The Mediating Role of Psychological Capital in the Relationship Between Organisational Resources and Flourishing

Abstract

This study looks into the relationship between organisational resources, Psychological Capital (PsyCap), and flourishing within the Job Demands-Resource (JD-R) framework, focusing on how PsyCap acts as a mediator between resources and flourishing to influence well-being and achievement. Data was collected from 120 employees-including interns, graduates, and full-time staff from an FMCG company in Johannesburg, South Africa. The survey included a composite demographic questionnaire combining validating scales, the PsyCap Questionnaire (Luthans et al., 2007), the JD-R Scale, and the Flourishing Scale. Mediation analysis revealed that PsyCap partially mediated the relationship between organisational resources and flourishing, with optimism emerging as the only significant mediator, suggesting that mindset-based strengths play more of an influential role in enhancing well-being than the other PsyCap facets such as hope, resilience or self-efficacy. On the other hand, job demands had no discernible impact as a moderator or control and had a weak relationship with flourishing. The moderated parallel mediation model of PsyCap facets accounted for over half of the variance in Flourishing (R² = 52.1%, F(7, 115) = 14.28, p < .001), with a significant indirect effect of optimism (B = .028, 95% CI [.008, .050])*. By pinpointing optimism as the primary psychological mechanism via which organisational resources foster and promote flourishing, these findings contribute to the body of the literature. Practically speaking, this places emphasis on how crucial it is to cultivate mindset-based characteristics, especially optimism, in workplace interventions meant to improve employee engagement, well-being, and long-term performance. These insights deepen our understanding of how organisational and psychological factors interact to influence employee flourishing.