Rebecca Brauchli

Effort-reward and work-life imbalance, general stress and burnout among employees of a large public hospital in Switzerland

INTRODUCTION Effort-reward imbalance (ERI) and work-life imbalance (WLI) are recognised risk factors for work stress and burnout but have not been investigated conjointly so far and compared with each other in this regard. The present cross-sectional study provides initial evidence by studying associations of ERI and WLI with general stress and burnout simultaneously. METHODS The study was based on survey data collected in 2007 among the personnel of a large public hospital in the canton of Zurich covering a random sample of 502 employees of all professions and positions. Prevalence rates, correlation coefficients, standardised regression coefficients and odds ratios were calculated as measures of association. RESULTS Concerning the main research question and relating to the entire study sample, WLI was found to be more strongly associated with general stress and burnout than ERI. As stratified analyses with regard to burnout have shown, this applied especially to nursing, technical care and emergency staffs who account for more than three fifths of the study population. But for other professional categories like physicians, therapists and medical-technical personnel the opposite of a stronger association of ERI with burnout was found. Results also suggested that general stress plays a (rather minor) mediating role in the relationships between ERI and burnout and particularly between WLI and burnout. CONCLUSION For the prevention of chronic stress and burnout one should consider both high efforts put into work as well as all job demands that are competing and interfering with family responsibilities or other private activities should be considered.

The consequences of job crafting: a three-wave study

This longitudinal study examined the consequences of job crafting on two important employee outcomes: psychological capital (PsyCap) as a work-related personal resource and work engagement as an indicator of employee well-being. The study also tested the reverse causation effects of PsyCap and work engagement on job crafting. It used a three-wave, three-month panel design to survey 940 employees from three European countries working in a broad range of economic sectors and occupations. The results of the cross-lagged longitudinal structural equation modelling demonstrated that job crafting predicted PsyCap and work engagement over time. No reverse causation effects were found. Overall, this study shows that when individuals proactively build a resourceful and challenging work environment for themselves, it can lead to diverse positive outcomes that are crucial to employee health and well-being. Employees should therefore be encouraged and be given the opportunity to craft their own jobs.

Busy Yet Socially Engaged: Volunteering, Work-Life Balance, and Health in the Working Population

Objective:To understand the relationship between volunteering and health in the overlooked yet highly engaged working population, adopting a contextualizing balance approach. We hypothesize that volunteering may function as a psychosocial resource, contributing to work–life balance and, ultimately, health. Methods:A total of 746 Swiss workers participated in an online survey; 35% (N = 264) were additionally volunteers in a nonprofit organization. We assessed volunteering, work–life balance perceptions, paid job demands, and resources and health outcomes. Results:After controlling for job characteristics, volunteering was associated with less work–life conflict, burnout and stress, and better positive mental health. Results further revealed that balance perceptions partly explained the relationship between volunteering and health. Conclusions:Volunteering, albeit energy and time-consuming, may contribute to a greater sense of balance for people in the workforce, which might, in turn, positively influence health.

Towards a Job Demands-Resources Health Model: Empirical Testing with Generalizable Indicators of Job Demands, Job Resources, and Comprehensive Health Outcomes.

Studies using the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) model commonly have a heterogeneous focus concerning the variables they investigate—selective job demands and resources as well as burnout and work engagement. The present study applies the rationale of the JD-R model to expand the relevant outcomes of job demands and job resources by linking the JD-R model to the logic of a generic health development framework predicting more broadly positive and negative health. The resulting JD-R health model was operationalized and tested with a generalizable set of job characteristics and positive and negative health outcomes among a heterogeneous sample of 2,159 employees. Applying a theory-driven and a data-driven approach, measures which were generally relevant for all employees were selected. Results from structural equation modeling indicated that the model fitted the data. Multiple group analyses indicated invariance across six organizations, gender, job positions, and three times of measurement. Initial evidence was found for the validity of an expanded JD-R health model. Thereby this study contributes to the current research on job characteristics and health by combining the core idea of the JD-R model with the broader concepts of salutogenic and pathogenic health development processes as well as both positive and negative health outcomes.

The experience of work-life balance across family-life stages in Switzerland: a cross-sectional questionnaire-based study

BackgroundThe division of paid and unpaid labor in families continues to be highly gendered with men doing more paid work and women doing more unpaid care work. This is especially true for life stages with young children. Our study investigates the subjective experience of demands in the work and the private domain and the experience of work-life balance across family-life stages as a consequence of this gendered division of labor.MethodsWe used data from a survey study on work-life issues and health in four large companies in Switzerland (N = 3664).ResultsIn line with our hypotheses, subjective work and private demands were predicted by an interaction of family-life stages and gender. Specifically, during the primary child-rearing family-life stages, women experience more private demands than men while men experience more work demands, regardless of level of employment. Furthermore, women who work part time experience more work-life balance than women who work full time and more than men who work part or full time during the primary child-rearing family-life stages.ConclusionsResults are discussed in terms of a gendered work-life experience across the life course and the need for part-time work for both genders. Finally, conclusions are drawn concerning our results’ implications for public health considerations.

Beyond Paid Work: Voluntary Work and its Salutogenic Implications for Society

The current understanding of work in I-O psychology is built fundamentally on the concept of paid labor. We believe that this angle is too narrow and discuss current as well as prospective strands of research on paid and unpaid work. In addition, we highlight the potential of volunteering with regard to life domain balance by drawing on different empirical results. First, it could be shown that volunteering can positively influence the appraisals of stressors. Second, due to their volunteer work individuals can build up resources that can be transferred to other life domains. And finally, volunteering facilitates relaxation/recovery, enabling individuals to better adapt to and fulfill tasks and responsibilities in other life domains. Results from our own research indicate the compensatory and beneficial potential of volunteering. However, there seems to be an optimum, suggesting that individuals who volunteer with a medium frequency experience minimal conflict between life domains. We conclude by discussing from a psychology perspective the health-promoting potential of income equality guaranteed by a utopian basic income.

Individual and group-level job resources and their relationships with individual work engagement

This study adds a multilevel perspective to the well‐researched individual‐level relationship between job resources and work engagement. In addition, we explored whether individual job resources cluster within work groups because of a shared psychosocial environment and investigated whether a resource‐rich psychosocial work group environment is beneficial for employee engagement over and above the beneficial effect of individual job resources and independent of their variability within groups.

The relevance of intervention participants’ process appraisal for change in well-being and lean work processes of entire teams

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether intervention participants’ process appraisals relate to change in well-being and lean outcomes of entire teams. For this purpose, the study focussed on two main characteristics of a lean implementation process – workshop quality and outcome expectancy – and their interaction with the participation rate, and examined their association with leaner work processes and affective well-being in nursing teams. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected from a lean implementation project within 29 nursing wards of a university hospital. Employee surveys covering lean work processes and affective well-being at work were conducted before the implementation of four-day lean workshops in each nursing ward and six months after. The participating employee representatives evaluated the workshop quality and outcome expectancy of the workshops. Findings Multilevel analyses indicated that workshop quality did not relate to leaner work processes, but was associated with enhanced affective well-being after six months. By contrast, outcome expectancy was associated with leaner work processes, but did not relate to well-being. No moderation effects with participation rate were found. Practical implications The study shows the importance of monitoring process indicators in the early stages of implementation and optimising workshop contents and formats accordingly to ensure positive outcomes for entire teams. Originality/value The present study considers intervention participants’ process appraisals of workshop quality and outcome expectancy as good indicators of future change in lean work processes and the well-being of entire teams.

Verbessert Freiwilligenarbeit die »Work-Life-Balance«?

In den letzten Jahren wird die Vereinbarkeit unterschiedlicher Lebensdomanen – meist unter dem Stichwort Work-Life-Balance – in zahlreichen wissenschaftlichen und nichtwissenschaftlichen Publikationen thematisiert. Gerade fur Freiwillige stellt die Vereinbarkeit der fur sie wichtigen Lebensbereiche eine besondere Herausforderung dar, und es stellt sich die Frage, ob und inwiefern der zusatzliche und personlich bedeutsame Lebensbereich der Freiwilligentatigkeit eine Belastung oder eine Bereicherung darstellt. Unter Bezugnahme auf die aktuelle Forschungsliteratur erscheint plausibel, dass sich die Freiwilligentatigkeit trotz der zusatzlichen zeitlichen Belastung eher positiv auf die Vereinbarkeit unterschiedlicher Lebensbereiche auswirkt. Eigene explorative Studien weisen ebenfalls in diese Richtung: Dabei erweist sich ein weder zu geringes noch zu starkes Engagement als besonders gunstig.