Suchergebnisse

Purpose
Non-technical skills are of increasing importance for safety engineers to perform their job. In their position as expert consultants, they work closely with managers. Thus, gaining management support is oftentimes crucial for safety engineers to successfully improve occupational health and safety. Drawing on organizational support theory (OST), this study investigates how safety engineers' non-technical skills in communication and persuasion (i.e. rational and hard influence tactics) are related with their management support, and how management support is related with their individual task proficiency (ITP). The purpose of this paper is to examine the moderating role of safety engineers' expert power in this context.


Design/methodology/approach
Using an online questionnaire, survey data were collected from 251 safety engineers working in Austria.


Findings
Rational influence tactics are positively related to ITP via management support, whereas hard influence tactics are not. Safety engineers' expert power moderates the relationship between influence tactics and management support and, consequently ITP. High (vs low) expert status strengthens the positive relationship of rational influence tactics on ITP via management support. For hard influence tactics, high (vs low) expert power buffered the negative relationship of upward appeal and pressure on ITP via management support.


Practical implications
Safety engineers should rely on rational persuasion when cooperating with management to obtain support and improve their own performance.


Originality/value
This study connects the effect of influence tactics in the context of safety engineers' work performance with OST. It demonstrates that safety engineers' influence tactics are related to work role performance through management support and that these relationships are moderated by expert power.

AbstractThis study investigates how cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility (i.e. to coordinate with others, to structure work tasks and to organize work and private obligations) relate to work–home outcomes among health care professionals. To understand the underlying psychological mechanisms of the relationship between cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility and work–home outcomes, we combined the challenge–hindrance approach with role theory. We hypothesized a positive relationship between cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility and work–home conflict via cognitive effort (strain process) and between cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility and work–home enrichment via learning to self‐organize (learning process). Eighty‐eight health care professionals working in eldercare homes participated in a diary study and provided 407 day‐level datasets. They completed questionnaires twice a day over 5 working days. Our analyses show that the relationships between daily cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility and work–home outcomes depend on strain and learning processes. Furthermore, our results demonstrate that cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility, although ambivalently related to work–home outcomes on the person level, trigger distinct strain and learning processes on the day level: daily coordinating with colleagues and daily structuring work tasks were related to work–home conflict via cognitive effort, whereas daily organizing work and family obligations was associated with work–home enrichment via learning to self‐organize.

This report uses European Working Conditions Survey data to examine working conditions and their implications for worker's health. Ensuring the sustainability of work in the context of ageing populations implies a greater number of people in employment who can remain in the workforce for longer. The report examines the interplay between work demands –which carry an increased risk of exhaustion – and work resources – which support workers in greater engagement and well-being. The findings indicate that physical risks have not increased but remain important, while emotional demands have increased, underlining the growing importance of psychosocial risks at work. Changes over time suggest that although the risk of poor health is concentrated in certain occupations, those occupations traditionally considered to be protected are increasingly exposed to risks that are likely to affect workers' health and well-being.