Workplace wellbeing and Entrepreneurship
Definition of wellbeing and workplace wellbeing
Wellbeing is a multidimensional concept. In essence, it can be broadly defined as ‘the basic
and universal human needs that if an individual’s needs are satisfied at the current time, the
individual will be happy’ (Diener et al., 1999:278). This definition assumes that happiness is
the sum of many small positive pleasures. However, as a matter of fact, wellbeing is the sum
of positive and negative effects, when one’s feeling of pleasures exceed pains, then he or she
can be defined as happiness (Walter-Busch, 2000, Veenhoven, 1996). More specifically,
Diener et al.(1999) concluded that wellbeing is essentially stresses-pleasant emotional
experience, which should consist of both positive and negative affect. Negative affect and
Positive effect for these qualities, explaining they represent predispositions to experience
the corresponding mood factors. The negative effect is a general dimension of subjective
distress subsuming a broad range of negative emotions such as anger, disgust, scorn, guilt,
fearfulness, and depression. The positive effect, on the other hand, reflects the level of
energy, excitement, and enthusiasm (Watson and Pennebaker, 1989), all are measured as
state (transient) or trait (stable) qualities. Watson and Pennebaker (1989) suggested that
high negative affect individuals tend to be more introspective, dwell on shortcomings,
focus on the downside of the world, hold a less favourable self-view, and experience
significant levels of distress and dissatisfaction in any given situation. Low Negative
effect individuals tend to be content, secure and self-satisfied. Positive effect reflects
general levels of energy and enthusiasm, with high trait positive effect subjects leading a
full and happy life and maintaining a high activity level.
In academic research, the topic of wellbeing has been gained presence rapidly in social
sciences and economics. Two primary research contexts have developed in recent years.
The first one is the analysis of life wellbeing, which is about individual’s overall life
satisfaction or happiness (Plagnol,2010), and the second is the analysis of job-related
wellbeing, better known as ‘workplace wellbeing’, which is one of the critical dimensions
of overall life wellbeing. Indeed, on average, a person spends much of his/ her life on
working, around 25% to 35% of his daytime life in the work (Harter, Schmidt and Keyes,
2003). Thus, the job is a significant part of an individual’s life closely associated with his
or her life and wellbeing. On the one hand, positive workplace wellbeing can enhance
overall life wellbeing. For example, around 20% to 25% of the variation in adult life
satisfaction can be accounted by job satisfaction (Campbell, Converse, and
Rodgers,1976). The results from previous studies indicate that the measurement of job
satisfaction correlates as much as 0.50 to 0.60 with measurement of life satisfaction
(Judge and Watanable,1993; Spector,1997). On the other hand, negative workplace
wellbeing is also closely associated with life wellbeing. This is because the nature of work
such as routinization, supervision, and complexity has been linked causally to an
individual’s sense of control and depression (Kohn and Schooler,1982). Moreover, it is
now recognised that job depression is the second factor ( the first one is ischemic heart
disease) in contributing to reduction in productive and healthy years of life (Murray and
Lopez, 1996). Consequently, in general, when referring to the concepts of wellbeing, the
workplace wellbeing can be defined as part of overall life wellbeing which is primarily
determined by work and can be affected by workplace interventions.
1.3.2 Measurements of workplace wellbeing
However, the measurement of workplace wellbeing is a complicated challenge, which
depends on various factors including social, emotional and physical elements, and takes
the perspective from both the internal and external workplace. Also, it may also need to
involve many different roles (e.g. occupational health, occupational safety, human
resources (HR) services, senior management, line management, health services, trade
unions and labour inspectors), for each role has a different motivation for improving and
promoting workplace wellbeing. Moreover, different occupations and workplaces will
have their own particular workplace wellbeing requirements and priorities. For example,
the needs of a driver may be very distinct from those of a shop worker. Furthermore, the
outcomes of workplace initiatives are very subjective, and an initiative that works well
for one driver may be of little or no benefit to another driver. These complexities make
workplace wellbeing very hard to define and measure, but research has been carried out
to develop a better understanding of the concept and to gain a consensus on the subject
(EU-OSHA,2013)
For example, Some researches highlight using a short tool to measure the workplace
wellbeing, for example, a one-item indicator to gauge job satisfaction(Sousa-Poza and Sousa-
Poza, 2000). Some focus on a long tool, like a five-item indicator, the WHO’s wellbeing
index (WHO-5) (Sjöberg, 2010), which gather information on psychological wellbeing, that
are useful within organization. Some researches show that workplace wellbeing could focus
on stress factors that include organisational pressure (i.e. Job anxiety and depression)
(VanKatwyk et al., 2000). Other scales move across a continuum with two principal axes
covering anxiety–contentment and depression– enthusiasm, to arrive at an assessment of
effective wellbeing. Anxiety–contentment could be shown through individuals being tense,
worried or relaxed, while depression– enthusiasm could be demonstrated through being
depressed, cheerful or optimistic
(Warr, 1990). Moreover, in some researches, the measuring of wellbeing has to rely to a
large extent on individuals’ subjective view of how they feel or believe they are capable
of functioning or coping at any point in time, while some researchers suggested this
subjective assessment could be replaced with relatively objective measures such as
sickness absence rates(North et al., 1993). Sometimes, the measurement of workplace
wellbeing may also need to take into account the specific demands of any one profession,
for example, nursing, where emotional labour is a predictor of ill health among this group
of workers (Laschinger and Fida, 2014).
The main challenge with measuring wellbeing is that different conclusions can be
obtained depending on the number of factors that are accounted for and then controlled in
the analysis, as a more robust outcome would be gained from research that controls for as
many factors as possible (EU-OSHA,2013). In this comparative thesis on studying
between the self-employed and employees, it need to consider the measurement that
should suit the most occupations in the UK market, thus, this study will use the two
principal axes measure, namely job satisfaction and work-related stress, to examine the
positive and negative workplace wellbeing.
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