The motivational potential of meaningful work: Relationships with strengths use, work engagement, and performance

Research in the field of work and organizational psychology increasingly highlights the importance of meaningful work. Adding to this growing body of research, this study examined the complex linkage between meaningful work and performance. More specifically, we hypothesized that meaningful work has a positive relationship with an employee’s performance in several and interrelated ways, via employees’ use of strengths, via work engagement, and via strengths use affecting work engagement. We conducted a structural equation modeling on a sample of 459 professionals working at a global operating organization for health technology. The results provided support for the proposed model which showed a better fit than the sequential mediation model and the direct effects model. This indicates that the meaningful work–performance relationship is predicted best by multiple pathways via employees’ use of strengths and work engagement. The main theoretical, practical, and methodological implications of the results are discussed.