The Amplification of Organizational Virtuousness Through Community at Work: Impact on Energy and Identity
The Amplification of Organizational Virtuousness Through Community at Work: Impact on Energy and Identity
Perry E. Geue | 2022
Abstract
The intent of this study was to investigate how virtuousness in the workplace is amplified to characterize the organization as a whole as evidenced by its effect on the energy and identity of employees. Cameron, Mora, Leutscher, and Calarco’s (2011) positive practices, comprised of six dimensions (respect, care, support, inspiration, meaning, and forgiveness), were used to measure organizational virtuousness, while energy and identity were measured, respectively, by work engagement and organizational identification. The mechanism for amplification explored in the study was a form of social capital comprised of high-quality connections between employees or the formation of a community at work. Thus, in this nonexperimental, cross-sectional, quantitative study, the mediation by community at work of the positive relationship between organizational virtuousness and the outcomes of work engagement and organizational identification was investigated by administering a questionnaire survey at Memorial Hospital in Jacksonville, Florida. Controlled for in the study were gender, age, job tenure, autonomy, and positive work-related identity. Baron and Kenny’s (1986) method was used to test for mediation. Results showed no mediation by community at work of the relationship between organizational virtuousness (or its subdimensions) and work engagement, while the relationship between organizational virtuousness (and its subdimensions) and organizational identification, though not significant, showed inconsistent (Kenny, 2018; MacKinnon, Fairchild, & Fritz, 2007) or indirect (Hair et al., 2021; Zhao, Lynch, & Chen, 2010) mediation by community at work (except for meaning). Interestingly, both the meaning dimension of organizational virtuousness, and the control variables of autonomy and positive work-related identity, were positively related to both of the outcomes—work engagement and organizational identification. The findings suggest that the formation of high-quality connections in the workplace facilitate the amplification of organizational virtuousness and its effect on employee identity within the organization, while employees’ experience of autonomy and meaning at work have a positive effect on both their energy and identity, but though related to positive relationships in the workplace, these relationships are not instrumental for this effect.