The Ebb and Flow of Job Engagement: Engagement Variability and Emotional Stability as Interactive Predictors of Job Performance

Abstract

Scholars have long recognized that employees often ebb and flow in how engaged they are in their jobs—what we term “engagement variability.” Yet, to date, we have little insight into how an employee’s engagement variability—that is, the degree of inconsistency in their engagement—affects job performance. Drawing on and extending habit theory, we hypothesize that, controlling for average engagement, engagement variability is negatively related to job performance. We further hypothesize that emotional stability moderates this relationship: Although engagement variability hinders performance when an employee is higher in emotional stability, this effect weakens when an employee is lower in emotional stability. Finally, we hypothesize that flow mediates the interactive effect of engagement variability and emotional stability on performance. We test our hypotheses across three studies: a multisource, ten-wave field study of 160 cadets across three Army and Air Force divisions of the Reserve Officer Training Corps, an experiment with 600 full-time employees, and a multisource, two-week experience sampling study with 152 full-time employees and their supervisors. We find consistent support for engagement variability’s negative relationship with performance and the moderating role of emotional stability, but mixed support for the mediating role of flow. We conclude by discussing the implications of our work.