Personal traits

The data showed that the role of personality is big in engagement. Personality also affects the process of perception. Bowditch and Buono (2001) propose that personality acts as a kind of perceptual filter or frame of reference influencing a person´s view of the world. According to Macey and Schneider (2008), some people have originally more engaged predisposition when it comes to work. All things being equal, these people are more engaged than others. Trait engagement of these individuals is high and they seem to be orientated to experience the world in a particular way. They tend to have positive views of work and life in general, positive affect, locus of control, conscientiousness, and proactive and autotelic personality (Macey & Schneider 2008). Individuals possessing autotelic personalities are internally driven and exhibit a sense of curiosity and purpose (Csikszentmihalyi 1998).

It is often discussed whether employee engagement is a personal trait, psychological state or a behavior. Seen as trait, it describes the employee´s disposition to and attitude towards work. In turn, state engagement describes the employee´s current feelings about his or her work such as energy, absorption, satisfaction, involvement, commitment, attachment, enthusiasm, and empowerment (Macey & Schneider 2008, 6). Finally, behavioral engagement describes how the employee performs his or her job. Trait engagement is reflected in state engagement, and these together lead to behavioral engagement. In other words, trait and state engagement are antecedents to behavioral engagement (Macey & Schneider 2008, 5). Engagement is often found to be quite persistent, but according to latest research, the level of engagement may fluctuate on a weekly or even day-to-day basis (Bakker & Xanthopoulou 2009).

Kular et al. (2008) argue that employee engagement is influenced by the employees´ perception of their environment. In the data, it was clearly shown that working in temporary problem-solving teams suits certain type of people possessing certain type of personalities. The informants that I perceived as engaged had some personal traits in common. These were curiosity and

willingness to learn, self-efficacy, openness, proactiveness, and ambitiousness.

The findings concerning the role of the personality are also supported by the results of Macey and Schneider (2008), Kular et al. (2008), and Schaufeli (2014).

Curiosity and willingness to learn. The main intrinsic motivators for the experts working in temporary problem-solving teams were learning in interaction with other top experts around the world, and personal development through learning. The experts were willing and anxious to learn new things and methods, and continuously wanted to improve themselves and their skills.

“The experts involved with the company want to be the best of their industry and always stay up to date... It is meaningful to be allowed to work with such people because you learn yourself.”

“The most inspiring thing is that you have someone from another industry suggesting something new you have never heard of… In my job I have to know a little about everything, and the little I know is how you usually do it… and when you get some additional information you are like “wow”!”

Most experts showed intellectual curiosity for the new ways of working that the case company applied, and for the possibilities digitalization offers. They seemed not to fear for change; pioneering, being at the forefront of technical development and creating new working methods were often mentioned in the interviews. Money and extra income played a little role compared to the role of learning. This had also to do with the fact that working in projects was additional work for the experts, who all worked temporarily for the case company.

“I think the possibilities that may open are quite big. I´m doing a lot of work for free now because I want to be involved in this, and I want to be awake and see what comes up next and how it can be used.”

“I came along because I wanted to experiment virtual working.”

Self-efficacy. Most experts had courage and self-confidence to share even their craziest ideas concerning projects with their team. I have categorized both courage and self-confidence under the construct of self-efficacy, which according to Bandura´s definition (1977), means an individual´s belief in his or her ability to succeed in specific situations or accomplish a task. Sense of self-efficacy plays a big role in how the individual approaches goals, tasks, and challenges. Self-efficacy is central in Bandura’s social cognitive theory that emphasizes the role of observational learning and social experience in the development of personality.

(Bandura 1977; Luszczynska & Schwarzer 2005.)

According to Bandura, people with high self-efficacy are likely to view difficult tasks as challenging, inspirational, and something to be mastered rather than something to be avoided or to be scared of (Bandura 1977). Self-efficacy includes self-understanding, self-confidence, and realistic view of one´s own abilities. It is central in multidisciplinary teams where each team member is specialized in one area and the others will have to rely on his or her expertise. The interviewed experts were confident and willing to share their knowledge with other team members.

“(At the digital platform) you have to have courage enough to comment on different things... I do not see it as a risk to propose crazy ideas or to suggest something risky.”

Knowledge sharing was facilitated by the fact that each expert´s knowledge was very specialized, and exploiting it in a wrong way was not probable or even possible.

“I find it quite easy to throw ideas in research circles, especially when no one can exploit them without additional information”.

Openness. Most experts seemed to be initially open as persons and willing to share their ideas, knowledge, and experience with other team members. They were not afraid of someone stealing their ideas but willing to share them with others to refine further. I find that openness - inborn or learned - is important when working in international project teams, because knowledge-sharing is essential for successful problem-solving in multidisciplinary teams.

“I think the world will not run out of ideas. You just have to share them and if someone takes them then takes. This is a place for spiritual growth; you need to see it as something bigger if your ideas are taken.”

“I gave them the whole concept and said: “It is like that, just do it”. It was a good experience that you were willing to share.”

Proactiveness. The interviewed experts were active in many ways. They did not wait for things to happen but actively contributed to them. In freelance economy, proactiveness is essential since you have to market your knowledge and sell your skills all the time.

“How much you invest and how much you get depends on yourself, your interests and the interests of different actors. If you are active you can get more and if you are passive you will get less.”

“This is how I took part of the project; I had noticed some areas that need to be developed and said: “Hey, I could help you to improve your processes”. So that was one process I was in.”

Ambitiousness. The experts were extremely ambitious in what they were doing.

They wanted to be a step ahead and to be forerunners in their industries. Varied challenges together with autonomy brought them value.

“They (experts in the company) are more ambitious and open-minded. It may be because the experts joining the network want to be the best of their industry and

always stay up to date, and probably invent something new and excellent themselves, and revolutionize everything!”

“One of the best things with the company is a holistic view - and well-chosen experts. They have to be very good at their substance but also capable of cooperating. And ambitious and enthusiastic.”

"The more tricky the problem, the more rewarding it is to solve it.”

Hence, there are personal traits or trait-like features that seem to enhance engagement. On the basis of the data I found these to be curiosity and willingness to learn, self-efficacy, openness, proactiveness, and ambitiousness. These are all needed in the new work context, the freelance economy, where one constantly has to sell his or her skills and knowledge to different employers. Personal traits are partly inborn, but also behavioral up to some point. Behavioral traits may be trained and learned, and some abilities also grow with experience.

6 DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS

In this chapter, I will discuss the concept of employee engagement in the new work context through the data. Further, I will present means of supporting employee engagement in project-based problem-solving teams. Finally, I will discuss theoretical and managerial implications, limitations, and reliability and validity of the research.