Shaping Engagement through Playful Work Design and Leader Humor: An Empirical Approach

Our paper aims to examine the extent of association between playful work design and work engagement among employees in customer-facing roles as they are more prone to emotional labor. We postulate that playful work design is positively associated with work engagement through meaningful work. In addition, we hypothesize that this indirect relationship between playful work design and work engagement is positively moderated by leader self-enhancing humor. To test these hypotheses, we adopted a quantitative research approach and gathered insights from (n=424) employees in the customer-facing roles. We employed a structural equation modeling approach to test hypotheses. We used proactive work behavior and social exchange theories to empirically test the moderated-mediation model of playful work design and engagement. Consistent with hypotheses, results reveal that playful work design is positively associated with work engagement through meaningful work. Additionally, findings suggest that indirect relationships between playful work design and work engagement through meaningful work were stronger for employees with a higher perception of leader self-enhancing humor. The findings of our study contribute to the proactivity and social exchange literature by showing how bottom-up approaches to work design, supported by top-down strategies, are positively related to work engagement.