Too proactive to switch off: When taking charge drains resources and impairs detachment

Area of Science:

• Organizational Psychology
• Occupational Health Psychology

Background:

• Proactive behavior is crucial for work performance but its impact on employee well-being and work-life balance is understudied.
• Research has largely overlooked how proactive behaviors affect an employee's ability to detach from work and recover personally.

Purpose of the Study:

• To examine the within-person effects of taking charge behavior on employees' ability to detach from work and recover.
• To investigate the mediating role of resource drain and the moderating role of autonomous motivation in this process.

Main Methods:

• A daily diary study was conducted with 77 managers over 5 consecutive working days.
• Data were collected three times daily to assess taking charge behavior, resource drain, autonomous motivation, detachment, and recovery.

Main Results:

• Daily taking charge behavior negatively impacted evening detachment via resource drain, but only on days with low autonomous motivation.
• The negative effect of taking charge on detachment did not extend to next-morning recovery.
• No negative effects on detachment were found when autonomous motivation was high.

Conclusions:

• Proactive behavior can deplete personal resources and impair work detachment under conditions of low autonomous motivation.
• Autonomous motivation acts as a crucial boundary condition, buffering employees against the potential downsides of proactivity.
• Organizations should foster autonomous motivation to encourage proactivity while safeguarding employee well-being and recovery.