Meaningful Work, Engagement and Innovative Behavior

Abstract

Employee management has changed along with the disruption and changes in the social order towards electronic or digitalization. Currently, many employees belong to generations Y and Z, where employees with this generation have unique and different characteristics from the previous generation which ultimately has a significant impact on several human resource management phenomena, such as meaningful work, engagement and innovative behavior. This study applies the Stimulus-Organism-responses theory, where the stimulus comes from meaningful work, which is the next phase of the stimulus felt by employees for the work they are doing. The research sample was archivists of private universities in East Java, as many as 94 people. This choice is based on the consideration that this profession is facing an explosion of disruption due to the presence of technology that has an impact on their careers. The research objectives are to examine the effect of meaningful work on innovative behavior; the effect of employee engagement on innovative behavior, and the effect of meaningful work and employee engagement together on innovative behavior. The research was conducted quantitatively, using regression analysis with Minitab 18. This study shows that meaningful work and engagement both partially and simultaneously are able to provide support for innovative behavior. Employees who interpret their work well will have a stronger engagement, and ultimately create innovative behavior for their work environment.