Importance of work characteristics affects job performance: The mediating role of individual dispositions on the work design-performance relationships

Work characteristics influence job performance but the individual values, reflected on the importance that employees place on each work characteristic, may affect this relationship. Drawing insights from personal salience and person-job fit theory, our research explored the partial mediation effect of importance given to work characteristics in the relation between 18 work characteristics and job performance in a sample of Colombian workers from different economic sectors (N = 817). We found that 17 out of 18 work characteristics indirectly influenced job performance through its effect on importance. These findings emphasize the role of personal antecedents on job performance with clear implications for research and practice (job design and selection).