Objective: High workload represents the main cause of stress-related absence from work in the UK. Yet, research also shows that workload does not always have such negative consequences and that the effect of anticipated workload depends on individuals' stress mindsets, which encompass individuals' beliefs as to whether stress is harmful or beneficial for health and productivity. Although the benefits of the
stress-is-enhancing mindset for individual well-being over the stress-is-diminishing mindset have been established, we do not yet know how leaders' stress mindsets impact their behaviours and their employees' well-being. This is of particular importance as it needs to be ensured that the established and very effective stress mindset interventions, when line managers are trained, do not result in adverse consequences for their staff.
Drawing on the transactional theory of stress, we propose that the relationships between leaders' workload anticipation in the morning, leader behavior during the working day and employee well-being in the evening depend on leader and follower stress mindsets.
Methods: We conducted a daily diary study with leader-follower dyads
(one daily measurement point for leaders, two daily measurement points for followers)
over ten consecutive working days to test our hypotheses. Data has been analyzed via
multilevel modelling in MPlus.
Results: The data analysis is ongoing and we will report on the findings when presenting.
Conclusions: This study will contribute to a better understanding of the role of stress
mindsets for leader behaviors and employee well-being. The results of this study might be
harnessed for organizational interventions.