The Role of Psychological Capital in Work Engagement: A Study of Employees from a Public Sector Bank in India

Abstract

Psychological capital is a core construct studied in the domain of Organizational Behaviour. Increasingly, it has been remarked to impact important work outputs such as performance at work, organizational citizenship behaviour, organizational commitment etc. Work engagement is one such critical variable. This study aims to unravel the linkage between psychological capital, its four sub-dimensions (viz. optimism, resilience, hope, self-efficacy) and work engagement in employees working at State Bank of India. It also aims to ascertain the effect of population parameters (age and designation) on work engagement. Data was analyzed using One-way ANOVA, Pearson Product- Moment Correlation, and Simple Regression Analysis. Results established non-significant effects of demographic characteristics like age, designation on work engagement. However, a significant relationship was established between psychological capital and work engagement. The relationship between the sub-dimensions of psychological capital, viz. optimism, resilience, hope, self-efficacy and work engagement was established as positive and significant. Further, psychological capital was found to predict high variance in work engagement; hope predicted high variance in work engagement whereas optimism, resilience and self-efficacy predicted moderate variance in work engagement. The present study underlines the importance of recognizing the self-resources of the workforce in contributing to the organization’s competitive edge.