Proactive Performance of Employees in Polish Higher Education Institutions: Determinants and Implications

Mateusz Hauk

doi:10.18290/pepsi-2026-0002

Published : 2026-06-30

Vol. 32 No. 1 (2026)

Proactive Performance of Employees in Polish Higher Education Institutions: Determinants and Implications

Mateusz Hauk

https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1202-9022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.18290/pepsi-2026-0002

Abstract

This study examines factors associated with proactive performance, as conceptualized by Griffin et al. (2007), among employees in Polish higher education. Drawing on a job performance framework (Hauk, 2025), rooted in the Job Characteristics Model (Hackman & Oldham, 1980) and its extensions, this research integrates motivational, social, and contextual job characteristics with two core psychological states – sense of meaningfulness and sense of responsibility and knowledge of results – and tests the moderating role of psychological safety.

A survey was conducted among 378 academic and administrative staff members from 26 Polish higher education institutions. The study assessed direct, indirect, and moderated pathways between work characteristics and three forms of proactive performance: doing a task individually, as a team member, and as a member of an organization.

As for the results, psychological safety moderated the indirect effects: meaningfulness served as a mediator under low to moderate levels of safety, whereas responsibility and knowledge of results played a stronger mediating role under moderate to high levels of safety.

These findings advance understanding of proactive performance in academia and highlight the importance of cultivating psychologically safe and supportive work environments. Thus, they hold particular significance for higher education institutions in Central and Eastern Europe.

Keywords:

proactive performance, proactivity, higher education, work characteristics, work design, psychological safety

Details

References

Statistics

Authors

Download files

pdf

Citation rules

Hauk, M. (2026). Proactive Performance of Employees in Polish Higher Education Institutions: Determinants and Implications. Journal for Perspectives of Economic Political and Social Integration, 32(1), 33–78. https://doi.org/10.18290/pepsi-2026-0002

Altmetric indicators

Cited by / Share

Licence

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

References

Ahmed, R., Al-Riyami, S., Ahmad, N., & Bibi, A. (2024). What are the contrasting types of proactivity that manifest at work? A systematic literature review, content analysis, and future directions. European Journal of Management Stud-ies, 29(2), 139–164. https://doi.org/10.1108/EJMS-09-2023-0064

Allan, B. A., Batz-Barbarich, C., Sterling, H. M., & Tay, L. (2019). Outcomes of meaningful work: A meta-analysis. Journal of Management Studies, 56(3), 500–528. https://doi.org/10.1111/joms.12406

Ashford, S. J., Blatt, R., & VandeWalle, D. (2003). Reflections on the looking glass: A review of research on feedback-seeking behavior in organizations. Journal of Management, 29(6), 773–799. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0149-2063(03)00079-5

Baer, M., & Frese, M. (2003). Innovation is not enough: Climates for initiative and psychological safety, process innovations, and firm performance. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 24(1), 45–68. https://doi.org/10.1002/job.179

Bakker, A. B., & Demerouti, E. (2017). Job demands–resources theory: Taking stock and looking forward. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 22(3), 273–285. https://doi.org/10.1037/ocp0000056

Bateman, T. S., & Crant, J. M. (1993). The proactive component of organizational behavior: A measure and correlates. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 14(2), 103–118. https://doi.org/10.1002/job.4030140202

Borman, W. C., & Motowidlo, S. J. (1993). Expanding the criterion domain to include elements of contextual performance. In N. Schmitt & W. C. Borman (Eds.), Personnel selection in organizations (pp. 71–98). Jossey-Bass.

Cai, Z., Parker, S. K., Chen, Z., & Lam, W. (2019). How does the social context fuel the proactive fire? A multilevel review and theoretical synthesis. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 40(2), 209–230. https://doi.org/10.1002/job.2347

Crant, J. M. (2000). Proactive behavior in organizations. Journal of Management, 26(3), 435–462. https://doi.org/10.1177/014920630002600304

Edmondson, A. (1999). Psychological safety and learning behavior in work teams. Administrative Science Quarterly, 44(2), 350–383. https://doi. org/10.2307/2666999

Edmondson, A. C., & Lei, Z. (2014). Psychological safety: The history, renaissance, and future of an interpersonal construct. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 1(1), 23–43. https://doi.org/10.1146/ annurev-orgpsych-031413-091305

Field, A. (2018). Discovering statistics using IBM SPSS Statistics (5th ed.). SAGE Publications.

Frazier, M. L., Fainshmidt, S., Klinger, R. L., Pezeshkan, A., & Vracheva, V. (2017). Psychological safety: A meta-analytic review and extension. Personnel Psychology, 70(1), 113–165. https://doi.org/10.1111/peps.12183

Frese, M., & Fay, D. (2001). Personal initiative: An active performance concept for work in the 21st century. Research in Organizational Behavior, 23, 133–187. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0191-3085(01)23005-6

Fried, Y., & Ferris, G. R. (1987). The validity of the Job Characteristics Model: A review and meta-analysis. Personnel Psychology, 40, 287–322. http:// doi. org/10.1111/j.1744-6570.1987.tb00605.x

Fuller, B., & Marler, L. E. (2009). “Change Driven by Nature: A MetaAnalytic Review of the Proactive Personality Literature.” Journal of Vocational Behavior, 75, 329–345. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2009. 05.008

Glaub, M. E., Frese, M., Fischer, S., & Hoppe, M. (2014). Increasing personal ini-tiative in small business managers or owners leads to entrepreneurial success: A theory-based controlled randomized field intervention for evidence-based management. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 13(3), 354–379. https://doi.org/10.5465/amle.2013.0234

Górska, A., Pikos, A., Dobija, D., & Grossi, G. (2022). Autonomy without ac-countability in resource allocation reforms: Blending old and new logic in universities. Central European Management Journal, 30(2), 43–82. https://doi. org/10.7206/cemj.2658-0845.75

Grant, A. M., & Ashford, S. J. (2008). The dynamics of proactivity at work. Research in Organizational Behavior, 28, 3–34. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.riob.2008.04.002 Grant, A. M., & Parker, S. K. (2009). 7 redesigning work design theories: the rise of relational and proactive perspectives. Academy of Management Annals, 3(1), 317-375. https://doi.org/10.1080/19416520903047327

Griffin, M. A., Neal, A., & Parker, S. K. (2007). A new model of work role per-formance: Positive behavior in uncertain and interdependent contexts. Academy of Management Journal, 50(2), 327–347. https://doi.org/10.5465/amj.2007.24634438

Griffin, M. A., Parker, S. K., & Mason, C. M. (2010). Leader vision and the devel-opment of adaptive and proactive performance: a longitudinal study. Journal of Applied Psychology, 95(1), 174. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0017263

Grobelny, J., Paliga, M., Zwardon-Kuchciak, O., & Hauk, M. (2025). The Polish adaptation of the work role performance questionnaire. PLoS ONE. https:// doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0332609

Güntert, S. T. (2015). The impact of work design, autonomy support, and strategy on employee outcomes: A differentiated perspective on self-determination at work. Motivation and Emotion, 39, 74–87. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11031-014-9412-7

Hackman, J. R., & Oldham, G. R. (1976). Motivation through the design of work: Test of a theory. Organizational Behavior & Human Performance, 16(2), 250–279. https://doi.org/10.1016/0030-5073(76)90016-7

Hackman, J. R., & Oldham, G. R. (1980). Work design. Addison-Wesley.

Hakanen, J. J., Perhoniemi, R., & Toppinen-Tanner, S. (2008). Positive gain spirals at work: From job resources to work engagement, personal initiative and work-unit innovativeness. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 73(1), 78–91.

Hauk, M. (2014). Kwestionariusz cech pracy – opracowanie polskiej wersji narzędzia do badania cech pracy i środowiska zawodowego – wstępne wyniki badań [Work Design Questionnaire: Development of the Polish version of the tool for studying job characteristics and work environment: Preliminary research results]. Acta Universitatis Lodziensis, Folia Psychologica, 18, 129–153. https://doi.org/10.18778/1427-969X.18.07

Hauk, M. (2020). Projektowanie pracy a zadowolenie z pracy: Modyfikacja koncepcji właściwości pracy Hackmana i Oldhama [Job design and job satisfaction: Modi-fication of Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model]. Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego.

Hauk, M. (2025). Role performance of individuals working in higher education institu-tions [Preprint]. OSF. https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/ye68v_v1

Hayes A. F. (2022). Introduction to mediation, moderation, and conditional process analysis: A regression-based approach (3rd ed.). Guilford Press.

Humphrey, S. E., Nahrgang, J. D., & Morgeson, F. P. (2007). Integrating motiva-tional, social, and contextual work design features: a meta-analytic summary and theoretical extension of the work design literature. Journal of Applied Psychology, 92(5), 1332. https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.92.5.1332

Ilgen, D. R., & Pulakos, E. D. (1999). The changing nature of performance: Implica-tions for staffing, motivation, and development. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Johns, G., Xie, J. L., Fang, Y. (1992). Mediating and moderating ef-fects in job design. Journal of Management, 18(4), 657–676. http:// doi.org/10.1177/014920639201800404

Kahn, W. A. (1990). Psychological conditions of personal engagement and disengagement at work. Academy of Management Journal, 33(4), 692–724.

Koop, S., De Reu, T., & Frese, M. (2000). Sociodemographic factors, entrepreneur-ial orientation, personal initiative and environmental problems in Uganda. In M. Frese (Ed.), Success and failure of microbusiness owners in Africa: A psy-chological approach (pp. 55–76). Greenwood Publications.

Morgeson, F. P., & Humphrey, S. E. (2006). The Work Design Questionnaire (WDQ): Developing and validating a comprehensive measure for assess-ing job design and the nature of work. Journal of Applied Psychology, 91(6), 1321–1339. https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.91.6.1321

Morrison, E. W., and Phelps, C. C. 1999. “Taking charge at work: Extra role efforts to initiate workplace change.” Academy of Management Journal 42, 403–419. https://doi.org/10.5465/257011

Newman, A., Donohue, R., & Eva, N. (2017). Psychological safety: A systematic review of the literature. Human Resource Management Review, 27(3), 521–535. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.01.001

Oldham, G. R., & Hackman, J. R. (2010). Not what it was and not what it will be: The future of job design research. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 31(2–3), 463–479. https://doi.org/10.1002/job.678

Parker, S. K., & Collins, C. G. (2010). Taking stock: Integrating and differentiating multiple proactive behaviors. Journal of Management, 36(3), 633–662. https:// doi.org/10.1177/0149206308321554

Petrov, S., Oprea, B., & Opariuc-Dan, C. (2023). Psychological safety and job performance: The mediating role of work engagement and job crafting. Psi-hologia Resurselor Umane, 21(2). https://doi.org/10.24837/pru.v21i2.536

Pulakos, E. D., Arad, S., Donovan, M. A., & Plamondon, K. E. (2000). Adaptabil-ity in the workplace: Development of a taxonomy of adaptive performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 85, 612–624 https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.85.4.612

Retowski, S., Owczarek, T., & Jurek, P. (2022). Milczenie ugodowe i obronne: Wielo-poziomowe efekty bezpieczeństwa psychologicznego i przywództwa tożsamościowego [Quiescent and acquiescent employee silence: The multilevel effects of psychological safety and identity leadership] [Unpublished manuscript]. University of Gdańsk.

Seibert, S. E., Kraimer, M. L., & Crant, J. M. (2001). What do proactive people do? A longitudinal model linking proactive personality and career success. Personnel Psychology, 54(4), 845–874. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1744-6570.2001. tb00234.x

Spitzmuller, M., Sin, H.-P., Howe, M., & Fatimah, S. (2015). Investigating the uniqueness and usefulness of proactive personality in organizational research: A meta-analytic review. Human Performance, 28(4), 351–379. https:// doi.org/10.1080/08959285.2015.1021041

Strauss, K., Griffin, M. A., Parker, S. K., & Mason, C. M. (2015). Building and sustaining proactive behaviors: The role of adaptivity and job satisfac-tion. Journal of Business and Psychology, 30(1), 63–72.

Trow, M. (2007). Reflections on the transition from elite to mass to universal access: Forms and phases of higher education in modern societies since WWII. In inter-national handbook of higher education (pp. 243–280). Springer Netherlands.

Uygun, S., & Murat, M. (2024). Examination of teachers’ proactivity, psychologi-cal well-being and professional satisfaction. Ahmet Keleşoğlu Eğitim Fakültesi Dergisi, 6(2), 130–155.

Wegman, L. A., Hoffman, B. J., Carter, N. T., Twenge, J. M., & Guenole, N. (2018). Placing job characteristics in context: Cross-temporal meta-analysis of changes in job characteristics since 1975. Journal of Management, 44(1), 352–386. https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206316654545

Wrzesniewski, A., & Dutton, J. E. (2001). Crafting a job: Revisioning employees as active crafters of their work. Academy of Management Review, 26(2), 179–201. https://doi.org/10.5465/amr.2001.4378011