EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

When Callings Are Calling: Crafting Work and Leisure in Pursuit of Unanswered Occupational Callings

Justin M. Berg (), Adam M. Grant () and Victoria Johnson ()
Additional contact information
Justin M. Berg: The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104
Adam M. Grant: The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104
Victoria Johnson: Organizational Studies Program, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109

Organization Science, 2010, vol. 21, issue 5, 973-994

Abstract: Scholars have identified benefits of viewing work as a calling, but little research has explored the notion that people are frequently unable to work in occupations that answer their callings. To develop propositions on how individuals experience and pursue unanswered callings, we conducted a qualitative study based on interviews with 31 employees across a variety of occupations. We distinguish between two types of unanswered callings---missed callings and additional callings---and propose that individuals pursue these unanswered callings by employing five different techniques to craft their jobs (task emphasizing, job expanding, and role reframing) and their leisure time (vicarious experiencing and hobby participating). We also propose that individuals experience these techniques as facilitating the kinds of pleasant psychological states of enjoyment and meaning that they associate with pursuing their unanswered callings, but also as leading to unpleasant states of regret over forgone fulfillment of their unanswered callings and stress due to difficulties in pursuing their unanswered callings. These propositions have important implications for theory and future research on callings, job crafting, and self-regulation processes.

Keywords: work orientation; calling; job crafting; self-regulation; psychological well-being; regulatory focus (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (34)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/orsc.1090.0497 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inm:ororsc:v:21:y:2010:i:5:p:973-994

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Organization Science from INFORMS Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Asher ().

 
Page updated 2025-03-19
Handle: RePEc:inm:ororsc:v:21:y:2010:i:5:p:973-994