Work engagement is a complex multi faced concept practiced in one’s daily life. It entails many practical, emotional and physical variables which create a combination of notions influencing decision making and final outcomes. The four preliminary variables of which work engagement is based on are hope, resilience, optimism and efficacy. Each variable is associated in a slightly different way manipulating the way of thinking and final outcomes. Work engagement is commonly defined as "a positive, fulfilling, work-related state of mind that is characterized by vigor, dedication, and absorption" (Schaufeli and Bakker, 2004: 295).
Psychological capital is a key term shaped by hope, resilience, optimism and efficacy that identifies the positive relationship between emotional variables and work engagement. Psychological capital was identified by Lutherans through the study of positive organisational behaviour (Luthan et al. 2012)Defined by Luthans and Youssef psychological capital is"an individual's positive psychological state of development characterized by: having confidence (self efficacy) to take on and put in the necessary effort to succeed at challenging tasks; making a positive attribution about succeeding now and in the future; persevering toward the goals, and when necessary, redirecting paths to goals (hope) in order to succeed; and when beset by problems and adversity, sustaining and bouncing back and even beyond (resilience) to attain success"(Luthans, Youssef, et al., 2007, p. 3).
Positive organisational behaviour are characteristics of resources humans possess, which can be transformed into performance in the work place. Positive organisational behaviour is defined “the study and application of positively oriented human resource strengths and psychological capacities that can be measured, developed, and effectively managed for performance improvement in today’s workplace”(Luthanset al.. 2012, P59).
This study will be focusing on the relationship between the variables ofhope, resilience, optimism and efficacy with the individual’s workplace engagement. Gender differences in workplace engagement have also been examined.
H-1: The variable Efficacy independently leads to positive performance
H-2: The variable resilience has no involvement in work engagement
H-3: Males stress less than females giving them a stronger sense of self efficacy which ultimately leads to and higher engagement rate of work.
The concept of psychological capital has broadened the value placed on employees to encompass their capability to adapt and engage successfully in work ventures even when their work environments change at a very fast rate. This means that organizations are now looking at highly skilled employees who are able to fit in the ever-changing work environment. This enables such employees to take up roles that demand a broader skill set that is an amalgamation of both technical skills and people's skills. This has been termed as employee citizenship behaviour.
Based on this foundation, employee work engagement can, therefore, receive measurement using a short self-report questionnaire. From a short but structured questionnaire management through the human resource department can differentiate employees who easily suffer from burnout from employees who are largely engaged on their work with an evident sense of energy and lasting connection with the work activities at their work place. These employees with energy are well able to handle the demands that come with their work environment.
The study organized on the 123 respondents from the organizational behaviour class made use of the Utrecht Work Engagement scale (UWES) on a 17 item scale. This is a reduced version after about 7 items were eliminated to remain with 6 items covering Vigor, %5 items covering Dedication and 6 items covering Absorption. This reduction is enjoyed because researchers never want to burden their respondents with questions that seem unnecessary.
Analysis of the 17 item UWES scale indicates that the UWES – 17 has admirable psychometric feature doting its scores (PM, 2010). A common example relates to internal consistencies whose values lie between .80 and .90. This means that Cronbach’s value for alpha is more than .70 which is considered as the field's rule of thumb. In this case, alpha can completely satisfy the stringent figure of .80 that has largely been accepted as the standard.
UWES using a three factor analysis has been praised to be much stable and superior to other models that make use of a single factor of analysis. In order to gauge the superiority in relation to a single point approach an iterative procedure is used to reduce the factor to a very lean scale to factors hence easily compare its effectiveness to the single factor models.
Method
A questionnaire was administered to the class taking organizational behaviour at the Parramatta campus of the University of Western Sydney. The students were requested to take part in a study with instructions being given via the class diary manifest and more instructions handed over via the class portal (PM, 2010). The participants clearly understood that they needed to fill out a questionnaire as honestly as they could because their participation would form part of the unit assessment. This ensured that all participants in the exercise participated without failure. This also enabled easier analysis of the data.
The sample of the participants in this study included 56 females and 67 males. This translates into 45.5% females and 54.5% males. It was noticed that very minor variations existed in the values indicating data from females and data from male participants.
Measures
There are numerous targets that the questionnaires sought to achieve as inputs to the analysis phase. The questionnaire data was keen to identify baseline positive emotions. These were assessed using JAWS (Job-related Affective Well Being scale). Running on a scale of five, seven questions were forwarded in the questionnaire and answered in accordance with a Likert scale (Bolger N, 2003). On this scale one represents the least likelihood while 5 signifies the most likelihood. The alpha values that represent reliability stood at around 0.8.
Another value that was measured in the questionnaire is the work-related hope. This was done using the State Hope Scale abbreviated as SHS. This made use of an adjustable three item agency scale. This seemed the most relevant and the most suitable means of measurement because the daily dimension that captures a wholesome scale over a monthly duration. The study tended to shy away from including pathway in the questions because "pathway" has a connotation that there is a negative challenge existing at the workplace. It was, therefore, worthy acknowledging that negative problems do not necessarily occur at the workplace every day. The responses were laid on a 6 point scale that places 1 as a strong disagreement while 6 is a strong agreement. The Likert scale held a reliability value of around .82.
Other areas of measurement include measurement of vigor, absorption and dedication. These were measured by the use of a three-point scale of UWES (Kenny DA, 2003). Three different questions are asked to represent the three facets that are: dedication, vigor and absorption. For instance, a common question for vigour would be: at my work, I feel ever full if energy. This is set at a given level of reliability that has a higher alpha value than the other elements.
Data Analysis
Data collected from the 123 student respondents in this exercise was analyzed largely using hierarchical models and approaches. Making use of multi-level models ensured that standard errors that would result in possible biases are dealt with. This approach also enabled ironing out of any estimates that arose out of data that did not have clear dependencies (BL, 1998). Multi-level analysis also offers the chance to point out the effect of variable on specific subjects of interest. This means that hope as an identified characteristic could easily be outlined from the web of positive emotions.
Results
Taking the example of the BRS measurement, we make use of the Likert scale that has six items that use a 5 point scale. This means that out scoring is based on 30.
Another vital characteristic that the questionnaire exercise sought to identify relates to the correlation that exists between the different variables under study. This highlights the objective of the study that seeks to link the effectiveness of employees to the concept of psychological capital (Avey JB, 2010). It is clear from the use of subscales that most measures taken under subscales have a very high correlation. This turns out to be the case because the constructs under measurement are the same.
The table that follows indicates the correlation the exists between the different variables addressed in the interview questionnaire.
NB. Ns = not significant, * = significant at the .05 level, ** = significant at the .01 level, *** = significant at the .001 level.
Age shows a weak but significant correlation with Vigour monitored under UWES, re.21 p<.05
Age shows a weak but significant correlation with UWES Absorption observed under r=.76 and significant level of 0.001
It is also clear that an age has a weak but significant relationship with LOT at .01 level with a value of r =0.28.
It is vital to note that the results of this exercise match with the hypothesis that psychological capital forms a considerable bit of the effectiveness of any organizational workforce (Cohn MA, 2009).
Our first hypothesis is strongly proved positive because of the correlation and significant levels in relation to age. For instance, UWES absorption is highly significant at 0.001 level in relation to the age.
H-1: The variable Efficacy independently leads to positive performance
H-2: The variable resilience has no involvement in work engagement
H-3: Males stress less than females giving them a stronger sense of self efficacy which ultimately leads to and higher engagement rate of work.
Bibliography
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http://www.globoforce.com/gfblog/2013/self-efficacy-optimism-resilience-and-hope/
