A globalized economy, an aging labor force, technological advances and societal changes such as flattening organizational structures, freelance work, and emphasis on work agility and flexibility cause major changes in the ways work is organized, accomplished, and experienced. Also, spatial and temporal boundaries between work and non-work vanish, thereby weakening the separation of work and home, and increasing employees’ opportunities for autonomy at work. In this symposium, the focus will be on job crafting, off-job crafting, and recovery from work, highly topical areas of research that explore ways to improve employee well-being in response to the challenges of modern working life.

A core contribution of this symposium is to deepen the understanding of both crafting and recovery as complex phenomena and study their relationship to employee well-being using state-of-the-art research methods. The studies utilize data from intervention, daily diary, and longitudinal studies to contribute to the understanding of how to improve crafting and recovery and what are their short- and long-term outcomes. The studies presented utilize advanced statistical methods to answer novel research questions, for example, by using person-centered approach to identify job crafting and recovery profiles.

In the first contribution describes findings on the role of DRAMMA experiences (i.e., detachment, relaxation, autonomy, mastery, meaning, and affiliation) for optimal employee recovery based on his longitudinal study with 279 German employees, covering both leisure and work episodes.

The second contribution further builds on this work in applying the DRAMMA model to recovery during workday breaks in relation to well-being in the afternoon and in the evening in a daily diary study of 107 Finnish teachers.

Also focusing on recovery during workday breaks, the third contribution examines the relationship of recovery activities across different temporal settings. In a sample of 97 Finnish employees undergoing a recovery intervention, results suggest that engaging in lunchtime recovery activities increases time spent in recovery activities in the evening after work.

The fourth contribution uses longitudinal data with 664 Finnish employees over a period of two years to identify profiles of recovery-enhancing processes (psychological detachment from work, physical activity and sleep), and to examine the profiles’ antecedents and consequences for well-being.

Similarly adopting a person-centered approach, the fifth contribution identifies diverse job crafting profiles in order to understand how employees combine and use multiple job crafting strategies simultaneously and how this impacts their well-being. Her research is based on data collected over 6 months with 3 measurement occasions among 296 Finnish employees.

The last contribution brings crafting and recovery themes together by focusing on employees’ off-job crafting efforts. She will present results from pilot testing and process evaluation of a randomized controlled trial aimed at helping employees to actively shape their leisure activities.

CHAIR
Miika Kujanpää
Tampere University, Tampere, Finland

IN THIS SYMPOSIUM

Need satisfaction and optimal functioning at leisure and work: A longitudinal validation study of the DRAMMA model
Miika Kujanpää, Christine Syrek, Dirk Lehr, Ulla Kinnunen, Jo Annika Reins, Jessica de Bloom
Tampere University, Tampere, Finland.
University of Applied Sciences Bonn-Rhein-Sieg, Rheinbach, Germany.
Leuphana University of Lueneburg, Lueneburg, Germany.
University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands

Do break recovery experiences mediate the relationship between daily emotional job demands and affect in the afternoon and in the evening?
Anniina Virtanen, Michelle van Laethem, Jessica de Bloom, Ulla Kinnunen
Tampere University, Tampere, Finland.
University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands

Recovery activities across different temporal settings
Marjaana Sianoja, Jessica de Bloom, Ulla Kinnunen
Tampere University, Tampere, Finland.
University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands

Working flexible, staying healthy – Development of a resource-oriented web-based training
Sarah E. Althammer, Anne Wöhrmann, Alexandra Michel
Federal Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (BAuA), Dortmund, Germany

Improving employees’ psychological well-being and job performance with the help of a hybrid off-job crafting intervention
Merly Kosenkranius, Jessica de Bloom, Floor Rink
University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands.
Tampere University, Tampere, Finland