Purpose – The purpose of this master thesis is to examine how job crafting relates to intended retirement age. I hypothesized that this relation is partially mediated by job satisfaction and depending on which type of job crafting (promotion- or prevention-focused), the relationship is positive or negative.
Design/methodology/approach – Data from 585 mainly older employees working in the healthcare sector (mean age 56 and 5 months) were analyzed using econometric techniques.
Findings – Promotion-focused job crafting, more specifically increasing challenging job demands, is positively related to intended retirement age.
Research limitations/implications – Although the study design is cross sectional, the results disclose how job crafting is related with the motivation to delay retirement directly and whether through job satisfaction indirectly.
Practical implications – Given today’s increasing dependency ratios, employees working up to and beyond their statutory retirement age are essential for the functional capability of organizations. The results suggest, that organizations should encourage employees’ promotion-focused job crafting. As promotion-focused job crafting fuels job satisfaction, especially organizations with frequent customer contact additionally benefit from encouraging employees to engage in this type of behavior.