Construction of Work Centrality through Experiences at Work.

Abstract

Work Centrality is defined as an individual’s belief regarding the importance of work in one’s life vis a vis other aspects like leisure, spending time with friends or family etc. (Kanungo, 1982, Paullay, Alliger & Stone-Romero, 1994). The concept has been measured in varied ways. The extant literature in this field looks at work centrality as an expression of work ethic and takes a passive view of the individual in ascribing centrality to work. Using the work narratives of 44 public sector bank employees in India, this study explored the process through which individuals define the role of work in their lives. The narrative analysis method and the grounded theory method were used in conjunction to develop a process theory to understand how people interpret work experiences to assign certain roles to work in their lives. All the participants said work was central to them. A deeper exploration revealed that people could state that work is central for them and yet mean different things. The heuristics and mechanisms used to assign these various roles to work are discussed.