Nurturing psychological capital: an examination of organizational antecedents: the role of employee perceptions of teamwork, training opportunities and leader–member exchange

Abstract

PurposeThis paper uses conservation of resources (COR) theory to examine antecedents of psychological capital (PsyCap). Past research shows that employees with high personal resources such as PsyCap also have high work performance. Hence, organizations need information about how to enhance PsyCap. This paper extends existing research by examining potential antecedents of PsyCap. A total of three potential antecedents are tested, including perceptions of individual-level cooperation between employees (i.e. teamwork), relationships between employees and their supervisors (i.e. supervisor–subordinate relationships) and a human resource (HR) practice (i.e. training opportunities).Design/methodology/approachStructural equation modeling (SEM) was used to compare the impact of organizational factors on US and Australian employees' PsyCap.FindingsThe results indicate a significant direct effect of leader–member exchange (LMX) onto PsyCap and a significant indirect effect between LMX and PsyCap through teamwork and through training opportunities for employees in Australia and the USA. Teamwork and training opportunities partially mediate the impact of LMX onto PsyCap for both Australian and US employees.Practical implicationsAustralian employees are likely to reduce their performance because of a perceived loss of personal resources and/or may even experience burnout and/or become a stress-related workers compensation statistic.Originality/valueThe findings suggest that employees in Australia perceived significantly lower levels of supportive resources to draw upon, including from their managers and peers. On applying COR theory, when comparing employees, it was observed that those who perceive fewer resources will be less equipped to produce resource gains. Taking into consideration that employees require the use of resources to maintain personal resources, Australian employees have fewer resources at their disposal to maintain their personal resources (i.e. PsyCap).

Benevolent leadership and organizational citizenship behaviors in a higher education context: a moderated mediation model

“…The nexuses between these different resources are in line with recent scholarly views in which resources do not exist in isolation, but rather travel in caravans for both individuals and organizations (Hobfoll et al. , 2018; Khattak and O’Connor, 2020; Luu, 2019a; Xerri et al. , 2021), as such, one resource can engender another resource (Halbesleben and Wheeler, 2015; Liao and Hui, 2021; Ma et al.…”

Catching emotions: the moderating role of emotional contagion between leader-member exchange, psychological capital and employee well-being

“…Luthans et al (2006) found that employees can be upskilled in PsyCap. Important antecedents of PsyCap include supportive resources and leadership, including organizational support (Luthans et al, 2008), team-based support (Xerri et al, 2021a) and transformational leadership (Gooty et al, 2009), and empowering and ethical leadership (Avey, 2014), all which are critical to successfully influence employee PsyCap.…”

The impact of supervision, training and teamwork on employee psychological capital

“…PsyCap is a construct composed of “[…] hope, optimism, self-efficacy and resilience” (Xerri et al , 2021, p. 1855). It is a higher-order variable which enables the individual to handle stress more effectively and it has been found in previous studies to predict higher individual performance.…”