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Article

Can I Get Back Later or Turn It Off? Day-Level Effect of Remote Communication Autonomy on Sustainable Proactivity

by
Yujing Liu
1,
Jing Du
1,*,
Jin Nam Choi
2 and
Yuan Li
3
1
Economics and Management School, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
2
Graduate School of Business, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea
3
Business School, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou 450001, China
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Sustainability 2022, 14(3), 1856; https://doi.org/10.3390/su14031856
Submission received: 5 January 2022 / Revised: 3 February 2022 / Accepted: 4 February 2022 / Published: 6 February 2022
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Rethinking Work: Organizing People for Sustainability and Well-Being at Work)
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Abstract

:
Overwhelming remote communication episodes have become critical daily work demands for employees. On the basis of affective event theory, this study explores the effect of daily remote communication autonomy on positive affect and proactive work behaviors. We conducted a multilevel path analysis using a general survey, followed by experience sampling methodology, with a sample of 80 employees in China who completed surveys thrice daily over a two-week period. The results showed that daily remote communication autonomy increased positive affective reactions, which, in turn, enhanced proactive work behaviors on the same workday. Furthermore, positive day-level relationships leading to employee proactivity were only significant when the employees’ person-level general techno-workload was not high. The findings provide a new perspective for managing employees working under continuous techno-workload and demands for remote interactions.

1. Introduction

The COVID-19 pandemic propelled billions of conversations that would otherwise have taken place face-to-face into remote meetings. Information and communication technologies (ICT), such as e-mail, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, and Ding Talk, are ubiquitous in the contemporary remote working environment [1]. Despite its positive potential that facilitates widespread and rapid information sharing and communications between employees at any time [2], the communication demands from ICT are continually increasing and oftentimes overwhelming for employees, thereby generating techno-stress and burnout [3]. With the normative expectation of immediacy for remote exchanges, employees may feel a lack of control due to their limited discretion in processing and responding to remote communication episodes to the extent that the urgent may even crowd out the important [4,5]. Given the increasing demands from ICT-based communication, exploring how employees can cope with such challenges is vital.
Remote communication autonomy refers to the extent to which employees believe they can control the scheduling, sequencing, and conduct of their work-related remote communication [6]. Employees with such autonomy can determine when they attend and reply to remote messages and which remote communication episodes they should process first. Despite well-established empirical findings that the overall level of job autonomy allows employees to experience harmonious passion and exhibit proactivity generally [7,8,9], the literature on how day-level fluctuation of job autonomy affects workplace outcomes is lacking. A job can consist of multiple tasks and communication episodes [10]; if an employee works on the same task on multiple occasions, then communication episodes are nested within tasks [11]. That means remote communication autonomy is more specific than general job autonomy because of its distinct temporal nature and occurs after one communication event [12]. Distinct levels of remote communication autonomy may emerge on any given day, possibly triggered by specific communication episodes of that day, due to the time-bound nature of remote communication episodes [10]. The experiences of daily remote communication autonomy might vary meaningfully for the same individual over time, highlighting the need to understand the dynamics of transitory affective resources and subsequent work behaviors. In view of the increasing demand for work-related remote exchanges, we investigate day-level processes initiated by daily experiences of autonomy in handling remote communication, which bears practical and theoretical significance.
With the goal of examining day-level effects, we propose that remote communication autonomy elicits positive emotional reactions and proactive behaviors, as illustrated in Figure 1. Affective events theory (AET) [13] indicates that individuals often react emotionally to workplace events, and these affective experiences have a direct influence on attitudes and behavior. Accordingly, the sense of control experienced during daily remote communication events can be a proximal cause of affect-laden responses of employees [14]. Such controlled remote communication episodes are conducive to articulating compelling purposes and galvanizing employees in their task endeavors [15]. These positive reactions serve as and increase central affective resources, which are essential for proactive performance by actively scanning the work environment to identify opportunities for improving task and goal achievements [16]. Therefore, employees with remote communication autonomy are likely to develop positive psychological states and engage in proactive work behaviors sustainably. In other words, the current study identifies autonomous experiences in handling daily remote communication episodes as a positive affective event for employees to gain resources and overcome such demands and exhibit sustainable proactive work behaviors.
We further elaborate on the potential contingency of the proposed day-level relationship. Specifically, we propose that, even when individuals feel a sense of control of their remote communication on a given day, its benefit toward affective experiences and behaviors may not be realized if their task is overloaded with ICT demands. “Zoom fatigue” as a feeling of being drained and lacking energy may arise after a day full of remote meetings, which requires additional cognitive effort on their behalf [17]. In the current context involving remote communication, we identify techno-workload as such ICT demands that characterize one’s job. Employees with high techno-workload experience the depletion of resources due to the exertion of sustained efforts and the effort-performance imbalance caused by technological demands [18,19]. To date, research on workload has largely ignored the role of ICT-related demands despite their increasing significance and burden on employees. The resource gain through exercising control over remote communication episodes and its replenishing function that leads to proactive task engagement may be stalled by high ICT demands, thereby depleting personal resources and hindering employees’ capacity to regenerate resources [20].
The present study advances the literature in several ways. First, although previous research has reported the benefit of job autonomy on task performance [7], the within-person, day-level mechanism through which daily experiences of remote communication autonomy shapes employees’ proactive work behaviors has been neglected. Second, on the basis of AET theory, we conceive of remote communication autonomy as positive workplace events that generate sustainable personal resources for positive affect and proactive work behaviors [21]. We further propose techno-workload as a contingency of the effect of remote communication autonomy. Employees with high techno-workload have only limited personal resources to deal with excess job demands. As such, they are more defensive and seek to protect their remaining resources [20,22], and remote communication autonomy is less able to increase their momentary positive affect. Finally, our study advances practice by providing guidance to managers on how remote communication influences employees’ affective responses and proactive work behaviors. Below, we develop the theoretical rationale and explanations for our proposed conceptual model.

2. Theory and Hypotheses

2.1. Day-Level Effect of Remote Communication Autonomy on Positive Affect

In the remote working environment, employees’ daily experiences often unfold as a series of remote communication episodes [11]. These episodes are organized around work-related goals, mostly time-bound, and are subjectively experienced by employees [4]. In comparison with offline communication, remote communication comes with greater uncertainty and unpredictability because it can happen anytime and anywhere with spontaneity and relatively low cost in terms of time and effort. This unpredictable nature may align with high techno-stress [23]. Therefore, work-related remote communication constitutes affect-laden work episodes with daily variations. Particularly, employees are sensitive to emotional fluctuations associated with remote communication caused by differences in duration and frequency [24]. For example, remote communications that occur with an unexpectedly high frequency at inopportune moments during work hours can consume personal resources considerably, resulting in frustration, distraction, and work backlogs [14].
A plausible way to cope with the potential strain associated with remote communication is allowing employees to control the timing and sequence of or temporarily block communication episodes. With the autonomous control of remote communication during their work, employees may avoid unnecessary consumption of personal resources and instead experience positive psychological states because the sense of control is a core driver of rewarding and internally satisfying experiences [25]. Affective events theory holds that specific workplace events are situational antecedents of emotional reaction that transmit their influence on subsequent attitudes [13]. That means work-related positive events in a face-to-face environment can be defined as significant occurrences that spark active emotions. Previous studies have supported that AET helps explain how workplace events are related to emotional responses [26,27]. As it pertains to the advance of information and communication technologies, Butts et al. (2015) suggested that electronic communications from work also represent work-related events, and affective responses should impact one’s experiences in the moment [14]. Therefore, employees can appraise remote communication autonomy as favorable events depending upon the sense of autonomy and control conveyed by the remote communication. If employees can choose the scheduling and the manner by which they can process and respond to remote communication episodes to accommodate their idiosyncratic needs and daily task rhythms, then they gain psychological resources and positive affect during their work [28]. In summary, we propose the following relationship.
Hypothesis 1 (H1).
Daily remote communication autonomy is positively related to daily positive affect.

2.2. Day-Level Indirect Effect of Remote Communication Autonomy on Proactive Work Behaviors via Positive Affect

Proactive work behavior refers to employee engagement in self-initiated, future-oriented behaviors to change and improve their task situations, work roles, or themselves [16]. Employees’ proactive behaviors have gained importance in remote workplaces that require an active and spontaneous task engagement [29]. Employees become willing to invest their personal resources in effortful and proactive actions sustainably when they possess internal driving forces based on positive motivational and psychological states. Positive affect tends to promote self-initiated and change-oriented behaviors [29,30]. Moreover, positive affect stimulates flexible thoughts and action tendencies, which can be cumulative and can replenish cognitive and social resources over time [31]. Personal resources that accrue during psychological well-being are durable and enable the array of thoughts and behaviors that come to mind to become true actions [32,33]. When combined with the model of proactive motivation, this suggests that positive experiences induce activation affect and will influence energization and well-being [34,35]. In line with the literature, we propose that employees’ daily positive affect motivates their proactive work behaviors.
Combined with the theoretical proposition that remote communication autonomy is related to increased positive affect, we further argue that remote communication autonomy may exert an indirect effect on proactive work behaviors through positive affect. Each time employees experience personal control in addressing remote communication episodes, they perceive organizational support for their wellbeing and self-determination in their remote exchanges [36]. This unfolding process is in line with AET in that positive work events serve as and increase central affective resources, which supply internal drives for proactive work behaviors [37,38]. Self-controlled episodes may elicit positive affective reactions, and increased affective resources then trigger a proactive view of tasks and energize corresponding behavior [29]. Therefore, we propose that positive affect derived from remote communication autonomy will function as an affective resource that stimulates employees to perform proactive work behaviors.
Hypothesis 2 (H2).
Daily remote communication autonomy exerts an indirect effect on proactive work behaviors on the same day through daily positive affect.

2.3. Person-Level Techno-Workload as a Cross-Level Moderator of the Day-Level Relationship

Techno-workload is defined as the amount of work and time pressure due to remote ICT-related demands characterizing one’s job [23]. High techno-workload tends to impair employees’ motivation and increase their counterproductive work behaviors [39]. A meta-analytic study also indicates that employees with high techno-workload may experience various physical symptoms [40]. Thus, a relatively stable resource deficiency exists because jobs with high techno-workload require individuals to engage in intensive volitional actions to control the task processes and make choices needed to cope with the unrelenting ICT-related task demands [23,41].
In the present study, we identify techno-workload as a between-person (or person-level) moderator that constrains the within-person (or day-level) relationship between remote communication autonomy and positive affect. To handle high techno-workload, employees need to exert continuous work-related self-control, which carries psychological costs and demands self-regulatory resources. Given the limited personal resources, excess ICT demands will lead to a loss of self-regulatory resources [31]. A corollary of COR theory states that those with fewer resources are less capable of orchestrating resource gain, whereas those with greater resources are more capable of achieving resource gain [19]. As such, employees with fewer resources due to high techno-workload may have difficulty gaining affective resources from remote communication autonomy [31].
High techno-workload depletes the personal resources of employees, which urge them to adopt a defensive posture to protect their remaining resources [20,22]. Due to the continuity of resource levels for a person with specific job characteristics, such as high techno-workload, resource deficiency tends to carry over to reduce one’s ability to use resource gain opportunities actively [40]. For example, employees overwhelmed with burdensome ICT demands are exhausted, and such resource deficiency may hinder them from acquiring resources through exercising personal control of remote communication. Recent research suggests that remote conferences are more fatiguing than face-to-face meetings because of increased sustained attention [12]. Communication can flow naturally in face-to-face meetings; employees are rarely consciously attending to their own gestures and other nonverbal cues. However, on Zoom, employees need to work harder to send and receive signals, which causes cognitive load [41]. By imposing an additional demand for ICT, remote communication autonomy can actually compete with or further deplete the personal resources needed to cope with a high techno-workload [2]. In sum, under the condition of high ICT-induced task demands, employees suffer from limited personal resources that constrain their capability and sensitivity to pursue active resource recovery through exercising control over their daily remote communication [42]. Therefore, we propose the following cross-level moderation hypothesis.
Hypothesis 3 (H3).
Person-level techno-workload moderates the day-level relationship between remote communication autonomy and positive affect, such that the day-level relationship is stronger when the techno-workload is low than when it is high.
When combined, the above hypotheses suggest that the day-level indirect relationship is also moderated by the person-level techno-overload. High techno-workload renders employees less capable of and sensitive to gaining affective resources from remote communication autonomy, which leads to their subsequent proactive work behaviors. We thus advance the following moderated indirect effects.
Hypothesis 4 (H4).
Techno-workload moderates the day-level indirect relationship between remote communication autonomy and proactive work behaviors through positive affect, such that the indirect relationship is weaker for employees with higher levels of techno-workload.

3. Methods

3.1. Participants and Procedure

We used an experience sampling methodology (ESM) to capture daily variations in the experiences of the participants. The daily ESM approach is a suitable approach to empirically test the present theoretical framework in which we proposed a day-level, relatively immediate effect of remote communication autonomy on affect and behavior. Thus, fluctuations and relationships between these constructs should be examined in a dynamic daily timescale to achieve the alignment between theory and empirical study [43].
We collected field data from a range of financial, information technology, and industrial organizations in China with 100 or more employees. These organizations were appropriate research targets for our study of daily remote communication episodes because their employees interacted with leaders, colleagues, and customers frequently. More important, they had easy access to wireless networks for computer-mediated communication and were accustomed to using mobile survey platforms [44]. To recruit participants, we initially contacted the human resource managers of 15 organizations to explain the purpose of our research and ask for assistance in recruiting employees who would frequently interact with others remotely in the study period. Each manager invited 10 employees to participate in our study. We followed the research ethics guidelines and explicitly informed all the participants of the voluntariness of participation and the confidentiality of their responses. We also explained the two-phase remote study procedure (a general survey and three daily surveys for 10 workdays) and offered a reward of RMB 200 (approximately US $30) to each participant who completed all the questionnaires.
A total of 85 individuals (response rate = 56.7%) completed the general survey reporting the demographic characteristics, techno-workload, and job autonomy (control variable). Approximately one week after the general survey, we sent three short daily surveys at specific times of day for 10 consecutive workdays. Specifically, the first daily survey was sent in the morning (Time 1, 8:30 a.m.) to assess sleep quality as a control variable. The participants received the second daily survey in the afternoon (Time 2, 3:00 p.m.) to measure their remote communication autonomy experience and positive affect at work on a given day. The third daily survey was sent right after office hours (Time 3, 6:00 p.m.) to measure their proactive work behaviors during the day. On average, the participants completed the first survey at 9:01 a.m. (SD = 1.41 h), the second survey at 4:21 p.m. (SD = 1.38 h), and the third survey at 6:27 p.m. (SD = 1.25 h).
Recent ESM studies [45,46] recommend the minimum of three data points per person for statistically analyzing within-person, day-level relationships. In line with this recommendation, we included participants who completed at least 3 of the 10 daily surveys in our analysis by removing 5 respondents who contributed fewer than 3 complete daily data points. Consequently, our final sample comprised 80 individuals who provided 779 matched data points out of a possible 800 (a completion rate of 97.4%). The majority of the sample was female (70%) and had obtained at least a college degree (86.3%). The average age of the participants was 30.71 years (SD = 4.45), and their average organizational tenure was 7.54 years (SD = 4.82). The participants performed various functions, including general management, finance, technical analysis, software development, and human resource management.

3.2. Day-Level Measures

The questionnaires were provided in Chinese. We followed the best practices for translation-back-translation procedures to translate scale items, which were originally developed in English [47]. All measures were slightly adapted to suit the ESM design based on the daily measurements of the constructs. The response format for all items was a five-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree and 5 = strongly agree).
Remote communication autonomy. We measured remote communication autonomy with a three-item scale developed by Breaugh (1985) [6]. To indicate that the focus was remote communication episodes on a given workday, we added restrictive phrases to the original items (“Today” and “for the remote communication episodes”). This adapted measure asked the participants to recall their remote communication experiences and rate whether they autonomously engaged in those episodes during their workday. The items were “Today, I had control over the scheduling of my remote communication episodes at work”, “Today, I had control over the sequencing of my remote communication episodes at work”, and “Today, I can decide when to deal with particular remote communication episodes at work”. The average Cronbach’s alpha across observations was 0.92.
Positive affect. We assessed positive affect with a five-item scale corresponding to a short version of the Positive and Negative Affect Scale validated by Mackinnon et al. (1999) [48]. To minimize the respondents’ burden, we used five shortened descriptors that are common in diary studies [42]. The participants indicated whether they experienced the listed positive affect during their workday. The items were “Today, I feel enthusiastic during my workday”, “Today, I feel excited during my workday”, “Today, I feel inspired during my workday”, “Today, I feel alert during my workday”, and “Today, I feel determined during my workday”. The average Cronbach’s alpha across observations was 0.96.
Proactive work behaviors. The participants’ daily proactive work behaviors were evaluated by using a three-item scale developed by Griffin et al. (2007) [16]. They indicated whether they had engaged in the listed behaviors during their workday. The items were “Today, I initiated better ways of doing my core tasks”, “Today, I came up with ideas to improve the way my core tasks are done”, and “Today, I made changes to the way my core tasks are done”. The average Cronbach’s alpha across observations was 0.91.
Day-level control variable. We assessed sleep quality in the preceding night as a control variable because the baseline resource level from recovery through sleep could influence subsequent resource gain and work behaviors during their workday [49]. We used one item derived from the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index [50]: “How do you evaluate last night’s sleep?” (1 = very poor, 5 = very good).

3.3. Person-Level Measures

Techno-workload. The general survey conducted a week before the ESM data collection included a five-item measure of techno-workload developed based on Spector and Jex (1998) [51]. The participants rated how well each item described them with regard to general ICT demands at work. The items were “In general, I have a lot of work to do because of information and communication technology (ICT) demands”, “In general, I have to do more work than I can do well because of ICT demands”, “In general, my job requires me to work very fast because of ICT demands”, “In general, my job leaves me with little time to get things done because of ICT demands”, and “In general, my job requires me very effortful because of ICT demands”. The Cronbach’s alpha was 0.75.
Person-level control variables. We followed previous ESM studies [42] by controlling the participants’ general job autonomy, which is a relatively stable job characteristic that positively relates to proactive behaviors [7]. Moreover, job autonomy reflects the baseline level of employees’ general autonomy, which can prescribe their daily communication autonomy. We assessed job autonomy in the general survey with a nine-item scale developed by Breaugh (1985) [6]. The items were “In general, I am allowed to decide how to go about getting my job done”, “In general, I can choose the way to go about my job”, “In general, I am free to choose the method to use in conducting my work”, “In general, I have control over my work schedule”, “In general, I have some control over the sequencing of my work activities”, “In general, I can decide when to do particular work activities in my job”, “In general, my job allows me to modify the normal way we are evaluated, such that I can emphasize some aspects of my job”, “In general, I can modify what my job objectives are”, and “In general, I have some control over what I am supposed to accomplish”. The Cronbach’s alpha was 0.88.

3.4. Analytic Approach

Given the multilevel structure of the present data, with daily responses nested within individuals, we conducted multilevel path analysis to test the theoretical model shown in Figure 1 with Mplus 7.4 [52]. This approach allows for the simultaneous estimation of path coefficients for the hypothesized relationships considering the day- and person-level variances. Specifically, the effects of the within-person, day-level study variables (i.e., remote communication autonomy, positive affect, and proactive behaviors) and control variable (i.e., sleep quality) were modeled as random slopes at Level 1 [46,53]. The between-person moderator (i.e., techno-workload) and controls (i.e., job autonomy and demographic characteristics) were modeled as Level-2 constructs that exert cross-level effects on Level-1 variables and relationships. In addition, we used parametric bootstrapping to test the significance of the indirect effects and obtained confidence intervals (CIs) based on Monte Carlo simulations with 20,000 replications using the open-source software R [54].

4. Results

4.1. Preliminary Analysis

Table 1 reports the proportion of within-person variance in each daily variable in our study. The daily measured variables showed significant variance at the day level, ranging from 31.8% to 77.5%. Therefore, utilizing within-person modeling for data analysis is appropriate [55].
To verify the discriminant validity of the current study variables, we conducted a multilevel confirmatory factor analysis. At the within-person or day level, we included three latent factors (i.e., remote communication autonomy, positive affect, and proactive work behaviors). Each factor was set to load on the respective items. The between-person level included techno-workload as a latent factor. This measurement model exhibited an acceptable fit to the data (χ2 = 307.50, df = 139, RMSEA = 0.04, CFI = 0.95, SRMR-within = 0.03, SRMR-between = 0.11) and performed better than alternative measurement models (all χ2 difference tests, p < 0.001), confirming the discriminant validity of the current variables. Table 2 reports the means, standard deviations, and correlations of the study variables at the day- and person-level analysis.

4.2. Hypotheses Testing

Main effect (Hypothesis 1 (H1)). Table 3 presents the results of the multilevel path analysis that simultaneously estimated all the path coefficients. Remote communication autonomy was positively related to increased positive affect (γ = 0.16, p < 0.01) after controlling for sleep quality of the day and general job autonomy, supporting Hypothesis 1 (H1).
Indirect effect (Hypothesis 2 (H2)). Employees’ remote communication autonomy is further hypothesized to exert an indirect effect on daily proactive work behaviors through positive affect. As reported in Table 3, positive affect was positively related to proactive behaviors (γ = 0.29, p < 0.001). To estimate the significance of the proposed indirect effect, we used bootstrapped samples based on 20,000 Monte Carlo replications [49]. The result showed that the indirect effect of remote communication autonomy on proactive work behaviors via positive affect was 0.06 with a 95% bias-corrected bootstrap CI of 0.01–0.10. Given that the 95% CI excluded zero, Hypothesis 2 (H2) was supported.
Moderation effect (Hypothesis 3 (H3)). We hypothesized the cross-level moderation effect of person-level techno-workload on the day-level relationship between remote communication autonomy and positive affect. The results in Table 3 showed that techno-workload negatively moderated the random slope between remote communication autonomy and positive affect (γ = −0.21, p < 0.01). We also conducted a simple slope analysis, as recommended by Preacher et al. (2006) [56]. As depicted in Figure 2, the positive day-level relationship between remote communication autonomy and positive affect was significant for employees with low levels of techno-workload (γ = 0.32, SE = 0.07, p < 0.001), but not for those with high levels of techno-workload (γ = 0.09, SE = 0.05, p = 0.06). Thus, Hypothesis 3 (H3) was supported.
Conditional indirect effects (Hypothesis 4 (H4)). We tested the indirect effect of remote communication autonomy on proactive work behaviors via positive affect estimated at different levels of techno-workload. To test these conditional indirect effects, we conducted the bootstrapping procedure based on 20,000 Monte Carlo replications [49]. Remote communication autonomy had a significant and positive indirect effect under low techno-workload levels or 1SD below the mean (b = 0.10, p < 0.01), and the same indirect effect was statistically insignificant under high techno-workload levels or 1SD above the mean (b = 0.03, p = 0.09). Moreover, the difference between the two indirect effects was significant (difference = −0.07, 95% CI [−0.13, −0.01]). Therefore, the conditional indirect effect of remote communication autonomy proposed in Hypothesis 4 (H4) was supported.

5. Discussion

With the extensive use of remote meeting in the workplace, overwhelming remote communication through various channels has become a critical part of daily work demands [14]. By using ESM involving thrice daily reports of 80 employees over a two-week period, this study demonstrated that employees’ autonomy in daily remote communication episodes provides vital affective resources that further motivate proactive work behaviors during a given workday. However, such a positive daily effect of remote communication autonomy on employees’ proactivity via positive effect was significant only when the employees’ general techno-workload was not high.
The present study advances the literature by making the following contributions. First, whereas past research confirms that job autonomy is positively related to proactive behaviors [8], little is known about how daily remote communication autonomy influences transient affect and work experiences. We hypothesized the daily variations and effects of autonomy experienced for remote communication, which may constitute increasingly important behaviors in the current workplaces. So long as the remote communication episode is relevant to the work task, it should be treated as a work-related affective event with its own connotation and interpretation [14]. Even in the most stable environments with clear job descriptions, employees tend to adjust the resources they need to perform their daily tasks [57,58]. In this respect, this study complements and extends previous works that have demonstrated the significance of between-person general job autonomy as a predictor of job creativity [7,9]. The variance partitioning results reported in Table 1 revealed that, even in the overall high job autonomy with clear task-related discretions, employees could experience different levels of autonomy related to remote communication episodes across workdays [10]. Our finding for remote working literature is particularly important as it shines a positive light on individual willingness toward daily remote communication, expanding past studies focused on stable contextual factors. Further, investigating the daily fluctuations of autonomy for a specific task facet, such as remote communication, is valuable for a comprehensive understanding of the domain and function of general autonomy.
Second, by using ESM, the present study theorized and validated the AET theory within a workday by showing that the workplace events involving self-controlled remote communication elicit transient daily positive affect during work, which fuels spontaneous proactive work behaviors among employees on the same day [13]. The fluctuation of communication autonomy is a catalyst of positive affective processes underlying episodic proactive behavior. This finding expands previous studies that have focused on stable contextual antecedents of daily task proactivity. Employee experiences involving remote episodes can modify the resource level available for offline proactivity within the span of a day. This immediate link between remote experiences and proactive behaviors suggests an intriguing possibility of mutual or reciprocal shaping of remote and offline task-related experiences in the heavily technology-driven work environments of contemporary organizations. Moreover, the finding is consistent with prior research demonstrating that high levels of autonomy may protect employees’ resources even when they engage in work-relevant communication after work hours [28].
Finally, previous studies have shown that job resources strongly affect work performance when job demands are high [59] but neglected the possibility that some employees may remain resource-depleted and fail to utilize resource gain opportunities. The current analysis provided a nuanced explanation of the day-level development of remote communication autonomy and its function by considering a moderating contingency. With respect to job outcomes, some individuals may be more or less motivated regardless of fluctuating resource levels [28,42]. Indeed, not all employees can gain resources from exercising control over remote communication. That is, remote communication autonomy is most beneficial for employees with low workloads because they have greater available resources for another episode of resource investment. In line with COR, when employees are overwhelmed with generally high ICT-related demands, remote communication autonomy may represent an effortful activity that divests self-regulatory resources and competes with already high ICT demands for their personal resources [53]. Accordingly, those who lack personal resources may exhibit defensive attempts to conserve remaining resources in the face of opportunities for resource gain [22]. The current pattern is in line with the primacy of resource loss suggested by COR theory [20]; that is, resource loss is disproportionally more salient than resource gain. Specifically, daily remote communication autonomy is less valuable under prevailing high techno-workload depleting resources. In general, our study draws on the personal resource perspective to identify techno-workload as a boundary condition for the relationship between individual remote communication autonomy and sustainable proactivity via positive affect.

5.1. Practical Implications

Our findings offer important implications for organizational and managerial practices. The flexibility of communication technology not only facilitates rapid information sharing among employees but also engenders the expectation of responsiveness from them that makes users “always on call” [60]. Given that remote communication episodes are bound by the structural element of time and nested within tasks [11], managers should strategically construct work-related remote communication norms to allow employees to feel autonomous over processing and responding to remote messages. Thus, employees can gain freedom from restrictions on and hidden rules of communication, such as the need to respond to every single message immediately even if unimportant [60]. With the increasing reliance on remote tools to complete tasks in contemporary organizations, constructive norms and managerial interventions should be developed and implemented to channel remote episodes in a constructive direction. Such interventions are beneficial for employees and organizations, as shown in the current analysis [29].
In addition, techno-workload may limit employees’ willingness to invest their remaining scarce resources in autonomous actions [31]. Thus, managers should be aware that employees may vary in their susceptibility and capacity to accrue benefit from remote communication autonomy. Employees with high techno-workloads may not positively respond to or may not even desire remote communication autonomy [53]. Thus, we recommend that managers provide these busy employees with advanced and unified communication media that simplify their remote communication to minimize cumbersome scheduling and organizing processes. Due to remote meeting fatigue having received popular press attention [17], providing meetings recommendations for intervals between remote meetings are quite helpful. Such a simplified approach and tools may help employees handle high ICT demands and enhance efficiency, which will help them mobilize personal resources for core tasks [61].

5.2. Limitations and Future Research Directions

We acknowledge the limitations of our study, which may inform the directions for future research. First, we could not draw firm conclusions on causality given the self-reported data for all the variables in the current study. Within-person perceptions that may reflect implicit theories or consistency motives could confound the current findings. Future studies may replicate the current findings and establish the direction of causality more strongly through a day-level experimental design and inviting managers or colleagues as informants. In addition, retrospective summaries of individual experiences are often biased by semantic memory [11,58]. Future studies could measure remote communication autonomy using non-parametric techniques, such as event-contingent diaries, to eliminate recall biases by requiring participants to record any event of communication in detail every time it occurs [62,63,64].
Second, experiences of remote communication episodes could be a joint function of resource generation and depletion [20]. Accordingly, the same self-controlled, autonomous experiences of remote communication could generate different affective reactions depending on the nature of the communication episodes. We recommend that future studies explore the context and content of different remote communication episodes in further detail, such as replenishing communication and draining communication, which may lead to disparate employee reactions and outcomes.
Third, given that our final sample only comprised 80 Chinese employees who provided 779 matched data points, the sample size and the generalizability of the present findings to other cultural contexts should be considered. We encourage further examination of our model in a wider range of cultural contexts to examine the extent to which the present study can be applied in other contexts. Finally, we did not consider the effect of employees’ position and the potential differences in the responses among them during remote communication. Therefore, we suggest that future research collecting more detailed organizational characteristics of the participants would be a useful extension.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization, Y.L. (Yujing Liu) and J.D.; investigation, Y.L. (Yujing Liu), J.D. and Y.L. (Yuan Li); methodology, Y.L. (Yujing Liu); writing—original draft preparation, Y.L. (Yujing Liu), J.N.C., J.D. and Y.L. (Yuan Li). All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Funding

This research received no external funding.

Institutional Review Board Statement

Not applicable.

Informed Consent Statement

Informed consent was obtained from all subjects involved in the study.

Data Availability Statement

Data available on request due to privacy restrictions.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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Sustainability 14 01856 g001 550
Figure 1. Theoretical framework.
Figure 1. Theoretical framework.
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Sustainability 14 01856 g002 550
Figure 2. Cross-level moderation effect of techno-workload on the day-level relationship between remote communication autonomy and positive affect.
Figure 2. Cross-level moderation effect of techno-workload on the day-level relationship between remote communication autonomy and positive affect.
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Table
Table 1. Within-person (day-level) and between-person (person-level) variances.
Table 1. Within-person (day-level) and between-person (person-level) variances.
Daily VariablesWithin-Person Variance (e2)Between-Person Variance (r2)Proportion of Within-Person Variance (%)
Sleep quality (Control) a0.550.1677.5%
Remote communication autonomy b0.170.2045.9%
Positive affect b0.140.3031.8%
Proactive work behaviors c0.210.2743.8%
Notes. a Variables measured in the morning survey. b Variables measured in the afternoon survey. c Variables measured in the end-of-workday surveys. The proportion of within-person variance was calculated as e2/(e2 + r2).
Table
Table 2. Descriptive statistics and correlations among study variables.
Table 2. Descriptive statistics and correlations among study variables.
VariableMeanSD wSD b123456
Day-level
1. Remote communication autonomy3.710.610.47—0.65 ***0.68 ***0.14−0.28 *0.59 ***
2. Positive affect3.520.660.660.51 ***—0.75 ***0.130.040.37 **
3. Proactive work behaviors3.550.690.540.47 ***0.63 ***—0.180.060.39 ***
4. Sleep quality (Control)3.250.840.470.09 *0.19 ***0.11 **—0.010.23 *
Person-level
5. Techno-workload2.98—0.57−0.18 ***0.060.050.01—−0.33 **
6. Job autonomy (Control)3.54—0.540.41 ***0.28 ***0.30 ***0.13 ***−0.33 ***—
Notes. Within-person level correlations are shown below the diagonal (n = 779). Between-person level correlations are shown above the diagonal, with within-person variables aggregated to the between-person level (n = 80). w Within-person. b Between-person. * p < 0.05. ** p < 0.01. *** p < 0.001.
Table
Table 3. Unstandardized coefficients of the multilevel model.
Table 3. Unstandardized coefficients of the multilevel model.
MeasurePositive AffectProactive Work
Behaviors
EstimateSEEstimateSEEstimateSE
Day-level
Intercept2.25 ***0.433.52 ***0.062.15 ***0.43
Sleep quality0.10 ***0.030.10 **0.030.010.03
Remote communication autonomy0.16 **0.060.20 ***0.04
Positive affect 0.29 ***0.07
Person-level
Job autonomy0.36 **0.120.43 ***0.120.39 **0.12
Techno-workload 0.190.10
Remote communication autonomy × techno-workload −0.21 **0.07
Pseudo-R20.390.360.42
Notes. Day-level n = 779; Person-level n = 80. SE = standard error. Pseudo-R2 indicates percentage of the total variance (i.e., within and between person) in the dependent variable accounted by all the predictor variables based on the formulas suggested by Sherf et al. (2019) [43]. ** p < 0.01. *** p < 0.001.
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Liu, Y.; Du, J.; Choi, J.N.; Li, Y. Can I Get Back Later or Turn It Off? Day-Level Effect of Remote Communication Autonomy on Sustainable Proactivity. Sustainability 2022, 14, 1856. https://doi.org/10.3390/su14031856

AMA Style

Liu Y, Du J, Choi JN, Li Y. Can I Get Back Later or Turn It Off? Day-Level Effect of Remote Communication Autonomy on Sustainable Proactivity. Sustainability. 2022; 14(3):1856. https://doi.org/10.3390/su14031856

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Liu, Yujing, Jing Du, Jin Nam Choi, and Yuan Li. 2022. "Can I Get Back Later or Turn It Off? Day-Level Effect of Remote Communication Autonomy on Sustainable Proactivity" Sustainability 14, no. 3: 1856. https://doi.org/10.3390/su14031856

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