Employee wellness on the frontline: an interactional psychology perspective

Abstract

PurposeEmployee wellness is vital to creating high-quality employee–customer interactions, yet frontline service workers (FLSWs) do not typically engage in, or benefit from, wellness initiatives. This paper aims to conceptually model the interactive influences of organizational and employee factors in influencing FLSW involvement in wellness programs and provides suggestions on how service organizations can enhance wellness behaviors and outcomes.Design/methodology/approachThis paper builds upon classical and contemporary management theories to identify important gaps in knowledge about how employees and firms engage with wellness. Interactive psychology, emphasizing multidirectional interaction between person (employee) and situation (organization) wellness orientation, is introduced.FindingsThe paper develops a model that can be used to assess organizational wellness program effectiveness by emphasizing the interaction of employee and organizational wellness orientation. The model illustrates that wellness effectiveness relies equally on employee agency through an active wellness orientation matched with the organizational wellness orientation.Originality/valueThis paper questions the dominant approaches to assessing the effectiveness of workplace wellness initiatives, arguing for a more humanistic and agentic perspective rather than traditional organizationally centered fiscal measures.

Collective Voice and Worker Well‐being: Union Influence on Performance Monitoring and Emotional Exhaustion in Call Centers

“…Instead, authors promote enlightened management practices that invest in “positive cultures” and “inclusive leadership” (Lowe 2020) or through a growing industry of “workplace wellness programs” (Lieberman 2019). Research shows that these kinds of interventions are often ineffective, but they are also less likely to be adopted in the first place in frontline service workplaces, where jobs are more often lower wage and precarious (Solnet et al 2020). Unions can play a particularly important role in addressing root causes of stress and burnout in these workplaces, with broader benefits to public health.…”

A wearable technology solution and research agenda for housekeeper safety and health

“…Originally focusing on minimizing health-care and insurance expenditures, organizations have also used workplace wellness programs for safety and associated preventative interventions (Christophersen et al, 2015). An organization may have the best intentions in implementing a workplace health and wellness program, but too often little attention is paid to a more comprehensive view of total worker health (Solnet et al, 2020) and the program is relegated to focusing on what is both easy and reliable to track, such as step counts (Chung et al, 2017;Song and Baicker, 2019). The hospitality industry has taken a similar limited approach to step counting as a proxy for employee health and wellness management (Solnet et al, 2020;Torres and Zhang, 2021), demonstrating a lack of a deeper commitment to employees' real concerns and expectations from a workplace health and wellness program.…”

“…An organization may have the best intentions in implementing a workplace health and wellness program, but too often little attention is paid to a more comprehensive view of total worker health (Solnet et al, 2020) and the program is relegated to focusing on what is both easy and reliable to track, such as step counts (Chung et al, 2017;Song and Baicker, 2019). The hospitality industry has taken a similar limited approach to step counting as a proxy for employee health and wellness management (Solnet et al, 2020;Torres and Zhang, 2021), demonstrating a lack of a deeper commitment to employees' real concerns and expectations from a workplace health and wellness program. Hospitality-centered research in this area has also revealed employees' expectations of a workplace health and wellness program that extends beyond step counts to include nutrition awareness, smoking cessation, stress management, and exercise programs as priorities over tracking devices (Zhang et al, 2020).…”

“…Using theoretical, behavioral, and structural frameworks from occupational health psychology as it pertains to Total Worker Health (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2020 [CDC]), there is an opportunity to advance a more holistic theoretical framework of worker health in the hospitality discipline based on a humanistic and agentic perspective, rather than a fiscal perspective (Solnet et al, 2020). NIOSH's Total Worker Health approach focuses on the integration of safety and health hazards protections together with injury and illness prevention, thus advancing worker health, safety, and well-being through interventions that target a variety of risk factors in the workplace (CDC, 2020).…”

Industry Context as an Essential Tool for the Future of Healthy and Safe Work: Illustrative Examples for Occupational Health Psychology from the Hospitality Industry

“…Until recently, the hospitality industry has not placed a high priority on employee health and wellness, aside from those wellness initiatives which generate a rapid return on investment [51]. This is due, in part, to resource allocation associated with thin profit margins, in which a misinformed rationale has undermined justification for employee wellness on its own merits [53,54]. Collectively, the U.S. hospitality industry is facing increasing uncertainties about its labor force in a time of heightened awareness around fair wages and forecasted increasing consumer demand [47].…”