Relationships between Agile Work Practices and Occupational Well-Being: The Role of Job Demands and Resources.

Sarah Rietze,Hannes Zacher

doi:10.3390/ijerph19031258

Abstract

Agile work practices have been adopted by most software development organizations and by many large organizations from other industries. The introduction of agile work practices is assumed to positively affect work characteristics and, in turn, well-being of employees. So far, there is only very little and methodologically limited empirical research on this topic. Based on job demands–resources theory, we developed and tested a model on the direct and indirect relationships between agile work practices, job demands and resources, and occupational well-being. Data were provided by 260 employees working in agile development teams who participated in two surveys that were approximately six weeks apart. Results of structural equation modeling provided support for the hypothesized model, suggesting that agile work practices have a negative indirect effect on emotional fatigue through lower job demands. At the same time, agile work practices also had a positive indirect effect on emotional engagement through higher job resources. Our research contributes to the literature by integrating agile work practices with job demands–resources theory, bridging an important gap between research and practice. Overall, the findings suggest that the implementation of agile work practices may have a positive impact on occupational well-being by improving employees’ perceptions of key work characteristics.

Highlights

Agile work seems to be “the new Holy Grail” for organizations [1]
We first tested the measurement model consisting of five latent variables and their reflective indicators, which are (1) agile work practices with the four factors self-organized team work, iterative planning, incrementation, and retrospective; (2) job demands with workload, time pressure, and work interruptions; (3) job resources with autonomy, feedback from task, and peer support; (4) emotional fatigue, with three corresponding items; and (5)
We hypothesized that agile work practices are negatively related to emotional fatigue (Hypothesis 1) and that agile work practices are positively related to emotional engagement (Hypothesis 2)

Summary

Introduction

Agile work seems to be “the new Holy Grail” for organizations [1]. Organizations recognize the need to implement agility in their structures and processes to keep pace with today’s complex, challenging, and competitive business environment [2]. Some key characteristics of agile work include self-organized teams, quick and proactive decisionmaking, transparency, collaboration, regular reflection within the team, customer centricity, and an iterative work approach [3]. Agile work practices were first established in software development to better meet customers’ requirements and to increase productivity and quality. To this end, an incremental development instead of a heavyweight plan-driven approach is adopted, and self-management of teams is enhanced [4]. Increased proactivity in agile teams seems to be an important influencing factor for the positive impact of agile taskwork on team performance [5]

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Results

Discussion

Conclusion