| The purpose of this study was to identify key occupational resiliency and coping characteristics which influence employees' personal health and productivity in a public service work setting. This type of research provides an opportunity to determine which characteristics might explain why some employees are more or less resilient, given the same stressful situation. In addition, this study identifies which coping strategies are used when employees respond to workplace stress, change and crisis. A mixed-methods sequential exploratory design was used in this study on resiliency and coping. The study consisted of two phases. Phase One of the study involved conducting interviews which utilized the Echo Approach and Repertory Grid Technique. In Phase One, 15 randomly selected employees from a Canadian public service organization were interviewed. Each participant was interviewed twice (N = 30). The interview results were used to design a subsequent quantitative phase of the study---a web-based survey on resiliency and coping. In Phase Two, 579 randomly selected employees (56% response rate) from the same Canadian public service organization completed the survey. Results from this study found that resilient employees were individuals who had high self-esteem, were adaptive to change/new situation, were optimistic and had an internal health locus of control. Resilient employees frequently used a combination of problem solving, self-control, accepting responsibility, empathy and distancing coping strategies in managing and overcoming crisis situations. These characteristics and behaviours appeared to be associated with high perceived health ratings, increased duration and frequency of physical activity, decreased visits to a physician, low burnout rates, low absenteeism rates and decreased consumption of alcoholic beverages and prescription medication. This study is intended to contribute to the fields of health psychology and organizational behaviour by identifying personality characteristics and coping strategies which demonstrate significant interrelationships with employee health and productivity outcomes. In addition, this study outlines a set of psychological measures which can be used in future organizational-based research studies on stress, resiliency and coping. |
