In search of protective factors against burnout: the role of psychological empowerment and perceived team empowerment

Abstract

The central aim of our study was to broad knowledge on the variables that may help to reduce burnout. To this end, we investigated whether the association between three job demands (i.e. role conflict, emotional demands and cognitive demands) and burnout was moderated by psychological empowerment and perceived team empowerment. Participants were 1268 employees from two organisations (government employees = 287, hospital staff = 981). Latent moderated structural equations revealed different patterns of moderation in the samples. Psychological empowerment offset the influence of the three job demands on burnout in the hospital sample, whereas in the government organisation only emotional demands were buffered. Perceived team empowerment ameliorated the effect of emotional and cognitive demands on burnout in the government sample whereas in the hospital only emotional demands were moderated. Interestingly, both kinds of empowerment were significant moderators of emotional demands in the two samples. Overall, our results support the notion that psychological and perceived team empowerment can be relevant health-promoting factors that help to deal with high job demands and reduce burnout