Role of Personality on Psychological Well-being in Public Services: Theorizing the Self-Determination Theory Perspective

Abstract

Public services constitute an important aspect in government functioning. The well-being of such employees becomes increasingly important, as they play a crucial role in national level decisionmaking. The study is focused on two objectives, that is whether individual resources lead to positive organizational outcomes and whether the organizational outcomes lead to creating positive workplaces. In order to explore the above objectives, two hypotheses are drawn: (a) Individual personality variables (individual resources) will lead to a positive impact on organizational citizenship behaviour (OCB) and (b) OCB will mediate the relationship between personality and perceived well- being (PWB) (conceptualized as primary component to happy workplaces). Data were collected on 399 employees from the Indian Ministry of Commerce and Industry. The results showed that OCB fully mediated the relationship between agreeableness, conscientiousness and intellect, with PWB, while OCB partially mediated the relationship between extraversion and neuroticism, with PWB. The results are explained in juxtaposition with Self-Determination Theory (SDT) to provide a new theoretical perspective of eudemonic well-being in the public sector. The study highlights the importance of personality of the employees to be considered for selection in public services, which is an important determinant for their discretionary behaviour towards organization and their well-being.