Two sides of the same coin: motivating and demotivating mediation paths of time pressure and their relationship with strain

Background Time pressure, commonly categorized a challenge stressor, consistently and positively relates to employees' experience of strain. However, regarding its relationship with motivational outcomes such as work engagement researchers have reported positive as well as negative effects.Objectives Drawing on the challenge-hindrance framework, we introduce two explanatory mechanisms (i.e., a loss of time control and an increase of meaning in work) which may explain both, the consistent findings related to strain (here operationalized as irritation) as well as the diverse findings related to work engagement.Methods We conducted a two-wave survey with a two-week time-lag. The final sample consisted of 232 participants. To test our hypotheses, we used structural equation modeling.Results Time pressure negatively and positively related to work engagement through loss of time control and meaning in work. Further, only loss of time control mediated the time pressure-irritation relationship.Conclusion Results demonstrate that time pressure likely acts motivating and demotivating at the same time, only through different paths. Hence, our study provides an explanation for the heterogeneous findings regarding the relationship between time pressure and work engagement.