Switching the Office for the Living Room: Homeworking and the Mediating Role of Job Crafting Between HR Practices and Job Performance
University of Groningen
Master’s Thesis Human Resource Management EBM722B20
17-01-2021
Tjitske Elizabeth ten Boom S2964996
t.e.ten.boom@student.rug.nl
Supervisor: Prof. dr. Onne Janssen o.janssen@rug.nl
Abstract
This study dives deeper into the appliance of job crafting among employees who are forced to work from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on the Ability-Motivation-Opportunity (AMO) framework and job demands-resources (JD-R) theory, the current research proposes that HR practices can enhance the performance of homeworking employees by facilitating job crafting. I hypothesize that AMO-enhancing HR practices can stimulate employees to find a new effective way of working after the switch to homeworking by facilitating job crafting. Following on from that, I propose that job crafting in turn may help employees to find a new desired demands-resources balance in order to perform at home. This research examines an expected mediation effect of job crafting between AMO-enhancing HR practices and task- and contextual performance. Questionnaire data was gathered from employees (N=101) who were forced to work from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Results of regression- and meditation analyses partly confirmed this hypothesis by illustrating that job crafting in the way of decreasing hindering job demands was positively related to task performance, and increasing challenging job demands was positively related to contextual performance. Furthermore, homeworking motivation-enhancing HR practices seemed to be related to increasing structural- and social job resources, and homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices was related to increasing challenging job demands. Finally, results showed a mediation effect of increasing challenging job demands between homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices and contextual performance. These findings contribute to the AMO-framework, JD-R theory and homeworking literatures by showing that HR practices and job crafting behaviors can be effective for employees finding a new way of working after the forced switch to homeworking. Theoretical implications, practical implications and directions for future research are discussed.
Keywords
Introduction
The current COVID-19 pandemic is affecting the world in unfortunate ways since the beginning of 2020. It has, along with health, economic and many other consequences, a direct impact on organizations and its employees. The business world is overpowered with unforeseen rules and regulations from the government, which results in organizations being forced to close their office or take other measures to reduce the possibilities of infections within the workplace. Consequently, employees from all over the world are currently forced to work from home. There is no other way than to assume that this is affecting organizations as well as employees in multiple ways. The pandemic has unexpectedly overwhelmed directors, managers, and supervisors to adjust their way of managing work and people, and it is also imperative for employees to adjust their old way of working when switching the office for the living room. The current study dives deeper into the effects of working from home due to this crisis situation, and examines how it affects the job performance of employees. How are the employees dealing with finding a new effective way of working and how important is the role of HR for this?
I use a job crafting perspective to get a better understanding of how employees adjust their way of working after the switch to homeworking. As working from home is in many ways different from working in an office, employees will have to make changes in their way of working. Based on the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) theory (Bakker & Demerouti, 2014, 2017), job crafting is defined as the changes that employees make to balance their job demands and job resources with their personal abilities and needs (Tims & Bakker, 2010; Tims, Bakker, & Derks, 2012). Job demands refer to job characteristics that require sustained effort from workers and are, therefore, associated with certain costs. Job resources refer to aspects of the job that are either functional in achieving work goals and reducing job demands, or stimulating personal growth, learning, and development (Akkermans & Tims, 2017). Following the JD-R theory, employees who have to switch from working in an office to working from home, are forced to make up a new balance between their job demands and job resources, and will thus be
likely to engage in job crafting to create a comfortable person-job fit. How, why, and to what extent employees will participate in job crafting is expected to differ among them and to depend on specific HR practices.
Specifically, I examine how HR practices might facilitate job crafting at home using the Ability-Motivation-Opportunity (AMO) framework (Appelbaum, Bailey, Berg & Kalleberg, 2000). The AMO framework assumes that employees perform well when they are able to do so (i.e. abilities), have the motivation to do so (i.e. motivation), and have the opportunity to do so (i.e. opportunity to participate). As such, HR practices influence employee performance by impacting their ability (knowledge and skills), motivation, and opportunities to perform in their jobs (Jiang, Lepak, Han, Hong & Kim, 2012; Obeidat, Mitchell & Bray, 2016). Examples of these kind of HR practices are giving instructions and tips on how to work from home (ability-enhancing HR practice), giving feedback or incentives on their work at home (motivation-enhancing HR practice) and having flexible work arrangements that facilitate working from home (opportunity-enhancing HR practice). Based on the AMO framework, I examine how AMO-enhancing HR practices may promote (or inhibit) employee performance through facilitating them in crafting their work at home.
To examine how AMO-enhancing HR practices and job crafting affect employee performance, I make a distinction between two dimensions of job performance: task performance and contextual performance. Task performance refers to the proficiency with which individuals perform the core substantive or technical tasks central to their job (Campbell, 1990). Contextual performance refers to behaviors that support the organizational, social, and psychological environment in which the technical core must function (Borman & Motowidlo, 1993). By examining whether there are differences between task- and contextual performance outcomes, we increase our understanding of whether AMO-enhancing HR practices drive employees to engage in more task performance-related behaviors (e.g. finish tasks on time) or
more contextual performance-related behaviors (e.g. take on extra responsibilities), via job crafting behaviors.
This research contributes to the literatures on the roles of HRM and job crafting in employee performance in several ways. First, it identifies specific HR practices that can facilitate employees to find a new balance between their job demands and job resources and to uphold their task- as well as contextual performance in the crisis situation in which they are forced to work from home. Second, this paper stresses the important role of job crafting within the unique context of forced homeworking, such that job crafting at home mediates in the relationship between homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices and employee performance. Examination into these relations in this specific context is important because it will broaden the job crafting perspective. Furthermore, it will theoretically contribute to the JD-R theory, the AMO framework and the multidimensional nature of job performance by examining whether these theories are applicable within a homeworking context. For example, there will be examined whether finding a new demands-resources balance plays a role in the transition to working from home, and thus whether the JD-R theory is applicable in this situation. Likewise, examining the importance of AMO-enhancing HR practices for the performance of homeworking employees and their engagement in job crafting, will place this AMO-approach in the perspective of working from home. Such a perspective provides us with new insights in the complicated HR-performance relationship. At last, the current study will add to the comprehensibility of the multidimensional nature of job performance, by examining differences between task- and contextual performance of homeworking employees in this crisis situation.
Beside theoretical contributions, the outcomes of this research may provide practical insights into how employees can craft their jobs effectively and how HR practitioners can stimulate this crafting by offering proper AMO-enhancing HR practices. The overarching aim of this paper is to get a better understanding of how employees are dealing with finding a new way of working at home and what the role of HR is in this process. As homeworking, forced or
not, is currently reality for a large part of the world, it will probably get more attention from now on and might become more common in the future. Therefore, a clearer understanding of the concept of homeworking will be fruitful for organizations and its employees.
Theory Job Crafting
According to Tims et al. (2012), job crafting is the changes that employees make to balance their job demands (e.g., high workload or emotionally demanding interactions) and job resources (e.g., autonomy or social support) with their personal abilities and needs. Tims et al. (2012) suggest that job crafting entails four dimensions. Increasing structural job resources are behaviors that aim to increase the autonomy, skill variety, and other motivational characteristics of the job, such as increasing autonomy in how the job is done and increasing opportunities for development. Increasing social job resources are behaviors that aim to increase social characteristics of the job, such as increasing social support and feedback. Increasing challenging job demands are behaviors that aim to increase the challenging, stimulating and invigorating characteristics of the job, such as starting new projects and mastering a new skill. Decreasing hindering job demands are behaviors that aim to minimize physical, cognitive, and emotional demands, such as reducing workload and work-family conflict (Rudolph, Katz, Lavigne & Zacher, 2017).
Job crafting is conceptualized using the JD-R theory, which states that job resources can enhance employee well-being as part of a motivational process and job demands can diminish employee well-being and lead to exhaustion and burnout (Bakker & Demerouti, 2007). Tims et al. (2012), however, make a distinction between hindering demands and challenging demands, based upon multiple findings illustrating how demands of a certain level can turn out to be beneficial if they challenge employees. For example, increasing challenging job demands can stimulate employees to develop their knowledge and skills and attain more difficult goals (LePine, Podsakoff, & LePine, 2005). Furthermore, increasing challenging demands is found to
be positively related with work engagement (Crawford, LePine, & Rich, 2010), and can offer mastery experiences that in turn may lead to satisfaction and high levels of self-efficacy (Gorgievski & Hobfoll, 2008). Following on from this, Tims et al. (2012) show that increasing challenging demands is, next to crafting social resources and structural resources, significantly positively related with work engagement, employability, and performance. According to the JD-R theory, employees proactively increase their job resources and challenging job demands and decrease their hindering job demands (Bakker & Demerouti, 2017).
Through job crafting, an employee can cope with uncertainty and changes, and adapt to challenges and constraints caused by their job (Berg, Wrzesniewski, & Dutton, 2010). As such, job crafting seems to be functional and beneficial for employees (Akkermans & Tims, 2017). Specifically, previous research has shown that individuals who craft their jobs by modifying their job demands and resources experience more meaning, are more engaged in their work, and perform better than those who do not proactively redesign their jobs (Rudolph et al., 2017; Tims et al., 2016). Petrou, Demerouti and Schaufeli (2015) identify that employees apply different job crafting strategies during organizational change. On the one hand, they cope with stress by reducing job demands. On the other hand, they create an environment to make the most out of it by seeking resources, which in turn enhances performance.
Homeworking Crafting and Performance
In this research, following Petrou et al. (2015), I examine effects of job crafting in a changing work environment (i.e., from working in an office to working from home). Overall, homeworking itself seems to have positive influences on performance (Bailey & Kurland, 2002; Bloom, Liang, Roberts & Ying, 2015) as well as the subjective well-being of employees (Reuschke, 2019). Specifically, Nakrošienė, Bučiūnienė, and Goštautaitė (2019) found that higher self-reported productivity achieved from work from home was related to reduced time in communicating with co-workers, a suitable working place at home and the possibility of better balancing work and taking care of family members. Despite the upcoming attention within the
HR research field for homeworking due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it is still unclear what the role of job crafting is when replacing the office for home forced by the current pandemic. Job crafting behaviors at home will in this paper be termed as homeworking crafting, which refers to the changes that homeworking employees make to balance their job demands and job resources with their personal abilities and needs. Using Tims et al.’s (2012) four-dimensional job crafting model, employees can craft their work from home by for example increasing their autonomy in planning, organizing and controlling their work (increasing structural job resources), seeking help and support from colleagues and sharing experiences of homeworking with one another (increasing social job resources), learning how to effectively communicate via digital channels (increasing challenging job demands), and creating a clean and quiet workplace (decreasing hindering job demands). In this way, each of the four dimensions of homeworking crafting can help employees cope with the changes.
As a result of coping with changes, it is expected that homeworking crafting eventually will lead to a higher homeworking performance. By engaging in the four dimensions of homeworking crafting, employees are expected to find a new optimal demands-resources balance which in turn will optimize their person-job fit and meet their personal preferences and needs for homeworking in order to perform. These expectations are consistent with the current literature, which in general describes beneficial effects of proactive behaviors like job crafting on job performance (Bakker, Tims & Derks, 2012; Gordon, Demerouti, Le Blanc, & Bipp, 2015; Tims et al., 2015), and performance-related outcomes as burnout, work engagement, self-image, perceived control and readiness to change (Crawford et al., 2010; Demerouti & Bakker, 2014; Lyons, 2008). Job crafting behaviors may be positively related to performance because they indeed seem to improve the person-job fit which, in turn, facilitates performance (Edwards, Caplan, & Harrison, 1998; Kristof-Brown, Zimmerman, & Johnson, 2005). However, more research is needed to get a better understanding of how homeworking crafting may influence different types of employee performance.
Task performance. Traditionally, individual job performance was conceptualized in terms of task performance, referring to the proficiency with which individuals perform the core substantive or technical tasks central to their job (Borman & Motowidlo, 1993). Behaviors related to task performance contribute to the production of a good or the provision of a service (Rotundo & Sackett, 2002), and are often described in terms of work quantity and quality, job skills and job knowledge (Koopmans, Bernaards, Hildebrandt, De Vet & Van der Beek, 2014). Gordon et al. (2018) highlight in their research on the association between job crafting behaviors and task- and contextual performance that seeking challenges as well as resources results in an increase in task performance. In addition, Rudolph et al. (2017) demonstrate in their meta-analysis reviewing among other things the associations between job crafting and task- and contextual performance, that increasing structural job resources is the most important job crafting dimension in terms of self-rated task performance. Likewise, the importance of increasing social job resources and challenging demands for task performance is acknowledged in Rudolph et al.’s review (2017), conforming to the outcomes of more recent meta-analyses supporting the effectiveness of job crafting in the form of increasing resources and challenging demands (Lazazzara, Tims & De Gennaro, 2020; Lichtenthaler & Fischbach, 2019).
In line with the abovementioned suggestions, I assume that increasing structural job resources will contribute to task performance at home, considering optimizing structural characteristics of the job could help recreate a desired job design for homeworking in order to carry out the core tasks and responsibilities of the job at home (e.g., altering the sequence of executing these tasks). To the same end, I assume that increasing social job resources will contribute to task performance at home, considering optimizing social aspects of the job could, despite the lack of face-to-face contact with colleagues and supervisors while working from home, attain satisfactory levels of feedback, coaching and interaction (e.g., actively seeking feedback on performed tasks at home). In addition, I assume that increasing challenging job demands will contribute to task performance at home, considering optimizing the challenging,
stimulating and invigorating characteristics of the job could motivate employees to develop their knowledge and skills or to attain more difficult goals in order to carry out the core tasks and responsibilities of the job at home (e.g., keeping skills and knowledge regarding homeworking up-to-date).
Despite the generally supported effectiveness of job crafting in the form of increasing resources and challenging demands, findings supporting the effectiveness of reducing hindering demands are limited (Lazazzara et al., 2020; Lichtenthaler & Fischbach, 2019; Rudolph et al., 2017). On top of that, negative effects of reducing demands on work engagement (Petrou et al., 2012) and performance (Tims et al., 2013) are also found. This may relate to the fact that reducing job demands can be effortful in itself and therefore somewhat drain energy (Bakker & Oerlemans, 2019). However, if job demands become too overwhelming or hindering, reducing them can help employees achieve their work goals (Tims & Bakker, 2010; Petrou et al., 2015), and prevent burnout (LePine et al., 2005). Hence, I assume that reducing hindering job demands will contribute to task performance at home, considering the sudden switch to homeworking due to COVID-19 can be very stressful and might come along with various physical, cognitive, and emotional demands. Minimizing them can help employees focus on their core responsibilities and tasks and remain functioning at home (e.g., minimize distractions at home by creating a quiet workplace).
Based on the proposed positive effects of homeworking crafting on task performance, the following is expected:
Hypothesis 1: Homeworking crafting in the form of (a) increasing structural job resources, (b) increasing social job resources, (c) increasing challenging job demands and (d) decreasing hindering job demands is positively related with task performance.
Contextual performance. More recently, the conceptualization of individual work performance has taken a broader perspective than the traditional focus on only task performance, capturing the multidimensional nature of performance (Dalal et al., 2012). As such, contextual
performance has been differentiated from task performance, with the former referring to extra-role behaviors that support the organizational, social, and psychological environment in which the technical core must function (Borman & Motowidlo, 1993). Behaviors related to contextual performance contribute to the goals of the organization by optimizing employees’ social and psychological environment (Rotundo & Sackett, 2002). Common examples of these extra-role behaviors are helping coworkers, volunteering for tasks, and defending the organization (Borman & Motowidlo, 1993). The difference with task performance is that in contextual performance, the effective functioning of the organization is promoted, but not necessarily with a direct effect on productivity (MacKenzie, Podsakoff, & Fetter, 1991). Looking at the nature of job crafting (i.e., making changes for a better person-job fit by taking control over the daily work environment to meet personal preferences and needs), I propose that job crafting-related behaviors may relate to contextual performance in other ways than to task performance. Therefore, it is important to take the task- and contextual performance distinction into account when examining the effect of homeworking crafting on different forms of homeworking performance.
Research reviewing the relation of job crafting behaviors and contextual performance suggests that seeking resources is in general related to an increase in contextual performance, however the effects of increasing challenging demands and decreasing hindering demands on contextual performance are in a lower degree discussed (Gordon et al., 2018; Rudolph et al., 2017). Rudolph et al.’s (2017) meta-analytical findings for instance display that increasing structural job resources is the most important crafting dimension in terms of contextual performance, however increasing challenging demands seems to be less effective. Decreasing hindering demands was not associated with contextual performance at all (Rudolph et al., 2017). On top of that, Gordon and colleagues (2015) found that decreasing hindering demands was significantly negatively related to contextual performance.
Following on from the abovementioned suggestions, I assume that increasing structural job resources will contribute to contextual performance at home, considering optimizing structural characteristics of the job (e.g., developing homeworking capabilities or increasing autonomy in when and how the job is done) may help employees to recreate a daily work-environment for homeworking. In this way, seeking structural job resources will not necessarily have a direct effect on workers’ responsibilities, but rather supports the environment in which the technical tasks are executed (e.g., working on different hours so it matches with the employees’ family schedule). To the same end, I assume that increasing social job resources will contribute to contextual performance at home, considering optimizing social aspects of the job could maintain a decent level of interaction and support the social and psychological environment (e.g., discuss with supervisor to evaluate homeworking performance more often if desired or seek social support by sharing homeworking experiences with colleagues). In addition, I assume that increasing challenging job demands will contribute to contextual performance at home, considering optimizing the challenging, stimulating and invigorating characteristics of the job could keep employees engaged with the organization and motivated to participate in extra-role behaviors and take on extra responsibilities (e.g., come up with creative solutions for homeworking). Lastly, I assume that decreasing hindering job demands will diminish contextual performance at home, considering minimizing the experienced physical, cognitive, and emotional demands while executing the core responsibilities and tasks of the job at home could leave the employee with less time, energy and interest left to participate in extra-role behaviors and take on extra responsibilities. This hypothesis is based on the assumption that after the switch to homeworking, employees will primarily be focused their main responsibilities and individual performance, rather than supporting the overall organizational environment and performance. Therefore, it is expected that optimizing task performance at home by decreasing hindering demands comes at the expense of contextual performance. Furthermore, if employees experience a lot of hindering demands within their work environment, this can be unfavorable for their
contextual performance. So the extent to which employees need to decrease hindering demands, might be an indicator of contextual performance.
Based on these findings and the expected effects of homeworking crafting on contextual performance, the following is expected:
Hypothesis 2: Homeworking crafting in the form of (a) increasing structural job resources, (b) increasing social job resources and (c) increasing challenging job demands is positively related with contextual performance, whereas (d) decreasing hindering job demands is negatively related with contextual performance.
AMO-enhancing HR Practices
There are several ideas and theories to understand how HR impacts performance, and research is still going on to come to a better understanding of this “black box” in the relationship between performance-oriented HR practices and employee performance (Obeidat et al., 2016). The Ability-Motivation-Opportunity (AMO) framework (Appelbaum et al., 2000) assumes that employees perform well when they have the ability, motivation, and opportunity to do so. HR practices can, according to the AMO framework, thus influence employee performance by increasing their ability (knowledge and skills), motivation, and opportunities to perform in their jobs (Jiang et al., 2012; Obeidat et al., 2016). Positive performance outcomes of AMO-enhancing HR practices were found regardless of gender (Edgar, Blaker & Everett, 2020) or culture (Dastmalchian et al., 2018; 2020). Moreover, Guan and Frenkel (2018) highlight that when management maintains a strong AMO-enhancing HR system, employees are more likely to be engaged in their work and participate in job crafting, thereby suggesting that the HR-performance relationship is mediated by job crafting. Berdicchia and Masino (2019) indeed found that for example participation in decision making is positively related to employee performance via employee job crafting of structural job resources and challenging job demands. In this way, an opportunity-enhancing HR practice (i.e., participation in decision making) can apparently impact performance by facilitating job crafting behaviors.
AMO-enhancing HR Practices for Homeworking
Based on the abovementioned research literatures of AMO-enhancing HR practices and job crafting, I propose that AMO-enhancing HR practices facilitate employees to craft their homeworking. Homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices refers to HR practices that enhance the ability, motivation, and opportunity of homeworking for employees. First, I assume that homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices facilitate increasing structural job resources. I propose that ability-enhancing HR practices of giving training or tutorials to improve skills for homeworking enables employees to increase their autonomy and skill variety for homeworking, and thus increase their structural resources. For example, if employees experience hindrance from the lack of self-discipline after switching to homeworking, it can be valuable for them to offer training in for example time-management, so that they can keep their professionalism and skills regarding homeworking up-to-date. Second, I assume that homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices facilitate increasing social job resources. Specifically, I propose that motivation-enhancing HR practices of regularly evaluating performance, receiving feedback, appraising improvements, and sharing experiences in homeworking do increase employees’ interaction with supervisors and colleagues, and thus increase their social resources. Third, I assume that homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices facilitate increasing challenging job demands. That is, I propose that opportunity-enhancing HR practices of involving employees in questions regarding homeworking and taking their ideas and suggestions seriously can stimulate employees to search for creative solutions to optimize homeworking and try out new developments regarding homeworking, and thus increase their challenging demands. Finally, I assume that homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices facilitate decreasing hindering job demands. I propose that opportunity-enhancing HR practices of offering the right equipment and facilities to work from home can help employees reduce obstacles and hindrances to effectively work from home, and thus decrease their hindering demands.
So all in all, based on earlier findings and the expected importance of homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices for participation in each of the four dimensions of homeworking crafting, the following is expected:
Hypothesis 3a: Homeworking ability-enhancing HR practices are positively related with increasing structural job resources.
Hypothesis 3b: Homeworking motivation-enhancing HR practices are positively related with increasing social job resources.
Hypothesis 3c: Homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices are positively related with increasing challenging job demands.
Hypothesis 3d: Homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices are positively related with decreasing hindering job demands.
The Mediating Role of Homeworking Crafting
Taken it all together, my research model (see Figure 1) specifies that homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices positively influence homeworking crafting which in turn positively influences task- and contextual performance. Thus, this mediation model proposes that homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices relate to task- and contextual performance through homeworking crafting, as formulated in the final hypothesis:
Hypothesis 4a: Homeworking crafting in the form of increasing structural job resources, increasing social job resources, increasing challenging job demands and decreasing hindering job demands positively mediates the indirect relationship between homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices and task performance.
Hypothesis 4b: Homeworking crafting in the form of increasing structural job resources, increasing social job resources and increasing challenging job demands positively mediates the indirect relationship between homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices and contextual performance, while homeworking crafting in the form of decreasing hindering job demands
negatively mediates the indirect relationship between homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices and contextual performance.
Figure 1. Conceptual framework.
Method Sample
To test the hypotheses, a questionnaire survey was conducted. In total, 101 respondents completed the questionnaire. The participants were employees who were forced to work from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Most of them were Dutch (86%), but there were also some Malaysian (5%), Brazilian (4%), German (3%), Greek (1%) and Spanish (1%). Of the total number of participants, 35.6% were male and 64.4% female. The age of the respondents varied from 20 to 66 (M = 37.97, SD = 14.68). On average, the employees had 15.42 years of working experience (SD = 14.13) of which 6.53 years in their current organization (SD = 8.74). The level of completed education varied from middle school or equivalent to master or equivalent, of which the most employees (42.6%) completed master or equivalent. Most of the respondents had little to no experience with working from home before COVID-19, indicating a low percentage of their total hours working from home before COVID-19 (M = 10.03, SD = 17.62). Eighty-two percent of the employees were, by the time of completing the questionnaire, still in their homeworking period. During their homeworking period, respondents worked an average of 89.66% of their total working hours from home (SD = 22.57).
Potential respondents for this research were approached using my own network. They were contacted face-to-face, via LinkedIn, by phone or by e-mail. Beforehand, they were asked if they have had a homeworking period due to COVID-19 and, if so, if they wanted to share their experiences of homeworking by participating in my research. After they agreed to participate, the respondents received a link to fill in the questionnaire online, using the software program Qualtrics. In the beginning of the questionnaire, the content and the purpose of the study was explained. It was made clear that for additional questions they could contact the researcher. It was also emphasized that participation was voluntary and that the questionnaire was anonymous to protect confidentiality. By checking the following box: “I understand all of the above and agree to participate in this research”, participants made clear if they consented to continue. They could leave the questionnaire at any time. The questionnaire was available in Dutch and English and contained multiple questions about homeworking experiences. For example, how many hours they worked from home before, during and after their homeworking period, and questions about their experiences of homeworking, HR practices and performance. Some demographic data was furthermore collected, like age, gender and highest level of completed education. It took the respondents approximately 15 minutes to complete the full questionnaire.
Measures
Homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices were measured using an adapted version of the AMO-enhancing HR practices-scale developed by Vermeeren (2009). The original items were adjusted in order to measure AMO-enhancing HR practices specific for homeworking. Homeworking ability-enhancing and homeworking motivation-enhancing HR practices were each assessed with eight items. Example items are: “My organization facilitates me to improve my skills for homeworking” (ability-enhancing HR practice) and “My homeworking performance is part of my performance appraisal” (motivation-enhancing HR practice). Homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices were assessed with 13 items, among which “My organization provides me with the right facilities to work from home”. Responses were
given on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree). The items were transferred into single variables for homeworking ability- (M = 3.07, SD = 0.90, α = 0.85), motivation- (M = 2.93, SD = 0.70, α = 0.82), and opportunity-enhancing HR practices (M = 3.45, SD = 0.51, α = 0.67).
Homeworking crafting was measured using an adapted version of the job crafting scale developed by Tims et al. (2012). The original items were adjusted in order to measure job crafting at home. Increasing structural job resources, increasing social job resources and increasing challenging job demands were each assessed with five items. Examples items are: “I try to develop my homeworking capabilities” (increasing structural job resources), “I ask my supervisor to coach me in working from home” (increasing social job resources), and “I try to make my work at home more challenging by examining and improving suboptimal aspects of my job” (increasing challenging job demands). Decreasing hindering job demands were assessed with six items, among which “I make sure that my work at home does not exhaust me mentally”. Responses were given on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = rarely to 5 = very often). The items were transferred into single variables for increasing structural job resources (M = 3.08, SD = 0.76, α = 0.83), increasing social job resources (M = 1.83, SD = 0.73, α = 0.79), increasing challenging job demands (M = 2.40, SD = 0.79, α = 0.76), and decreasing hindering job demands (M = 2.68, SD = 0.72, α = 0.73).
Task- and contextual performance were measured using an adapted version of the Individual Work Performance Questionnaire by Koopmans et al. (2014). The original items were adjusted in order to measure the task- and contextual performance at home. Task performance was measured with five items, among which “I manage to plan my work from home so that it is done on time”. Contextual performance was measured with eight items, among which: “I take on extra responsibilities”. Responses were given on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = rarely to 5 = very often). The items were transferred into single variables for task performance (M = 3.46, SD = 0.70, α = 0.74) and contextual performance (M = 3.08, SD = 0.76, α = 0.85).
Control variables. The analyses were controlled for age, gender, tenure, and hours worked from home and from the regular workplace for both before and during the forced homeworking period.
Results Descriptive Statistics and Correlations
The correlations between variables are displayed in Table 1. A lot of the independent-, mediator-, dependent-, and control variables correlated significantly with each other. Task performance correlated significantly with gender (1 = male, 2 = female), r = 0.25, p = < .05. Contextual performance correlated significantly with the hours worked from home during the participants’ homeworking period, r = 0.37, p = < .01. Tenure correlated significantly with homeworking ability-enhancing, r = 0.23, p = < .05, and opportunity-enhancing HR practices, r = 0.22, p = < .05. Gender correlated significantly with homeworking opportunity-enhancing, r = 0.14, p = < .05, and motivation-enhancing HR practices, r = 0.08, p = < .05. Increasing structural job resources correlated significantly and negatively with the hours worked from the regular workplace during the forced homeworking period, r = -0.22, p = < .05. Increasing social job resources correlated significantly with the hours worked from the regular workplace before COVID-19, r = 0.22, p = < .05. Increasing challenging job demands correlated
significantly with the hours worked from home during the forced homeworking period, r = 0.24, p = < .05, and the hours worked from the regular workplace before COVID-19, r = 0.23, p = < .05. Decreasing hindering job demands correlated significantly and negatively with the hours worked from the regular workplace during homeworking period, r = -0.26, p = < .05.
Hypotheses Testing
In order to test the hypotheses, regression analyses have been performed. The results of the regression analyses for hypotheses 1, 2 and 3 are displayed in Table 2 and 3.
Homeworking crafting and task performance. To test hypothesis 1, predicting homeworking crafting in the form of (a) increasing structural job resources, (b) increasing
social job resources, (c) increasing challenging job demands and (d) decreasing hindering job demands to be positively related with task performance, I included simultaneously each of the four dimensions of homeworking crafting in a regression analysis to predict task performance. Inconsistent with hypothesis 1, increasing structural job resources was not found to be
significantly and positively related with task performance (β = .208, t(76) = 1.648, p = .104). Neither did increasing social job resources (β = -.024, t(76) = -.203, p = .840), and increasing challenging job demands (β = -.027, t(76) = -.244, p = .808). However, in line with hypothesis 1, decreasing hindering job demands was found to be significantly and positively related with task performance (β = .272, t(76) = 2.491, p < .05).
Homeworking crafting and contextual performance. To test hypothesis 2, predicting homeworking crafting in the form of (a) increasing structural job resources, (b) increasing social job resources and (c) increasing challenging job demands to be positively related with contextual performance, whereas (d) decreasing hindering job demands to be negatively related with contextual performance, I ran a second regression analysis including each of the four dimensions of homeworking crafting but now with contextual performance as the
dependent variable. Inconsistent with hypothesis 2, increasing structural job resources was not found to be significantly positively related with contextual performance (β = .174, t(76) = 1.565, p = .122). Neither was increasing social job resources (β = .075, t(76) = .719, p = .474). However, in line with hypothesis 2, increasing challenging job demands was found to be significantly positively related with contextual performance (β = .440, t(76) = 4.574, p < .000). Decreasing hindering job demands was, inconsistent with hypothesis 2, not significantly negatively related with contextual performance (β = .054, t(76) = .560, p = .577).
Homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices and homeworking crafting. To test hypothesis 3a-d, predicting homeworking ability-enhancing HR practices to be positively related with increasing structural job resources, homeworking motivation-enhancing HR practices to be positively related with increasing social job resources, homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR
practices to be positively related with increasing challenging job demands and decreasing hindering job demands, I ran four separate regression analyses. Specifically, I regressed each of the four dimensions of homeworking crafting on homeworking ability-, motivation-, and opportunity-enhancing HR practices.
Homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices and increasing structural job resources. Inconsistent with hypothesis 3a, homeworking ability-enhancing HR practices (β = .113, t(76) = 1.104, p = .273) did not contribute to the prediction of increasing structural job resources. Neither did homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices (β = .103, t(76) = .705, p = .483). However, increasing structural job resources was significantly positively related with homeworking motivation-enhancing HR practices (β = .248, t(76) = 2.205, p < .05).
Homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices and increasing social job resources. Consistent with hypothesis 3b, increasing social job resources was significantly positively related with homeworking motivation-enhancing HR practices (β = .283, t(76) = 2.511, p < .05). However, increasing social job resources was not significantly positively related with homeworking ability- (β = -.006, t(76) = -.055, p = .956), and opportunity-enhancing HR practices (β = .158, t(76) = 1.076, p = .285).
Homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices and increasing challenging job demands. Consistent with hypothesis 3c, increasing challenging job demands was significant positively related with homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices (β = .407, t(76) = 2.464, p < .05). However, increasing challenging job demands was not significantly positively related with homeworking ability- (β = .034, t(76) = .292, p = .771), and motivation-enhancing HR practices (β = .120, t(76) = .942, p = .349).
Homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices and decreasing hindering job demands. Inconsistent with hypothesis 3d, homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices (β = .129, t(76) = .881, p = .381) did not contribute to the prediction of decreasing hindering job
demands. Neither did homeworking ability- (β = .111, t(76) = 1.080, p = .283), and motivation-enhancing HR practices (β = .020, t(76) = .177, p = .860).
Mediation Analyses
Furthermore, Hayes’ (2017) PROCESS-macro (model 4) was used to test the hypothesized mediation effects of homeworking crafting in the indirect relationships of homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices with task and contextual performance. Specifically, I tested two series of mediation analyses to test the indirect effects of homeworking ability-, motivation-, and opportunity-enhancing HR practices on task performance and contextual performance with each of the four dimensions of homeworking crafting as mediators. In doing so, three separate analyses for task performance and three separate analyses for contextual performance were performed to test the indirect effects of each of the three types of homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices controlled for the other two types.
As can be seen in Table 4, for each of the four proposed mediators (i.e. increasing structural job resources, increasing social job resources, increasing challenging job demands and decreasing hindering job demands) the current study did not find a positive mediation effect in the indirect relationships between each of the three types of homeworking AMO (ability-, motivation-, or opportunity)-enhancing HR practices and task performance. Despite contradicting with hypothesis 4a, this outcome is consistent with the results of the previously performed regression analyses in order to test hypotheses 1-3, as none of the proposed mediators related significantly with both homeworking ability-, motivation-, or opportunity-enhancing HR practices and task performance.
Regarding contextual performance, the results in Table 4 show that only increasing challenging job demands mediates the indirect relationship between homeworking
opportunity-enhancing HR practices and contextual performance (b = .1580, SEb = .0859, 95% bias correlated and accelerated confidence interval (BCA CI) = 0.0169 – 0.3556). This
performed regression analyses in order to test hypotheses 1-3, as increasing challenging job demands related significantly positively with both homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices and contextual performance. Inconsistent with hypothesis 4b, for the proposed mediators increasing structural job resources and increasing social job resources, the current study did not find a positive mediation effect on the indirect relationships between each of the three types of homeworking AMO (ability-, motivation-, or opportunity)-enhancing HR practices and contextual performance. Furthermore, for the proposed mediator of decreasing hindering job demands, there was no negative mediation effect found for the indirect relations between each of the three types of homeworking AMO (ability-, motivation-, and
opportunity)-enhancing HR practices and contextual performance. These outcomes are consistent with the results of the previously performed regression analyses in order to test hypotheses 1-3, as increasing structural- and social job resources did not relate significantly positively with homeworking ability-, motivation-, or opportunity-enhancing HR practices and contextual performance. Furthermore, decreasing hindering job demands did not relate
significantly positively with homeworking ability-, motivation-, or opportunity-enhancing HR practices, and significantly negatively with contextual performance.
Discussion
The present study examined the role of job crafting among employees who were forced to work from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic. More specific, it explored the effects of job crafting behaviors in the relationships between Ability-Motivation-Opportunity (AMO)-enhancing HR practices and task- and contextual performance.
Main Findings
First, I expected homeworking crafting to increase task- and contextual performance. Partial support was found for this proposition, whereas increasing structural- and social job resources were not related to task- or contextual performance. However, this study
task performance. A possible explanation for this found relation could be that decreasing hindering job demands serves the employee to focus more on its in-role prescribed behaviors and core responsibilities. Moreover, results illustrated that increasing challenging job demands enhances contextual performance. This could possibly be explained by the idea that employees might want to challenge themselves by looking beyond their core responsibilities and tasks and search for extra and/or more complicated tasks. Challenges can also be found in for example focusing on improving the environment in which the core responsibilities are performed. As follows, these challenging extra-role behaviors could thus promote the contextual performance of employees, as the focus is not primarily on the technical tasks central to the job, but rather on supporting the organizational, social and psychological environment for homeworking. All in all, regarding the relation between homeworking crafting and homeworking performance, seeking resources seems to be less important than increasing challenging demands and decreasing hindering demands. This might be related to the fact that being forced to switch to homeworking can be an intense and stressful event, accompanied with various demands. Employees may thus possibly primarily focus on decreasing their hindering demands and use challenging demands to deal with this stressful event, rather than focusing on seeking
resources for optimizing their performance. Perhaps, increasing resources could be more valuable for employees at a later stage in longer homeworking periods, when they are more used to the switch and experience less demands.
Furthermore, I expected that homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices could enhance homeworking crafting. More specific, I proposed that homeworking ability-enhancing HR practices would make a crucial contribution in facilitating increasing structural job resources, homeworking motivation-enhancing HR practices in facilitating increasing social job resources and homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices in facilitating increasing challenging- and decreasing hindering job demands. This study illustrated that homeworking motivation-enhancing HR practices enhances increasing structural job resources and, as expected, social
job resources. The engagement in specific seeking resources instead of increasing challenging demands or decreasing hindering demands might be related to the regulatory focus theory (Higgins, 1997), implying that people with higher levels of promotion focus concentrate on their hopes, accomplishments, and gains while pursuing their goals. Keeping employees motivated to perform at home could possibly make them more goal-oriented and promotion focused and thus more susceptible for possible resources enabling them to perform. This is in line with recent literature confirming that promotion focus is strongly associated with both increasing structural- and social resources (Rudolph et al. 2017). This study moreover illustrated that homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices enhances increasing challenging job demands. As proposed, a possible explanation for this relation could be that involving employees in the process of switching to homeworking and offering them sufficient opportunities to perform at home might stimulate employees to try out new developments and search for creative solutions to optimize the switch to homeworking. Different from
motivation- and opportunity-enhancing HR practices, ability-enhancing HR practices did not significantly enhance any of the four dimensions of job crafting. The lack of support for the effectiveness of ability-enhancing HR practices might be related to the fact that employees are not actually incapable of working from home due to the lack of homeworking skills and abilities, but rather need to be motivated and supported to use them. Enhancing the abilities for homeworking will therefore perhaps make no difference in participation in job crafting. For example, if employees are stimulated by the organization to enhance their abilities for
homeworking but yet feel like they are skilled enough to work from home, they might do not feel the need to make changes and craft their jobs in order to optimize their skills and
performance.
Finally, I expected that homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices relate to task- and contextual performance through the mediating role of homeworking crafting. Results of the study illustrated that homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices relate to contextual
performance through increasing challenging job demands. A possible explanation for this mediation effect could be that if employees have sufficient opportunities to execute more or challenging tasks, they can be stimulated to challenge themselves and participate in extra-role behavior. Furthermore, involving employees in for example decision-making processes regarding homeworking could stimulate them to think about new developments or creative solutions, which in turn facilitates an organizational performance-oriented view. Consequently, employees might engage more in contextual performance-related behaviors. This proposition is in line with the findings of Berdicchia and Masino (2019), as they indeed demonstrated that participation in decision making is positively related to employee performance via structural job resources and challenging job demands.
Theoretical Implications
The current study’s findings make several contributions to the literature on homeworking, especially what role AMO-enhancing HR practices and job crafting can play for facilitating homeworking employees to enhance their task- and contextual performance. This study broadens the job crafting perspective by examining employees’ engagement in job crafting when they are forced to change their way of working. It extends previous literature by shifting the focus away from employees who voluntarily choose to switch to work from home and as a result make work-related changes in order to find a new desired balance of demands and resources (Bakker & Demerouti, 2017; Rudolph et al., 2017; Tims et al., 2016), to a focus on employees who are forced to work from home and whose situation and work environment thus involuntarily changes. This study illustrates that employees who involuntarily go through a work environment change (forced to change their office for home) also do participate in job crafting behaviors. As such, the present study adds new perspectives and insight in the research to the notion of job crafting. This research’s findings suggests that research on job crafting may need to consider a wide range of factors, such as external involuntary changes, that may underlie participation in job crafting.
In addition, I demonstrated that job crafting in the form of decreasing hindering- and increasing challenging job demands can have an impact on respectively task- and contextual performance. The lack of support for the effects of seeking resources challenges with the JD-R theory and the current literature on job crafting. In general, past research namely suggest that employees are trying to find a balance between their job demands and their job resources, and that crafting social resources, structural resources and challenging demands is significantly positively related with work engagement, employability, and performance (Tims et al., 2012; Bakker & Demerouti, 2007; 2017; Rudolph et al., 2017). However in this case, increasing challenging demands and decreasing hindering demands seem to be more important than increasing resources for homeworking performance. By showing that seeking resources does not significantly contribute to task- or contextual performance, the present findings thus suggest to be cautious with the assumption that seeking resources is often associated with positive consequences. In addition, the positive impact of decreasing hindering demands on task performance reflects on past findings displaying on the one hand negative effects of reducing demands on work engagement (Petrou et al., 2012) and performance (Tims et al., 2013), and on the other hand positive effects of reducing demands on achieving work goals (Tims & Bakker, 2010; Petrou et al., 2015) and prevention of burnout (LePine et al., 2005). My found positive relation between decreasing hindering job demands and task performance adds more clarity and a better understanding of the effects of decreasing hindering demands. Furthermore, the found positive relation of increasing challenging job demands and contextual performance is on the contrary strong in line with previous literature, as increasing challenging demands has been found to relate to contextual-related variables, such as work engagement (Crawford et al., 2010), developing knowledge and skills, attaining more difficult goals (LePine, Podsakoff, & LePine, 2005), satisfaction, and high levels of self-efficacy (Gorgievski & Hobfoll, 2008).
Third, the differences in the impact between the four dimensions of homeworking crafting on task- and contextual performance supports previous research endorsing the multidimensional
nature of job performance (Dalal et al., 2012). More specifically, based on my findings suggesting that decreasing hindering job demands and increasing challenging job demands predict respectively task- and contextual performance, there can be concluded that participation in job crafting can enhance overall employee performance via different performance domains. This study therefore moreover upholds the idea that both task performance and contextual performance contribute independently to overall performance (Motowidlo & Van Scotter, 1994). Hence, within the research field of employee performance, researchers should be aware of the differences within performance dimensions and their related predictors. Measuring only single domains of performance (such as only task- or contextual performance) may be insufficient for capturing overall performance, resulting in misinterpreted outcomes and invalid conclusions.
Finally, the current study theoretically contributes to the AMO framework. By indicating that homeworking motivation-enhancing HR practices can stimulate employees to increase their resources and homeworking opportunity-enhancing HR practices to increase their challenging demands, this study’s results illustrate that AMO-enhancing HR practices can be important for finding the demands-resources balance, and in that way enhance the success of job crafting. Furthermore, it shows that the distinct ability-, motivation-, and opportunity-enhancing HR practices can have differential relationships with the distinct dimensions of job crafting. This variety contributes to further conceptualization of the AMO framework, as it confirms the belief that ability-, motivation-, or opportunity-enhancing HR practices can have a different impact on organizational outcomes apart from each other (Marin-Garcia & Tomas, 2016). To complete, the mediation effect found for increasing challenging job demands in the relationship between opportunity-enhancing HR practices and contextual performance, helps to get a better understanding of the ambiguous HR-performance relationship. It shows that job crafting in the form of increasing challenging demands can be important for the effectiveness of HR practices for employee performance. This is in line with the findings of Guan and
Frenkel (2018), as they pointed out that when management maintains a strong HR system, employees are more likely to be engaged in their work and participate in job crafting.
Limitations and Future Research
The present research is not without limitations. Notably, the current study’s sample size is a potential source of concern as it was somewhat small for analyzing the relationships between the variables, especially when keeping in mind that the independent variable homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices and the mediator homeworking crafting consisted of
respectively 3 and 4 distinct dimensions. As such, it may have lacked a satisfactory level of power, which makes results more difficult to interpret and leads to less convincing outcomes. Future research may therefore use larger samples to increase the study’s power and ensure meaningful results.
Another aspect which could have influenced the results of this study is the fact that the gathered data was correlational. In this way, no suggestions could be made about the causality of the found patterns. Hence, causality between related variables could be the other way
around than assumed. It could for example be the case that high contextual performance results in more participation in increasing challenging job demands. To provide a definite answer as to the direction of the found relations, research could in the future conduct experimental- or longitudinal studies. This could moreover give more insight into the underlying reasons behind the found relations and therefore provide more clarity in if, how, when and why
AMO-enhancing HR practices and job crafting influence homeworking performance.
Somewhat in line with previous limitation, a final limitation related to the design of the present research is the fact that it collected self-reported questionnaire data. As follows, participants needed to classify their level of offered HR practices, participation in job crafting and performance themselves. It could be questioned how well individuals are capable of self-reporting their performance and evaluating the offered AMO-enhancing HR practices. For example, organizations might act on facilitating the ability, motivation, and opportunity for
homeworking more than employees were aware, or that employees over- or underestimate their own performance. Future research could diminish these limitations through expanding the data with other-rated performance measures and call upon HR practitioners for indicating the correct level of offered HR practices. Despite this limitation, the current study nevertheless serves the validity by using reliable scales, available in Dutch and English. Even though scale items were adapted to a homeworking context, the reliabilities were sufficient enough to interpret meaningful results and detect relations.
Beyond addressing such limitations, future research could furthermore aim to get an impression of how a sudden switch to homeworking due to the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting employees and organizations in other ways. Further investigation into this unique situation stands out from earlier research to regular homeworking, as employees as well as organizations are brought into a situation in which they are forced to make decisions on how to redesign their organization or job. Forthcoming research could thus focus more on the effects of a forced situation compared to a situation in which employees voluntarily decide to work from home. Regular homeworking employees’ participation in job crafting could for example differ from forced homeworkers, as the former might experience less demands. For example, the demands coming along with sharing the kitchen table with a partner who is also forced to work from home or taking care of homeschooling children during the day, are probably not applicable for regular homeworkers. Furthermore, it might be valuable to study the long-term effects by conducting research at a later stage or by the means of a longitudinal research design. It could for instance be the case that organizations offer more homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices to employees when homeworking periods last longer. Additionally, as organizations from all over the world are suffering from the consequences of COVID-19, future research could examine if there are any cultural differences in coping with the obligation of (facilitating) homeworking.
Next to examining other effects of forced homeworking on organizations and their employees, future research could moreover dive deeper into the current study’s findings. First, it could focus on the role of seeking resources for homeworking performance. Previous
research mainly demonstrated positive consequences of seeking resources, however the current research illustrates otherwise. As such, future research might aim to find out why in this case seeking resources is not significantly benefitting task- or contextual homeworking
performance, and if and how this can be changed for the better such that homeworking
employees can optimize their homeworking performance with the means of an ideal demands-resources balance.
Second, with regard to the lack of finding sufficient support for a significant effect of homeworking ability-, motivation-, or opportunity-enhancing HR practices on decreasing hindering job demands, future studies could further examine if and how HR practices can facilitate decreasing hindering demands. It might for example be essential for HR-practitioners to get a clear understanding of how employees are exactly hindered to perform, before being able to stimulate employees to decrease demands. Consequently, HR practices can be
organized in such a way that employees can deal with these hindrances and corresponding demands. For example, if a lot of employees note that they experience hindrances from the lack of proper desks and chairs at home, HR can address those needs by (financially)
supporting employees to buy adjustable desks or chairs. Employees are in this way furthermore urged to contemplate their experienced hindrances and determine how to deal with them. However, it is important to bear in mind that scholars do not agree on the effectiveness of decreasing hindering demands, for negative as well as positive consequences are currently advocated. I expect that the amount of hindering demands and the success of increasing them might be important for the overall effectiveness of participation in decreasing hindering job demands for performance. Decreasing hindering demands could for example backfire
and decreasing them will drain a lot of energy which might go at the expense of their performance. However, it could also turn out to be effective if employees are not able to execute their core responsibilities and tasks before dealing with high demands, for example minimizing large distractions at home. This conforms to the results of the current study, indicating that decreasing hindering job demands enhances task performance. However, working towards more certainty on the overall effectiveness of decreasing hindering demands on itself is necessarily, and perhaps even a necessity before considering facilitating this behavior at all.
Finally, future studies could expand the current research’s model by examining other potential moderators or mediators in the relationships between homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices, homeworking crafting and homeworking performance. The effectiveness of the implementation of HR practices might for instance partially depend on employees’
personalities, as positive relationships are found between job crafting and for example
openness to experience and proactive personality (Rudolph et al., 2017). Rudolph et al. (2017) moreover show that job crafting is related to employees’ level of work engagement and job satisfaction. Hence, individual differences in personality, job attitudes and occupational well-being might play an important role in the effect of job crafting on job performance.
Simultaneously, individual differences might also moderate the effectiveness of HR practices for facilitating job crafting. For instance, if employees are less engaged with their
organizations or satisfied with their jobs, it could be the case that they are therefore less
interested in the offered HR practices and motivated to adjust their way of working to optimize performance. All in all, it is imaginable that individual differences in personality, job attitudes and occupational well-being can enhance or diminish employees’ participation in job crafting, their homeworking performance and/or the effectiveness of homeworking AMO-enhancing HR practices. So, to conclude, forthcoming research to forced homeworking is in great need as
the COVID-19 pandemic is currently still forcing a large number of employees to switch the office for the living room.
Practical Implications
With the growing number of employees working from home as a result of the current pandemic, more and more employers and employees are now (in)voluntarily experiencing the consequences of homeworking. Although this can be positive or negative, the attention to the concept of homeworking is inevitably rising and this might result in homeworking becoming more common in the future. The present research offers important practical implications for future homeworking employees and HR practitioners striving to achieve optimal performance, as the current research suggests that this can be accomplished by the right HR practices and job crafting behaviors.
One thing employees can do in order to optimize their task- and contextual performance at home, is to craft their work effectively. According to the results of this study, employees who switch to homeworking can optimize their task performance by decreasing their hindering job demands. To clarify, this study suggests that decreasing hindering demands in a way of for example reducing workload, minimizing distraction and regulating work stressors will enhance employees’ task performance. Furthermore, the present research offers implications for
employees who strive to increase their contextual performance at home, as the results of this study imply that this could be accomplished by increasing their challenging job demands. For example, employees can try to focus more on the overall organizational performance instead of their individual task-related performance by looking for extra responsibilities or tasks (e.g., assist colleagues in projects). Furthermore, they can make their work at home more
challenging by examining and improving suboptimal aspects of their job at home to enhance their overall effectivity, which leaves them with more time and energy to engage in extra-role behavior.
