This document summarizes a lecture on positive occupational health and work engagement. The lecture discusses how perspectives on work and occupational health are shifting from a traditional negative focus on disease and damage to a positive focus on thriving and optimal human functioning. It defines work engagement as a positive work-related state characterized by vigor, dedication and absorption. The lecture reviews research showing that approximately 25% of employees are engaged, and engagement is higher in certain professions. Engagement is stable over time and influenced by job resources and personal characteristics. Studies link work engagement to improved business outcomes like performance, safety and profitability.

1. Positive occupational health
The challenge for the future
Wilmar Schaufeli
Utrecht University
The Netherlands
&
University of Leuven
Belgium
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2. The Low Countries Leuven Utrecht
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3. City of Utrecht
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4. City of Leuven
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6. The Janus-face of work
Labor: Animal laborans
• Effort
• Strain
• Sacrifice
• Blood, sweat & tears
• ‘In the sweat of thy face shalt
thou eat bread’ (Genesis 3:19)
The traditional view
• Disease
• Disorder
• Damage
• Disability
Opus: Homo faber
• Creativity
• Productivity
• Challenge
• Development
• ‘In and through labor man
becomes man’ (Karl Marx)
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7. “Positive Psychology is the scientific study of optimal human
functioning. It aims to discover and promote the factors that
allow individuals and communities to thrive”
Martin Seligman (1999)
It’s time for a change…..
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8. Positive concepts
• Appreciative inquiry
• Authentic leadership
• Character strengths and
virtues
• Courage
• Emotional intelligence
• Empowerment
• Flourishing
• Flow
• Gratitude
• Hope
• Organizational
virtuousness
• Organizational spontaneity
• Organization based self-etsteem
• Passion
• Psychological capital
• Resilience
• Self-efficacy
• Serving leadership
• Spirituality
• Spirit at work
• Thriving
• Transcendent behavior
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9. Changes in the world of work
From To
• Stability ● Continuous change
• Monoculture ● Diversity
• Vertical hierarchy ● Horizontal networks
• External supervision & control ● Self-control & empowerment
• Dependence on organization ● Accountability & employability
• Fixed schedules & work patterns ● Boundarylessness
• Physical demands ● Mental and emotional demands
• Individual work ● Team work
• Detailed job descriptions ● Job crafting
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10. ‘Psychologization’
For modern organizations, mental capital is of increasing
importance. Therefore they do not need a merely ‘healthy’
workforce but a motivated workforce that is ‘engaged’.
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11. The emergence of engagement
• First used in the 1990’s in business contexts
• Increase of importance of mental capital
• From 2000 onwards also in academia
• Emergence of positive psychology
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12. Engagement = business
• 2,030,000 hits (in 0.19 sec.)
• All major consultancy firms are involved
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13. Engagement is on the rise…
Source: Google Scholar
400
350
300
250
200
150
100
50
0
2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
Work engagement Employee engagement
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Number of publications

14. Why positive?
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Scientific
• To overcome the one-sided negative focus
• To challenge the notion of one-dimensionality
• To add explanatory power
Practical
• To be in line with business developments
• To connect HRM and OH&S
Pragmatic
• It is more appealing
• It is fun

15. What is engagement?
Concept and measurement
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17. Engagement in business
: “Engaged employees consistently demonstrate three general
behaviors. They: (1) Say – consistently speak positively about the
organization to co-workers, potential employees, and customers; (2)
Stay – have an intense desire to be a member of the organization despite
opportunities to work elsewhere; (3) Strive – exert extra time, effort,
and initiative to contribute to business success” (www.hewittassociates.com).
Employee engagement is usually defined in terms of:
• Organizational commitment (affective – say and continuance - stay)
• Extra-role behavior (discretionary effort - strive)
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18. Engagement in academia
“Work engagement is a positive, affective-motivational state of
fulfillment that is characterized by vigor, dedication, and
absorption” (p. 74).
Schaufeli et al. (2002)
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19. Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES)
• Vigor
• “At my job I feel strong and vigorous”
• Dedication
• “I am enthusiastic about my work”
• Absorption
• “I get carried away by my work”
Available in 26 language versions from www.wilmarschaufeli.nl
Finnish version: Seppälä et al. (2009)
Schaufeli et al. (2002, 2006)
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20. What do we know?
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21. Prevalence of engagement
Study Sample Engaged (%)
Gallup (2010) US 28%
Towers Perrin (2005) US 23%
Blessing White (2005) US 21%
Towers Perrin (2004) UK
France
Germany
14%
14%
23%
Gallup (2003) UK
France
Germany
19%
12%
12%
± 25%
± 15%
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22. Demographics of engagement
(N = 4,000 representative Dutch national sample)
• Weak positive relationship with age (r = .10)
• No systematic gender differences
• Differences between professions:
Smulders (2006)
High in engagement:
• entrepreneurs
• teachers
• managers
• artists
• farmers
• sales persons
• nurses
Low in engagement:
• blue-collar workers
• food processing
• printers
• police officers
• ICT-workers
• home care staff
• retail workers
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23. Development of engagement across time
• Engagement is relatively stable across time (Mauno et al., 2007; Seppälä et al.,
2009)
• Engagement and workaholism develop separately, job change
has positive effect (Mäkikangas et al., 2013)
• Vigor and exhaustion do not develop in tandem, but dedication
and cynicism do (Mäkikangas et al., 2012)
• Two profiles: Engaged and Exhausted-Workaholic (Innanen et al., 2014)
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24. Engagement model in business
‘Linkage studies’
Engagement
drivers
Employee
engagement
Business
outcomes
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25. Drivers of engagement
• Trust and integrity of management
• Personal relationship with manager
• Co-workers and team (support, climate)
• Challenging job (autonomy, participation)
• Skill development
• Career opportunities
• Line-of-sight between individual and company performance
• Pride about the company
Source: Gibbons (2006), based on 12 studies using over 500,000 employees around the globe
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26. Business outcomes (linkage studies)
• Sales performance at team level (Bates, 2004 Fleming et al. 2005)
• Customer service productivity (Conference Board, 2003)
• Customer satisfaction (Coco & Jamison, 2011)
• Company’s financial performance (Hewitt, 2004)
• Individual job performance (CLC, 2004)
• Customer’s discretionary purchases (Oakley, 2005)
• Retention and turnover (Towers Perrin, 2005)
For additional case studies see the report to the UK government of MacLeod & Clarke (2010). Engaging
for success: Enhancing performance through engagement.
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27. Engaged vs. non-engaged units
152 organizations; 32,394 business units; 955,905 employees
Gallup, 2010; See also Harter, Schmidt & Hayes, 2002
Absenteeism Safety incidents Quality (defects)
Customer
satisfaction Productivity Profitability
- 37%
- 49%
- 60%
+12%
+18% +16%
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28. Academic studies
• Is engagement something specific?
• What are its antecedents and consequences
• How can it be explained?
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29. Types of affective employee well-being
ACTIVATION
DISPLEASURE PLEASURE
DEACTIVATION
Adapted from Russell (2003)
SATISFIED
WORK
ADDICTED
BURNED-OUT
ENGAGED
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30. Putting the taxomomy to the test
Salanova et al. (2014)
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31. Engagement goes beyond job satisfaction
Correlation between engagement and satisfaction: .53 (k=4, N=9,712)
k N Satisfaction Engagement
Task performance 5 1175 .30 .39
Contextual performance 4 1139 .24 .43
Christian, Garza & Slaughter (2011)
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32. Antecedents
Job resources
• Job control
• Social support
• Performance feedback
• Opportunity to develop
• Task variety
• Responsibility
• Transformational leadership
• Value fit
• Organizational justice
Challenge demands
• Workload
• Time urgency
• Mental demands
For reviews and meta-analyses see: Halbesleben (2010); Mauno et al. (2010); Crawford et al. 2010; Christian et al. (2011)
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33. Antecedents
Challenge demands
• Workload (challenging job)
• Time urgency (idem)
• Mental demands (idem)
Job resources
• Job control (autonomy)
• Social support (co-workers and team)
• Performance feedback (line-of-sight)
• Opportunity to develop (career opportunities)
• Task variety (skill development)
• Responsibility (challenging job)
• Transformational leadership (personal relation with leader)
• Value fit (pride)
• Organizational justice (trust & integrity)
For reviews and meta-analyses see: Halbesleben (2010); Mauno et al. (2010); Crawford et al. 2010; Christian et al. (2011)
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34. Person characteristics
• Emotional stability
• Extraversion
• Conscientiousness
• Optimism
• Self-confidence
• Achievement striving
• Adaptive perfectionism (i.e. personal standards)
For reviews see: Simpson (2009), Schaufeli & Salanova (2008), Schaufeli & Taris (2012)
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35. Individual outcomes
Physical
• Reactivity of the HPA (Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal) –axis (Langelaan et al. 2006)
• Cardiac autonomic activity (Seppälä et al., 2012)
Mental
• Low levels depression (Hakanen & Schaufeli, 2012; Anxiety (Innstrand, 2012)
• Perceived physical/psychosomatic health (Schaufeli, Taris, van Rhenen, 2008)
• Sleep quality (Kubota et al., 20l1); Sleep hygiene (Barber et al., 2013)
Behavioral
• Workability(Airila et al. 2012)
• Proactive behavior (Salanova & Schaufeli, 2008)
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36. Organizational outcomes
• Quality of service as perceived by customers (Salanova et al. 2005, Fischer, 2012)
• Self-reported medical errors (Prins et al., 2009)
• Occup. injuries, adverse events, unsafe behaviors (Nährgang, 2011)
• Manager’s and co-worker’s rated job performance (Halbesleben & Wheeler,
2008)
• Innovativeness (Hakanen, Perhoniemi & Toppinen-Tanner, 2007)
• Frequency of sickness absenteeism (Schaufeli, Bakker & Van Rhenen, 2009)
• Financial return (Xantopoulou, Bakker, Demerouti & Schaufeli, 2008); Pay level (Hakkanen &
Koivumäki, 2014)
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37. A model for work engagement
Challenge
demands
Job
resources
Personal and
organizational
outcomes
Engagement
Personal
resources
Leadership
Adapted from Bakker & Demerouti (2007, 2008)
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38. What we know…
• Work engagement differs from workaholism and job satisfaction
• Similar antecedents of work engagement are identified by business and
academic research
• Business research shows linkage with business outcomes
• Academic research shows links with person characteristics and individual
outcomes and – to a lesser degree – organizational outcomes
• A dynamic psychological motivation process seems to exist
• Leadership might play a crucial (indirect) role
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39. How to improve engagement ?
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40. Interventions
Treatment à Prevention à‘Amplition’
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41. Different levels (empirical evidence)
• Individual level
• Gratefulness and kindness (Ouweneel, Le Blanc & Schaufeli, 2014)
• Mindfulness (Leroy, Anseel, Dimitrova & Sels, 2013)
• Job crafting training (Van den Heuvel, Demerouti & Peeters, 2012)
• Career management training (Vuori, Toppinen-Tanner & Mutanan, 2011)
• Team level
• Manager led group meetings (Allen & Rogeslberg, 2013)
• Caring leadership (Bishop, 2013)
• Team redesign (Cifre, Salanova & Rodriguez, 2010)
• Team-level collaborative job crafting (McClelland, 2014)
• Organization level
• Performance management (Mone et al., 2011)
• Leadership development (Biggs, Brough & Bardour, 2014)
For additional case studies see: MacLeod & Clarke Simpson (2010)
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42. Key-factors for success (consultancy experience)
1. Systematic, stepwise approach
2. Combination of approaches
3. Participation
4. Communication
5. Commitment from top-management
6. Focus on operational leadership
There is neither a ‘silver bullet’ nor a ‘quick fix’
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43. Work engagement…..
• … seems to be a unique construct
• … can be measured in a valid and reliable way
• ... is fostered by job and personal resources
• … has positive consequences for employee and organization
• … may be improved by interventions at different levels
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44. Paljon kiitoksia mielenkiinnostanne!
More information
Academic: www.wilmarschaufeli.nl
Consultancy: www.3ihc.nl
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