Author(s)

Enxi Zhou

School of Management, Jinan University, Guangzhou, China.

The “Taylorian” management thinking of the outside control in the past has been unable to adapt to the current Internet era. The external control has changed to the flexible management of self-control, and the increase of job autonomy has become a trend. Job autonomy refers to the discretion of an organization to allow employees to complete tasks when, where, in what order and in what manner. In the past, the mainstream theoretical models and empirical studies have found that the job autonomy has a positive impact on employees. But currently the new research has found that the excessive job autonomy can have a negative impact on employees, and there is a “too-much-of-a-good-thing” effect. This article mainly expounds the “too-much-of-a-good-thing” effect of the job autonomy, and then, explains the effect by the two types mechanisms, “additive benefit and cost” and “interactive motivation and opportunity”. Finally, this article puts forward some issues that should be paid attention to future researches.

Job Autonomy, Too-Much-of-a-Good-Thing, Interactive Motivation and Opportunity, Additive Benefit and Cost

Zhou, E. (2020) The “Too-Much-of-a-Good-Thing” Effect of Job Autonomy and Its Explanation Mechanism. Psychology, 11, 299-313. doi: 10.4236/psych.2020.112019.