Employees’ fit to telework and work well-being: (in)voluntariness in telework as a mediating variable?

Abstract

PurposeThe present study aims to examine the mediating role of (in)voluntariness in teleworking in explaining the relationship between employees’ fit to telework and work well-being (i.e. work engagement and exhaustion).Design/methodology/approachA cross-sectional survey design was used in this study. The sample comprised 222 individuals performing telework in Portugal. Statistical analyses employed were descriptive statistics, Pearson’s correlation, confirmatory factor and structural equation analyses, and mediation analysis using Hayes Process macro.FindingsThe findings confirmed the hypothesis that employees’ fit to telework raises the voluntariness in telework and decreases involuntariness in telework. However, contrary to expectations, no significant relationships were found between voluntariness in telework, work engagement and exhaustion. Yet, involuntariness in telework showed a significant role in decreasing work engagement and increasing workers’ exhaustion. The mediating role of involuntariness in telework was confirmed in explaining the relationship between employees’ fit to telework and exhaustion.Practical implicationsManagers in global firms can draw from the results to understand how employees’ fit to telework directly and/or indirectly contributes to work well-being and develop human resource (HR) management practices aiming to increase employees’ fit to telework.Originality/valueAlthough teleworking is already studied, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, no studies have analyzed the same conceptual model employees’ fit to telework, (in)voluntariness in teleworking and work well-being.

The relationship between various social work environment elements and hybrid worker well-being

“…However, employees with high remote work preferences experienced remote work to affect well-being directly and positively (Erro-Garcés et al , 2022). Perceptions may also depend on employee age, gender (Kirchner et al , 2022), and whether remote work is enforced or voluntary (Kirchner et al , 2022; Kaluza and van Dick, 2022; Lopes et al , 2022), and on industry, occupation, job and personal characteristics of the remote worker (Beckel and Fisher, 2022; Nenonen and Sankari, 2022). In addition, the location of remote work (Morganson et al , 2009), the design and condition of the home office (Ng, 2010), the quality of job crafting (Stempel and Siestrup, 2022), the amount of remote work (Niebuhr et al , 2022) and national conditions (Ipsen et al , 2022) may affect well-being and performance.…”

Working from home during lockdown: the impact on performance and wellbeing

“…Remote work requires employees to be relatively self-sufficient and autonomous (Lopes et al, 2023;Malinen, Wong, & Naswall, 2020). In research on blended working arrangements pre-COVID-19, Wörtler, Van Yperen, and Barelds (2021) found that autonomy orientation led to positive attitudes toward the organization.…”

“…The salience of autonomy was evident in the comments of some of our participants, who either appreciated or criticized the degree of autonomy they were given in lockdown. Those who valued autonomy experienced an improved fit either between their actual work and work preferences (person-job fit) or between their actual autonomy and need for autonomy (needs-supplies fit) (Lopes et al, 2023). Some participants suggested that their introverted personalities contributed to psychological comfort while WFH, while the extroverted missed the social contact in the office.…”

“…One promising approach would be a longitudinal investigation of employee experiences of WFH from different contexts, examining the influence of the length of lockdowns, the number of lockdowns, and the changing health, administrative, and community conditions in different geographic areas. This would help to separate the similar costs and benefits to them, for example, isolation and the absence of commuting, from those that are specific to involuntary WFH (Lopes et al, 2023).…”

“…The extent to which people work from home (WFH), an element of remote-, virtual-, flexible-, and tele-work, has increased in recent years (Charalampous, Grant, Tramontano, & Michailidis, 2019;Felstead & Henseke, 2017;Lopes, Dias, Sabino, Cesario, & Peixoto, 2023;Semuels, 2020b). This has been fueled by the growing sophistication of digital technologies, employee preferences, and organizational cultures that value flexibility, innovation, and autonomy (Delanoeije & Verbruggen, 2020;Grant, Wallace, & Spurgeon, 2013;Rothbard, 2020;Wörtler, Van Yperen, & Barelds, 2021).…”