The impact of individual and job characteristics on 'burnout' among civil engineers in Australia and the implications for employee turnover

Helen Lingard

Construction Management and Economics, 2003, vol. 21, issue 1, 69-80

Abstract: A survey was undertaken to explore the experience of 'burnout' among engineers working in the Australian construction industry. The most widely recognized model of burnout, comprising emotional exhaustion, cynicism and a diminished sense of personal accomplishment was found to be valid. However, Australian engineers experience a strong sense of the social worth of their professional activity, independently of believing in their own individual competence as engineers. There was also a widespread belief that the rewards enjoyed by engineers as a result of their professional endeavours are not commensurate with their level of skill and responsibility. The results of the study also show that burnout cannot be attributed to a single cause but occurs as a result of a complex interaction of individual characteristics and issues in the work environment. As such, there is no single 'cure' for burnout and multiple intervention strategies are probably needed. However, the relative importance of job characteristics compared to personality characteristics in predicting burnout suggests that job re-design may be an effective preventive strategy. Cynicism and emotional exhaustion were strong predictors of engineers' intention to leave their jobs. This suggests that measures to prevent burnout could also help to reduce turnover and its associated costs.

Keywords: Burnout; Civil Engineering; Construction; Job Demands; Turnover (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2003
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0144619032000065126 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

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:taf:conmgt:v:21:y:2003:i:1:p:69-80

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/RCME20

DOI: 10.1080/0144619032000065126

Access Statistics for this article

Construction Management and Economics is currently edited by Will Hughes

More articles in Construction Management and Economics from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().