Zhang, L; Yao, Y and Yiu, T W (2020) Job burnout of construction project managers: Exploring the consequences of regulating emotions in workplace. Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, 146(10): 04020117, ISSN 0733-9364
Abstract
Construction project managers (CPMs) need to handle project tasks through interpersonal interaction, which always involves emotion. Thus, CPMs must perform emotional labor. Different emotional labor strategies, namely, surface acting (i.e., faking emotional expressions) and deep acting (i.e., modifying feelings), may cause different levels of stress and influence job burnout. This paper investigates the impacts of two components of emotional labor, emotional display demands and emotional labor strategies, on CPMs' job burnout. It also examines the moderating effect of emotional intelligence (EI) between emotional display demands and emotional labor strategies. Data from 234 questionnaire surveys were analyzed with structural equation modeling. The results show that CPMs who choose surface acting as a strategy to regulate emotions in the workplace will be under more stress and encounter job burnout. In addition, CPMs with higher EI are less inclined to choose surface acting and thus experience less job burnout. This paper extends emotional labor research into the construction project context and provides evidence that studying job burnout from an emotional labor perspective generates useful insights into the causes of CPMs' job burnout.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | construction project managers; deep acting; emotional labor; job burnout; surface acting |
| Index terms: | construction project, questionnaire, evidence, strategy, structural equation modelling, survey, manager, burnout, interaction, emotional intelligence |
| Subjects: | psychology, practitioner, evaluation and assessment methods, data collection methods, statistical analysis, behavioral psychology, occupational health and safety management, production management, management |
| Topics: | Human Resources, Roles and Professions, Business Strategy, Health and Safety, Project Management, Research Practice |
| Descriptive scope: | 4 PCEA |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here