Summary
Academic research on passion is much more complex than the extant literature or popular press portray. Although research on work‐related passion has progressed rapidly over the last decade, ...much remains unknown. We are now just beginning to recognize the different theoretical underpinnings and empirical operationalizations that work passion research has adopted, and the confusion this has generated hampers our understanding of the construct and its relationship to workplace outcomes. Accordingly, we use a meta‐analytic examination to study the work‐related outcomes of three dominant literature streams of work passion: general passion, dualistic passion (i.e., harmonious passion and obsessive passion), and role‐based passion (i.e., passion for developing, passion for founding, and passion for inventing). We employ meta‐analytic techniques using random effects modeling summarizing 106 distinct samples across 87 manuscripts totaling 384 effect sizes (total unique N = 38,481; 43.54% women, average age is 38.04). Importantly, we highlight how each of the three streams of passion relates to various outcomes differently, illuminate several important heretofore undetected nuances in passion research, and provide a roadmap for future inquiry on passion at work.
By integrating conservation of resources and social comparison perspectives, we seek to investigate how employees' own i-deals, independently from and jointly with their coworker's i-deals, determine ...their emotional exhaustion and subsequent deviant behaviors. We conducted a field study (131 coworker dyads) focusing on task i-deals, and used Actor-Partner Interdependence Model and polynomial regression to test the hypotheses. We found that emotional exhaustion not only mediated the negative relationship between employees' own task i-deals and deviant behaviors, but also mediated the positive relationship between upward social comparison of task i-deals (i.e., a coworker's vs own task i-deals) and deviant behaviors. These results demonstrated the intra- and interpersonal implications of task i-deals for emotional exhaustion and subsequent deviant behaviors. The current research not only shifts the attention from a predominantly positive view on i-deals to a more balanced and nuanced view on i-deals' implications, but also sheds light on the interpersonal nature of i-deals and the emotional exhaustion implication of upward social comparison.
We propose a conceptual model that links entrepreneurs' passion, network centrality, and financial performance, and test this model with small business managers in formal business networking groups. ...Drawing on the dualistic model of passion, we explore the relationships that harmonious and obsessive passion have with financial performance, mediated by network centrality. Results indicate that harmoniously passionate entrepreneurs had higher out‐degree centrality in their networking group (i.e., they were more inclined to seek out members to discuss work issues), which increased the income they received from peer referrals and, ultimately, business income. Obsessively passionate entrepreneurs had lower in‐degree centrality (i.e., they were less likely to be approached by peers), and in turn received less income from referrals and less business income. These findings highlight that entrepreneurial passion does not always result in positive financial outcomes – the type of passion makes a difference. Implications for research and practice are discussed.
Summary
Drawing from signaling theory, we propose a work passion transfer model where leaders' passion is transmitted to employees through the former's leadership style and is contingent on ...employees' perceived importance of performance to self‐esteem (IPSE). Data from 201 supervisor–employee dyads from the health‐care industry show that leaders' harmonious passion led to employees' harmonious passion through charismatic leadership, whereas contingent reward leadership accounted for the transfer of obsessive passion; IPSE did not play a moderating role for either form of passion. Results from a supplementary study further reveal that the link between leadership and employee passion operated through employees' perception of leader passion and that employees' IPSE accentuated for the relationship between perceived leader obsessive passion and employees' obsessive passion. This study advances research in work passion, leadership, and signaling theory and provides important implications for managerial practice.
We integrate research in work passion, social influence, and social networks to examine whether work passion can be contagious and “spread” to others, such that an employee's passion is influenced by ...the broader social milieu to become more similar to that of a social referent. We investigate formal (supervisory) and informal (trust-based) referents, and also consider direct and indirect (through common third-parties) avenues through which passion contagion may occur. Using data from 70 full-time employees (providing 4830 pairwise observations) in a non-profit organization, we found that respondents' harmonious passion was more similar to that of people they trusted, but their obsessive passion was less similar to that of the same referents. Respondents who had similar trust relationships to third parties also reported less similar harmonious passion. For both forms of passion, we did not find evidence that employees' passion was related to that of their supervisors, or of coworkers who shared the same supervisor. Overall, the findings provide nuanced insights into whether and which workplace relationships have a role in shaping one's harmonious and obsessive work passion. In doing so, this study contributes to the work passion literature by extending the limited body of works on passion antecedents and the social aspects of passion.
•We examine whether work passion can be contagious among formal and informal referents at work.•We used pairwise data from 70 employees in a non-profit organization to test for passion contagion.•Employees' harmonious work passion was more similar to that of people they trusted.•Employees' obsessive work passion was less similar to that of people they trusted.•Employees with similar trust relationships to third parties had less similar harmonious passion.
Idiosyncratic employment arrangements (i-deals) stand to benefit the individual employee as well as his or her employer. However, unless certain conditions apply, coworkers may respond negatively to ...these arrangements. We distinguish functional i-deals from their dysfunctional counterparts and highlight evidence of i-deals in previous organizational research. We develop propositions specifying both how i-deals are formed and how they impact workers and coworkers. Finally, we outline the implications i-deals have for research and for managing contemporary employment relationships.
While anecdotal industry evidence indicates that passionate workers are engaged workers, research has yet to understand how and when job passion and engagement are related. To answer the how ...question, we draw from person-environment fit theory to test, and find support for, the mediating roles of perceived demands–abilities (D–A) fit and person–organization (P–O) fit in the relationships between passion and job engagement, and between passion and organizational engagement, respectively. Also, because the obsessive form of passion is contingency-driven, we answer the when question by adopting a target-similarity approach to test the contingent role of multi-foci trust in the obsessive passion-to-engagement relationships. We found that when obsessively passionate workers trust their organization, they report greater levels of organizational engagement (because of increased P–O fit). In contrast, when these workers trust both their co-workers and supervisor simultaneously, they report greater levels of job engagement (because of increased D–A fit).
•We study the signaling function of i-deals and their interaction in three studies.•Task i-deals, independently and jointly with financial i-deals, predict OCB.•These relationships are mediated by ...competence need satisfaction.•The competence-signaling function operates even after including LMX, OBSE, and POS.•Financial i-deals facilitate OCB, but not through competence need satisfaction.
By adopting signaling theory as the overarching framework and integrating self-determination theory, we examined the signaling function of task i-deals, financial i-deals, and their interaction. Across three studies with varying measures, we found that task i-deals, independently and jointly with financial i-deals, conveyed a positive message regarding competence in that they were positively related to recipients’ competence need satisfaction. In turn, competence need satisfaction positively related to organizational citizenship behaviors. The competence-signaling function of task i-deals and task-financial i-deals interaction remained significant even after accounting for leader–member exchange, organization-based self-esteem, and perceived organizational support. Financial i-deals, however, did not exhibit a competence-signaling function. The current research sheds light on the signaling function of i-deals and their interaction, and provides guidance on the practice of granting one or multiple types of i-deals.
This research draws on self-determination theory to investigate (a) the role of cooperative psychological climate in promoting harmonious work passion among employees with low intrinsic motivation; ...and (b) the mediating role of harmonious passion in linking cooperative psychological climate to behavioral outcomes. We propose that cooperative psychological climate facilitates harmonious passion and, in particular, plays a compensatory role among employees with low intrinsic motivation. In turn, harmonious passion is expected to facilitate both task performance and interpersonal helping, thereby linking cooperative psychological climate to these employee behaviors. We test the model using data from employees and their supervisors across two countries (Singapore and Brazil) and find cross-national evidence that cooperative psychological climate compensates for low intrinsic motivation to predict harmonious passion. Harmonious passion also positively predicts task performance and interpersonal helping, but only in the Brazilian sample. This research enriches the nomological network of harmonious passion, provides an alternative pathway to driving employee passion when intrinsic motivation is lacking, and underscores the value of considering the joint roles of passion predictors so as to reap the performance benefits of harmonious work passion.
•We examine how to promote harmonious work passion when intrinsic motivation is low.•Data from Singaporean and Brazilian employees were used to test the proposed model.•Cooperative psychological climate compensated for low intrinsic motivation to predict passion.•Harmonious passion increased Brazilian employees' performance and interpersonal helping.•Harmonious passion did not predict Singaporean employees' performance or helping.
We introduce, and empirically test, a model of entrepreneurial burnout that highlights the relationships among job fit, entrepreneurial passion, destiny beliefs, and burnout. Using a sample of 326 ...individuals involved in entrepreneurial jobs, we tested the link between job fit and two forms of passion-harmonious and obsessive-and the moderating role of entrepreneurs' destiny beliefs about work (i.e., the belief that a successful career is "meant to be"). Findings illustrated that their job fit perceptions were positively related to harmonious passion, which in turn negatively predicted burnout. Additionally, the relationship between job fit and obsessive passion was moderated by destiny beliefs, such that it was positive at high and average levels of destiny beliefs. In turn, obsessive passion was positively related to burnout. We discuss implications for both theory and practice.
