The moderating effect of flourishing at work on psychological determinants and performance amongst early career academics at a selected university

Orientation – Flourishing is a phenomenon that moderates the relationship between psychological determinants and performance amongst early career academics at a selected South African university. Research objective – The main objective of this investigation was to explore if flourishing moderates the relationship between psychological determinants and performance amongst early career academics at a selected South African university. Motivation for the study – There are numerous difficulties that early career academics (ECAs) encounter in their career paths, including managing their current work performance, setting sights to pursue and explore further career development, and executing their tasks and activities. Coupled with this, they are expected to perform important roles that include facilitating teaching, its associated support work and research. Following on this, the most significant intervention with regards to ECAs’ professional careers would be to understand the controlling effect of flourishing at work on psychological determinants and the ability to execute job tasks and activities amongst early career academics with the intention of providing knowledge to help ECAs perform to their optimum level. Research approach/design and methods – A quantitative approach was applied with the Flourishing-at-Work Scale (FAWS) which was used to measure flourishing at work, while the Career Success Scale (CSS) was used to measure career performance. Resilience was measured through the Dispositional Resilience Scale, motivation was measured through the Achievement Motivation Questionnaire and personality was measured using The Big Five Inventory (BFI). Structural equation modeling (SEM) was conducted to model the relationship between the research variables aided by the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 25 and the Linear Structural Relations (LISREL) version 8.80. Main findings – The major finding in this study was that flourishing at work moderates the relationship between psychological determinants and performance. The findings revealed that personality predicts performance, and that a noteworthy relationship exists between resilience and performance. Additionally, a connection was found between motivation and performance. The results also revealed that all the psychological determinants, namely personality, resilience and motivation are important predictors of performance. Practical/Managerial implications – Institutions of higher learning and associated stakeholders will need to find ways to improve employee flourishing, managing personality, resilience, performance and motivation of ECAs in their workspaces through providing physical, emotional and intellectual resources that will afford employees to perform their tasks effectively; offering supportive and trusting relationships with leaders and managers; building sound relationships among co-workers; providing challenging, interesting roles and responsibilities; availing career advancement opportunities; providing clearly defined goals and role clarity; providing authentic leadership; being mindful that individual ECAs have unique personalities that assist them to perform satisfactorily in their roles; providing ECAs with opportunities for work adaptation, , optimistic thinking, realism, behavioural control, physical aptness, selflessness and removing removing uncertainty in their roles; availing environments that promote resilience within individuals which include a positive command climate, teamwork, and cohesion; and providing sound motivation systems correlated to organisation goals which might include growth/career advancement, stability, training and development, stimulating work and recognition.Thesis (MCom) (Industrial Psychology) -- University of Fort Hare, 202