Open AccessPlayful work design: A diary study on its correlates in white collar workers
Author(s) -
Laura Petrescu
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
studia doctoralia
Language(s) - English
DOI - 10.47040/sd0000056
Subject(s) - work engagement , moderation , affect (linguistics) , work (physics) , psychology , autonomy , social psychology , job design , applied psychology , job performance , job satisfaction , engineering , political science , mechanical engineering , communication , law
The present study addresses playful work design as the consistent initiative of employees to integrate game-like elements into their day-to-day work in order to reach theirimposed work-related goals. We adapted a short measure for daily playful work design and followed 55 white-collar workers over 5 consecutive working days. We hypothesized that playful work design would be predicted by contextual factors and an individual factor (i.e. job autonomy, manager support for fun and growth need strength). Furthermore, we predicted that, across days, playful work design would relate positively with work engagement and positive affect and negatively with negative affect. Additionally, we tested for the moderation of growth need strength in the relationship between work engagement and playful work design. Results indicated that playful work design was not predicted by job either job autonomy, manager support for fun or growth need strength. We found that playful work design was related positively to work engagement and positive affect, but not related to negative affect. Moreover, growth need strength didn’t moderate the relationship between daily playful work design and daily work engagement. We discuss theoretical and practical implications of our findings for the work design literature.