Accommodation Crafting as a Partial Mediator of the Effects of Personal Resources and Job Characteristics on Task Crafting by Employees with Hearing Limitations

Abstract Are proactive behaviors like task crafting an answer to the long-sought social goal of leveling the playing field for employees with disabilities? This question is important because, after three decades, legal remedies such as the Americans with Disabilities Act, theoretical and empirical advancements, and skill development interventions have yet to close enough of the well-documented gap in employment opportunities being faced by employees with disabilities. The current study seeks to shed light on this topic by addressing the research question “Does accommodation crafting partially mediate the effects of personal resources (self-efficacy and political skill) and job characteristics (job autonomy and perceived organizational support) on employees with hearing limitations’ decisions to engage in task crafting?” Methods. Employees with hearing limitations (n=225) completed an on-line questionnaire. Participants responded under conditions of anonymity unless they chose to participate in a cash drawing by providing their email address. All participants worked full-time (30 or more hours per week) in the United States. Results. As hypothesized, a significant positive relationship between accommodation crafting and task crafting was confirmed. Accommodation crafting was also found to partially mediate the significant direct effects of political skill, self-efficacy, and job autonomy on task crafting. Perceived organizational support was not found to be significantly related to accommodation crafting and was therefore excluded from partial mediation analyses. Conclusion. This study suggests that an enhanced understanding of task crafting by employees with hearing limitations is conceivable when considering the antecedent effects of personal resources and organizational characteristics. Although personal resources and organization characteristics seem to be direct antecedents of task crafting for employees with hearing limitations, the availability of crafted accommodations seems to be important as a partial mediator of these relationships.