processes. Consistently with the hypotheses, our results showed that day-level work engagement mediated the impact of day-level co-workers' support on day-level job satisfaction and day-level mental health, after general levels of work engagement and outcome variables had been controlled for. Moreover, day-level exhaustion mediated the relationship between day-level work/family conflict and day-level job satisfaction and day-level mental health after general levels of exhaustion and outcome variables had been controlled for. These findings provide new insights into the dynamic psychological processes that determine daily fluctuations in employee well-being. Such insights may be transformed into job redesign strategies and other interventions designed to enhance work-related psychological well-being on a daily level.     

Development and validation of the job crafting scale

We developed and validated a scale to measure job crafting behavior in three separate studies conducted in The Netherlands (total N = 1181). Job crafting is defined as the self-initiated changes that employees make in their own job demands and job resources to attain and/or optimize their personal (work) goals. In Study 1 and 2 the Dutch job crafting scale (JCS) was developed and tested for its factor structure, reliability, and convergent validity. The criterion validity of the JCS was examined in Study 3. The results indicated that there are four independent job crafting dimensions, namely increasing social job resources, increasing structural job resources, increasing challenging job demands, and decreasing hindering job demands. These dimensions could be reliably measured with 21 items. The JCS shows convergent validity when correlated with the active constructs proactive personality (+), personal initiative (+), and the inactive construct cynicism (?). In addition, results indicated that self-reports of job crafting correlated positively with colleague-ratings of work engagement, employability, and performance — thus supporting the criterion validity of the JCS. Finally, self-rated job crafting behaviors correlated positively with peer-rated job crafting behaviors.     

The Ambivalent Effects of Participation on Performance and Job Stressors: The Role of Job Crafting and Autonomy

ABSTRACT

Literature provides mixed results on the effect of participatory practices on outcomes such as individual performance and job stressors. By examining these relationships via the mediation of job crafting behaviors, while considering the moderating effect of autonomy, we help clarifying the reasons behind the apparently ambiguous effects of participation. We surveyed 318 employees in an Italian mass retail company. On the one hand, we found a positive effect of participation on performance and a reduction of both role conflict and role overload thanks to increased job crafting behaviors aimed at seeking job resources. On the other hand, we also found that participation and autonomy may augment job stressors because of an associated increase of job crafting behaviors aimed at seeking challenging demands.     

Job crafting mediates how empowering leadership and employees’ core self-evaluations predict favourable and unfavourable outcomes

ABSTRACT

Based on job crafting theory and workplace resources theories, the present study develops a model of both antecedents and consequences of job crafting. We hypothesized subordinates’ perceptions of empowering leadership and core self-evaluations influence employee job crafting behaviours, which subsequently influence four outcomes: improving three employee well-being outcomes, (a) work-family enrichment, (b) flourishing, and (c) life satisfaction; and simultaneously reducing the organizational outcome of (d) deviant behaviours. Three-waves of data over nine months were collected from U.S. full-time employees (n = 276). Results showed empowering leadership and core self-evaluations positively related to expansive/approach forms of job crafting behaviours, which in turn related to the three different well-being outcomes. However, job crafting did not affect employee deviant behaviour. Instead, empowering leadership and core self-evaluations directly predicted less deviant behaviour. With the imputed data, we also found job crafting had a significant but weak relationship with deviant behaviour. These findings provide an integrated understanding of how and why employees engage in job crafting, and the important influence that job crafting has on employees’ subjective well-being. The present study advances leadership and job crafting theories, providing practical recommendations for promoting employee well-being and decreasing undesirable behaviours in the form of workplace deviance.     

The relation between off-job recovery and job resources: person-level differences and day-level dynamics

It is well-known that recovery from work and job resources can counteract negative effects of high job demands, but less is known about how off-job recovery and job resources are related to each other. In this two-level daily diary study, 67 employees filled out daily surveys over the course of 8 days to examine this issue. Consistent with our expectations, multilevel analyses revealed that previous day’s detachment from work is positively related to the state of being recovered before going to work, and that the state of being recovered is positively related to one’s level of job resources. Moreover, the results indicated that both person-level differences and day-level dynamics play a role in these relations. Our study highlights the importance of recovering from work in the sense that it does not only help individuals by repairing negative strain effects but can also function as a catalyst in the activation of job resources.     

Job crafting for lean engagement: The interplay of day and job-level characteristics

The quality of working life under the production system known as lean manufacturing (LM) is a heavily debated topic. Little is known about the engagement level of employees under this system. Our study is concerned with how employees in this context craft their jobs to enhance their own engagement, and we specifically consider how daily skill utilization triggers this process. Using a cross-level perspective, we further consider whether job-level characteristics relevant to the lean context, namely task interdependence and boundary control, restrict or facilitate the effects of daily skill utilization. A daily diary study was conducted over 4 working days with 64 employees in a large company utilizing LM. The results of multilevel structural equation modelling demonstrated that on a given day, skill utilization was associated with seeking resources, and this relationship was stronger when employees had high boundary control and low task interdependence in their general job roles. Results further demonstrated that employees experienced higher work engagement on days when they sought resources and challenges. Our findings illustrate the motivational potential of job crafting under LM and how crafting activities can be facilitated by the design of jobs and allocation of daily tasks.     

A meta-analysis on promotion- and prevention-focused job crafting

The purpose of this study is to present a meta-analytical summary of the job crafting literature. We integrate resource- and role-based job crafting conceptualizations in one job crafting model, which can theoretically account for beneficial and detrimental job crafting effects. Applying reasoning from regulatory focus theory we differentiated promotion-focused (increasing job resources and challenging job demands; expansion-oriented task, relational, and cognitive crafting) from prevention-focused (decreasing hindering job demands; contraction-oriented task and relational crafting) job crafting. We hypothesized that promotion-focused job crafting relates positively and prevention-focused job crafting relates negatively with employee health, motivation, and performance. Results of cross-sectional meta-analytical structural equation modelling showed that promotion-focused job crafting was positively related with work engagement and negatively related with burnout, while prevention-focused job crafting was negatively related with work engagement and positively related with burnout. Moreover, promotion-focused job crafting was positively and prevention-focused job crafting was negatively related with performance through work engagement and burnout. Results of longitudinal meta-analytical structural equation modelling showed that there were reciprocal, positive relationships between promotion-focused job crafting and work engagement, and between prevention-focused job crafting and burnout. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.     

Transmission of reduction‐oriented crafting among colleagues: A diary study on the moderating role of working conditions

Zooming into reduction‐oriented job crafting among employees, next to minimizing demands (i.e., making a job less strenuous), we introduced optimizing demands (i.e., simplifying the job and making work processes more efficient) and suggested that optimizing demands should be positively related to work engagement, whereas minimizing demands negatively related to work engagement. Moreover, we suggested that both forms of reduction‐oriented crafting can be transferred among colleagues, and this will particularly occur in jobs that are high on demands (workload and emotional demands), low on resources (autonomy), and when the colleagues have a high‐quality relationship. We examined these hypotheses among 65 dyads of employees who filled in a general questionnaire and a diary for three working days. Multilevel analyses supported the transmission of both job crafting dimensions among colleagues. Moreover, there is more transmission of minimizing demands among colleagues when workload and emotional demands are high and autonomy is low. Additionally, optimizing demands was transmitted among colleagues when autonomy was low and quality of relationship with colleague was high. Optimizing demands was positively related to work engagement, whereas minimizing demands was unrelated to work engagement. These findings imply that optimizing demands is a favourable behaviour and can be transmitted among colleagues under specific conditions.

Practitioner points

• Working smarter is related to higher work engagement
• Employees model their colleague's proactive behaviour
• Unfavourable working conditions stimulate modelling behaviour of colleagues

     

Testing crossover effects in an actor–partner interdependence model among Chinese dual‐earner couples

The purpose of the present study is to examine the crossover effects from one partner's work–family interface (work–family conflict [WFC] and work–family enrichment [WFE]) to the other partner's four outcomes (psychological strain, life satisfaction, marital satisfaction and job satisfaction) in a sample of Chinese dual‐earner couples. Married couples (N = 361) completed a battery of questionnaires, including the work–family interface scale, the psychological strain scale, the life, marital, as well as job satisfaction scale. Results from the actor–partner interdependence model (APIM) analyses showed that wives' WFE was negatively associated with husbands' psychological strain, and positively associated with husbands' life, marital and job satisfaction. Furthermore, husbands' WFC was negatively related to wives' marital satisfaction, whereas husbands' WFE was positively related to wives' marital satisfaction. Theoretical and practical implications were discussed, and future research directions were provided.