Job Burnout and Employee Engagement A Meta-Analytic Examination of Construct Proliferation
Abstract
Drawing on 50 unique samples (from 37 studies), the authors used meta-analytical techniques to assess the extent to which job burnout and employee engagement are independent and useful constructs. The authors found that (a) dimension-level correlations between burnout and engagement are high, (b) burnout and engagement dimensions exhibit a similar pattern of association with correlates, and (c) controlling for burnout in meta-regression equations substantively reduced the effect sizes associated with engagement. These findings suggest that doubts about the functional distinctiveness of the dimensions underlying burnout and engagement cannot be dismissed as pure speculation.
... Since EE significantly impacts corporate results, anticipating or controlling EE behaviour is essential for companies (Chandni & Rahman, 2020). For this reason, professionals and academics have not been oblivious to the importance of understanding the EE drivers (Gullekson et al., 2021;Kumar, 2021;Mutha & Srivastava, 2023;AlZgool et al., 2020;Yuan et al., 2020;Bakker, 2017;Cole et al., 2012). However, the results obtained differ from one study to another, mainly due to multiple measurement perspectives, the use of different samples and the low level of adjustment of the models used (Cole et al., 2012;Jose & Mampilly, 2014). ...
... For this reason, professionals and academics have not been oblivious to the importance of understanding the EE drivers (Gullekson et al., 2021;Kumar, 2021;Mutha & Srivastava, 2023;AlZgool et al., 2020;Yuan et al., 2020;Bakker, 2017;Cole et al., 2012). However, the results obtained differ from one study to another, mainly due to multiple measurement perspectives, the use of different samples and the low level of adjustment of the models used (Cole et al., 2012;Jose & Mampilly, 2014). In this context, the previous literature calls for new research to accurately determine the EE drivers (De la Calle-Durán & Rodríguez-Sánchez, 2021;Galanti, 2021). ...
... According to the Job Demands-Resources model (Schaufeli & Bakker, 2004), social support and feedback are critical drivers of EE. An individual can sustain high levels of engagement only when the resources provided exceed the job demands (Cole et al., 2012). Bakker (2017) identifies two approaches to promoting EE. ...
Employee engagement is increasingly important, as it can become a competitive advantage for companies, helping them increase productivity, attract talent and improve customer satisfaction. Numerous works have studied the drivers that encourage employee engagement and have developed models to identify them. However, the existing models have limitations, and the literature demands more research on the subject since the precision of the models still needs to improve. This paper presents a computational model that can estimate the drivers of employee engagement accurately. A sample of 205 Spanish employees was used, allowing us to consider a wide sectorial heterogeneity. Different methods have been applied to the sample under study to achieve a high-precision model, selecting drivers using the Multilayer Perceptron Classifier and quantifying the impact of the drivers with Sensitivity Analysis. The results obtained in this research present important implications for the managerial improvement of human resources departments by facilitating the design of strategies and policies that foster employee engagement, which significantly influences corporate results.
... Practically, our results offer insightful data on possible points for intervention between burnout and work engagement variables. nature of their empirical relationship (e.g., Cole et al. 2012;Taris, Ybema, and van Beek 2017;Trógolo et al. 2020). ...
... A similar study was carried out by Demerouti, Mostert, and Bakker (2010) who replicated the identification continuum but not the energy continuum in a sample of 528 construction workers. Later, Cole et al. (2012) carried out a meta-analysis on more than 19 articles and a sample of over 14.000 individuals. They compared four different latent models and concluded that the model with cross-loadings from the latent burnout construct to the work engagement variables were preferable. ...
... In this model, exhaustion and cynicism are defined as facet variables of a latent burnout construct, while vigour, dedication and absorption are facet variables of a latent work engagement construct. The 'continuum'-model was based on the final model in the meta-analysis by Cole et al. (2012). In their study, burnout is the latent factor for all burnout and work engagement variables, while work engagement is a latent factor only for vigour, dedication, and absorption variables. ...
Based on previous empirical evidence, scholars have argued for a dialectical relationship between burnout and work engagement. However, these conclusions largely rely on latent variable models, which have inherent limitations due to strong hierarchical assumptions about data. As a result, previous findings should be considered preliminary indications rather than conclusive evidence. In this study, we introduce network analysis to investigate the relationship between burnout and work engagement. We demonstrate its utility by comparing the fit indices of the network model and three factor models in a cross‐national sample with 2469 employees from Norway and 879 employees from the US and UK. Based on theory and fit indices, we conclude that the network model was preferred in both samples. Using this model, we uncovered positive relationships between two work engagement variables and the exhaustion component of burnout. Theoretically, this study broadens our understanding and show support for the dialectical relationship between burnout and work engagement. Furthermore, by introducing the network model to empirical research, we provide a novel approach that contribute to nuance and ideas for research on burnout and work engagement. Practically, our results offer insightful data on possible points for intervention between burnout and work engagement variables.
... Adicionalmente, a literatura tem abordado o engajamento no trabalho como um fator que impulsiona o bem-estar e a estabilidade profissional (Schaufeli & Bakker, 2004;Sonnentag, 2017), além de mitigar a intenção de rotatividade (Oliveira & Rocha, 2017). Embora alguns estudos tratem o engajamento no trabalho e a Síndrome de Burnout como estados opostos de bem-estar (e.g., Cole et al., 2012;Maslach & Leiter, 1997), este estudo adota a perspectiva de Schaufeli et al. (2002), que considera ambos os conceitos correlacionados, porém independentes, uma visão também compartilhada por outros pesquisadores (e.g., Maricuțoiu et al., 2017;Schaufeli & Bakker, 2004;Schaufeli & De Witte, 2017;Sonnentag, 2017). ...
... O debate sobre a relação entre engajamento e Burnout apresenta duas visões contrastantes. Cole et al. (2012) e Maslach e Leiter (1997) argumentam que o engajamento é simplesmente o oposto de Burnout, sugerindo uma única dimensão contínua onde a presença de um implica na ausência do outro. Em contrapartida, Schaufeli et al. (2002) propõem que, embora correlacionados, engajamento e Burnout são constructos distintos e independentes. ...
Este estudo teve como objetivo analisar a influência da demanda no trabalho na intenção voluntária de rotatividade de auditores independentes, considerando os efeitos mediadores do engajamento no trabalho e da Síndrome de Burnout. A pesquisa é descritiva, do tipo survey, com abordagem quantitativa, e conta com uma amostra de 196 auditores independentes brasileiros. Os resultados confirmaram a associação positiva entre a demanda no trabalho e a intenção voluntária de rotatividade dos auditores. Além disso, evidenciou-se que o engajamento no trabalho atua como mediador nessa relação. Por outro lado, a Síndrome de Burnout não desempenha função mediadora na relação entre a demanda no trabalho e a intenção de rotatividade. Finalmente, observou-se que o engajamento no trabalho exerce uma influência negativa e neutralizadora sobre a Síndrome de Burnout. Esses resultados proporcionam às firmas de auditoria uma compreensão mais aprofundada dos antecedentes da intenção de rotatividade dos auditores independentes.
... Thus, construct redundancy is a major threat to theoretical development and the progress of the literature (Le et al., 2010). Indeed, scholars have long lamented that construct redundancy is one key issue that inhibits the advancement of the literatures in various areas, such as leadership (e.g., Hoch et al., 2018;Shaffer et al., 2016); mistreatment (e.g., Hershcovis, 2011); job performance (e.g., Sackett et al., 2006); and job attitudes (e.g., Cole et al., 2012;Xu et al., 2023). ...
Scholars disagree on the distinction between positive and negative leader humor, which may hinder the integration and advancement of the leader humor literature. Thus, we meta-analyzed the correlation between positive and negative leader humor, as well as their shared nomological networks (k = 161; follower N = 45,759; leader N = 7820). Our meta-analysis indicates that (1) there is a very small but significant correlation between positive and negative leader humor (ρ = − .07); (2) positive and negative leader humor have differential relationships with most antecedents (e.g., positive affectivity) and outcomes (e.g., innovation and citizenship behavior); (3) positive affect and leader-member exchange intervene independently and in series the relationships between leader humor and follower outcomes, whereas negative affect mediates the effects of positive leader humor but not negative leader humor. These findings improve our understanding of the uniqueness of positive and negative leader humor, and provide important theoretical and practical implications for the leader humor literature.
... without first establishing construct validity risks contributing to construct proliferation, which means that new constructs become indistinguishable from preexisting ones (Harter and Schmidt 2008). As pointed out by Cole et al. (2012) "A potential hazard [with construct proliferation] is that using different terms for a similar phenomenon produces confusion within a research community, leading to miscommunication and misunderstandings that can impede theory development. This concern is compounded in that the advancement of existing theory relies on future researchers' ability to build on previous work." ...
Exhaustion disorder (ED) was introduced to the Swedish version of the International Classification of Diseases, 10th edition (ICD‐10) 2005. Primarily characterized by general fatigue and cognitive deficits, ED has become one of the most common mental health diagnoses in Sweden. Little is still known regarding the discriminative validity of the ED diagnosis and how it relates to other diagnostic constructs. The study aimed to investigate the discriminative validity of ED compared with two similar diagnoses, major depressive disorder (MDD) and adjustment disorder (AD). Using data from a sample of patients with a principal diagnosis of either ED ( n = 352), MDD ( n = 99), or AD ( n = 302), we compared demographic and clinical variables and scores on self‐report symptom scales. Results showed that ED patients were of a higher age and had a higher frequency of sickness absence than MDD and AD patients. There was a substantial overlap of symptoms between ED and MDD, only differing on two of nine self‐report symptom scales, with ED patients rating lower work ability d = −0.37 and alcohol consumption d = −0.57. Compared with AD patients, ED patients reported more severe symptoms in every symptom domain. Given the prevalent use of ED diagnosis, its diagnostic validity and clinical usefulness merit further attention.
... Further, researchers have observed that leadership theory suffers from construct proliferation, that is, the development of concepts with different names but overlapping conceptual domains (Cole et al., 2012;Le et al., 2010). Construct proliferation undermines discriminant validity, and subsequently, violates the notion of parsimony (Popper, 2002;Tepper and Henle, 2011). ...
Because research on responsible leadership has grown significantly in recent years, we conducted a systematic review of research on responsible leadership. Our overall goal was to establish a comprehensive understanding of alternative definitions of responsible leadership, its theoretical foundations, and distinctions from other moral leadership constructs. Drawing from 194 studies, we first clarify the conceptual underpinnings of responsible leadership, and how it differs from other constructs in the moral leadership domain, thus highlighting its value as a construct. Second, we identify and evaluate the prominent theoretical frameworks that underpin responsible leadership. Third, we conceptualize the antecedents, mediating factors, contingency variables and outcomes of responsible leadership. Fourth, we offer important recommendations for future research that will move the field forward. Overall, our review provides insights to advance an understanding of responsible leadership.
... PSE and PS represent key psychological mediators that help explain why transformational approaches encourage innovative employee behaviors. Meanwhile, perceived organizational support serves as an essential social-contextual moderator that shapes the degree of impact of these relationships (Jung & Sosik, 2002;Cole et al., 2012). The study findings enrich the literature by empirically substantiating the impact of PSE and PS as mediators and POS as moderators in the TL-EIB association. ...
This study elucidates the moderated-mediated role of transformational leadership (TL) in engendering innovative behaviors among employees (EIBs) while considering perceived self-efficacy (PSE) and perceived stress (PS) as the two mediators and perceived organizational support (POS) as the critical moderating contingency. The underlying theories have been the social exchange theory and the expectancy-value-cost theory. After performing PLS-based structural equation modeling, using SmartPLS 4.0 and PROCESS, on a dataset comprising 419 observations, it was found that TL positively influences EIBs through the two mediators (i.e. PSE and PS). The study also corroborates the moderating role of POS in affecting TL-PSE linkages and the TL-PS association. It has also been found that PSE and PS partially mediate TL-EIB linkage. This partial mediation implies that TL affects employees’ creative behaviors by electrifying PSE and reducing PS. Finally, the moderated mediation effects model indicates that POS moderates the indirect impact of TL on EIBs via the two mediators. Besides furthering the scholarly discourse encompassing the productiveness of TL, the findings offer valuable insights for managers aspiring to foster innovative behaviors among their employees.
... The effects of emotional exhaustion on employee outcomes have been an area of research for a long time (Cole et al., 2012;Corbeanu et al., 2023;Taris, 2006;Wright & Bonett, 1997). Surprisingly though, while burnout as a team-level phenomenon has been established for almost three decades, research has made limited progress in assessing the team-level effects of burnout, yielding scant and mixed findings (Bakker et al., 2008;Chiang et al., 2021;Keijsers et al., 1995). ...
... Engaged employees are more likely to contribute to a high-performance organisation (Mishra et al., 2014). Organisations constantly seek solutions to motivate their employees to be more engaged in their work (Cole et al., 2012). Engaged employees are more efficient and productive, add to the top line, and are more likely to stay with the company (Dabke & Patole, 2014). ...
Orientation: This study examines the impact of drivers of employee engagement on job performance and investigates the relationship between employee engagement and job performance.Research purpose: The purpose of this study is to assess how various factors, such as job characteristics, organisational support, support from superiors, rewards, recognition, and organisational justice, influence employee engagement and subsequently affect job performance.Motivation for the study: The researcher is motivated by the need to understand the drivers of employee engagement and their implications for job performance in organisations, particularly in the context of the Sultanate of Oman.Research approach/design and method: The study was conducted based on a closed-ended questionnaire across various industries in the Sultanate of Oman, focusing on three levels of management: junior, middle, and senior. Non-probability convenience sampling was utilised. The study employed models of drivers leading to employee engagement and assessed their impact on job performance.Main findings: The study reveals that drivers of employee engagement significantly affect job performance across all levels of management. Job characteristics and rewards and recognition emerged as strong predictors of job performance.Practical/managerial implications: Organisations are encouraged to prioritise the development and nurturing of employee engagement, fostering a two-way relationship between employers and employees. Engaged employees contribute to higher retention rates, increased productivity, profitability, growth, and customer satisfaction.Contribution/value-add: This study provides valuable insights into the relationship between employee engagement and job performance in the Sultanate of Oman, offering guidance for the development of effective employee engagement strategies aimed at improving organisational outcomes.
Improvement methodologies (IMs) consist of many components; however, employee engagement (EE) is particularly important in bottom-up initiated process improvement. This study aims to investigate EE with reference to IMs used by companies. EE measurement constructs focused on process improvement has been developed and verified as reliable. This study examines a sample of 380 medium- and large-sized companies. The ANOVA procedure proves that: (1) IMs support EE in companies, and (2) the absence of IMs leads to lower EE. However, support for EE is specific and does not primarily concern issues directly related to process improvement. This study also discovers the multi-use of IMs by companies. IMs such as Lean, strongly focused on EE by their assumptions, only moderately support EE in companies. The study found no exceptionally effective IM which allows for the easy gain of EE in the investigated companies’ current state of implementation. The results imply that companies are approximately halfway towards the effective use of IMs. They should rethink the use of IMs, transform their leadership style, and better motivate employees to engage in bottom-up process improvement, which is indispensable.
According to the job demands-resources (JD-R) model, job demands and resources evoke two relatively independent processes: health impairment and employee motivation. The robustness of the JD-R model was tested in two different occupational samples, the first of 654 Spanish employees and the second of 477 Dutch employees. Structural equation modeling analyses provided partial evidence for the two processes. Multigroup analyses showed that the structural paths of the model were invariant across countries, although the strength of the relationships differed. We conclude that the basic structure of the JD-R model is maintained, even when applied in different national and occupational contexts, when using different ways of gathering data (computerized versus paper and pencil), and when using slightly different measures to assess the key variables of the model.
Analysis of 42,934 correlations published in 581 articles not only revealed general evidence that self-report methods have produced percept–percept inflation in microresearch on organizations but also suggested that this effect is diminished when 1 or both covariates are demographic variables. Further analysis of a subsample of 11,710 correlations indicated that percept–percept inflation has influenced research on particular bivariate relationships but has not had the broad, comprehensive effects envisioned by critics. These findings challenge the validity of general condemnations of self-report methods, suggesting instead that domain-specific investigations are required to determine which areas of research are especially susceptible to percept–percept effects.
We theorize that engagement, conceptualized as the investment of an individual's complete self into a role, provides a more comprehensive explanation of relationships with performance than do well-known concepts that reflect narrower aspects of the individual's self. Results of a study of 245 firefighters and their supervisors supported our hypotheses that engagement mediates relationships between value congruence, perceived organizational support, and core self-evaluations, and two job performance dimensions: task performance and organizational citizenship behavior. Job involvement, job satisfaction, and intrinsic motivation were included as mediators but did not exceed engagement in explaining relationships among the antecedents and performance outcomes.
This meta-analysis examined how demand and resource correlates and behavioral and attitudinal correlates were related to each of the 3 dimensions of job burnout. Both the demand and resource correlates were more strongly related to emotional exhaustion than to either depersonalization or personal accomplishment. Consistent with the conservation of resources theory of stress, emotional exhaustion was more strongly related to the demand correlates than to the resource correlates, suggesting that workers might have been sensitive to the possibility of resource loss. The 3 burnout dimensions were differentially related to turnover intentions, organizational commitment, and control coping. Implications for research and the amelioration of burnout are discussed.
This study reviews the engagement construct using a meta-analytic framework. Meta-analytic results show that the three factors of engagement (i.e. vigor, dedication, and absorption) are strongly intercorrelated. Also, engagement is more strongly related to job resources than job demands. Finally, we found that the dimensions of engagement predict organizational commitment and individual health outcomes in a manner consistent with predictions.
Although practising evidence-based medicine is the goal of most physicians, it can be a real challenge to sift through the vast body of data to determine the best strategies. Most clinical guidelines regard replicated randomized controlled trials (RCTs), metaanalyses, and systematic reviews as the highest level of evidence to support treatment recommendations. High-quality metaanalyses can overcome many of the drawbacks of individual RCTs and qualitative reviews. They can reduce bias, provide adequate power to demonstrate real differences in outcomes, and resolve the results of inconsistent studies. This paper focuses on basic principles and terms used in metaanalysis, so that clinicians can appropriately evaluate and use their results to guide treatment decisions.
This study began with the premise that people can use varying degrees of their selves. physically. cognitively. and emotionally. in work role performances. which has implications for both their work and experi ences. Two qualitative. theory-generating studies of summer camp counselors and members of an architecture firm were conducted to explore the conditions at work in which people personally engage. or express and employ their personal selves. and disengage. or withdraw and defend their personal selves. This article describes and illustrates three psychological conditions-meaningfulness. safety. and availabil ity-and their individual and contextual sources. These psychological conditions are linked to existing theoretical concepts. and directions for future research are described. People occupy roles at work; they are the occupants of the houses that roles provide. These events are relatively well understood; researchers have focused on "role sending" and "receiving" (Katz & Kahn. 1978). role sets (Merton. 1957). role taking and socialization (Van Maanen. 1976), and on how people and their roles shape each other (Graen. 1976). Researchers have given less attention to how people occupy roles to varying degrees-to how fully they are psychologically present during particular moments of role performances. People can use varying degrees of their selves. physically, cognitively, and emotionally. in the roles they perform. even as they main tain the integrity of the boundaries between who they are and the roles they occupy. Presumably, the more people draw on their selves to perform their roles within those boundaries. the more stirring are their performances and the more content they are with the fit of the costumes they don. The research reported here was designed to generate a theoretical frame work within which to understand these "self-in-role" processes and to sug gest directions for future research. My specific concern was the moments in which people bring themselves into or remove themselves from particular task behaviors, My guiding assumption was that people are constantly bring ing in and leaving out various depths of their selves during the course of The guidance and support of David Berg, Richard Hackman, and Seymour Sarason in the research described here are gratefully acknowledged. I also greatly appreciated the personal engagements of this journal's two anonymous reviewers in their roles, as well as the comments on an earlier draft of Tim Hall, Kathy Kram, and Vicky Parker.
A holistic construal is presented to represent and test organizational theories, using examples from contemporary organizational theory and data from a recent study of wholesale distribution companies. The methodology provides a mechanism for linking theory construction and theory testing in organization research by explicitly representing theoretical and empirical concepts, nonobservational hypotheses, and correspondence rules. Unlike traditional methods used for construct validation and hypothesis testing, the methodology permits the researcher to model the extent of random and systematic error in measures of theoretical concepts and to control these sources of error when testing substantive hypotheses. Comparisons made between the holistic construal and traditional procedures show how the latter can lead to inaccurate conclusions about the status of a theory's constructs, hypotheses, and measures.