Working conditions and Work-Family Conflict in German hospital physicians: psychosocial and organisational predictors and consequences

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Germany currently experiences a situation of major physician attrition. The incompatibility between work and family has been discussed as one of the major reasons for the increasing departure of German physicians for non-clinical occupations or abroad. This study investigates predictors for one particular direction of Work-Family Conflict – namely work interfering with family conflict (WIF) – which are located within the psychosocial work environment or work organisation of hospital physicians. Furthermore, effects of WIF on the individual physicians' physical and mental health were examined. Analyses were performed with an emphasis on gender differences. Comparisons with the general German population were made.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Data were collected by questionnaires as part of a study on <it>Psychosocial work hazards and strains of German hospital physicians </it>during April–July 2005. Two hundred and ninety-six hospital physicians (response rate 38.9%) participated in the survey. The Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire (COPSOQ), work interfering with family conflict scale (WIF), and hospital-specific single items on work organisation were used to assess WIF, its predictors, and consequences.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>German hospital physicians reported elevated levels of WIF (mean = 74) compared to the general German population (mean = 45, <it>p </it>< .01). No significant gender difference was found. Predictors for the WIF were lower age, high quantitative demands at work, elevated number of days at work despite own illness, and consequences of short-notice changes in the duty roster. Good sense of community at work was a protective factor. Compared to the general German population, we observed a significant higher level of quantitative work demands among hospital physicians (mean = 73 vs. mean = 57, <it>p </it>< .01). High values of WIF were significantly correlated to higher rates of personal burnout, behavioural and cognitive stress symptoms, and the intention to leave the job. In contrast, low levels of WIF predicted higher job satisfaction, better self-judged general health status, better work ability, and higher satisfaction with life in general. Compared to the German general population, physicians showed significantly higher levels of individual stress and quality of life as well as lower levels for well-being. This has to be judged as an alerting finding regarding the state of physicians' health.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>In our study, work interfering with family conflict (WIF) as part of Work-Family Conflict (WFC) was highly prevalent among German hospital physicians. Factors of work organisation as well as factors of interpersonal relations at work were identified as significant predictors for WIF. Some of these predictors are accessible to alteration by improving work organisation in hospitals.</p

Resolution, Relief, And Resignation:A Qualitative Study Of Responses To Misfit At Work

Research has portrayed person–environment (PE) fit as a pleasant condition resulting from people being attracted to and selected into compatible work environments; yet, our study reveals that creating and maintaining a sense of fit frequently involves an effortful, dynamic set of strategies. We used a two-phase, qualitative design to allow employees to report how they become aware of and experience misfit, and what they do in response. To address these questions, we conducted interviews with 81 individuals sampled from diverse industries and occupations. Through their descriptions, we identified three broad responses to the experience of misfit: resolution, relief, and resignation. Within these approaches, we identified distinct strategies for responding to misfit. We present a model of how participants used these strategies, often in combination, and develop propositions regarding their effectiveness at reducing strain associated with misfit. These results expand PE fit theory by providing new insight into how individuals experience and react to misfit—portraying them as active, motivated creators of their own fit experience at work

The function of fear in institutional maintenance: Feeling frightened as an essential ingredient in haute cuisine

Fear is a common and powerful emotion that can regulate behaviour. Yet institutional scholars have paid limited attention to the function of fear in processes of institutional reproduction and stability. Drawing on an empirical study of elite chefs within the institution of haute cuisine, this article finds that the multifaceted emotion of fear characterised their experiences and served to sustain their institution. Chefs’ individual feelings of fear prompted conformity and a cognitive constriction, which narrowed their focus on to the precise reproduction of traditional practices whilst also limiting challenges to the norms underpinning the institution. Through fear work, chefs used threats and violence to connect individual experiences of fear to the violation of institutionalized rules, sustaining the conditions in which fear-driven maintenance work thrived. The study also suggests that fear is a normative element of haute cuisine in its own right, where the very experience and eliciting of fear preserved an essential institutional ingredient. In this way, emotions such as fear do not just accompany processes of institutionalization but can be intimately involved in the maintenance of institutions

Psychosocial working conditions and the risk of depression and anxiety disorders in the Danish workforce

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>To examine the risk of depressive and anxiety disorders according to psychosocial working conditions in a large population-based sample.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Job Exposure Matrix was applied to assess psychosocial working conditions in a population-based nested case-control study of 14,166 psychiatric patients, diagnosed with depressive or anxiety disorders during 1995–1998 selected from The Danish Psychiatric Central Research Register, compared with 58,060 controls drawn from Statistics Denmark's Integrated Database for Labour Market Research.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Low job control was associated with an increased risk of anxiety disorders in men (IRR 1.40, 95% CI 1.24–1.58).</p> <p>In women an elevated risk of depression was related to high emotional demands (IRR 1.39, 95%CI 1.22–1.58) and to working with people (IRR 1.15, 95% CI 1.01–1.30). In both sexes high demands were associated with a decreased risk of anxiety disorders. There was a weak association between job strain and anxiety disorders in men (IRR 1.13, 95%, CI 1.02–1.25)</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Psychosocial work exposures related to the risk of depressive and anxiety disorders differ as between the sexes. The pattern of risks is inconsistent. The results give rise to rethinking both study designs and possible causal links between work exposures and mental health.</p

Energy Management of People in Organizations: A Review and Research Agenda

Although energy is a concept that is implied in many motivational theories, is hardly ever explicitly mentioned or researched. The current article first relates theories and research findings that were thus far not explicitly related to energy. We describe theories such as flow, subjective well-being, engagement and burn-out, and make the link with energy more explicit. Also, we make a first link between personality characteristics and energy, and describe the role of leadership in unleashing followers’ energy. Following, we identify how the topic of energy management can be profitably incorporated in research from a scientific as well as a practitioner viewpoint. Finally, we describe several interventions to enhance energy in individuals and organizations

How authentic leadership influences team performance:the mediating role of team reflexivity

This study examines how authentic leadership influences team performance via the mediating mechanism of team reflexivity. Adopting a self-regulatory perspective, we propose that authentic leadership will predict the specific team regulatory process of reflexivity, which in turn will be associated with two outcomes of team performance; effectiveness and productivity. Using survey data from 53 teams in three organizations in the United Kingdom and Greece and controlling for collective trust, we found support for our stated hypotheses with the results indicating a significant fully mediated relationship. As predicted the self-regulatory behaviors inherent in the process of authentic leadership served to collectively shape team behavior, manifesting in the process of team reflexivity, which, in turn, positively predicted team performance. We conclude with a discussion of how this study extends theoretical understanding of authentic leadership in relation to teamwork and delineate several practical implications for leaders and organizations

The meaning of my feelings depends on who I am: work-related identifications shape emotion effects in organizations

Theory and research on affect in organizations has mostly approached emotions from a valence perspective, suggesting that positive emotions lead to positive outcomes and negative emotions to negative outcomes for organizations. We propose that cognition resulting from emotional experiences at work cannot be assumed based on emotion valence alone. Instead, building on appraisal theory and social identity theory, we propose that individual responses to discrete emotions in organizations are shaped by, and thus depend on, work-related identifications. We elaborate on this proposition specifically with respect to turnover intentions, theorizing how three discrete emotions - anger, guilt, and pride - differentially affect turnover intentions, depending on two work-related identifications - organizational and occupational identification. A longitudinal study involving 135 pilot instructors reporting emotions, work-related identifications, and turnover intentions over the course of one year provides general support for our proposition. Our theory and findings advance emotion and identity theories by explaining how the effects of emotions are dependent on the psychological context in which they are experienced