Abstract
ABSTRACTGiven the limited knowledge about the effect of contextual factors of organizational ownership types on emotional labor, this research addresses two main questions: (1) whether emotional labor varies among organizations with different ownership types; and (2) whether emotional labor and emotional intelligence relate to job performance in different ways in public and private organizations. This paper examines the research questions with 306 self-report questionnaires from the public sector, domestic privately-owned enterprises and foreign-invested firms in China. Significant differences were found in the emotional labor reported in public and private organizations. Overall, emotional labor was found to have a significant effect on in-role performance, and emotional intelligence moderated the link between emotional labor and job performance in public organizations, but not in private organizations.
Highlights
Emotional labor involves the management of feelings to create publicly observable expressions that are in accordance with the display rules established by organizations (Hochschild, 1983)
Emotional labor was found to have a significant effect on in-role performance, and emotional intelligence moderated the link between emotional labor and job performance in public organizations, but not in private organizations
Different Emotional Labor across Organizations of Different Ownership Type This study reported a significant difference in emotional labor demands in the case of public and private organizations
Summary
Emotional labor involves the management of feelings to create publicly observable expressions that are in accordance with the display rules established by organizations (Hochschild, 1983). This study examines differences on emotional labor among managers and professionals working in Chinese public organizations (CPOs), foreigninvested enterprises (FIEs) and Chinese privately-owned enterprises (POEs), as well as differences in the relationships between emotional labor, emotional intelligence and job performance. There are differences in organizational culture and structure, job autonomy, explicitness of displays, power of role receiver and closeness of supervision existing in CPOs, POEs and FIEs. Under the lens of cultural-normative approach and structural-relational approach, employees’ emotional labor is expected to differ in these three types of organizations and the study proposes the following hypotheses.
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