Benefiting from creative activity: The positive relationships between creative activity, recovery experiences, and performance‐related outcomes

Abstract

Employees have limited personal time to engage in activities that enable them to recover from a demanding work environment and perform at a high level. To evaluate the importance of non-work creative activity, we conducted two studies that examine the relationships between non-work creative activity, recovery experiences, and performance-related behaviours at work. Study 1 included employees who provided self-rated performance-related outcomes, whereas Study 2 included employees with other-rated (co-workers and subordinates) performance-related outcomes. Creative activity was positively associated with recovery experiences (i.e., mastery, control, and relaxation) and performance-related outcomes (i.e., job creativity and extra-role behaviours). The mediating effects of recovery experiences were examined to better understand the underlying processes involved in the relationship between creative activity and performance-related outcomes. Creative activity was found to have both indirect effects and direct effects on performance-related outcomes, but the effects varied by the type of performance-related outcome. The results indicate that organizations may benefit from encouraging employees to consider creative activities in their efforts to recover from work. Practitioner pointsOrganizations should increase employee awareness of the benefits of creative activity on recovery. Many companies already provide information to employees regarding the importance of specific activities (e.g., eating habits, exercise) on physical health. Information on activities that influence recovery -a psychological health consequence -should be included in the informational resource provided to employees. Organizations may consider professional development opportunities for employees that involve creative activities while away from work. Creative activities are likely to provide valuable experiences of mastery and control, but may also provide employees experiences of discovery that uniquely influence performance-related outcomes. Opportunities used by large organizations, such as Zappos Inc., include employees bringing their artwork to work to decorate their offices. Other options include memberships to art studios, creative writing resources, and access to musical instruments.

The Relationship between Happiness, Subjective Well-Being, Creativity and Job Performance of Primary School Teachers in Ramhormoz City

“…Tabeshfar (2013) in a study on the relationship between creativity and job performance of female working employees in high schools located in Yasouj concluded that there is significant relationship between these two variables. Behtari-Nezhad (2013), Nazem and Hamoudi (2006) and Schliemann (2014) came to the same conclusion with regard to the relationship between creativity and job performance. Taejon and Hokang (2010) in their research found out that higher creativity in marketers is associated with their better performance and higher benefits of the organizations for which they work.…”

Envisioning, Planning and Innovating: A Closer Investigation of Proactive Goal Generation, Innovative Work Behaviour and Boundary Conditions

“…For example, Janssen (2000) found that self-ratings of innovative work behaviour were positively associated with supervisor ratings, while Moneta et al (2010) provided evidence on the convergent validity among selfratings, peer ratings and supervisor ratings of creativity. Likewise, Eschleman et al (2014) indicated that selfratings of creative activity had positive direct effects on supervisor ratings of job creativity, and Baron and Tang (2011) reported a significant positive relationship between self-ratings of creativity and firm-level innovation. Accordingly, it is reasonable to suggest that the use of self-report ratings of innovative work behaviour was not invalid in our study.…”

Regulatory Focus, Task Engagement and Divergent Thinking

“…We recruited 341 non-student participants for this study through StudyResponse, a non-profit provider of pre-screened online respondents for academic purposes (Stanton & Weiss, 2002). This panel has been used successfully for several creativity studies (e.g., Agypt, Rubin & Spivack, 2012;Eschleman et al, 2014). Each respondent was paid US $7 for their participation.…”