Competency Labor: A Conceptual Framework for Examining Individuals’ Effort and Emotions in Projecting an Image of Competence at Work

Abstract

This chapter introduces the concept of “competency labor” and illustrates its important role in organizational life for both researchers and practitioners. In the contemporary workplace environment individuals face increasing expectations of competence. However, demonstrating competence is no simple task – rather, to demonstrate competence requires a concerted effort in terms of individuals’ affect, cognition, and behavior. Accordingly, new models are needed that can explain these emergent processes. The present work integrates the literatures related to emotional labor and impression management, and builds a theory-based framework for investigating the processes (affective, cognitive, and behavioral) of making desired impressions of competency at work and how these processes impact critical individual and organizational outcomes. Our conceptual model proposes how growing demands in the workplace for individuals to display competence affect how they think, feel, as well as act. In sum, our work advocates that a new research stream is needed to better understand the “competency labor” phenomenon and its theoretical as well as practical implications.

Citation

Haber, J., Pollack, J.M. and Humphrey, R.H. (2014), "Competency Labor: A Conceptual Framework for Examining Individuals’ Effort and Emotions in Projecting an Image of Competence at Work", Emotions and the Organizational Fabric (Research on Emotion in Organizations, Vol. 10), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 305-330. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1746-979120140000010020