Approach versus avoidance strategies in job crafting and their relationship to prosocial service behavior in university professors

Abstract

What work strategies must university professors adopt to guarantee the service of higher education and even go beyond the role universities have formally established for them? This article aims to analyze the strategy of job crafting – specifically, how it influences the job crafting strategies of approach vs. avoidance in prosocial service behavior, with engagement as a mediating variable. To achieve this goal, we analyze the behavior of 1068 university professors in Faculties of Economics and Business at Spanish public universities. The results suggest that university professors who expand their work role and who expand socially develop more prosocial behavior in the service they deliver. The job crafting strategy of avoidance, in contrast, influences prosocial behavior negatively. Further, engagement acts as a mediating variable in the relationship between professors’ job crafting and their prosocial service behavior. These results are relevant to higher education institutions, which must work constantly to adopt workplace strategies and programs to improve service performance. The study results may help universities to achieve professors who are more committed to their job functions and responsibilities.