A Macro‐National Level Analysis of Arab Women's Work Engagement

• Date: 01 June 2017
• Published date: 01 June 2017
• Author: Jawad Syed,Muntaha Banihani
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/emre.12095

A Macro-National Level Analysis of Arab

Women’s Work Engagement

MUNTAHA BANIHANI

1

and JAWAD SYED

2

1

Mutah University, Jordan

2

University of Huddersfield, UK and Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan

This paper reviews the macro-national level factors that influence women’s work engagement in Arab c ountries.

First, it offers an overview of the notions of work engagement and gendered work engagement. Next, the macro-

national context is investigated where economic, socio-cultural, and legal factors are analyzed that may explain

differences in workplace engagement between men and women. Lastly, the discussion, implications for future

research and practice, and conclusion are offered.

Keywords: Arab countries; gender equality; Jordan; Middle East; women; work engagement

Introduction

Engagement in the workplace has recently received much

attention as it is found to have desirable organizational

outcomes such as job satisfaction, productivity,

organizational commitment, employee performance, and

less intention to quit (Maslach et al., 2001; Saks, 2006;

Rich et al., 2010; Gruman and Saks, 2011; Alfes et al.,

2013; Andrew and Sofian, 2012; Li et al., 2015).

However, despite the plethora of studies on the

antecedents and consequences of work engagement, there

hasbeenlittleresearchonwomen’s work engag ement.

The way workengagement is constructedand investigated

in the literature is assumed, implicitly, to be gender-

neutral where women and men can equally demonstrate

their engagement in the workplace (Banihani et al.,

2013). The absence of attention to gender in

organizational research does not imply gender neutrality,

instead a male perspective is often tacitly adopted (Calas

and Smircich, 1992), which ultimately may contribute to

the perpetuation of inequalities in the workplace (Martin,

2000). Previous research has shown that the antecedents

of work engagement presented in Kahn’s (1990) classical

theorization, that is, psychological meaningfulness,

psychological safety, and psychological availability, are

gendered which makes it harder for women to be engaged

than for men (Banihani et al., 2013). This review paper

examines the macro-national context surrounding

women’s work engagement to develop a comprehensive,

realistic and context-specific perspective of women’s

work engagement.

Work engagement as a concept has been mainly

developed, explored, and researched in western countries

(Albrechy, 2010). As a result, little research has been

conducted on work engagement in Arab cultures. Yet, as

global organizations move, they bringtheir work practices

with them and may also need to adapt to local cultural

norms and values in order to attract, motivate and retain

employees (Hofstede, 1997; Greblikaite and Daugeliene,

2010). The current expansion of the global economy has

increased cross-cultural research.However, as far as work

engagement is concerned, cross-culturalresearch has also

been largely limitedto western countries (Schaufeli et al.,

2002a; Shimazu et al., 2010). The investigation of work

engagement in Arab culture is still missing and this may

affect our understanding and the generalizability of this

concept in thatregion. This is of special relevancebecause

it has been realized that research findings from western

samples cannot always be generalized to non-western

context (Scholz et al., 2002; Shimazu et al., 2010).

Hofstede (1980) found that the Arab countries share

similar societal and cultural values such as large power

distance, high uncertainty avoidance, and high

collectivism. Arab culture is also known to be patriarchal

where men have negative views of women’s abilities to

succeed in the workplace (Mostafa, 2003; Whiteoak

et al., 2006). Arab culture has unique characteristics and

values that differ from western culture and research in

such culture has the potential to improve our

Correspondence: Muntaha Banihani, College of Business Administration,

Mutah University, Karak, Jordan.E-mail mbanihan@mutah.edu.jo

European Management Review, Vol. 14, 133–142, (2017)

DOI: 10.1111/emre.12095

© 2016 European Academy of Management