Abstract:
Graduation speakers,
company mission statements, and job postings all call on employees to follow
their passion. But how do people follow their passion? Based on an analysis of
117 graduation speeches that included advice about the pursuit of passion, I
find that individuals pursue their passion in one of two ways: some people
pursue their passion by concentrating on pursuing work they like, whereas
others pursue their passion by focusing on work they find personally important.
Across three field studies and one laboratory experiment (N = 1,489), I
find that individuals who pursue their passion by focusing on work they find
personally important are more likely to be successful in their pursuit of
passion than those who focus on work they like. This has consequential
implications for organizations, as I find that employees who fall short of
desired levels of passion are more likely to quit their jobs. The second half
of my talk explores whether the successful pursuit of passion is enough to
achieve higher performance. Drawing on prior research which has found mixed
results regarding the relationship between passion and performance, I propose
and find across two field studies (N = 670) that the successful pursuit
of passion only produces higher performance when combined with higher
perseverance, which provides the guidance and commitment to pursue one’s
passion. These effects are mediated by increased immersion, i.e., how absorbed
individuals are in the pursuit of their passion. Taken together, my program of
research situates the pursuit of passion as an important construct in the
organizational behavior literature and explores meaningful behavioral outcomes,
from turnover to performance, using field studies, laboratory experiments and
meta-analyses.