Abstract
The findings of existing studies of how role overload affects employees’ performance in organizations have been mixed and controversial. We draw on the hindrance–challenge framework to suggest that role overload contains both hindrance and challenge stressor components. We integrate this theory with the behavioral inhibition and behavioral activation systems (BIS and BAS) perspective to develop hypotheses about the effects of role overload on employees’ extra-role performance (voice). We suggest that although role overload is positively associated with withdrawal (a prototypical response of the BIS system) and ultimately negatively influences extra-role performance, it can also trigger job crafting (a prototypical response of the BAS system) and is, consequently, positively associated with extra-role performance. We further posit that the strength of these indirect effects is moderated by the quality of leader–member exchange (LMX). To support these hypotheses, we conducted a time-lagged study of 450 full-time pre-school teachers from various Chinese kindergartens. As hypothesized, we found that withdrawal and job crafting mediated the relationship between role overload and extra-role performance. Further, LMX strengthens the positive relationship between role overload and job crafting. Taken together, our results suggest that role overload can be a mixed stressor that activates both negative and positive behaviors, thus ultimately having an impact on extra-role performance.
Highlights
Job stressors have long been an important topic in organizational and industrial psychology (Cooper et al, 2003)
By integrating the hindrance–challenge stressors framework and the behavioral inhibition system/behavioral activation system (BIS/BAS) perspective, we identify the BIS/BAS responses withdrawal and job crafting as a key mechanism linking role overload to organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs); we provide a possible solution to the contradictory findings on the impact of role overload on OCBs (Eatough et al, 2011)
We suggest that leader–member exchange (LMX), which serves as an additional resource and contextual information for followers to interpret the character of role overload, can attenuate the negative effects of role overload through withdrawal while exacerbating the positive effects through job crafting on employees’ extra-role performance
Summary
Job stressors have long been an important topic in organizational and industrial psychology (Cooper et al, 2003). Business competition and the recent sanitary crisis (the COVID19 pandemic) have led to an increase in stressors such as workload, job insecurity, and job instability (Bliese et al, 2017; Nemteanu and Dabija, 2021; Nemteanu et al, 2021). Mixed Effect of Role Overload to work anywhere, anytime (Colbert et al, 2016), and organizations are increasingly using the latest technology to monitor employee performance (Harrower, 2019; Kassick, 2019; Pera, 2019; Wingard, 2019), which increases workers’ perceptions of stress (Barley et al, 2011). The purpose of this paper is to explore in the context work-related stress grew and developed over the century, whether and how job stressors affect employees’ extra-role performance
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