Mitigating Turnover among Millennials: Catalytic Role of Passion, Well-being, Cynicism & Organizational Citizenship Behaviors.
| Date | 01 April 2020 |
| Author | Gaan, Niharika |
Introduction
Millennials endorse confidence, civic duty, achievement, sociability, morality, diversity, and street smart as their core values. They are perceived as team players (Zemke, 2001) who seek employment in organizations that honor an environment of creating meaningful services and collaboration (Martin & Tulgan, 2002). Another line of research relates them as potentially the most selfish and poorly socialized generation compared to other generational cohorts. Further, their nature is construed to be self-absorbed, lazy, entitled, narcissistic, and dependent (Gallup, 2013). Some suggest that they possess a range of undesirable personality traits that allegedly cause numerous problems and limit development of desirable problem-solving skills. Further, millennials value passion, balance, leisure, and security in their work, which owes to their feeling of ownership towards their career (Gulyani & Bhatnagar, 2016). The existing literature paves the way to the present study wherein the work passion of the millennial is studied in a given work context to examine the outlining intervention mechanisms and any impact on outcomes.
An implicit notion in the existing literature towards work passion denotes it as an unequivocally valuable attribute that organizations should strive to nurture among employees. Being apathetic and impassionate will not lead to improved performance (Ho et al., 2011). Although the concept of passion at work has gained overwhelming interest in the new millennium, with a surge in the number of practitioner articles stressing company benefits from having passionate employees (e.g., Moses, 2001; Boyatzis, McKee & Goleman, 2002), a systematic research is warranted. However, other than anecdotal and speculative reports that passion can play a role in one's job (e.g., Hill, 2002), there is a dearth of research that links work passion to critical work outcomes. An individual also perceives work passion playing a vital role (Ho et al., 2011; Vallerand et al., 2003) by showing utmost priority in one's work (Burke & Astakhova, 2015). Albeit, studies with respect to passion at work among millennials are quite rare with the exception of a few (Neumann, 2006; Ho et al., 2011).
Work passion is defined as an intense interest an individual shows for work-related activities that can be ultimately rejoiced concomitant with considerable investment of time and energy. The work passion (WP) model is considered as dual facets of harmonious and obsessive passion. These types of passion arise from two different processes by which one's self-concept is proximally achieved by way of internalization. Harmonious passion (HP) stems from the autonomous internalization of an activity one is engaged with and important to one's self-concept (Vallerand & Houlfort, 2003). On the contrary, obsessive passion (OP) refers to a controlled internalization of an activity that creates an internal pressure to engage in the prescribed activity without any willingness. Due to two different sets of passions existing in the literature the outcome, too, is dual in nature. HP generally produces healthy adaptation and consequently positive work outcomes, whereas OP "thwarts it by causing negative affect and rigid persistence" (Vallerand et al., 2003) thereby causing unnecessary imbalances with the environment.
Past research on work passion suffers from certain limitations in the Indian context. Firstly, studies on passion of millennials as an independent variable explaining work-related behaviors like organizational citizenship, well-being, cynicism and turnover intention are mostly sparse except for a few (Houlfort et al., 2014; Gaan, 2014; Gulyani & Bhatnagar, 2017; Gaan & Mohanty, 2018). Secondly, the past research reports that work passion as an independent variable, shares only a distal relationship with work behavior like burnout (Ho et al., 2011; Vallerand et al., 2011). However, the role of passion among millennials in the Indian work setting has been investigated as a mediating mechanism explaining the relationship between attitude and work-related behavior (Gulyani & Bhatnagar, 2017). Thirdly, one phenomenon readily seen is a millennial tendency to move from one job to another which is termed as turnover intention (TI) (Sourceright, 2016). The lack of job satisfaction, work engagement and the weakness of passion are predominant factors causing turnover intention (TI) (Rui-Han Teoh et al., 2016; Houlfort et al., 2014). There is little formal research which has unfolded the relationship between dual-pronged passion and its potential outcome like TI among millennials. Fourthly, work conflict occurs when the work passion is unable to balance with work environment expectations. This occurrence is more prevalent with OP (in contrast to HP). Therefore, work passion will be significantly associated with well-being of the millennial. The latter in turn would mitigate the cynicism and subsequently TI in which the prior research again lacks the representation of phenomenon with millennials in the Indian context (Gulyani & Bhatnagar, 2017). Fifthly, millennials are socially conscious and politically engaged (Milkman, 2016) and are thereby creating an environment of organizational citizenship behavior that sees organizations as socially responsible entities. As long as passion sustains and entangles the person in organizational citizenship behavior it assures high engagement levels which in turn may mitigate cynicism. Previous studies in these areas are insufficient to generalize any conclusions on the relationships between passion, organizational citizenship behavior and cynicism among millennials (Vallerand et al. 2003; Edwards & Rothbard, 2000; Burke et al., 2015).
Dualistic Model of Passion (DMP)
With the inclusion of positive psychology into mainstream psychology, human psychology no longer suffers from the pathology and deficit that so often forms a person's understanding of it (Snyder & Lopez, 2011). The sole theoretical model proposed by Vallerand and his colleagues (2003; 2006; 2007;2008) that underpins positive psychology is the Dualistic Model of Passion (DMP) which argues that one's intense involvement in specific activities can result in well-being (Vallerand et al., 2003; Vallerand, 2010). They defined passion in line with Self-Determination Theory (SDT), which states that intense investment in any activity is not only construed from a quantifiable aspect (to various degrees) but also from a qualitative aspect in which passion may be either harmonious or obsessive (Deci & Ryan, 1985; 2000). This intense psychological involvement in an activity acts in unison with one's identity. HP denotes intense psychological investment in an activity of interest that are rejoiced and internalized automatically. Subsequently, person establishes harmony with other peripheral activities surrounding life, facing any overbearing of such activities. In contrast, OP involves a person's intense involvement in activities arising out of internal and external pressures. This results in overbearing and the individual thereby loses balance with peripheral activities (Deci & Ryan, 2000; Vallerand et al., 2003).
In the same parlance, Gaan (2014) also posited about the dual facets of passion, which is in coherence with the proposition made by Vallerand and colleagues. The intriguing role of work rumination is reported to have both constructive and unconstructive outcomes (Watkins, 2008) based on its classification: problem solving or depressive rumination. Thus, the triadic combination of cognitions (work cognition), affects (work affects), and behaviors (work rumination) may be manifested in the dualistic nature of WP (Gaan, 2014). Although it is a scientifically valid and tested construct, this combination exists in the Indian context. However, the construct designed by Vallerand and his colleagues shows robust measurement examined in many cultures (Zito & Colombo, 2017).
WP & Organization-Focused Outcomes
It is commonly accepted in the passion literature that disposition of HP leads to more positive outcomes owing to its adaptive nature, whereas OP results in fewer positive and more negative outcomes owing to its poorly adaptive behavior. In the view of Vallerand et al. (2003) HP is demonstrated as the passion that makes life "worth living". The voluntary acceptance to engage in a particular activity allows one to rejoice with the associated benefits. This inevitably tends to positive work consequences (Vallerand & Houlfort, 2003). Conversely, OP spins high-engagement activities that are both time consuming and may be inconsistent with one's other life domains, values, and self-concept. As such, OP seldom results in adaptive work outcomes (Vallerand & Houlfort, 2003). Individuals whose disposition orients towards OP tend to have lower levels of job satisfaction, commitment and performance, and ultimately burnout and TI (Burke & Fiksenbaum, 2009; Spehar et al., 2016; Ho et al., 2011).
In Western (Vallerand et al. 2010; Ho et al. 2011; Vallerand et al. 2007) and Eastern contexts (Burke & Astakhova, 2015; Gulyani & Bhatnagar, 2017; Gaan & Mohanty, 2019), favorable work outcomes associated with HP (and the less favorable outcomes associated with OP) have been consistently reported. However, such studies are sparse with respect to millennials in the specific Indian context. The next section argues for examination of the model that entails linkages between WP and organization-focused outcomes via mediating mechanisms as illustrated in Fig. 1.
Work Passion & TI
TI refers to conscious and volitional intent to leave the organization (Griffeth et al., 2000). As per the turnover models, the factors influencing employees' intentions to quit may vary but are commonly generated by external contingencies such as rewards systems, job demands, or relations with co-workers (Steel, 2002). According to Self-Determination Theory (Deci & Ryan, 2000), the...
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