The Pursuit of Happiness at Work
This National Public Health Week, we remind ourselves there is much that management academics and practitioners can do to refocus on the relevance of the field for improving people’s lives. Today we highlight a literature review on life satisfaction from the Journal of Management that aims to understand the relationship between work and happiness. Managers may ask themselves: do employees feel challenged at work? Are they given opportunities to grow? Is their work meaningful to them? On-the-job tension, work-family conflict, and other stressors are also considered:
A discussion of top-down and bottom-up theories of life satisfaction is included, and the literatures on work-related antecedents of life satisfaction, the proximal mediators (quality of work life, quality of nonwork life, and feelings of self-worth), and consequences of life satisfaction were reviewed. A meta-analysis of life satisfaction with respect to career satisfaction, job performance, turnover intentions, and organizational commitment was performed. Each major section of the article concludes with a future opportunities subsection where gaps in the research are discussed.
Click here to continue reading “Whistle While You Work : A Review of the Life Satisfaction Literature,” published by Berrin Erdogan, Talya N. Bauer, Donald M. Truxillo and Layla R. Mansfield in the Journal of Management (JOM)–and sign up for e-alerts so stay up-to-date on the latest research in your field.
