HOW POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY APPLICATIONS CAN REVAMP TODAY’S WORKPLACE, AND ENHANCE EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE, ENGAGEMENT & WELLBEING.

Introduction:

Technology advances continue to disrupt the way we live and work at an incredible pace of change that today’s workplace becomes increasingly complex, yet full of challenging expectations to attract, develop and retain talents alongside designing a conducive culture to support those talents to grow, flourish and become more innovative by reaching their fullest potential. Such a healthy work environment can’t be attained today without applying effective strategies to enhance well-being and work engagement, especially during such a time of the Covid19 pandemic that massively disrupted the workplace all over the globe.

Over the past 20 years and since its emergence, positive psychology found its way to achieving incredible growth in both academic and professional fields, positioning itself as a new wing of the discipline that aims for happy and fulfilled lives. Positive psychology applications in the workplace have progressed at an incredible pace (McDonald et al., 2021). 

Albrecht (2013) emphasized the enormous growth of the positive psychology applications at work throughout the past decade, hailing the contribution of The Gallup Organization, which has successfully administered the Clifton Strengths Finder tool in many organizations all over the world, helping millions of employees and leaders develop a better understanding of their natural talents and how to put them to work in order to enhance their work experience.

This literature tackles the growing impact of positive psychology applications in the work context to enhance work engagement, well-being and performance; in light of some important psychological theories such as the Psychological Capital and Self-Determination theories, besides some interesting models (e.g., PERMA), alongside some tools such Clifton Strengths Finer that could support such applications through enhancing positive self-awareness. 

The emergence of Positive Psychology: 

As explained in research from Snyder and Lopez (2005), after world war II psychology became a science devoted to healing damage rather than focusing on thriving, neglecting the value of focusing on strengths whilst using a disease model of human functioning. Recently, around 1998 positive psychology was introduced by Martin Seligman to rather focus on living a better life and helping people achieve their fullest potential instead of only focusing on repairing the worst things. 

“The field of positive psychology at the subjective level is about the positive subjective experience: well-being and satisfaction (past); flow, joy, sensual pleasures, and happiness (present); and constructive cognitions about the future-optimism, hope, and faith.” (Snyder and Lopez, 2005, p. 3). 

Dr Seligman championed the strength movement, emphasizing the importance of developing talents into strengths to get the best out of everyone, supported by Linley’s brilliant book Average to A+ (2008) which defined strengths as a pre-existing capacity for a particular natural talent(s), considering the uniqueness of individuals who would feel stronger when they are doing things that would allow them to use their strengths and talents more and more. (Lewis, S., 2011).

Positive Psychology & work: 

Is it possible for organizations to be managed in a way that is good for both people and business? Such an important question has received greater attention over the past decade and witnessed incredible results. In research from Lewis(2011), defined the best workplaces as associated with exceptional performance, and respecting people and their contributions. 

According to (Peterson & Seligman, 2003 as cited in J. Mills et al. 2013) for long time organizations neglected the worker in favour of focusing on practices that directly affect the bottom-line results rather than enhancing the employee experience, whilst recently organizations and literature have started to consider positive psychology practices as essential for organizations to grow while their people are given more opportunities to achieve their fullest potential. 

“When applied to the workplace, positive psychology seeks to shift the emphasis away from rectifying weaknesses, to focusing on employees and organizational strengths such as resilience, creativity, emotional intelligence, flow, hope and courage” (McDonald et al., 2021, p. 2). 

The Psychological Capital & Self-Determination Theories: 

One of the key theories that influence workplaces that are associated with positive psychology is the psychological capital theory according to research from Youssef-Morgan and Luthans (2013), they introduced the concept of psychological capital to address positivity in the workplace at the individual level, and in their definition, they explained it as a positive psychological state of development of individuals including critical characteristics like self-efficacy, optimism, hope and resilience. Their empirical research identified a significant association between the psychological capital theory and positive outcomes of employee performance.

Youssef-Morgan and Luthans (2013) have proposed a positive holistic model that penetrates the walls of the workplace toward building such psychological capital at the individual and group levels. Such an enlightening model is based on the reciprocal relationships across life domains; health (physical and mental), relationships (social, personal and work-related) and work (attitude, behaviours and performance), identifying strong reciprocal connections among those three life domains and their impact at work in light of the psychological theory. 

Furthermore, another major theory that has found its roots in positive psychology to help individuals and teams achieve their fullest potential at work is the Self-Determination (SDT) theory. As explained by Gagne and Vansteenkiste (2013), it’s about human motivation, developed by Edward L. Deci and Richard M. Ryan at the beginning of the 1970s and they argue that the SDT has a significant correlation with positive psychology. The basic definition of the SDT revolves around three critical human motivation needs; autonomy, competence and relatedness, needs that are highly associated with positive aspects to be developed rather than problems to solve. The SDT constructs prioritized the importance of intrinsic motivation that encourages people to do things for their sake rather than waiting for external rewards.

“Numerous studies have demonstrated that the support of individual’s needs for autonomy and competence fosters interest in and linking of activity in hand, while the undermining of these needs precludes the development of intrinsic motivation” (Gagne and Vansteenkiste, 2013, p. 65). 

Furthermore, Gagne and Vansteenkiste (2013) considered SDT as one of the most important positive psychology theories that promote optimal human functioning at work and demand effective positive leadership strategies to promote autonomy, empowerment, mastery and facilitate building positive relationships at work that support developing a sense of belonging. 

Positive Psychology and Work Engagement: 

In research from Ouweneel et al. (2012), they emphasized the coincidence of the appearance and growth of the work engagement concepts alongside the rise of positive psychology towards enhancing performance and wellbeing by using human strengths and talents to flourish at the workplace. In light of the same direction, positive psychology has found its way to becoming an essential practice for supporting organizational growth and success through promoting engagement. Moreover, (Harter et al., 2002 as cited in Ouweneel et al., 2013) argue that employee mental health has a huge impact on their productivity at work, which is a critical need for organizations today, highlighting the importance of considering positive psychological interventions to reinvent the workplace. Furthermore, Ouweneel et al. (2013) argue that work engagement is a valid and reliable tool to measure employee well-being and its relevant workplace interventions.

Gagne and Vansteenkiste (2013) consider work engagement a critical outcome in organizational psychology and linked to organizational effectiveness, whilst arguing that autonomous motivation is a bedrock for achieving higher levels of engagement at work in light of the SDT constructs.

In recent research by McDonald et al. (2021), they highlighted one of the most important theories that explain higher levels of work engagement in light of the positive psychology concepts. This theory has been introduced and developed by Csikszentmihlyi (1990) to describe a state of consciousness in which the person is exceedingly immersed in an activity and profoundly concentrating on the task at hand and is not distracted by anything else. This theory has been called Flow.

Positive Psychology & Wellbeing at Work: 

Ouweneel et al. (2013) consider self-efficacy and positive emotions important predictors of work engagement and might be strong drivers to foster engagement and productivity. “When engaged in our work we are more likely to feel good and competent, and to have a sense of belonging.” (Lewis, 2011, p. 24). Therefore, employee engagement is considered a strong driver of well-being alongside developing positive emotions. 

Kun et al. (2016) considered facilitating subjective wellbeing as a prime objective of positive psychology, therefore, researchers identified several trials by Dr Seligman to develop a more systematic approach to measure and enhance well-being in light of positive psychology constructs and Seligman’s PERMA model can be considered a systematic model yet a very simple approach to do so. PERMA stands for (1) Positive Emotions as good feelings play a pivotal role in strengthening relationships and having a healthy work environment, (2) Engagement as a strong driver of well-being through boosting mental health and self-efficacy when connecting people to their inner self and amplifying their intrinsic motivation power, (3) Relationships play an incredible role through developing such a sense of belonging that could take wellbeing into higher levels, (4) Meaning and purpose in a more practical sense it’s about use of strengths to feel more powerful, stronger and effective and (5) Accomplishment that augments that feeling and help people move farther and go the extra mile again and again. 

The PERMA model is a systematic tool that could help individuals and organizations measure, track and enhance wellbeing and make the best use of positive psychology practices and applications at work. 

Strengths and Work Fulfilment:

Undoubtedly, a sense of fulfilling work responsibilities is a positive feeling that would have a positive impact on an individual’s well-being as explained in research by Owens et al. (2019), they have defined fulfilling work as the complete comprehensive experience of well-being in the work sphere. Furthermore, they highlight the impact of focusing on human strengths and optimal functioning towards fulfilling work and consequently promoting engagement and well-being. 

Ding and Quan (2021) argue that Strength-based approaches to leadership are critical to helping people fulfil their work and develop positive emotions, and behaviours, drawing on the grounded assumptions of the strength-based theory that the greatest room for employee growth is within their strengths, whilst individuals achieve positive outcomes by focusing on advancing their strengths rather than fixing their weaknesses. 

Lewis, S. (2011), highlighted the effort of Gallup researchers over the past 25 years, studying the factors behind management success until they figured out that the key secret to management success is understanding the uniqueness of each individual and ensuring that jobs fit their strengths and talents as a key transformational concept of leadership that is strength-anchored and excellence-driven.

Positive Leadership:

Leadership is one of the most critical interventions in any workplace, with a plethora of definitions, whilst one of these definitions revolves around adopting positive conducive behaviour that would foster positive work behaviours and promote trust, self-efficacy, and intrinsic motivation through autonomy and empowerment. 

Smith et al. (2012) has defined positive leadership as both transformational and authentic practice of leadership at work to promote positive work behaviours, which integrates classical philosophy and modern positive psychology in an enriched model of leadership to foster autonomy, empowerment, and positive behaviours. 

Authentic leadership behaviours as an essential component of positive leadership are associated with strengths-based theory and research in the science of positive psychology (Fowler et al., 1999 as cited by Smith et al., 2012). 

Positive leaders help people become more self-aware of their signature strengths profile as one of the strongest leadership contributions today. As explained by Marcus Buckingham, people are adaptive creatures and they can possibly learn anything but the question is not about learning new things but is it possible to reach that level of consistent near to perfect performance, in other terms turning natural talents into strengths. Tools such as Clifton Strengths Finder would make this journey more enjoyable, categorizing 37-character strengths emanated from numerous interviews with key successful people across the globe. (Buckingham M. & Clifton. D. O., 2020). 

Moreover, it’s argued that using one’s character strengths is a strong predictor of improving mental health and wellbeing, which have a greater impact on one’s performance and outcomes at work (van Woerkom et al., 2015). 

Limitations of positive psychology at work: 

Positive psychology is relatively a new branch that continues to grow and solidify as robust science; however, it might still need further development into more systematic approaches. 

Moreover, the explicit focus of positive psychology on a personal ‘self” in a time where organizations and workplaces are now revolving around teams as the smallest building blocks of organizations that embrace diversity, collaborative and collective intelligence. Such a limitation needs further development, research and effort to extend the concepts of one’s signature strengths into a better understanding of a team’s signature strength profile and how teams can collaboratively use one’s strengths to amplify their collective intelligence and innovation. 

Final word. 

Positive psychology has emerged as a modern science of psychology to transform the use and need of/for psychology from just focusing on the disease model and helping people get out of their worst struggle to helping every person on our planet find their way towards their stronger life. 

Positive psychology principles go in line with the ley constructs of the psychological capital and the self-determination theory SDT towards enhancing engagement and performance through promoting autonomy, empowerment, mastery and probably reaching the state of Flow. 

The strength-anchored approach to leadership and development is central to the positive psychology concepts and has a magnificent impact on boosting engagement, well-being and overall employee experience, in light of Seligman’s PERMA model to make positive psychology contribute to the workplace extremely effective yet growing at an incredible pace. 

Finally, albeit few limitations that are worth further studies and exploration; positive psychology can transform today’s workplace and help people reach their fullest potential at work. 

References:

Kun, G., Balogh, P., & Krasz, K. G. (2016). Development of the Work-Related Well-Being Questionnaire Based on Seligman’s PERMA model. Periodica Polytechnica Social and Management Sciences, 25(1), 56. https://doi.org/10.3311/ppso.9326

Albrecht, S. L. (2013). WORK ENGAGEMENT AND THE POSITIVE POWER OF MEANINGFUL WORK. Advances in Positive Organizational Psychology, 1, 237–260.

Buckingham M. & Clifton. D. O. (2020). Now, Discover Your Strengths: The revolutionary Gallup program that shows you how to develop your unique talents and strengths. Gallup Press.

Ding, H., & Quan, G. (2021). How and When Does Follower’s Strengths‐Based Leadership Relate to Follower Innovative Behavior: The Roles of Self‐Efficacy and Emotional Exhaustion. The Journal of Creative Behavior, 55(3), 591–603. https://doi.org/10.1002/jocb.473

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