Work engagement

Work engagement as measured by the UWES is positively related with, but can nevertheless be differentiated from, similar constructs such as job involvement and organizational commitment,Hallberg, U., & Schaufeli, W.B. (2006). "Same same" but different: Can work engagement be discriminated from job involvement and organizational commitment? European Journal of Psychology, 11, 119-127 in-role and extra-role behavior;Schaufeli, W.B., Taris, T.W., & Bakker, A. (2006). Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde: On the differences between work engagement and workaholism. In: R. Burke (Ed), Work hours and work addiction (pp. 193-252). Edward Elgar: Northampton, UK personal initiative,Salanova, M., & Schaufeli, W.B. (2008). A cross-national study of work engagement as a mediator between job resources and proactive behavior: A cross-national study. International Journal of Human Resources Management, 19, 226-231 Type A,Hallberg, U., Johansson, G. & Schaufeli, W.B. (2007). Type A behaviour and work situation: Associations with burnout and work engagement. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 48, 135-142 and workaholism.Schaufeli, W.B., Taris, T.W., & Van Rhenen, W. (2008). Workaholism, burnout and engagement: Three of a kind or three different kinds of employee well-being? Applied Psychology: An International Review, 57, 173-203 Moreover, engaged workers are characterized by low levels of burnout,González-Roma, V., Schaufeli, W.B., Bakker, A., Lloret, S. (2006). Burnout and engagement: Independent factors or opposite poles? Journal of Vocational Behaviour, 68, 165-174 as well as by low levels of neuroticism and high levels of extraversion.Langelaan, S., Bakker, A.B., Van Doornen, L.J.P. & Schaufeli, W.B. (2006). Burnout and work engagement: Do individual differences make a difference? Personality and Individual Differences, 40, 521-532 Also they enjoy good mental and physical health.

Generally, work engagement is conceptualized as a relatively stable phenomenon. This can be explained by the presence of specific job and organizational characteristics.Macey, W.H., & Schneider, B. (2008). The meaning of employee engagement. Industrial and Organizational Psychology, 1, 3-30 However, engagement is not a fixed state:{{cite journal |last1=Altunel |first1=Mustafa C. |last2=Kocak |first2=Omer Erdem |last3=Cankir |first3=Bilal |title=The Effect of Job Resources on Work Engagement: A Study on Academicians in Turkey |journal=Educational Sciences: Theory & Practice |date=30 April 2015 |volume=15 |issue=2 |doi=10.12738/estp.2015.2.2349 |url=https://jestp.com/index.php/estp/article/view/690 |language=en |issn=2148-7561|doi-access=free |url-access=subscription }} the level of engagement can even fluctuate on a weeklyBakker, A.B., & Bal, P.M. (in press). Weekly work engagement and performance: A study among starting teachers. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology or day-to-day basis.Bakker, A.B., & Xanthopoulou, D. (2009). The crossover of daily work engagement: Test of an actor-partner interdependence model. Journal of Applied Psychology, 94, 1562–1571

Xanthopoulou, D., Bakker, A.B., Demerouti, E., & Schaufeli, W.B. (2009). Work engagement and financial returns: A diary study on the role of job and personal resources. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 82, 183-200.Xanthopoulou, D., Bakker, A.B., Heuven, E., Demerouti, E., & Schaufeli, W.B. (2008). Working in the sky: A diary study on work engagement among flight attendants. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 13, 345-356.) Increasingly, attention is being paid to these short-term fluctuations by conducting experience sampling studies and diary studies.Sonnentag, S., Dormann, C., & Demerouti, E. (2010). Not all days are created equal: The concept of state work engagement. In A.B. Bakker & M.P. Leiter (Eds.), Work engagement: A handbook of essential theory and research. New York: Psychology Press

Christian, Garza, and Slaughter (2011) meta-analyzed over 90 engagement research studies. They found that engagement is distinct from job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and job involvement.{{Cite journal |last=Christian |first=Michael S. |last2=Garza |first2=Adela S. |last3=Slaughter |first3=Jerel E. |date=March 2011 |title=WORK ENGAGEMENT: A QUANTITATIVE REVIEW AND TEST OF ITS RELATIONS WITH TASK AND CONTEXTUAL PERFORMANCE |url=https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1744-6570.2010.01203.x |journal=Personnel Psychology |language=en |volume=64 |issue=1 |pages=89–136 |doi=10.1111/j.1744-6570.2010.01203.x}}

The three aspects of work engagement (vigor, dedication and absorption) are assessed by the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES), which is currently available in 20 languages and can be used freely for non-commercial purposes. In addition a short formSchaufeli, W.B., Bakker, A.B. & Salanova, M. (2006). The measurement of work engagement with a short questionnaire: A cross-national study. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 66, 701-716 and a student versionSchaufeli, W.B., Martínez, I., Marques Pinto, A. Salanova, M. & Bakker, A.B. (2002). Burnout and engagement in university students: A cross national study. Journal of Cross- Cultural Psychology, 33, 464-481 are available. The reliability and validity of the UWES is documented is various studies.For an overview see: Schaufeli, W.B. 2007 pp. 135-177

The Oldenburg Burnout Inventory (OLBI)Demerouti, E., & Bakker, A.B. (2008). The Oldenburg Burnout Inventory: A good alternative to measure burnout and engagement. In J. Halbesleben (Ed.), Handbook of stress and burnout in health care (pp. 65-78). New York: Nova Science Publishers.Demerouti, E., Mostert, K., & Bakker, A. B. (2010). Burnout and work engagement: A thorough investigation of the independency of both constructs. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 15(3), 209–222. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0019408 is an alternative instrument for the assessment of work engagement. It consists of two dimensions: exhaustion-vigor and cynicism-dedication.Sinval, J., Queirós, C., Pasian, S. R., & Marôco, J. (2019). Transcultural adaptation of the Oldenburg Burnout Inventory (OLBI) for Brazil and Portugal. Frontiers in Psychology, 10, 1–28. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00338

The recently operationalized construct of drive was proposed as the key differentiating individual difference dimension of work engagement and has shown promising psychometric results.{{Cite journal|last1=Siegling|first1=Alex B.|last2=Ng-Knight|first2=Terry|last3=Petrides|first3=Konstantinos V.|date=2018-12-27|title=Drive: Measurement of a sleeping giant.|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327704708|journal=Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research|language=en|volume=71|pages=16–31|doi=10.1037/cpb0000123|s2cid=149751746 |issn=1939-0149}} Measured on the basis of 13 facets and three aspects (passion, effort, ideation),{{Citation|last=Siegling|first=Alex B.|title=The Drive Wheel: A 3-branch model of drive|date=2018|url=http://rgdoi.net/10.13140/RG.2.2.31307.44329|publisher=Unpublished|doi=10.13140/rg.2.2.31307.44329|access-date=2019-02-19}} drive is argued to predict future motivation and engagement levels better than measuring these attributes directly at any point in time, in any given context.

Research has identified two key sets of variables that drive work engagement:

• Job resources: Work engagement is found to be positively associated with job resources such as social support from co-workers and from one's superior, performance feedback, coaching, job control, task variety, opportunities for learning and development, and training facilities. These resources are helpful in reducing the impact of job demands on strain, but they are also useful in the achievement of work goals, and they stimulate learning, personal growth and development. One consistent finding is that the motivational potential of job resources is particularly salient in the face of high job demands.Bakker, A.B. & Demerouti, E. (2008). Towards a model of work engagement. Career Development International, 13, 209-223

:Example: In a longitudinal study among 2555 Finnish dentists, researchers found that job resources lead to work engagement, which in turn had an influence on the level of personal initiative and consequently on work-unit innovativeness.Hakanen, J.J., Perhoniemia, R., and Toppinen-Tannera (2008). Positive gain spirals at work: From job resources to work engagement, personal initiative and work-unit innovativeness. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 73, 1, 78-91

:Example: In a study that aimed to examine job resources, work engagement and Finnish dairy farmers’ preferences concerning methods to enhance overall well-being while working on farms. The results indicate that the family, working with cattle, healthy farm animals, a reasonable workload, and a sustainable farm economy have the capacity to create positive impacts on well-being among dairy farmers. Well-being on farms is a part of sustainable food production.{{Cite journal|last1=Kallioniemi|first1=Marja K.|last2=Kaseva|first2=Janne|last3=Lunner Kolstrup|first3=Christina|last4=Simola|first4=Ahti|last5=Kymäläinen|first5=Hanna-Riitta|date=2018-07-03|title=Job Resources and Work Engagement among Finnish Dairy Farmers|journal=Journal of Agromedicine|language=en|volume=23|issue=3|pages=249–261|doi=10.1080/1059924x.2018.1470047|pmid=30047861 |hdl=10138/311256 |s2cid=51719258 |issn=1059-924X|url=http://jukuri.luke.fi/handle/10024/542276}}

• Personal resources: personal resources, such as optimism, self-efficacy and resilience are functional in controlling the environment and exerting impact on it in a successful way. Furthermore, engaged employees have several personal characteristics that differentiate them from less engaged employees. Five factor model is useful for examining the dispositional source of work engagement. As a higher order factor work engagement was related to big five factors.{{cite journal |title= A study of relationship between personality traits and job engagement |last=Ongore |first=O. |date=2014 |journal= Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences |doi=10.1016/j.sbspro.2014.05.226 |volume=141 |pages=1315–1319|doi-access=free }} Examples are extraversion, conscientiousness and emotional stability. Psychological capital also seems to be related to work engagement.

:Example: Xanthopoulou, Bakker, Demerouti, and Schaufeli (2007) studied Dutch technicians' work engagement in relation to three personal resources (self-efficacy, organizational-based self-esteem, and optimism).Xanthopoulou, D., Bakker, A.B., Demerouti, E., & Schaufeli, W.B. (2007). The role of personal resources in the job demands-resources model. International Journal of Stress Management, 14, 121-141 Results indicated that these resources were related to work engagement.

For an overall model of work engagement, see Bakker & Demerouti (2008).

The work motivation model includes 5 elements of individual motivators: money, myself, membership of a team, mastery, and mission. The approach is similar to Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

Engagement is related to better performance. For instance, engaged contact workers from hotels and restaurants produce better service quality as perceived by their customers;Salanova, M., Agut, S., & Peiró, J.M. (2005). Linking organizational resources and Work engagement to employee performance and customer loyalty: The mediating role of service climate. Journal of Applied Psychology, 90, 1217-1227 the more engaged university students feel the higher their next year's Grade Point Average;Salanova, M., Bresó, E. & Schaufeli, W.B. (2005). Hacia un modelo espiral de la autoeficacia en el estudio del burnout y Engagement [Towards a spiral model of self-efficacy in burnout and engagement research] Ansiedad y Estrés, 11, 215-231 the higher the level of engagement of flight attendants, the better their in- and extra-role performance on the flight;Xanthopoulou, D., Bakker, A.B., Heuven, E., Demerouti, E. & Schaufeli, W.B. (2008). Working in the sky: A diary study among flight attendants. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 13, 345-356 and the more engaged restaurant workers, the higher the financial turnover of the shift.Xanthopoulou, D., Bakker, A.B., Demerouti, E. & Schaufeli, W.B. (2009). Work engagement and financial returns: A diary study on the role of job and personal resources. Journal of Organizational and Occupational Psychology, 82, 183-200.

Other research has shown links between supervisor-ratings of performance and the work engagement of teachersBakker, A.B. and Bal, P.M. (2010). Weekly work engagement and performance: A study among starting teachers. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 83, 189-206. and administrative workers in financial services.Yalabik, Z.Y., Popaitoon, P., Chowne, J.A. & Rayton, B.A. (2013). Work engagement as a mediator between employee attitudes and outcomes. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 24, 2799-2823. Salanova, Agut and Peiró (2005) found a positive relationship between organization resources, work engagement and performance among employees, working in Spanish restaurants and hotels.Salanova, M., Agut, S. & Perió, J.M. (2005). Linking organizational resources and work engagement to employee performance and customer loyalty: The mediation of service climeate. Journal of Applied Psychology, 90, 1217-1227.

There are several possible reasons why engaged employees show higher performance than non-engaged employees:Bakker, A.B. (2009). Building engagement in the workplace. In R. J. Burke & C.L. Cooper (Eds.), The peak performing organization (pp. 50-72). Oxon, UK: Routledge

• They often experience positive emotions;
• They experience better health;
• They create their own job and personal resources;
• They transfer their engagement to others (cross-over).

There is also a possibility of becoming 'over-engaged'. For example, it can distort the work-life balance when employees take work home.Geurts, S.A.E., & Demerouti, E. (2003). Work/Non-work interface: A review of theories and findings. in M. Schabraq, J. Winnubst & C.L. Cooper (Eds.), The handbook of work and health psychology (2nd ed.; pp. 279-312). Chichester: Wiley. Over-engagement may also lead to workaholism.Halbesleben, J.R., Harvey, J. & Bolino, M.C. (2009).Too engaged? A conservation of resources view of the relationship between work engagement and work interference with family. Journal of Applied Psychology, 94(6), 1452-65.

• Adaptive performance
• Employee engagement
• Happiness at work
• Motivation
• Positive psychology in the workplace
• Work motivation

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Category:Industrial and organizational psychology

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