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Management Research Review
Growth-focused resilience: development and validation of a new scale
Muhammad Taufiq Amir, Peter Standen,
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Muhammad Taufiq Amir, Peter Standen, (2019) "Growth-focused resilience: development
and validation of a new scale", Management Research Review, https://doi.org/10.1108/
MRR-04-2018-0151
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Growth-focused resilience:
development and validation
of a new scale
Muhammad Taufiq Amir
Department of Management, Universitas Bakrie,
South Jakarta, DKI Jakarta, Indonesia, and
Peter Standen
Faculty of Business and Law, Edith Cowan University,
Joondalup, Western Australia, Australia
Abstract
Purpose –This study argues that existing constructs of psychological resilience of employees focus too
narrowly on recovery from adverse events. Therefore, this paper aims to present an alternative construct in
which resilience reflects an intention to grow as a person when facing both opportunities and difficulties.
Initial evidence for a measure of growth-based resilience is presented.
Design/methodology/approach –In Study 1, a six-step scale development procedure was used. Items
were generated deductively, and an exploratory factor analysis on data from a sample of 167 Indonesian
managers was used to refine the scale structure. Study 2 validated the Study 1 results using a two-step
confirmatory factor analysis, including structural equation modelling, involving a second sample of 241
Indonesian managers.
Findings –Study 1 suggested a scale using 16 items reflecting two dimensions, Developmental Persistency,
involving perseverance and commitment to growth, and Positive Emotion. Study 2 generally confirmed the
structure of this measure and produced expected correlations with other theoretically related constructs.
Overall, the findings support the reconceptualisation of resilience as a response to life challenges and
opportunities focussed on growing as a person.
Research limitations/implications –Further testing of the validity of this construct is recommended,
and its nomological network should be examined to clarify its relationship to related concepts such as
hardiness, coping, thriving and similar qualities.
Practical implications –The growth-based perspective allows organisations to better assess and
improve employee resilience as it more accurately reflects the nature of resilience as a fundamental “positive”
dimension of human personality, where existing approaches focus merely on recovering from workplace
adversities. An implication is that employee development efforts focussed more on personal development
than specific work skills, or at least contextualising the latter in the person’s life context, will be more
successful.
Originality/value –A more holistic view of resilience as the capacity for responding to life’s challenges
and opportunities through personal growth resolves a number of issues created by existing recovery-based
constructs.
Keywords Resilience, Personal development, Growth, Thriving,
Organizational theory and behaviour, Positive emotion, Employee adaptability
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Psychological resilience is increasingly important in today’s highly pressured and changing
business environment (Luthans et al.,2005;Luthans and Youssef, 2004) and has been
New scale
Received 7 April2018
Revised 14 September2018
5 December 2018
Accepted 7 December2018
Management Research Review
© Emerald Publishing Limited
2040-8269
DOI 10.1108/MRR-04-2018-0151
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/2040-8269.htm
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studied from a variety of theoretical approaches. In recent years, positive organisational
behaviour (POB) scholars have promoted resilience as a key to strengthening employees’
capacity to perform at high levels and thrive in challenging work environments (Cameron
et al., 2003;Nelson and Cooper, 2007). However, despite much research attention the
construct of resilience is not well understood. This paper argues that current conceptions are
missing a vital “positive”ingredient, personal growth.
Psychological resilience is typically defined as the capacity for recovery after
adversity or trauma: a resilient person “bounces back”(Smith et al., 2008) where others
remain encumbered by setbacks. Studies in general psychology relate resilience to
concepts such as coping, survival and adaption and to personal qualities such as
perseverance and tolerance (Yu and Zhang, 2007). This “recovery”perspective contrasts
with the model below in which individuals respond to adversity by growing beyond their
previous condition, becoming more psychologically integrated and resourceful persons.
We see the recovery perspective as unnecessarily limiting as it defines a positive quality
only in terms of overcoming negative events. Rather than merely returning to one’s
previous functioning, in our view resilient persons develop their internal psychological
structure in ways that should help them better deal with future challenges. A person who
grows in this sense is likely to thrive in life generally, rather than merely surviving
specific adversities. This has significant implications for employee development
activities.
Below we delineate a construct of growth-based resilience and report initial data on the
reliability and validity of a measurement scale. Our construct builds on a tradition,
stretching back many decades, in which psychological growth is central to mental health.
Recent examples of this include Ryff’s model of psychological well-being and its relationship
to resilience (Ryff, 2008), and studies of post-traumatic recovery based on growth (Tedeschi
and Calhoun, 2004). While personal growth is sometimes mentioned or implied in
organisational studies of resilience, its nature and its connection to mental health have so far
not been investigated. We see growth as a concept fundamental to resilience and the related
qualities highlighted in POB studies, and suggest it has much to offer both organisational
research and employee development activities.
The ability to grow and thrive in a challenging environment may be especially relevant
to workers in organisations facing highly competitive marketplaces, new technologies,
changing management structures and practices, long working hours, constant deadlines
and the consequent health and safety concerns. Organisations often respond with
hierarchical management systems that foster a very formal and impersonal climate and a
culture of “stretching”towards ever higher goals, presenting a complex, ambiguous and
often highly stressful work environment (Luthans et al., 2006a,2006b). Employees must not
only survive specific changes and setbacks but also develop their capacity to maintain
mental health under such pressures. In our model, this involves maintaining an emotionally
positive outlook and a proactive focus on personal development. A person with this
perspective not only bounces back under pressure but manages his or her self in a way that
maximises long-term growth of one’s psychological capabilities and well-being in and out of
the workplace.
Some time ago, Ahern et al. (2006) expressed concerns about the narrow theoretical base
of organisational studies of resilience. It appears that few authors have since systematically
considered the various conceptualisations found in the psychological literature. We
therefore begin by outlining the role of growth in psychology since 1980 before turning to
organisational studies.
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2. Literature review
2.1 concepts of resilience in psychological and organisational studies
2.1.1 Early studies. Resilience has been conceived in various ways in the psychological
literature depending on each author’s assumptions and focus. Early writers asked why some
children fared better than others when raised in high-risk environments, for example under
mentally ill parenting, poverty or family discord (Rutter, 2007;Werner, 1993). Resilience was
identified with “protective factors”in both the child (flexible personality, high IQ and
positive self-concept) and the environment (e.g. social support, stability and adequate
resources).
At the same time, personality psychologists conceived adult resilience as an individual
difference variable related to adaptability and coping. An influential example was Block and
Block’s (1980) concept of “ego-resilience”, the capacity to modify one’s characteristic level of
self-control to suit the context rather than maladaptively over- or under-controlling one’s
inner “impulses”. In their view, resilience was less about facing trauma than approaching
life generally with openness and flexibility, constructively adapting to one’s changing
experiences whether experienced as positive or negative. In this more holistic perspective,
resilience was identified with mental health, seen in terms of the positive long-term
enhancement of the individual (Jahoda, 1958), rather than a set of specific“assets”
underlying recovery from deficit conditions. This is similar to the perspective introduced
below.
2.1.2 Stable individual difference variable or developable capacity? The growth
perspective behind Block and Block’s concept was subsequently lost in the focus on
protective factors in child and adolescent development (Luthar et al., 2000) or adults facing
difficulties and trauma (Bonanno, 2004). Further complicating the field was that protective
factors could be either individual difference variables or capacities developable in all
persons. Studies of personality variables predicting recovery from adversity in adults
portrayed resilience as a stable trait moderating the negative effects of stress and promoting
adaptation (Ong et al.,2010). Others saw resilience as a quality, potentially found in all
persons, that could be developed in times of need. Masten for example, identified resilience
with a set of “psychological systems”underlying social attachment, learning, intelligence,
self-regulation, self-efficacy and intrinsic motivation. She proposed interventions for
restoring these systems under trauma or adversity through developing protective assets,
such as cognitive abilities or self-regulation capabilities, and minimising risky or destructive
experiences (Masten, 2001;Masten and Reed, 2002). While this approach allows development
of specific abilities, it stops short of personal growth as conceived here. More importantly,
whether taking a stable or developable perspective, research in recent decades tends to view
resilience as recovery from specific short-term deficits rather than longer-term personal
growth.
2.1.3 Defining resilience. Contemporary studies commonly define resilience as “positive
adaptation to adversity”(Masten, 2007), but these terms raise questions. Whether “positive
adaptation”covers both recovery and growth, or merely the absence of negative outcomes
such as mental or physical illness, is rarely stated. And while resilience is often studied as a
response to more severe “adversity”or trauma (Luthar et al.,2000), some authors include the
lesser disruptions of daily challenges or “hassles”(Davis et al., 2009), more general
“life challenges”, or merely “change”(Jahoda, 1958). In the more holistic perspective of
positive mental health elaborated below, resilience is a response to positive and negative
“life challenges”(Ryff and Singer, 2003), “opportunities”, or inevitable human “struggles”
(Tedeschi and Calhoun, 2004). For these authors, mental health necessarily involves
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struggles with adversity and challenge. Our construct makes no specific assumptions about
these issues but is more compatible with this perspective.
2.1.4 Resilience in organisational studies. Resilience in the workplace is currently a topic
of considerable interest given the pressures facing today’s employees and growing
recognition of how psychological well-being underpins sustainable and effective work
outcomes (Grant et al., 2009;Avey et al.,2009). Recent research tends to take the Positive
Psychology movement’s focus on developing human strengths as a means of improving
organisational performance (Luthans et al., 2007b). Resilience has been theoretically related
to concepts such as vigour and thriving (Shirom, 2007) and in Luthans and colleagues’
influential construct of Psychological Capital to self-efficacy, hope and optimism (PsyCap;
Luthans and Youssef, 2004). However, empirical studies of employee resilience are rare, and
so far only the PsyCap scale is specifically designed for work contexts.
The PsyCap studies suggest employees can develop resilience to the regular challenges
of working life by learning to remain realistic, retain control and sort through possible
responses (Luthans et al., 2007c), although the efficacy of such interventions under
significant adversity has yet to be tested. One limitation of the PsyCap scale is that
following its antecedent, the Wagnild-Young Resilience Scale (WYRS; Wagnild and Young,
1993), resilience is defined solely in terms of recovery. A second is that it addresses work-
based outcomes rather than the broader personal qualities underpinning psychological well-
being. The present construct’s growth perspective addresses these concerns.
2.2 growth in studies of resilience
2.2.1 Psychological studies. As noted above, growth is generally absent in studies of
resilience due to their emphasis on recovery from adversity, usually accompanied by the
assumption that “normal”or mentally healthy human functioning is homeostatic. Normal
functioning is depicted diagrammatically as a horizontal line that then dips following an
adverse event and recovers to its former level (Bonanno, 2004;Masten and Reed, 2002).
An alternative perspective sees resilience as a process of continual personal growth in
response to inevitable environmental challenges. This can be traced back to Goldstein’s
(1940) biological concept of “self-actualisation”, the basic drive of any organism to realise its
inherent capabilities. Growth in this sense was subsequently central to theories of mental
health as a “positive”phenomenon, rather than merely the absence of illness. Allport’s (1961)
view of personality growing across the lifespan, Maslow’s (1971) concept of the “self-
actualising”person, Rogers’(1975) notion of the “fully functioning”person and Jahoda’s
(1958) view of positive mental health influenced a broad range of psychological theorists
including organisational scholars in the human relations, organisational development and
clinical movements (Montuori and Purser, 2001).
The growth perspective continued to influence psychological theorists over recent
decades, albeit less broadly. For example, Ryff made personal growth a dimension of her
construct of psychological well-being (Ryff and Keyes, 1995). Here growth involves realising
one’s“talent and potential”by developing “new resources and strengths”in a process of
“self-expansion through challenge”(Ryff and Singer, 2003, p. 278), and psychological well-
being therefore reflects one’s broad approach to life’s inevitable “challenges and difficulties”
(Ryff, 2008, p. 279). Resilience is seen as “flourishing under fire”(Ryff and Singer, 2003)
rather than merely avoiding negative outcomes.
Growth is also central to Richardson’s(2002)clinical model of “resilient reintegration”,
the healthy response when a period of homeostasis is disrupted by adversity, stress,
opportunity or change. Resilient reintegration involves a major shift in understanding of
one’s self and one’s place in the world: individuals who survive challenges while remaining
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in their “comfort zone”do not experience personal growth but rather “reintegration back to
homeostasis”. This mirrors Block and Kremen’s (1996, p. 360) notion that responding to
adversity by “settling for less”or keeping “despairs and anxieties within tolerable bounds”
avoids facing the deeper psychological issues that produce growth, thriving or flourishing.
Like Ryff, Richardson sees both negative and positive “life prompts”as the conditions for
developing growth-based resilience.
Ryff and Richardson appear to be the only authors making growth central to resilience.
Others have seen it as a possible outcome of resilience, alongside recovery (Amir, 2014;
Leipold and Greve, 2009), but not linked to broader processes underlying personal growth
and mental health.
Growth does, however, take a central role in two related areas of current psychological
theory. In a wide range of studies, Dweck and others observe a growth “mindset”or
“implicit theory”in individuals who cope better with stress, persevere more in the face of
setbacks and enjoy more success in life than those with a fixed view of their abilities (Dweck,
2006;Haynie et al.,2010). Secondly, growth increasingly underpins a conceptual distinction
between post-traumatic growth (PTG) and the more familiar post-traumatic stress. PTG
involves a significant change in beliefs concerning one’s self and the world resulting from
“struggles”with highly stressful events (Tedeschi and Calhoun, 2004). Often, a profound
transformation with highly emotional qualities, PTG improves interpersonal relationships,
deepens spirituality, increases personal strength and renews one’s sense of life’s possibilities
(Tedeschi and Calhoun, 1996).Here again, growth is more than coping, recovery or survival.
Finally, growth features in two books by authors experienced in developing resilience in
clinical and workplace settings. Maddi and Khosabha (2005, p. 2) place growth “at the heart
of”resilience, the capacity to turn “disruptive changes and conflicts from potential disasters
into growth opportunities”. Resilience is equated with “hardiness”, a learnable personality
attribute involving the ability to maintain commitment to one’s work rather than
withdrawing from it, to positively influence outcomes rather than succumbing to “passivity
and powerlessness”, and to see change as “instrumental in opening up new, fulfilling
pathways for living”(Maddi and Khosabha, 2005, p. 18). Reivich and Shatte (2003) similarly
describe “proactive resilience”as the capacity to achieve one’s potential by pursuing new
capabilities, experiences, relationships and meanings that broaden and enrich life. Both
these books relate growth-based resilience to the workplace.
2.2.2 Organisational studies. While a few organisational studies mention employee
growth, none make it central to resilience and most emphasise specific work-related
capacities rather than personal growth. In Sutcliffe and Vogus’(2003,p.97)“developmental”
approach, organisational support systems help individuals learn to deal with workplace
stressors so as to “rebound from adversity strengthened and more resourceful”in terms of
work tasks or systems-related knowledge and skills. Caza and Milton (2011, p. 896) similarly
view resilience as a “developmental trajectory characterised by competency, efficacy and
professional growth in the face of workplace adversity”, explicitly separating professional
(or career) growth from personal growth and focussing on professional learning and
identity. They view workplace adversities as milder and less likely to underpin the “mental
crises”or “transformational growth”emphasised in psychological research.
Luthans and colleagues’PsyCap construct likewise relates resilience primarily to work
competences, alongside its other core elements of hope, optimism and self-efficacy. Resilient
individuals increase their performance after a mildly adverse work event by developing new
work-based knowledge, skills or abilities, although these researchers focus more on recovery
(Luthans et al., 2006a;Luthans et al., 2007a).
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2.2.3 Summary. Personal growth has long been central to “positive”notions of
psychological well-being but is rarely prominent in recent psychological studies of
resilience, and even less so in the organisational literature. This reflects the dominant focus
on recovery and deficit-based views of psychological functioning, and in organisational
research an emphasis on work-related capabilities to the exclusion of psychological well-
being as a contributor to employee performance. The construct developed below addresses
these shortcomings.
3. A construct and measure of growth-focussed resilience
In this construct resilience stems from a desire to improve one’s response to life’s challenges
and opportunities by developing the personal capabilities identified above –a proactive
attitude towards improving oneself in all aspects of daily life. Growth may speed up or slow
down in response to external or internal forces, but remains the overriding goal. A person
does not aim to bounce back from adversity so much as to become a better person in
response to life’supsand downs.
In developing this construct, we examined previous constructs and measures for general
and organisational use to identify potential dimensions besides growth that appear
consistent with a positive view of mental health. Although many scales exist, most address
specific contexts such as child development or clinical research. Relatively few have
received broad construct validation, and the theoretical base of many is unclear. Ahern
et al.’s (2006) review of 32 measures potentially relevant to adolescent resilience found only
one with an adequate theoretical base and sound psychometric properties. This review
consequently focusses on a few scales prominent in psychological or organisational
research.
Well-known measures for adults include Connor and Davidson’s Resilience Scale (CD-
RISC; (Connor and Davidson, 2003) and Friborg and colleagues’Resilience Scale for Adults
(RSA; Friborg et al., 2003). CD-RISC measures adults’ability to cope with stress using five
dimensions covering:
(1) personal competence, high standards and tenacity;
(2) trust in one’s instincts, tolerance of negative affect and strengthening effects of
stress;
(3) positive acceptance of change and secure relationships;
(4) control; and
(5) spiritual influence.
The RSA was developed for clinical use and assesses protective resources in five
dimensions: personal competence,social competence,family coherence,social support and
personal structure (daily routines, planning and organising). These two examples illustrate
the divergence in theoretical perspectives on resilience and the implied link to psychological
well-being in many.
A search of organisational studies over the past 14 years using the keyword “resilience”
identified fifteen empirical studies but only two measures: Ego-Resilience as measured by
ER-89 (Block and Kremen, 1996, p. 167) and the resilience dimension of Luthans and
colleagues’PsyCap (Luthans et al., 2007c). ER-89 measures a broad range of variables
including curiosity, generosity, emotional fluidity, physical energy and social skills, with
one factor analysis suggesting four dimensions: confident optimism,productive activity,
insight and warmth and skilled expressiveness (Klohnen, 1996). ER-89 was used in
organisational research by Youssef and Luthans (2007), who reframed Block and Kremen’s
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trait concept from the POB “developable”perspective. Luthans and colleagues’PsyCap
resilience subscale is based on Wagnild and Young’s (1993) Resilience Scale (WYRS), which
has five dimensions –equanimity,perseverance,self-reliance,meaningfulness and
existentiality –although a factor analysis suggests only two dimensions, personal
competence and acceptance of self and life. In PsyCap, items from the perseverance and self-
reliance scales are adapted to the work context.
Neither of these scales is strongly growth-based. ER-89 shares a broad emphasis on
psychological well-being with the present construct but does not make growth central to
this. Luthans and colleagues’view of resilience as the capacity to “bounce back”from
stressful events (Luthans et al., 2007c, p. 546), and their adaptations of the WYRS
perseverance and self-reliance dimensions, are more consistent with short-term recovery
from specific work stressors than personal growth.
3.1 Dimensions of resilience
While the four measures above are all multidimensional they present a very broad range of
dimensions. Reviewing these and other constructs suggested three dimensions potentially
relevant to a growth-based construct: perseverance,positive emotion and meaning-making.
Perseverance is a WYRS subscale found also in Luthan’s PsyCap and similar to the CD-
RISC dimension of tenacity. Perseverance implies self-reliance, a belief that one’s goals will
eventually be reached and one’s interests benefited. Consequently, perseverant individuals
tend to have high levels of perceived control over and responsibility for the outcomes of
challenges (Markman et al., 2005). This mental outlook appears highly relevant to a growth
concept of resilience.
Positive emotion (PE) is an important variable in POB studies, considered to help
individuals survive or thrive under stress (Fredrickson, 2001;Fredrickson and Joiner, 2002)
through encouraging proactive coping and rebuilding of impaired resources (Lazarus and
Folkman, 1984). It also broadens awareness, helping a person to creatively frame problems
from a broader perspective and generate solutions without panic or stress (Fredrickson and
Branigan, 2005;Luthans et al.,2011). PE helps a person maintain realism, perceive situations
as manageable, and increase recall of relevant prior knowledge (Baron, 2008).
Ong et al. (2010, p. 81) describe PE as a “basic building block”of resilience as it counters
feelings of stress and restores a more pleasant state. Theoretical and empirical studies link
PE to improvements in many work variables related to resilience, including flexible
thinking, problem-solving and innovating (Isen, 2002), adaptive coping and well-being
(Fredrickson and Joiner, 2002). For example, Xanthopoulou et al. (2007) found positive
feedback from managers lead employees to immediately feel enthusiastic and content, and
later in the day to feel greater self-efficacy, self-esteem and optimism, encouraging belief in
their ability to respond to challenges and adverse events.
PE therefore appears to be an important element of resilience, bringing calmness,
creativity and quick decision-making to a challenging situation. Apart from two items in
ER-89 PE is not explicitly mentioned in common constructs, which tend to have a strongly
cognitive focus.
Meaning making is a fundamental human motivation (Frankl, 1992) that predicts
physical health and adjustment to disease (Taylor et al.,2000) and psychological well-being
(Helgeson et al., 2006). A meaningful life is seen as important, worthwhile and purposeful.
Persons with meaning-making capacities have greater optimism and self-esteem, and
experience less depression and anxiety (Steger et al., 2006).
Meaningfulness is a dimension of the WYRS and somewhat consonant with the CD RISC
dimension of positive acceptance of change. In a growth orientation, it is likely to involve an
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active attempt to find meaning by consciously reflecting on challenges and revising one’s
beliefs, values and goals. Instead of giving up, resilient persons see difficulties as a personal
calling in which they are deeply involved and which is therefore in some sense emotionally
positive (Wagnild and Young, 1993;Wrzesniewski, 2003).
Employees who proactively refine their understanding of the meaning and value of their
work maximise its intrinsic value and energise themselves to higher levels of performance
(Wrzesniewski, 2003). Through conscious reflection on their values they integrate
challenging or ambiguous work situations into a framework of personal meaning (Heuvel
et al., 2009), improving their self-esteem and motivation under uncertainty. Meaning making
therefore appears important to growth-based resilience due to both its central role in health
maintenance and its specificadvantages when facing work challenges.
The multidimensional scale in the two studies below used perseverance, positive emotion
and meaning-making along with a fourth dimension measuring commitment to growth. The
first study explored the structure of this scale, and the second sought to validate it.
4. Study 1: Scale development
4.1 Method
Our approach to scale development procedures followed guidelines set by DeVellis (2012);
Hinkin (1998,1995), Netemeyer et al. (2003, p. 238); Costello and Osborne (2005);Field (2009)
and Hair et al. (2013) and precedents set by studies of new measurement scales in
organisational contexts (Tian et al., 2001;Tracey and Tews, 2005). The process followed
Hinkin’s (1995,1998) six-step procedure:
(1) domain specification, item generation and establishing content validity;
(2) questionnaire administration;
(3) initial item reduction;
(4) exploratory factor analysis (EFA);
(5) establishing convergent/discriminant validity; and
(6) confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) with an independent sample.
Scale items can be generated inductively, when there is no conceptual basis for identifying
the construct’s dimensions and items, or deductively when some prior theoretical foundation
exists (Hinkin, 1998). Our approach is deductive, incorporating relevant items and
dimensions of previous scales along with new items reflecting the growth perspective. This
approach helps to ensure the content validity of the final scale (Hinkin, 1998).
Domain specification involves clarifying the construct to be measured (DeVellis, 2012),
an important consideration for constructs such as resilience that describe intangible
phenomena that cannot be observed directly. Resilience was defined as an individual’s
capacity to respond to adversity at work in ways that strengthen and develop him or herself as
a better person, and comprises the four potential dimensions identified above: perseverance,
positive emotion, meaning making and commitment to growth.
Thirty-eight items covering attitudes and behaviours on the four proposed dimensions
were selected from scales developed for adult samples in work or non-work settings and
treating resilience as a developable capacity: CD-RISC (Connor and Davidson, 2003), the
Brief Resilience Scale (Smith et al., 2008), the Resilience Scale for Adults (Friborg et al.,2003),
Wagnild and Young’s Resilience Scale (Wagnild, 2009;Wagnild and Young, 1993), Blatt’s
Resilience Scale (Blatt, 2009), Heuvel’s Meaning Making Scale (Heuvel et al.,2009), and
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Marsick and Watkins’Learning Organisation Scale (Marsick and Watkins, 2003). The use of
these previous scales is described in Table I.
Sample items are “I am not easily discouraged by failure”(perseverance), “I actively look
for ways to overcome the challenges I encounter”(commitment to growth), “I am interested
in facing and solving problems”(positive emotion) and “I actively take the time to reflect on
events that happen in my life”(meaning making). Some items were modified for the present
context. New items based on studies reviewed above were also included.
This item pool was constructed with the expectation of reducing it substantially through
the expert review and EFA refinement process, following recommendations of DeVellis
(2012) and Hinkin (1998). We use the approach of DeVellis (2012),Haynes et al. (1995) and
Hardesty and Bearden (2004) in using an expert panel to assess content validity. Five
researchers with expertise in resilience were asked “How relevant do you think each item is
to resilience at work in business organisations?”and “Do you think the item is clear and
concise?”Responses were collected on scales anchored with 1 “not relevant at all”and 5
“highly relevant”or 1 “not at all clear and concise”and 5 “clear and concise”. The experts
were also asked to provide verbal comments and suggest new items. As a result, nine items
were deleted and twenty-seven retained. The items were then translated into Indonesian and
back-translated to English for checking, using certified translators. To guard against
narrowing of the construct and over-reliance on the initial definition, additional and possibly
redundant items were added to capture a variety of different angles (DeVellis, 2012). Items
were screened to eliminate redundant, complex or unfamiliar words and ambiguous or
leading statements.
Three additional measures were included to assess construct validity: proactive coping
(Greenglass and Schwarzer, 1998), self-esteem (Reynolds, 1982) and psychological
vulnerability (Sinclair and Wallston, 1999). Resilience was hypothesised to correlate
positively with proactive coping and self-esteem and negatively with psychological
vulnerability.
The resulting questionnaire had four parts. Part A involved demographic questions
about gender, age, industry and participants’department. Part B measured resilience by
asking respondents to rate the extent to which each of the 27 items applied to them. Part C
contained the Proactive Coping, Self-Esteem and Psychological Vulnerability measures, and
Part D measured an important control variable, Social Desirability, using the short version
of the Marlowe-Crowne scale from Reynolds (1982).
Participants were managers with two or more direct reports, working in twelve large
organisations in multiple industry sectors in Jakarta, Indonesia. Managers were chosen as
Table I.
Sources of items for
the scale
Dimensions of
resilience Description
No. of
items Source of items
Perseverance Willingness to face adversity with
continual effort and self-discipline
13 Connor and Davidson (2003),Smith
et al. (2008),Wagnild and Young
(1993),Friborg et al. (2003)
Positive
emotions
Maintaining a positive outlook, when
facing adversity
7Connor and Davidson (2003),
Wagnild and Young (1993) and
new items based on the literature
Meaning
making
Actively reflecting on and affirming
personal values when facing problems
8Connor and Davidson (2003), van
den Heuvel (2009)
Commitment
to growth
Growing and becoming stronger during
times of intense difficult and loss of control
10 Blatt (2009),Marsick and Watkins
(2003)
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they were expected to have sufficient education and cognitive competence to address
questions about resilience and to have experienced the workplace pressures calling for
resilience. In total, 50 per cent were in mining or infrastructure industries, 76 per cent were
men and 87 per cent were 31-50 years old. A total of 275 questionnaires were personally
delivered to the organisations and subsequently collected by a research assistant, yielding a
response rate of 64.7 per cent. Excluding 11 with invalid data, we were left with 167 useable
cases.
4.2 Results
EFA was conducted with PASW 18 to examine the dimensionality of the latent construct of
resilience. Nine items that did not contribute to a simple factor structure, or failed to reach a
factor loading of 0.4 or a cross-loading of 0.3, were eliminated over six runs. This included all
meaning making items.
Principle axis factoring with Oblimin rotation revealed three factors with eigenvalues
exceeding 1, explaining 36.2, 14.1 and 8.4 per cent of the variance (Table II). A scree plot also
showed a clear break after the third factor. These three factors explained 58 per cent of the
variance, close to the 60 per cent recommended.
The pattern matrix suggested Factor 1 represented both the hypothesised Perseverance
dimension (six items) and the commitment to growth dimension (four items). Factor 2 was
Table II.
Factor loadings,
communality and
factor correlations for
Study 1
Factors
Variables 1 2 3 Commun-ality
Per4 (I don’t give up when things look helpless) 0.834 0.126 0.181 0.545
Per3 (I tend to bounce back after illness or hardship) 0.731 0.061 0.067 0.536
Per5 (I tend to recover quickly from stressful events) 0.669 0.031 0.044 0.410
Per7 (I am not easily discouraged by failure) 0.668 0.077 0.089 0.554
Grow2 (I think about my mistakes and learn from them) 0.666 0.046 0.025 0.414
Per2 (I can deal with whatever comes) 0.648 0.095 0.182 0.619
Per1 (I am able to adapt to change) 0.606 0.043 0.084 0.440
Grow5 (I actively look for ways to overcome the
challenges I encounter) 0.577 0.080 0.260 0.579
Grow1 (I see difficulties as challenges and opportunities
to learn) 0.554 0.053 0.055 0.363
Grow4 (I can grow in positive ways by dealing with
difficult situations) 0.541 0.056 0.155 0.418
Pos5 (I am usually optimistic and hopeful) 0.031 0.790 0.077 0.639
Pos6 (I am enthusiastic when facing problems rather
than avoiding them) 0.066 0.789 0.011 0.674
Pos4 (I am usually confident in doing whatever I choose) 0.028 0.787 0.053 0.596
Pos3 (I am interested in facing and solving problems) 0.006 0.711 0.109 0.483
Pos7 (I can see the humorous side of a problem) 0.028 0.687 0.022 0.444
Pos2 (I can get through difficult times at work because
I’ve experienced difficulty before) 0.082 0.623 0.082 0.473
Grow3 (I think how I could have prevented unforeseen
problems when they occur) 0.035 0.051 0.660 0.440
Grow7 (I often seek feedback on my work from others) 0.146 0.078 0.571 0.453
Factor 1 1
Factor 2 0.405 1
Factor 3 0.242 0.415 1
Notes: Factor loadings >0.4 are in italic. Variable descriptions are questionnaire items
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easily interpreted as all items reflecting the positive emotion dimension (six items). Factor 3
had only 2 items, making it unusable following Costello and Osborne’s (2005, p. 5)(2005, p. 5)
view that a factor with fewer than three items is weak and unstable.
Factor 1 was labelled developmental persistency as it suggests facing challenges with
both perseverance and a commitment to growth, as represented respectively in recovery-
based and growth-based concepts of resilience. Factor 2 was called Positive Emotion.
The correlation between developmental persistency and positive emotion was moderate
(r= 0.41), suggesting resilience comprises related but separable factors and justifying the
use of oblique rotation. A positive relationship is expected as positive emotion should help
individuals persist and grow in facing challenges, and growth should in turn increase
positive emotion.
Cronbach’s alpha was 0.87 for developmental persistency and 0.86 for positive emotion and
dropping any item lowered these values. The item-to-total correlations were greater than 0.5
for both factors, and the inter-item correlations were both greater than 0.3. The scale is
therefore considered reliable and sufficiently consistent with its theoretically predicted
structure. Construct validity was suggested by positive correlations between resilience and
both proactive coping (r= 0.67) and self-esteem (r= 0.74), and a negative correlation with
psychological vulnerability (r=0.64), all significant at p<0.01 (Table III).
4.3 Discussion
The results of Study 1 suggest a construct of resilience comprising two dimensions,
developmental persistency and positive emotion. This structure has important advantages
over previous constructs. First, the dominance of Developmental Persistency is consistent
with the growth orientation hypothesised to underlie resilience. More resilient persons make
an effortful, persistent attempt to not merely recover but to thrive by learning from
challenges, a philosophy of facing the future with an intention to grow from both positive
and negative events. The items loading on this scale suggest it involves a belief that things
will usually work out and confidence in one’s ability to adapt to change and survive stress
and adversity. Challenges, mistakes and set-backs are seen as opportunities to learn and
develop as a person. The person is reflective, persistent, proactive in dealing with problems
and believes he or she will recover quickly from them. The opposite would be a person who
minimises or avoids difficulties, blames his or her lot on “fate’or other persons, and
generally aims only for self-preservation. This attitude does not improve one”s capacity for
living in a changing and uncertain world.
Concepts of resilience that overlook this growth motivation are likely to have
unnecessary limitations or drawbacks. For example, Luthans et al. (2006b) suggest
organisations develop resilience through culture change, training and education. Such
Table III.
Descriptive statistics
and correlation
matrix for Study 1
Variable Mean SD 1 2 3 4 5 6
1 Resilience 67.62 7.53 (0.88)
2 Developmental persistency 42.71 5.12 0.88 (0.87)
3 Positive emotion 24.80 3.92 0.78 0.41 (0.86)
4 Proactive coping 43.74 4.53 0.67 0.60 0.51 (0.81)
5 Self-esteem 21.73 2.03 0.74 0.59 0.67 0.59 (0.83)
6 Psychological vulnerability 9.22 2.61 0.64
þ
0.56
þ
0.47
þ
0.45
þ
0.47
þ
(0.82)
Notes: n= 167. Chronbach’s alpha for each variable is displayed in parentheses. For all correlations, p<
0.01 (two-tailed).
þ
Kendall’s tau
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interventions could help employees face adversity by inducing positive emotional
experiences, dissociating from negative emotions, “self-enhancement”(creating a positively
inflated or biased self-concept), and developing an external (rather than internal) locus of
control. However, while these strategies might boost performance, it is difficult to see how
they can lead to personal growth. Developmental persistency involves acceptance of life’s
inherent negatives and negative emotions as signs pointing to healthy responses. It requires
realistic self-assessment and an internal locus of control: an awareness of one’s personal
challenges and limitations and a sense of agency in addressing them. We believe this more
holistic view of how workplace adversity sits in one’s broader life context underpins true
resilience.
Developmental persistency is consistent with Maddi and Khoshaba’s (2005) notion of
finding motivation during adversity by seeking to learn from problems, and Mueller and
Dweck’s (1998) concept of mastery orientation, a behavioural pattern of seeking challenges
and persisting in the face of obstacles. However, in the growth perspective learning,
persistence and mastery are less about overcoming specific setbacks, in or out of work, than
realising one’s potential and purpose in life through integrating positive and negative
experiences in a state of greater psychological balance.
The presence of positive emotion is consistent with many previous empirical and
theoretical studies of resilience noted above. Ong et al. (2010) found highly resilient
individuals’positive emotions were less easily lost during adversity, remaining alongside
their negative emotions in a “relative independent fashion”and thereby creating “the facility
to experience the full richness and range of experiences that makes up human emotional
life.”We see this integrated state as resulting from the combination of developmental
persistency and positive emotion. In this model, resilience involves more than cognitive
efforts to overcome adversity, such as strategising or goal-setting.
So far measures of resilience have not explicitly included positive emotion (PE). The
Equanimity scale of WYRS involves accepting difficulties without excessive regret
(Wagnild and Young, 1993), and Klohnen (1996) found the ER-89 correlated with a measure
of positive emotionality encompassing behavioural and temperamental characteristics
conducive to joy, excitement and vigour. Our findings and the theoretical viewpoints above
suggest reconsideration of PE as a fundamental dimension of resilience.
Future studies might examine how positive emotion contributes to long-term growth.
Fredrickson’s (2003) “build and broaden”theory predicts PE benefits stressed individuals in
several ways. First, it broadens their outlook, helping them understand difficult challenges
and see them as opportunities to grow. Second, PE helps recall previous experiences and the
resources used then to survive, adapt or learn. Third, it counters negativity, protecting
against anxiety, depression and physical health problems and helping individuals gain self-
control and confidence. We emphasise that positive emotion does not just offer a short-term,
reactive advantage but underpins developmental persistency by building cognitive and
emotional capabilities that promote mental health.
In summary, it appears resilience represents the conjunction of two powerful
psychological attributes that jointly help individuals develop capabilities for meeting future
challenges and thereby growing towards better mental health and psychological
functioning.
An unexpected outcome of Study 1 was the poor loading of the meaning making
dimension. Aside from statistical explanations or incorrect theoretical formulation, two
possible item-wording explanations should be raised. First, participants may have
interpreted these items as referring broadly to life rather than just work: three of the six
items referred to “my life”, perhaps encouraging a non-work perspective more than other
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dimensions. Second, respondents may have related “meaning”or “meaningful”only to
significantly adverse events. Luthar et al. (2000), amongst others suggest resilience is only
invoked in significantly adverse events: perhaps the work difficulties participants faced were
not significant enough to require meaning making. As middle or lower-level managers,
respondents may have had less need for meaning making than higher-level managers
(Heuvel et al., 2009;Wrzesniewski et al., 2003). Further investigation of the role of meaning
making is therefore suggested.
The construct validity of the new scale was shown in positive correlations between its
dimensions and measures of proactive coping and self-esteem, empirically confirming the
link between resilience and psychological well-being. This finding addresses calls in the
POB literature for constructs that influence both employees’performance and well-being
(Caza and Milton, 2011;Luthans et al.,2010). Proactive coping involves capabilities such as
personal control and self-regulation (Greenglass and Schwarzer, 1998), future-oriented
qualities directed towards challenging long-term goals and personal growth rather than
merely coping with current stresses. Indeed, developmental persistency and positive
emotion may be central components of proactive coping. Resilience has been linked to self-
esteem in POB research (Lyubomirsky et al.,2006), and a growth orientation may also
underlie self-esteem (Maslow, 1970).
Negative correlations between the two new dimensions and Psychological Vulnerability
are consistent with studies showing positive coping resources such as self-efficacy and
dispositional optimism decrease vulnerability and negative affect (Sinclair and Wallston,
1999). The belief set underlying developmental persistency and positive emotion is likely to
protect against dysfunctional feelings of vulnerability and negativity when facing
challenges and adversity. For example, people who optimistically use problem-solving and
planning strategies tend to show better adjustment to stressful events where a more
pessimistic outlook increases vulnerability (Updegraff and Taylor, 2000).
Finally, composite scores on the Marlowe and Crowne social desirability scale (Reynolds,
1982) showed a negligible correlation with resilience (Kendal’sTao=0.13), suggesting
responses were not strongly influenced by desirability bias.
In summary, Study 1 provided initial support for a growth-based model of resilience with
two dimensions, developmental persistency and positive emotion. Study 2 sought to validate
this model in a new sample.
5. Study 2: Scale validation
5.1 Method
Resilience was measured with the developmental persistency and positive emotion scales
from Study 1. Three additional variables addressed construct validity: self-esteem
(Richardson et al., 2009), psychological vulnerability (Carver et al., 1989) and active coping
(Carver et al.,1989). The latter replaced the proactive coping scale used in Study 1 to broaden
the range of variables.
Questionnaires were distributed to 345 managers in 11 organisations in the same
industries and using the procedure described in Study 1, supplemented by a software
version distributed to email groups used by local managers. The response rate for the paper
version was 66 per cent, producing 222 for analysis after excluding four incomplete returns.
Another 19 were received from the email distribution. Similar to Study 1, around half the
respondents were in property or infrastructure industries, 74 per cent were male and 82 per
cent were 31-50 years old.
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5.2 Results
Resilience was modelled with two latent constructs, Developmental Persistency and Positive
Emotion, and 16 measured variables. CFA suggested a reasonable fit. Although the chi-
square test suggested some problems [
x
2
(103) = 168.59, p<0.01], this test is often
inadequate by itself (Byrne, 2010;MacCallum et al., 1996). The
x
2
/df ratio of 1.64 was below
3, indicating good fit between observed and model matrices. The CFI of 0.91 and the
RMSEA of 0.052 (PCLOSE = 0.41) also indicated a moderately good initial fit.
The fit was then improved with procedures recommended by Byrne (2010). First, after
considering the content validity of items and the likelihood of compromising the scale, item
Grow5 was deleted as its factor loading of 3.8 suggested poor fit. This should not
compromise the scale as the wording (“I actively look for ways to overcome the challenges I
encounter”) was similar to Grow4 (“I can grow in positive ways by dealing with difficult
situations”). Grow4 was retained as it refers directly to growth. Second, the error-term pairs
ep4-ep5 and epo5-epo4 were correlated following Byrne’s (2010 p. 84) recommendation for
covarying theoretically related error terms attached to a common latent variable. The final
model (Table V) had a substantially improved goodness-of-fit[
x
2
= 116.6, D
x
2
(DDF =
16) = 51.99, p<0.01]. The chi-square difference was higher than the critical value (51.99 >
26.29), the CFI increased to 0.96, the normalised chi-square decreased to 1.34, and the
RMSEA dropped to 0.03 with a higher PCLOSE of 0.87.
Convergent validity was demonstrated by generally acceptable standardised loadings, one
item being “poor to reasonable”,nine“fair”,three“good”and two “very good to excellent”by
Tabachnick and Fidell’s (2007) criteria. However, as the AVEs were low, 0.34 for developmental
persistency and 0.23 for positive emotion, further evidence for convergent validity is needed. The
construct reliabilities of 0.81 for positive emotion and 0.63 for developmental persistency were
acceptable or close to acceptable according to Hair et al. (1998) criterion of >0.7foranewscale.
Concurrent validity was demonstrated by positive correlations between Resilience and
Active coping (r= 0.61,p<0.01) and self-esteem (r= 0.64, p<0.01) and negative
correlations with Psychological Vulnerability (r=0.49, p<0.01) (Table IV). Developmental
persistency and positive emotion were again moderately correlated (r= 0.43), and this was
lower than the square root of each AVE (0.58 and 0.47 respectively) confirming that they
form distinct dimensions.
In summary, the results confirm that the construct of growth-based resilience has two
dimensions reliably and validly measured by the relevant scales, and generally adequate
construct validity.
5.3 Discussion
Our findings support a reconceptualisation of resilience as a response to life challenges
focussed on growing as a person through maintaining developmental persistency and positive
emotion. This construct goes beyond existing conceptualisations based on recovery,
Table IV.
Fit indices for the
confirmatory model
Index Resilience initial model Resilience modified model
x
2
168.59 116.61
Df 103 87
P0 0
x
2
/df 1.64 1.34
CFI 0.91 0.96
RMSEA 0.05 0.03
PCLOSE 0.41 0.87
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adaptation, survival or coping in the face of adversity. We suggest resilience reflects a positive
but also realistic attitude towards life more than a set of capabilities or resources for “bouncing
back”from adverse events. Growth-focussed persons face positive and negative events or
possibilities intentionally and purposefully, seeking to become more adaptable, integrated and
competent as persons. They know they grow because of,notdespite,difficulties (Maitlis, 2011;
Roosa, 2000). Where others see only adversities, they see also opportunities.
The growth perspective is consistent with some previous studies but is rarely made explicit
in the psychological literature. A few organisational studies mention growth in passing, but see
it as a response to milder forms of adversity at work (Caza and Milton, 2011;Luthans et al.,
2006a), a focus that ignores the wider human context. Work goals exist within broader personal
goals and life skills. Individuals may seek to maintain their present state and recover it after
adversity, or to more fully develop their human potential in response to whatever
circumstances they face. This is an important distinction: work-related capabilities may or may
not support “psychological well-being”(Ryff and Singer, 2003)or‘positive adaptation’(Masten,
2007). Facing work challenges with the goal of meeting organisational requirements does not
by itself make an employee a better person: developmental persistency has broader aims.
Linking resilience closely to psychological well-being broadens its value to
organisational research. For example, resilient employees should also be more innovative. A
person who faces life challenges with a growth focus and a positive attitude will be more
creative than one with a fixed mindset (Dweck, 2006), and hence more innovative in dealing
with the challenges, pressures and opportunities of the modern workplace.
Our findings also give positive emotion a critical role in resilient functioning at work.
Previous constructs have tended to focus on cognitive functioning but it appears resilience
has an important emotional dimension, consistent with recent conceptions of subjective
well-being (Bakker and Oerlemans, 2011). Positive emotion is linked to many psychological
and performance-related variables in POB studies, and it is perhaps unsurprising that it also
underpins resilience. However, by itself positivity may merely help a person return to a
comfortable or normal level of functioning in which future challenges are avoided.
Overcoming a problem, learning skills for facing similar ones in the future, and feeling
better adjusted to the immediate context may be positive experiences in the short-term but
do not necessarily indicate a person open to experience and positive about facing a broad
range of future challenges (Block and Kremen, 1996). Lacking developmental persistency, a
person is “satisficing”rather than thriving, staying in the “comfort zone”.
A personal growth focus links positive emotion to psychological well-being, but not by
avoiding negative emotion. As theories of personal growth from Maslow (1970) to Ryff
(2008);Dweck (2006) and Tedeschi and Calhoun (2004) emphasise, negative emotions are
unavoidable. The healthy response is to “transmute”(Maslow, 1971) negatives into a more
Table V.
Descriptive statistics
and correlation
matrix for Study 2
Variable Mean SD 1 2 3 4 5 6
1 Resilience 62.46 4.92 (0.86)
2 Developmental persistency 38.39 3.54 0.91 (0.63)
3 Positive emotion 23.86 2.27 0.76 0.43 (0.81)
4 Active coping 13.57 1.13 0.61 0.34 0.74 (0.79)
5 Self-esteem 21.70 1.38 0.64 0.34 0.88 0.69 (0.84)
6 Psychological vulnerability 8.73 2.98 0.49
þ
0.50
þ
0.27
þ
0.25
þ
0.23
þ
(0.79)
Notes: n= 241. Chronbach’s alpha for each variable is displayed in parentheses. For all correlations, p<
0.01 (two-tailed).
þ
Kendall’s tau
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positive yet realistic perspective on life by facing up to uncomfortable situations rather than
avoiding them and maintaining positivity alongside negative feelings. This concept of
growth can help POB studies link positive variables to mental health by giving place to,
rather than rejecting, negative emotions and experiences.
A growth focus has implications for interventions aimed at increasing employee
resilience. Short training exercises and group discussions have previously been
recommended for increasing resilience in specific work tasks or capabilities (Luthans et al.,
2006a;Luthans et al.,2008;Luthans et al., 2010), but a broader approach is needed for
personal growth. The psychological literature offers many options for developing qualities
such as optimism, problem-solving, self-efficacy, self-regulation, self-awareness, mental
agility, mental toughness, “character strength”and effective relationships (Maddi and
Khosabha, 2005;Reivich and Shatte, 2003), which can be adapted to work settings.
Interventions for improving positive emotion in the workplace (Emmons, 2003;Gable et al.,
2004;Lyubomirsky, 2008) have a place, although we stress the need to frame them in a
growth context. For example, coaching and mentoring can facilitate personal growth
through dealing with personality factors behind work performance.
Perhaps the most important implication of our findings involves the need to
communicate the difference between two views of resilience, the widespread “bouncing back
after adversity”model and the personal growth perspective supported here. If our results are
confirmed, managers and organisational developers interested in developing resilience
would be advised to highlight attitudes towards persistent development of one’s self, along
with the more obvious need to remain positive in times of trouble. Employees would be
encouraged to see both positive and negative work challenges as opportunities to grow as
persons, not just to meet organisational imperatives. Staff development would focus less on
obtaining a fixed set of skills for surviving problems and more on cultivating the broader
mindset of personal growth, starting by, for example, better understanding of one’s personal
strength, limitations, challenges and future interests in areas relevant to work. For
managerial staff, for example, this might involve developing self-management and
leadership skills. While positive psychology has greatly increased appreciation of the value
of positivity in the workplace, the role of psychological growth is much less understood.
Managers seeking to develop employee resilience will have greater success cultivating a
growth mindset al.ong with qualities such as optimism, hope and self-efficacy. Staff
development programs, work systems, organisational cultures and human resource
management processes for recruitment and performance appraisal can all assist in this.
5.4 Limitations and future research
As a first approximation to a growth-based construct of resilience, some questions remain.
First, further testing of the validity of the new construct is recommended. Second, its
nomological network should be examined for overlaps with concepts such as hardiness
(Maddi and Khosabha, 2005), psychological vulnerability (Sinclair and Wallston, 1999),
coping (Rutter, 2007) and particularly psychological well-being (Ryff and Keyes, 1995).
Other candidates include the PsyCap variables of self-efficacy, optimism and hope, and
other positive psychology variables like passion, vigour and thriving.
Third, reservations concerning the findings for meaning making and perseverance
suggest further examination of the structure of resilience is needed. Few studies have
attempted to assess its dimensionality. Fourth, the generalizability of our construct to other
national and industry contexts should be investigated. For example, while the results from
our Indonesian sample reflect expectations based on research in Western countries, future
studies could examine the universality of the attitudes behind developmental persistency.
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Conclusion
Where current constructs of resilience tend to focus on recovery from adversity we propose
a broader viewpoint emphasising the capacity for seeing both positive and negative events
as opportunities to grow as a person. Growth was once a central concept in psychology,
particularly in studies of psychological well-being, but today underpins relatively few
studies of resilience and so far no empirically validated constructs. Drawing on previous
studies to develop and test a new construct for workplace settings, we suggest growth-based
resilience has a cognitive dimension of developmental persistence and an affective
dimension of positive emotion. This construct addresses concerns over the limited
theoretical base of resilience research generally (Ahern et al., 2006) and the narrow focus of
organisational research (Youssef and Luthans, 2007).
In developing this construct we saw resilience as a fundamental aspect of mental health,
viewed not so much as the absence of illness, a deficit-based model, but the presence of a
positive attitude of improving oneself and making the most of life. Although present in much
older studies, this link can enlarge the modern “positive psychology”view of resilience in and
out of the workplace. Our findings further suggest adding an emotional dimension to what is
currently a largely cognitive perspective. In our view, however, positivity should sit
alongside rather than replacing negative emotions: less resilient persons face challenges by
avoiding difficult negative feelings, settling for homeostatic recovery rather than growth.
Our scale was tested on managers in large, established organisations but should be
adaptable to other organisational and non-work settings. Although further testing is needed, a
construct comprising developmental persistency and positive emotion has strong theoretical
foundations and offers direction for future studies of the dimensionality of resilience.
Growth-based resilience develops naturally in response to life experience, and we
therefore expect employees’capacity to deal not only with work setbacks and problems but
also positive challenges and opportunities can be improved most effectively through
interventions placing work capabilities in the context of broadening and enriching the whole
person. This is a significant shift from current proposals for developing resilience. It should
help employees become more confident, eager to seek out new experiences, willing to take
reasonable risks, less disturbed by setbacks and more able to see the “silver lining”within
the “dark clouds”of unavoidable difficulties. Such persons would grow in personal mastery
rather than merely “bouncing back”, surviving or returning to normal after setbacks, goals
that are unnecessarily limiting.
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About the authors
Muhammad Taufiq Amir gained his Masters in Management from PPM Graduate School of
Management in 1996. He then pursued his career in business development. In 2003, he became a full-
time academic and later joined Bakrie School of Management/Bakrie University in 2007 as the Head
of Institutional Development (2007-2008); Head of Quality Assurance (2008-2009); and Chief Editor of
the Journal of Human Capital (2008-present). Now, he is the Head of Management program
(2016-present). In 2009, he received a scholarship from Indonesian Government for doctoral study in
Edith Cowan University, Western Australia, and has been awarded PhD in Management in 2014.
Taufiq research focusses on how organisational conditions strengthen capabilities of individuals and
firms. In particular, he examines how positive relationship, emotions, meaning, compassion and
resilience contribute to individual and organisational strength. Early 2015, he founded the Center for
Positive Leadership, where he and his colleagues promote research and training stream on positive
organisational studies. Muhammad Taufiq Amir is the corresponding author and can be contacted at:
taufiq.amir@bakrie.ac.id
Peter Standen is an Associate Professor in the School of Business and Law. He has a diverse
background in applied and theoretical research in psychology and management. Since completing
PhD in Psychology in 1991, he has taught management, research methods, organisational behaviour
and leadership in the School of Business. Some of his research interests authentic leadership: a
humanistic perspective; leadership development as personal transformation; eWork, telework and
virtual work; leadership and leadership development; and psychological well-being at work including
work-life balance.
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