Organisational Nostalgia

Organisational nostalgia—a sentimental longing for past events in, and aspects of, one’s organisational life—is a commonly experienced but poorly understood emotion. Qualitative research has explored how it helps employees cope with threat. Here, we examine its motivational properties. Building on the job demands-resources model, we hypothesised that organisational nostalgia—assessed with a newly developed and validated scale—predicts (in-role and extra-role) job performance, creativity, and support for organisational change. Study 1 showcased the development of the organisational nostalgia scale. We proceeded to hypothesise that work engagement, via need satisfaction, mediates the abovementioned positive relations, and tested these hypotheses in three additional studies. In Study 2, a multi-source design with leader-follower dyads, leader organisational nostalgia was associated with increased leader OCB, as rated by followers. In Study 3, a lagged correlational design with employees, organisational nostalgia positively predicted OCB via work engagement. Finally, in Study 4, a lagged correlational design, organisational nostalgia predicted increased in-role performance, creativity, and support for organisational change. These associations were serially mediated by need satisfaction and work engagement. We conclude that organisational nostalgia has motivational implications. Our research affords a theoretical framework for the emotion and the means (i.e., a scale) to study it.