Occupational Stress and Turnover Intentions in Employees of the Portuguese Tax and Customs Authority: Mediating Effect of Burnout and Moderating Effect of Motivation

Abstract

The main objective of this study was to study the effect of occupational stress on turnover intentions, as well as determine whether this relationship is mediated by burnout levels and moderated by motivation. The sample size of this study consisted of 603 participants, all employees of the Portuguese Tax and Customs Authority, which is part of the Ministry of Finance and belongs to the Direct State Administration. The results indicate that occupational stress (with managers, career and pay, and overwork) has a positive and significant effect on turnover intentions and that this relationship is mediated by burnout. Motivation (intrinsic and identified) has a negative and significant effect on turnover intentions. Intrinsic motivation moderates the relationship between occupational stress (with managers, colleagues, career and pay, and family problems) and turnover intentions. These results indicate that among the dimensions of occupational stress, the most critical are the stress caused by managers, work overload, and career and pay. These are factors that the Direct State Administration should be concerned with to reduce employees’ stress levels, as well as their turnover intentions.

Intercultural communication competence and job burnout in MNC employees: the mediation role of job stress

“…In contrast to the paucity of literature connecting ICC to job burnout, a large body of literature exists that explores the relationship between job stress and burnout across a variety of work-related contexts (e.g., Innstrand et al, 2004 ; Leung et al, 2011 ; Silbiger and Pines, 2014 ; Mullen et al, 2018 ; Freitas et al, 2023 ). Stress can be defined as “a nonspecific response of the body to any demand” ( Seyle, 1983 , p. 127).…”

“…For professional aspect, job satisfaction ( Dartey-Baah et al, 2020 ), organizational commitment ( Wong et al, 2021 ), and job burnout are common symptoms due to job stress. Abundant research has found that job stress is the antecedent of burnout ( Nyssen et al, 2003 ; Leung et al, 2010 ; Li et al, 2015 ; Luo et al, 2016 ; Mnif and Rebai, 2022 ; Freitas et al, 2023 ).…”

Human Resources’ Burnout

“…In recent decades, the technological revolution has brought about a significant change in the labour market, speeding up the pace of work and increasing the overload of information. The characteristics of the contemporary labour market, i.e., temporary contracts, psychological contracts between workers and employers, and new perceptions of employability, call into question job security, thus representing an inexhaustible source of professional stress, which is defined by the worker's inability to deal with the sources of stress, and in chronic cases, burnout, which can lead to mental and physical exhaustion requiring complex medical assistance [1][2][3].…”