YOU'RE THE MEANING IN MY [WORK], YOU'RE THE INSPIRATION: TRUST ME! THERE'S BRILLIANCE BEHIND THESE WORDS
Organizations have a responsibility to their stakeholders to create an environment where their employees have rich meaningful interactions and work. Using psychological theory in Swanson’s three-legged stool as a theoretical framework, our goal is to advance organizational knowledge in recognizing the mental and behavioral aspects of humans, as indispensable agents. By creating a culture in organizations where relationships are grounded in trust, employees and customers can feel a deeper commitment to the organization, thus enhancing more meaningful interactions. Grounded in human resource development theory, this body of work explores the correlations between absorption, work enjoyment, and intrinsic abilities to create meaningful experiences for employees at the individual, group, and organizational levels.
At the core of any organization’s people-centered functions lies an opportunity to strategically thread the employee experience to meaningful work using a human resource development (HRD) lens. Organizational scholars and practitioners have conducted several research studies during the past 15 years on the benefits of meaningful work (Pratt & Ashforth, 2003; Rosso, Dekas, & Wrzesniewski, 2010). However, the psychological considerations on the interplay between the employee experience and meaningful work, using a HRD lens, have informed this study.
Because the employee experience has implications on meaningful work, there is continued interest in the topic of meaningfulness for both academics and practitioners (Yeoman, Bailey, Madden, & Thompson, 2019). Meaningful work encourages consideration of moral management practices at the individual and group-level(s) (Michaelson, Pratt, Grant, & Dunn, 2014). Therefore, work becomes meaningful if it supports the moral development of employees (Bowie, 1998). If organizations prioritize a strong foundation of trust for the employees, then the proverbial Chicago lyrics “you’re the meaning in my life, you're the inspiration” take on a whole new meaning for organizations, as they identify ways to inspire the employee experiences to drive meaningful work.
THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Organizational learning and leadership development represent constructs under the discipline of HRD and play an integral role in the education, advancement, and maturity of employees, subsequently impacting the employee experience. Thus, there is a practical meaning behind the discipline’s mantra of performance through learning (Knowles, Holton, & Swanson, 2005). As such, HRD practitioners’ trilevel focus—individual, group, and organization—involves a range of opportunities for achieving value creation and meaningful work. The challenge lies in the broad scope of attaining meaningful work to provide for the diverse needs of the individuals) as well as for the organization as a whole. A recent literature review suggested that it is important for HRD practitioners to consider the inner workings, both drivers and outcomes, of meaningful work (Bailey, Yeoman, Madden, Thompson, & Kerridge, 2019).
The three fundamental theories supporting HRD— economic, system, and psychological (Swanson & Holton, 2005)—are depicted as the three legs of a stool resting on an ethical carpet (Figure 1). As a practical matter, the grounding of the stool (resting on an ethical carpet) ensures that the theories are enacted with the standard of what is right. In addition, the stool is supported by each of the three legs—thus, the holistic nature and importance of each theory supporting performance optimization at the individual, group, and organizational levels. Because HRD literature is not ripe with research on the concept of meaningfulness in the workplace (Bailey, Yeoman, Madden, Thompson, & Kerridge, 2019), the alignment of psychological theory to meaningful work has piqued the researchers’ curiosity and prompted the following conceptual research questions, which are further explored in the literature review.
Citation: Performance Improvement Journal 62, 4; 10.56811/PFI-22-0014
The ethical carpet serves as the foundation where the (three) supporting theories are grounded in ethics. Kuchinke (2017) stressed the importance of ethics in HRD and suggested that ethical issues might need more consideration by organizations. Economic theory serves as the primary driver of HRD, whereby there is recognition of how leaders can inspire human capital and effectively leverage existing knowledge, skills, and abilities to create meaningful experiences for employees. Systems theory identifies fundamental functions and connections as organizations evaluate how to create meaningfulness for their employees. For the purposes of this article, the focus will be on the third leg of the stool, representing psychological theory; this recognizes the mental and behavioral aspects of humans as indispensable agents (Swanson & Holton, 2005). By creating a culture in organizations where relationships are grounded in trust, employees and customers can feel a deeper commitment to the organization, thus enhancing more meaningful interactions. Performance optimization is the seat of the stool and depicts organizations’ focus on providing an environment grounded in ethics, whereby economic, systems, and psychological theory are appropriately applied; this work explores the implications on the employee experience.
PURPOSE
Using psychological theory in the three-legged stool (Figure 1) as a theoretical framework, our goal is to advance organizational knowledge in recognizing the mental and behavioral aspects of humans as indispensable agents (Swanson & Holton, 2005). By creating a culture in organizations where relationships are grounded in trust, employees and customers can feel a deeper commitment to the organization, thus enhancing more meaningful interactions as depicted in (Figure 2).
Citation: Performance Improvement Journal 62, 4; 10.56811/PFI-22-0014
RESEARCH QUESTIONS
This article explores the following overarching research question: Are there statistically significant correlations between absorption, work enjoyment, and intrinsic motivation?
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Research Question 1: Is there is a correlation between an employee’s absorption and work enjoyment?
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Research Question 2: Is there a correlation between an employee’s work enjoyment and an employee’s intrinsic motivation?
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Research Question 3: Is there a positive and strong correlation between an employee’s absorption and an employee’s intrinsic motivation?
LITERATURE REVIEW
The approach to the literature review begins, at the core of the conceptual framework, with reviewing the ethical considerations and the threading of organizational trust. This foundation fuels the psychology behind creating meaningful work and extends through the (organizational) systems in strategically understanding the future of work and the importance of putting the right leaders in place to inspire employees. Innately, the market dynamics, specific to the employee experience and customer experience, are interconnected and can drive business results. Woven through the literature review is a deconstruction of the three-legged stool resting on an ethical carpet and an exploration of how to cultivate an ethical culture that fuels meaningful work at the trilevel.
Ethical Foundations
Building an environment of organizational trust to drive the employee experience is an important ethical consideration for an employee to demonstrate positive feelings toward the organization in which they work. Also, the psychology of organizational support in the environment on an employee's organizational citizenship behaviors has been examined as a mediating factor to employee empowerment (Lamm, Tosti-Kharas, & King, 2015). Organizational trust has been defined by Rotter (1967) as general expectations by a group that “includes the promise, written, verbal word, or commitment toward any other individual or group that can be relied upon (p. 492).” Organizational trust is demonstrated when any individual in an organization is concerned with the actions of another individual and the outcomes of the situation (Mayer, Davis, & Schoorman, 1995). Organizational trust has also been described as part of an employees' commitment to an organization and establishes a positive connection between the employer and the employee (Karia & Ahmad, 2000). Commitment as a measure of organizational trust is a component of the employee commitment and loyalty index, which is helpful in evaluating how commitment and loyalty affect employee performance within the organization (Brown & Ryan, 2003).
Trust, as an ethical foundation for meaningful work, is not new (Herriot, 2001; Holbeche & Springett, 2004); it is suggested in research that meaning can be attributed to trust in an organization, which is the responsibility of organizational leaders (Andersson, 1996; Flade, 2003). One’s work environment (Kopp & Desiderio, 2009; Pratt & Ashforth, 2003; Weick, Sutcliffe, & Obstfeld, 2005; Wrzesniewski, Dutton, & Debebe, 2003) is essential for how one’s experiences are shaped. Research has already made a link between the employee experience and organizational trust. When employees talk about the spirit that arises from experiences at work, they become energized. Being energized through work can be used to discuss the organizational environment, which, through the help of organizational leaders, encourages trust, among other factors (Kinjerski & Skrypnek, 2004). When organizations understand that an employee who experiences joy and happiness as well as increased energy while working, they exhibit high levels of organizational trust. Furthermore, it shows that employers have an obligation to their employees to provide meaningful work and, too, organizations can gain a competitive advantage if they focus more on their employees' experience (Bowie, 1998).
Psychological Theory
The psychological pillar is central to thread meaningful work. The psychological thread is fueled by an interrelated foundation and can be cultivated when there is an understanding of how to drive these experiences.
Meaningful Work
Meaningfulness is defined as the value of a work goal or purpose, tethered to the individual’s own ideals or standards (May, Gilson, & Harter, 2004), and employees can determine the meaning of work by asking themselves, “Why am I here?” (Pratt & Ashforth, 2003). There have been cases made that organizations may have an ethical or moral obligation to help workers experience meaningful work (Michaelson, 2005).
According to a recent literature review, the psychological theories that were most prevalent in the meaningful work literature were the job characteristics theory from Hackman and Oldham (1975) and the transformational leadership theory by Arnold, Turner, Barling, Kelloway, and McKee (2007; Bailey et al., 2019). Both of these psychological theories rely on the organization to inspire leaders and ensure the employee experience meets the individual psychological needs.
Employees who say their work feels meaningful report a better psychological connection to the organization and have reported behaviors that organizations look for and employees view their work as important (Harpaz & Fu, 2002) and valuable (Nord, Brief, Atieh, & Doherty, 1990) and report greater job satisfaction (e.g., Kamdron, 2005).
In addition, a major source of creating meaningful work for employees is freedom and autonomy, which can be encouraged through leadership empowerment; this encourages a desire to enhance the employee experience through meaningful work. Empirical research on meaningful work has been growing over the years (Lepisto & Pratt, 2017), therefore there are a few considerations that organizations can make to drive the employee experience through meaningful work. Specific to HRD practitioners, understanding what drives meaning for employees continues to be an area of exploration in the research (Thory, 2016). However, interventions to enhance meaningfulness cannot necessarily be generalized to all employees (Lips-Wiersma, 2002). This gap is important to meaningful work research and developing the working conditions that promote a sense of meaningfulness; Chalofsky (2003) implied that meaningful work is a motivational tool.
The Employee Experience and Positive Psychological Theory
Psychology literature places an emphasis on how experiences impact an individual and often lead to powerful, meaningful experiences (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990; Maslow, 1964). Significant and worthwhile work, and whether that work is deemed positive by the employee, is subjective (Tims, Derks, & Bakker, 2016), but can be enhanced by the organization and the leaders within that organization. For purposes of alignment on how organizations can use the psychological leg of the stool to enhance the employee experience (EX) and drive meaningful work, the Csikszentmihalyi (1990) work on flow will be examined.
Flow
Based on Csikszentmihalyi’s (1975) work, flow is said to be reached when a balance of perceived challenges and skill, above a certain level, is obtained in one’s participation in an activity. The state of flow is said to occur when challenges and skills are optimized and a balance is established but has since evolved to require an optimum balance that is above a certain level (Csikszentmihalyi & Csikszentmihalyi, 1988). In terms of the findings of Csikszentmihalyi (1990), one’s interest is at the forefront of obtaining this balance. Given that one’s flow experiences are said to rely on the intrinsic attributes associated with the individual, the consideration of one’s level of motivation is at the forefront of achieving this state. Specifically, when it comes to organizational performance, employees can move in and out of the state of flow. The starting point of a flow state is often a balance of challenge and skill, which was described in the four-channel model (Figure 2). Although one may feel challenged and have the necessary knowledge, skills, and attitudes (KSAs) to perform their job at work, becoming apathetic at work may occur despite the balance of challenge and skill (Csikszentmihalyi & Csikszentmihalyi, 1988). In addition, if an employee feels the work is too difficult for the skills required, people will feel anxious, or conversely, if the work seems too easy for the employee, then boredom will likely occur. Therefore, the psychological states of boredom, apathy, flow, and anxiety may impact how individuals find meaning from work and impact the employee experience. Seemingly, we must be aware of the psychological implications that subjectively thread each state. For an employee to experience flow at work, there must be a balance of the demands of the job and the employee’s knowledge, skills, and abilities as well as the organizational support to complete the job (Bakker, 2008). Csikszentmihalyi’s positive psychology theory of flow, specifically the four states of boredom, anxiety, apathy, and flow, can be used as drivers of the employee experience (Figure 3).
Citation: Performance Improvement Journal 62, 4; 10.56811/PFI-22-0014
Apathy
Apathy is defined as the absence of feeling, emotion, or interest (Marin, 1990) and is an index of overall motivation; therefore, apathy can impact the extent to which goal-directed behavior is achieved based on motivational factors (Marin, 1990). The similarities between people feeling apathetic toward work or work projects are strikingly similar. When we reference meaningless work, it is often associated with apathy and detachment from one’s work (May et al., 2004).
Boredom
Boredom is an important issue in psychology and human behavior and is not receiving the adequate attention it deserves as a construct by researchers (Smith, 1981). Boredom has been described in the literature in many ways; when looking at the environment in which people work, the boredom state has been defined as eliciting an emotional response to an environment that is continuous and repetitive, changing, or unchanging and monotonous (Davies, Shackleton, & Parasuraman, 1983; Smith, 1955). However, one cannot ignore the fact that a person’s environment is not the sole cause of boredom (Guest, 1978). Boredom is very different from other affective states, simply stated, people feel a lack of motivation or reward for completing the task (Pekrun, Goetz, Daniels, Stupnisky, & Perry, 2010); boredom also elicits feelings of being unchallenged (Van Tilburg & Igou, 2012).
It was suggested that everyone possesses a very distinct level of how they process information (Mehrabian, 1977), which is required for optimal behavior. Individuals may also try behavioral modifications while completing a boring (task), possibly increasing their pace or trying to combat the proneness of being bored (Runcie, 1980). In addition, bored behaviors have also been attributed to a lack of goal-directed behavior and can be associated with adverse affective behavior of an individual (Carver, 2004), resulting in poor performance.
A person’s susceptibility to becoming bored, or boredom proneness, has been related to lower levels of knowledge and poor performance (Gardell, 1971; O’Hanlon, 1981), yet this is contrary to the Csikszentmihalyi (1988) four-channel model, where individuals possess the high skill and low challenge. Watt (1991) discovered that individuals who are more boredom-prone perceived time as passing by slowly during a task they deemed “boring.” The Watt (1991) study was corroborated by Wittman and Paulus (2008) when they reported that individuals who are boredom-prone overestimated how long it took to complete a task. When organizations are examining how to create meaningful work to enhance the employee experience, they should look at the opposite effect of the bored behaviors described previously and provide the appropriate conditions for employees to find their state of peak enjoyment, energy, and concentration during work, termed flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990, 2000). Psychologically, whereas boredom causes individuals to increase the duration in judgment of completing a task, when one is experiencing flow, it is as if time flies by, or decreases the duration in judgment (Zakay, 2012).
Anxiety
As a psychological phenomenon, anxiety influences performance (Eysenck, Derakshan, Santos, & Calvo, 2007). Csikszentmihalyi (1975, 1990) stated that anxiety is a result of an individual possessing low knowledge and skills in an environment that is challenging. When one does not perceive to have the ability to address challenges or cope with the situation based on lack of available resources, anxiety can occur (Jones & Hardy, 1990).
Arguments have been made that anxiety raises an individual’s self-awareness when undertaking a task, and when one has a skill, the attention given to that task is requiring a large allocation of knowledge (e.g., Baumeister, 1990; Masters, 1992). Self-focus theorists hypothesize that anxiety is more likely to lead to decrements in task performance, especially when skills required are part of a procedure (Masters & Maxwell, 2008).
The impact of role stressors and job characteristics on productivity (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990) is important in tethering employee experience to meaningful work. Interestingly, Singh’s (1998) findings indicate that reducing stress, not to be confused with the healthy form of eustress, customarily increases not only job satisfaction but also performance. Although job satisfaction does not equate to high performance, the indications made by Singh (1998) are favorable to understanding how Csikszentmihalyi and Csikszentmihalyi’s (1988) four-channel construct applies. In addition, to reduce occupational stress, thus improving job outcomes, the findings by Singh (1998) also signify increasing autonomy and providing feedback as subsequent attributes to lower distress; this can lead to more meaningful work.
Karo-jisatsu
The death through overwork phenomenon in Japan, karo-jisatsu, is when employers push their employees for performance to a point that becomes fatal (Ibison, 2002); this is also familiar to many employees in the United States (Caldwell, 2008). Occupational stress can be detrimental to individuals and may also hinder the growth and health of the organization. Whereas external encouragement to employees is supported, the real challenge for leaders is to provide intrinsic motivation to employees successfully. If organizations can begin to identify what the perceived challenges are facing employees, leaders can begin by moving employees to a more productive state where they can find meaning in their work.
Developing Inspiring Leaders
The seminal work on flow identified eight conditions that are important for organizations to explore (Nakamura & Csikszentmihalyi, 2002), with an eye toward developing inspiring leaders in the future to drive meaningful work for employees. Organizations and, more important, leaders in the organization who thread employees’ work around these conditions can enhance affective and normative commitment behaviors. Providing the environment in which these conditions are considered is grounded in the ethical pillar of trust; thus, organizations may consider these as they focus on creating meaningful work for their employees.
Eight Conditions of Flow for Leaders to Use Drive Employee Experience
Contrary to popular belief, happiness does not merely occur for any reason; rather, it is subjectively controllable by simply living up to our potential (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003). Leaders may be interested in the factors that contribute to happy employees to drive meaningful work and enhance the employee experience. Interestingly, the prescription for happy employees seems rather straightforward: “the experience of happiness in action is enjoyment – the exhilarating sensation of being fully alive” (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003, p. 37); for Csikszentmihalyi, this is his definition of flow. As organizations begin to understand the specific nature of how to inspire trust and meaningful work, where employees can experience this enjoyment, they must first understand (the conditions of) flow. The purpose of this section is to examine the eight conditions that accompany flow—goals are clear, feedback is immediate, the balance of opportunity and capacity, concentration deepens, the present is what matters, control is no problem, sense of time is altered, and loss of ego—perhaps not all at once, that are “the most salient components of what it feels like to be in flow” (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003, p. 42). Applying the Csikszentmihalyi (1975) flow theory to inspire leaders to cultivate this experience is essential to the employee experience.
There is a balance between opportunity and capacity
This condition is essentially the essence of how the state of flow is defined. For experiential purposes, organizations can foster meaningful work among their employees by understanding how to optimize their employee’s KSAs. Like all flow activities, the level of complexity is very subjective (Csikszentmihalyi, 1975, 1988, 1990, 2003) and should be approached as such. Similarly, as employees improve their KSAs, more trust is built between the employees and the organization.
Goals are clear
For someone to immerse oneself fully in any activity, and find meaning, the clarity of the task must be accurately defined (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003)—hence the importance of goal setting in the workplace. It is not necessarily about the outcome of a goal, but the tactical steps that one takes to attain the goal. When employees’ goals are aligned with organizational strategy and values, they enlist those individuals to be stewards of the company in front of the customer. Organizations can create this condition in the workplace in many ways, specifically around encouraging strong communication of goals (Knowles et al., 2005; Swanson & Holton, 2001).
Feedback is immediate
The concept of strong communication is woven into the perception of a meaningful work environment and plays an important role in motivating employees to enjoy their work. Although the feedback from managers and coworkers is important, the concept being presented here is more about the activity itself. The objective in this case is for organizations to help employees learn to trust their individual standards based on knowledge and past experience which can help them identify which activities at work lead to more meaningful activities and essentially find the desirable state of flow. In addition, there are data that support a positive link between manager recognition and meaningful work (Montani, Boudrias, & Pigeon, 2017).
Concentration deepens
As an extension to the aforementioned condition, concentration is said to deepen when clear goals and immediate feedback are given whereby the depth of involvement in the activity heightens (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003). Gaining an understanding for employees’ concentration on and immersion in their work fuels awareness building at the individual and group levels. The thread of effective communication remains central in encouraging absorption in (meaningful) work.
Present is what matters
Similarly, when a person is in a flow state, the activity demands total attention (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003), which allows the individual to forget about anything outside of the task at hand. If employees can identify and communicate the activities that provide them meaning, then the opportunity for organizations to modify the environment to complement these variables exist.
Control is no problem
In many life activities, individuals are presented with situations in which they have no control (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003). If organizations are equipped to understand flow and the importance of a Theory Y style of management (McGregor, 1960), fueled by autonomy, strong communication, and trust, then employees are said to work more for the work at hand instead of for anyone or anything else (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003). Analogous to meaningful work, employees will be willing to do something for the pure enjoyment of accomplishing the task at hand.
The sense of time is altered
This condition epitomizes meaningful work, provided that the state of flow allows one to become completely immersed in an activity and their sense of self becomes altered (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003).
The loss of ego
When we think of meaningful work, creating an environment where employees, upon completion of an activity, have their self-esteem reappear more intensely than it was prior to the activity (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003), can drive positive behavioral changes and organizational commitment behaviors.
Inspired leaders have an opportunity to understand and encourage the eight conditions in new ways to enhance the employee experience and create inspired employees. By building on a foundation of trust, leaders have an impact on how they move employees to flow; in turn, the happier an employee is, the more they enjoy work and are motivated to perform for themselves, and the organization grows.
BUSINESS PERFORMANCE OPTIMIZATION: CUSTOMER AND EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE
As organizations commit to building an environment of trust, it is important to look at ways leaders can enhance flow experiences and drive meaningful work. This is an important step given the interconnections between the customer experience and the employee experience. The interplay of the customer and employee experience is the primary business case for organizations when they evaluate ways to create meaningful work for their employees. With the future of work becoming more virtual, organizations need to adapt to how they are going to maintain a competitive advantage (grounded in trust). The future of work demands that employees of organizations learn to build trust and create value in new ways with customers.
A Google Scholar search of full-text articles containing “customer experience” returns approximately 70,000 pieces of literature. Understanding the intricacies of the customer experience, for the purposes of this article, is essential. Most of the information surrounding customer experience can be found in practitioner-oriented journals or books that focus on the management of customers (Holbrook, 2007; Verhoef et al., 2009). As a result, a theme emerged that focuses more on managerial actions and outcomes versus examining the customer experience using a theoretical lens. Trying to align a definition of customer experience has been widely examined in the literature (De Keyser, Lemon, Klaus, & Keiningham, 2015) and a common theme that emerges; that is, organizational performance cannot be accomplished without a customer base.
In addition, individuals responsible for assessing and enhancing the customer experience recognize the complexities in correctly identifying how to assess value. Simply stated, the customer experience has been said to be moderated by several connected variables, specifically demographics, psychographic, competitive landscape, the macro-environment, economic, and technological trends (Bitner, 1992; Verhoef et al., 2009; Wakefield & Baker, 1998). Therefore, effectively examining customer experience and the value exchange process should be composed of both the functional and the emotional benefits that customers receive from their interactions with the company. Prahalad and Ramaswamy (2004) recognized that, as we consider a more digitized and global landscape, customer experience should result in creating value that is truly unique to each individual in the organization. They emphasized that true customer value exchange should be forged through purposeful and meaningful interactions between customers and employees. Contemporary thinking, specific to the customer experience, is that organizations and their employees are not fully responsible for the experience itself, but the experience is connected to the value transfer that occurs with the individuals involved in the experience (Helkkula, Kelleher, & Pihlstrom, 2012). Hence, we know from a psychological perspective, “value creation is phenomenological and experiential in nature” (Vargo & Lusch, 2008, p. 7).
Employees play an integral role in the subconscious and emotional elements derived from the total experience (Zaltman & Braun, 1998). Overall, there is a significant number of organizational employees who have responsibility for the customer experience, in fact, it encompasses many facets of the organization, such as marketing, sales, quality, and service, to name a few (Zomerdijk & Voss, 2009). Although these departments may not be all customer-facing in a more technological world, trusting that these departments keep the customer at the forefront of their decisions is paramount. When thinking about our interconnected world, it has become much more community-centric rather than organization-customer-centric (Achrol & Kotler, 1999), and customer interactions and relationships with organizations are enhanced by the intelligence companies gain (Hoffman & Novak, 1996) on the internet. With this future state of business interaction in mind, as we think about creating meaningful work for employees, it is increasingly important to develop leaders in organizations who know how to build an ethical foundation of trust; these areas could have both positive and negative effects on the customer and organizational value exchange. For example, it has been observed that everything, from person to message, that touched a customer communicates something positive or negative about the organization (Duncan, 2005). Nowadays, the ability to rate, review, and make comments about an experience with a company is at the fingertips of every consumer. The customer experience has been described as a subjective response that customers have when they interact with an organization (Meyer & Schwager, 2007) and its employees, so the increasing importance of every customer interaction. Thus, the grounding of this work is in the Swanson and Holton (2005) theory, namely, in understanding the drivers and outcomes of every organization’s most important asset, the people.
MEASURING FLOW TO ENHANCE MEANINGFUL WORK
Based on the literature review, there are inferences from past research conducted on ethics and psychological drivers on how leaders can inspire this effort. There is continued interest in what factors correlate to meaningful work (Allan, Batz-Barbarich, Sterling, & Tay, 2019). Building on this curiosity, the authors explore how flow can contribute to meaningful work and what relationships exist between the psychological factors of absorption or immersion in one's work, work enjoyment, the act of enjoying work, and an employee’s intrinsic motivation. Because there is interest in the relationship between variables on flow attainment as a driver of meaningful work, a correlation analysis will be used to determine if there are positive or negative relationships between the variable’s absorption, work enjoyment, and intrinsic motivation.
According to Heath (2018), correlational studies are a type of research often used in psychology, and because the nature of this article is evaluating psychological factors, it was determined that a correlational study was a good preliminary way to gather information about the aforementioned psychological factors. Therefore, the following hypotheses are proposed:
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Hypothesis 0: There are no statistically significant correlations between absorption, work enjoyment, and intrinsic motivation.
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Hypothesis 1: There is a positive strong correlation between an employee’s absorption and work enjoyment.
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Hypothesis 2: There is a positive and strong correlation between an employee’s work enjoyment and an employee’s intrinsic motivation.
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Hypothesis 3: There is a positive and strong correlation between an employee’s absorption and an employee’s intrinsic motivation.
INSTRUMENT
Csikszentmihalyi (1975, 1990, 2003) has proposed that individuals reach a state of happiness and satisfaction when they are involved in an activity and are functioning at the peak of their abilities. Bakker (2008) has translated Csikszentmihalyi’s theory, which states that “flow is a state of consciousness where people become totally immersed in an activity and enjoy it intensely” (p. 400).
Bakker (2008) designed the Work-Related Flow Inventory (WOLF) instrument to measure the three main elements of flow, including four absorption items, four work enjoyment items, and five intrinsic work motivation items. The face validity and reliability analysis, conducted by Bakker and five organizational psychologists, guided the WOLF to be the 13-item inventory used today. The answers are reported on a 7-point scale (1 = never to 7 = always) and the statements refer to the respondents’ experiences at work for the two weeks prior to taking the survey (Bakker, 2008).
Reliability of the WOLF
Bakker (2008) successfully tested and reported on the intercorrelations and reliability coefficients of the three flow dimensions included in the WOLF instrument. The results are conducive to Bakker’s aims, whereby absorption, work enjoyment, and intrinsic work motivation “correlate moderately high with each other” (p. 404). It was reported that absorption had an estimated 30% overlap with work enjoyment and intrinsic work motivation and an estimated 50% overlap with work enjoyment and intrinsic work motivation. Correlations ranged from .44 for absorption and intrinsic work motivation to .82 for work enjoyment and intrinsic work motivation (Bakker, 2008).
Using Cronbach’s alpha to estimate internal consistency, the reliability of the WOLF was reported as good overall (Bakker, 2008). Using N = 1,071, Cronbach’s α for work enjoyment was reported as high (average, r = .90), absorption was reported acceptable (average, r = .80), and intrinsic work motivation was reported satisfactory (average, r = 75); overall subscales had high internal consistency, and Cronbach’s α coefficients ranged between .91 and .94. Moreover, the test-retest reliability of the WOLF was reported as good, showing absorption as r = .74, work enjoyment as r = .77, and intrinsic work motivation as r = .71 (Bakker, 2008).
Validity of the WOLF
The validity of any instrument is one of the most important factors in research because the validity refers to the degree to which the instrument measures what it is supposed to assess (Fraenkel & Wallen, 2006). For the purposes of this study, the validity of the instruments is of the highest importance with regard to their use, namely, to ensure that the WOLF would accurately measure work flow experiences. Empirical support was found for the convergent validity, which correlated flow with a similar measure of job satisfaction, when each of the three dimensions (work enjoyment, absorption, and intrinsic work motivation) “correlated positively with the general flow index” (Bakker, 2008, p. 404). The WOLF suitably measures each of the three measures of flow and, based on the results of the study by Bakker, it can be assumed that employees generally perform better when they enjoy their work.
STUDY DESIGN
For this correlational study, we adapted the WOLF instrument to 6 items (Appendix B, Table 1) from 13; the subscales demonstrated good internal consistency (Table 2, Appendix A). Questions were used from the WOLF (Table 1). The WOLF survey was sent to a convenience sample in both the private sector (n = 78) and public sector (n = 167). The survey was available for 60 days, and the participants were alerted to the voluntary nature of their participation; those who chose to participate in the survey were also notified, via the cover page, that anonymity would be kept at the forefront of this research. During the 60 days, 245 surveys were collected for analysis.
RESULTS
The adapted WOLF instrument subscales and items represented in Table 2 demonstrated strong psychometric properties in our sample (Table 2). In addition, our sample (N = 245) WOLF demonstrated internal consistency (.79; Table 3), which allows us to generalize any relationships that may result from our correlations drive meaningful work.
Correlation
As expected, all correlations between absorption, work enjoyment, and intrinsic motivation had a low to high positive correlation and were significant at the .01 level and .05 level (Table 4); therefore, we reject the null hypotheses. Based on the correlations, we accept Hypothesis 1 to Hypothesis 3 because there is a statistically significant (p = .00) strong positive correlation (r = .878) between “feeling happy at work” and “doing work with a lot of enjoyment.” In addition, there was a statistically significant (p = .00) strong positive correlation (r = .752) between “doing work with a lot of enjoyment” and “working because I enjoy it.” Lastly, there was a statistically significant (p = .00) strong positive correlation to be found between absorption, “feeling happy at work,” and intrinsic motivation, “I work because I enjoy it” (r = .755).
CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE INTERSECTION OF ETHICS AND MEANINGFUL WORK
Organizations have a responsibility to their stakeholders to create an environment of trust by creating a culture where their employees have rich meaningful interactions. As cited in Bolino and Grant’s (2016) work, we know that “employees engage in greater citizenship under leaders who are transformational, trusted, and supportive (Podsakoff et al., 2000), and take more initiative when leaders express gratitude” (Grant & Gino, 2010, p. 31) and reinforce (perceived) value. An opportunity exists for organizations to develop a culture where employees value the meaningful work they do, encouraging feelings of affective and normative commitment.
Provided that individuals experience flow more during work than they do during their free time (Delle Fave & Massimini, 2003) and that meaningful work is impacted through work engagement, job satisfaction, motivation, and stress reduction (Elangovan, Pinder, & McLean, 2010; Hackman & Oldham, 1975; May et al., 2004; Sparks & Schenk, 2001), it is up to each organization to develop the working conditions to promote a meaningful work experience. From an HRD perspective, the findings of this study fill a gap in the field, namely, in investing in training and development opportunities (Thory, 2016) to fuel meaningful work.
Review of Findings
There is a positive strong correlation between an employee’s absorption (i.e., concentration on and immersion in the work) and work enjoyment (i.e., happy feeling and positive view regarding the quality of his or her work). There is a positive and strong correlation between an employee’s work enjoyment (i.e., happy feeling and positive view regarding the quality of his or her work) and an employee’s intrinsic motivation (i.e., the tendency that a person does the work for pleasure and satisfaction in the work). There is a positive and strong correlation between an employee’s absorption (i.e., concentration on and immersion in the work) and an employee’s intrinsic motivation (i.e., the tendency that a person does the work for pleasure and satisfaction in the work).
This article considered the psychological factors that contribute to driving meaningful work and enhancing the employee experience; this was fueled by Csikszentmihalyi’s (1975) flow theory “the experience of happiness in action is enjoyment – the exhilarating sensation of being fully alive” (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003, p. 37). Who is responsible to create a climate for meaningful work to be cultivated and shared? In “The Genesis of Flow: What to Explore Next?” Frino and Desiderio (2018) explored the responsibility of the (HRD) field to inspire flow experiences at work. The genesis of flow for employees begins with the recognition of how the eight conditions can be operationalized as organizations consider the future of work. Considering the findings of this study, there is a relationship between absorption, work enjoyment, and intrinsic motivation; therefore, reflecting on the three-legged stool (Figure 1) and the four-channel flow model (Figure 2), there is value in using the eight conditions of flow as a guide to navigating how organizational trust is established, leaders are inspired, and meaningful work is created. Senge (2006) mentions that mental models are one of the five practices of creating a learning organization, and by embracing the eight conditions of flow, using them as a catalyst to drive meaningful experiences at the individual, group, and organizational levels, the behaviors become part of one’s mental model, which, in turn, may show up as organizational look to enhance the employee experience.
If organizations prioritize meaningful work, grounded in a foundation of trust for the employees and customers then, the proverbial Chicago lyrics “someone saying you're the meaning in my work, you’re the inspiration” creates shared meaning and opportunities to strategically invest in the employee experiences to drive meaningful work. From a practical perspective, as organizations focus on developing inspiring leaders in the future to drive meaningful work for employees, emphasis should be placed first on cultivating an environment grounded in trust. The impetus is seemingly straightforward; the action orientation comes in the opportunity to enact these said conditions. Meaningful interactions, where employees feel a deep sense of commitment to the organization, can be nurtured in the relationship-building process. As the future of work continues to encourage agility in the fundamental functions and connections of organizations, we have an opportunity to assess how flow experiences, namely, in the categories of absorption, work enjoyment, and intrinsic work motivation, are cultivated to inspire meaning.
Human Resource Development Theory Three-Legged Stool
Ethics of Meaningful Work Framework
Four-Channel Flow Model
Contributor Notes
MICHAEL G. FRINO is a Wall Street Journal bestselling author of The Beekeeper: Pollinating Your Organization for Transformative Growth. Michael has more than 20 years of professional experience working for Fortune 500 companies in sales, leadership, and organizational development across the payroll/human resources, pharmaceutical, and medical–technical industries. Michael finds his flow state today from helping organizations transform their culture with a focus on the growth and development of human beings. His curiosity on how organizations optimize performance at work inspired him to obtain his doctorate in organizational learning and leadership in (2010) and embrace opportunities to help individuals, groups, and organizations reach their peak potential. His coauthoring of The Beekeeper is the culmination of decades of research and publishing with his friend, Katie P. Desiderio, in performance improvement journals to understand how organizations can provide transformational growth to their most important assets: people. You may reach him at mfrino@comcast.net.
KATIE P. DESIDERIO is a Wall Street Journal bestselling author of The Beekeeper: Pollinating Your Organization for Transformative Growth and counts her blessings starting with the people in her life, which guides her approach to work where her focus is on every organization’s most important asset—you! Along with her work as a professor of management and tenured faculty member at Moravian University, Katie is principal partner in Learning of Proximal Development, LLC, an authorized DiSC partner, specializing in leadership development and the advancement of performance through learning. Katie’s personal mission is grounded in her r2C model, where she has devoted her work to recognize what we give our time and energy to grow, to reflect on how we (choose to) interact with and see the world, and, at the heart of her approach, to connect with why this fuels transformative growth. This model is delicately nurtured in the interplay of our mindset and our (mindful) behaviors, so when she falls along the way, she chooses to fall up. This inspires her to lead with grace while tickling curiosity and encouraging discovery in working with and through others. Upon completion of her doctorate in organizational learning and leadership, Katie has been coauthoring scholar practitioner journal articles, conference proceedings, and now this book with her learning partner and friend. You may reach her at desideriok@moravian.edu.
