Promoting employee’s self‐change skills: The role of job characteristics, goal clarity and learning goals

Abstract

Personal growth initiative (PGI), i.e., self‐change skills, is necessary for employees to adapt to changing environments, but research examining the antecedents of PGI in an organizational context is limited. The present research investigated the antecedents of PGI in the workplace. Using a two‐wave questionnaire survey, data were collected from 204 employees, including nurses, medical technicians and administrative staff, at six healthcare organizations in Japan. The results of hierarchical regression analyses showed that goal clarity and learning goal orientation were positively related to PGI, whereas autonomy, skill variety and job complexity were not significantly related to PGI. The results also showed that goal clarity positively moderated the effect of skill variety on PGI, yet, negatively moderated the effect of job complexity on PGI. This study contributes to the existing literature by demonstrating how personal and situational factors influence employees’ self‐change skills in the workplace.