A Dual-Path Study Of The Effect Of Work Pressure On Employee Followership

With the advent of the VUCA era,changes in the social environment have led to organisational changes,the organisational structure has become “flat”,the distance between leaders and employees has been reduced,and the uncertainty of the external environment has brought huge risks and challenges to the company.As the main performers of the work,employees have become an important human capital for the organisation to cope with risks and challenges and to enhance the competitiveness of the organisation,and their followership behaviour is importance for the role of leaders and the development of the organisation.Therefore,motivating and enhancing employees’ followership is a sure way for companies to cope with uncertainty in the current highly competitive environment.At present,research on the antecedent variables of employee followership has mainly focused on leadership style,with a small number of studies discussing the influence of individual personality traits and other aspects,but it is not deep and comprehensive enough and neglects the analysis of influencing factors from the follower’s perspective.Employees often play the role of followers and their behaviour is not only influenced by the leader but also varies according to individual differences in the perception of situational factors.As work pressure has become a common phenomenon in organisations,research exploring the effect of such situational factors on employee followership is necessary.However,in previous studies,work pressure has always been given a pre-determined ‘status’ of ‘good’ or ‘bad’ in order to obtain a positive or negative outcome.In essence,however,work pressure is a stimulus to the individual at work,and the stimulus itself is not good or bad,it is objective,and it is the cognitive differences between individuals that make them behave differently.As a personality trait,the level of conscientiousness affects the individual’s perception of situational factors,causing individuals to form different perceptions,which in turn guide their behaviour.In summary,this study will use social cognition theory as the theoretical basis to focus on the effect of the interaction between work pressure and conscientiousness on harmonious work passion and obsessive work passion,as well as the mediating role of harmonious work passion and obsessive work passion in the relationship between the interaction between work pressure and conscientiousness and employee followership,constructing a mediated moderation model that affects employee followership from both positive and negative aspects.This study used a questionnaire survey to collect relevant data of 339 working employees from Shanxi and Shaanxi.Regression analysis and simple slope analysis were conducted with the help of SPSS 26.0 statistical analysis software and Process plug-in to test the effect of the interaction between work pressure and conscientiousness on dualistic work passion,and found that when individual conscientiousness is high,the interaction between work pressure and conscientiousness have a positive effect on harmonious work passion;when individual conscientiousness is low,the interaction between work pressure and conscientiousness have a negative effect on obsessive work passion.Hierarchical regression analysis was used to test the effects of harmonious and obsessive work passions on employee followership,as well as to test the mediated moderation model,and found that harmonious work passion has a positive effect on employee followership,while obsessive work passion has a negative effect on employee followership;harmonious work passion and obsessive work passion play a mediating role in the interaction between work pressure and conscientiousness on employee followership,reflecting a mediated moderating effect.The innovation and significance of this study are reflected in the following aspects:firstly,this study constructs a dual-path model of the interaction between work pressure and conscientiousness on employee followership,which reveals the mechanism of the interaction between work pressure and conscientiousness on followership in a more comprehensive manner.Secondly,it explains the formation mechanism of dualistic work passion and its influence from the perspective of social cognitive theory,and builds a new ‘bridge’ for the pathway of the interaction between work pressure and conscientiousness on employee followership.Thirdly,this study considers work pressure as an attributeless objective situational factor,and draws on social cognitive theory to explore the effect of the interaction between work pressure and conscientiousness on individual cognition and behaviour,which provides reference for managers to rationalise their employees’ workplace and enhance employee followership.