Purpose

The continuous advancement and adoption of digital technologies at the workplace can lead to technology-related stress, termed technostress, at the individual level. While much is known about its antecedents (i.e., stressors) and consequences (i.e., strain and outcomes), the ways in which organizational members cope with technostress to mitigate its adverse effects, are far less clear. However, understanding individual coping efforts is crucial, as coping allows to address stressful demands and can influence their consequences. Studies so far do not differentiate between diverse organizational groups in their samples, despite evidence suggesting, that differences in group-specific characteristics may lead to the employment of different coping strategies. Our study aims to fill this research gap, through examining the technostress experience and respective coping strategies of both leaders and their followers. We contribute to theory and practice by considering the multiplicity of the workforce and unvealing the technostress-relevant coping strategies of organizational members of different hierarchical levels, and further expand previous research of the technostress effect structure and coping mechanism.

Approach

A multi-wave study was conducted, assessing both leaders (n=279) and followers (n=358). Our holistic research model examines the full chain of effects in the technostress-coping context and allows us to disclose how leader- and follower-specific coping strategies affect individual strain as well as organizational outcome variables.

Keywords

Technostress, coping, leader versus follower, digital workplace, multi-wave study

Involved Persons

Lea Kocheise, Dr. Ellen Weber, Prof. Dr. Marion Büttgen; Dr. Julia Lanzl, Prof. Dr. Henner Gimpel