Manager Autonomy Support as a Moderator of Job Insecurity and Subjective Wellbeing

Abstract

Job insecurity is an inescapable workplace experience in the United States that reduces wellbeing and health (e.g., Burgard et al., 2009; De Witte et al., 2016; Dekker & Schaufeli,1995; Hellgren et al., 1999; Sverke & Hellgren, 2002) and organizational commitment behaviors (e.g., Cheng & Chan, 2008; Dekker & Schaufeli, 1995; Shoss, 2017). Job insecurity corelates to job control (e.g., Brockner et al., 2004; Karasek, 1979; Schreurs et al., 2010) and employees who experienced restricted autonomy, one application of a lack of job control, demonstrated lower health and work performance (Fallman et al., 2019). Conversely, employees who experienced job control were less negatively influenced by job insecurity (e.g., Schreurs et al., 2010) and reported increased wellbeing (Lee & Ravichandran, 2019). Rooney et al. (2009) observed that managers influenced employees’ perceptions of job control. Manager autonomy support, which is a managerial style that allows employees to make decisions about their work, determine their work tasks and goals, and provide input on work matters, is one way managers can enable job control.A quantitative survey methodology was employed to understand the relationships between manager autonomy support, job insecurity, and subjective wellbeing and between work climate, job insecurity, and subjective wellbeing. The survey methodology allowed for consistent data collection of the following: perception of manager autonomy support received via participative decision making and autonomy providing behaviors, positive affect and life satisfaction experienced (subjective wellbeing), the presence of job insecurity and details about work climate experienced by participants. The sample consisted of employees in the United States within a large global high tech/manufacturing organization. In addition to correlational results between the study’s variables, the findings identified that manager autonomy support was a predictor of positive affect and job insecurity was a predictor of subjective wellbeing. Limitations, study contributions, and implications for future research and practice are provided.