A Study on the Moderating Role of Work Motivation in the Relationship between Personality Traits and Workplace Procrastination
Procrastination comes from the Latin pro (“forward, forth, or in favor of,”) and crastinus (“of tomorrow”), this can be translated into ‘putting something off until tomorrow’ (Steel, 2007). In his meta-analysis on the possible causes and effects of procrastination, Steel (2007) defines procrastination as voluntarily postponing, delaying, or holding off an intended action or decision. Procrastination is present in various domains: in a study on distinguishing between procrastination in different life-domains, Klingsieck (2013a) found that it occurs in the academic, every day, health, leisure, family, and work domains. Procrastination in the general and academic setting have been researched most frequently, the present study will focus on the workplace setting, as more knowledge is required in this field.
Workplace procrastination is defined as “the delay of work-related action by intentionally engaging (behaviorally or cognitively) in non-work-related actions, with no intention of harming the employer, employee, workplace or client” (Metin, Taris, & Peeters, 2016, p. 255). Van Eerde (2003a; 2003b) states several benefits of procrastination, but at the same procrastination can be a problem. The author describes that we live in a world where achieving is important. In this achievement-oriented society, we are expected to meet our deadlines within a certain time span, and procrastination is not desirable (Van Eerde, 2003a).
For organizations, this self-regulatory failure of executing work tasks is a problem since it is a large expense. Nguyen, Steel, and Ferrari (2013) describe that procrastination consumes a quarter of the working day and costs about $10,000 per employee a year. D’Abate and Eddy (2007) see procrastination as a form of presenteeism because employees are on the job but do not perform at their peak level due to attending personal business during working hours. According to the authors, the distraction by personal or non-work-related activities ensures that employees are less focused on their work, leading to a lower productivity and quality of the output.
In the present study, two concepts are considered to have an effect on procrastination, in layman's terms: how people are and what drives them. Respectively, personality and work motivation. Earlier studies show a relation between procrastination and personality traits: people who score high on neuroticism (anxious, vulnerable to stress) and low on conscientiousness (organized, self-disciplined) tend to procrastinate more than people with opposite scores on these traits (Van Eerde, 2003a). Research on workplace procrastination is scarce (Prem, Scheel, Weigelt, Hoffman, & Korunka, 2018; Van Eerde, 2016), and the relation with work motivation is a neglected topic in this area (Van Eerde, 2000). It is not yet clear which type of work motivation might stimulate or discourage the delay of a task, and how this can be used to benefit the organization. More scientific knowledge on this topic could provide managers with guidelines on how certain types of motivation can be supported among employees to prevent procrastination and ensure productivity. Nguyen et al. (2013) found that procrastinators are more likely to have jobs that require lower intrinsically rewarding qualities, i.e. lower in characteristics that would provide motivation. According to the authors, procrastinators seek jobs that are equal to their self-disciplinary skills, so they will not require much dependability, achievement, planning, or self-control, which is not beneficiary for their performance at work.
It is essential that science provides more knowledge on procrastination in workplace situations, to increase organizational productivity and decrease the costs. Therefore, the main purpose of this study is to gain more knowledge on the role of work motivation and personality in workplace procrastination.
Workplace Procrastination: Soldiering and Cyberslacking
In general, delaying a task is considered merely dysfunctional, but according to the meta-analysis of Van Eerde (2003a) this is not always correct. Van Eerde reviewed 121 studies to examine the relationship between procrastination and personality variables, motives, affect, and performance. One of the outcomes was that when a task is delayed, there might be more information or more time to think, which can improve the quality of a decision. In another intervention study on the impact of time management training, Van Eerde (2003b) stated that procrastination makes routine, easy, or boring tasks more challenging because there will be more time pressure: this could lead to finishing the task faster. Also, delaying an intended action and replacing it with a more pleasant distraction provides temporary stress relief, which can be part of a strategic effort to restore a bad mood for a short time period (Van Eerde, 2003b). Procrastination involves avoidance behavior, the intended action is not executed, which leads to a voluntarily delay in performing a task or making a decision (Nguyen et al, 2013). An intended action can cognitively be considered as important, but at the same time experienced as emotionally unattractive. This causes an approach-avoidance conflict between what the individual should do and what the individual wants to do (Van Eerde, 2000; Van Eerde 2003b). Avoidance is a coping reaction, however, at work, it is not always possible to avoid the task indefinitely. To avoid emotional distress, Van Eerde (2000) describes that one may use distractions to reduce the distress with more pleasant activities or thoughts. Distractions such as taking a long coffee break and surfing on the internet are activities that can be done short-term and guide the mind away from the action they are avoiding (Van Eerde, 2003b). Procrastinators have an inability to focus their attention on engaging in unpleasant tasks that they are expected to complete. The immediate positive outcome of the distraction overrules the long-term gratification of the intended action. On the short-term, it will feel better, but in retrospect, it might be self-destructing. This desire for immediate effects is described as “the failure to delay gratification” or” the lack of impulse control” (Van Eerde, 2003b), and procrastination at work is referred to as “a self-regulatory failure of work tasks” (Nguyen et al., 2013).
According to the conceptualization of Metin et al. (2016) procrastination at work can be distinguished into two behavioral processes, soldiering and cyberslacking. Soldiering is more traditional, offline behavior that prevents employees from delivering output – without hurting others or putting more work on co-workers (Paulsen, 2015). Employees are actively withdrawing from what should be done, and as a result do not produce the output they could have delivered. Examples of soldiering are daydreaming, taking long coffee breaks, going to the bathroom very often, having long chats or gossiping, and doing other activities that are more pleasant than working. Negative outcomes that are associated with work-avoiding behavior are lower income, reduced employment (Nguyen et al., 2013), poorer mood and worse performance (Steel, 2007).
The modern times equivalent of soldiering is cyberslacking, which is related with increased personal use of the Internet and mobile technology at work (Garrett & Danziger, 2008; Thatcher, Wretschko, & Fridjhon, 2008; Vitak, Crouse, & LaRose, 2011). People who are cyberslacking engage in online shopping, blogging, gaming, instant messaging, and checking social network sites such as Facebook and Instagram. This online procrastination during work hours, is less visible than soldiering but nevertheless a waste of company time and resources (Lavoie & Pychyl, 2001; Metin et al., 2016; Vitak et al., 2011). The negative outcomes of cyberslacking reach further than just loss of productivity (Garrett & Danziger, 2008), it also threatens the company’s network security and increases the liability of employers on lawsuits from securities fraud to sexual harassment (Oswalt, Elliott-Howard, & Austin, 2003; Vitak et al., 2011).