Predicting employees’ engagement using a framework of emotional resources and ethical climate

Abstract

Organizations are reluctant to hire emotionally exhaustedemployees. However, current research has partially exploredthe implications of retaining both emotionally intelligent andemotionally exhausted employees. Hence, the question arises:do emotionally intelligent employees always remain mean-ingfully engaged in their work? And do emotionally exhaustedemployees adversely impact the organization? In our study,we empirically examined the role of ethical climate in assess-ing the impact of employees’ emotional intelligence andexhaustion on their work engagement. We collected datafrom 450 employees of private sector banks in India. Theresults showed that an ethical climate was positively cor-related with employees’ work engagement. Additionally, wefound that the influence of emotional intelligence was posi-tive and emotional exhaustion was negative on employeeengagement. Interestingly, in organizations with a strong eth-ical climate, emotionally intelligent employees did not displaysignificantly higher engagement. However, emotionallyexhausted employees appeared more engaged in such envi-ronments. These findings underscored the importance ofre-evaluating the role of ethical climate and its influence onthe work engagement of customer-contact employees withdifferent emotional capacities.