Employees’ perceptions of working-from-home and their relationship to work engagement: a person-centred approach over time

This study investigates how employees’ perceptions of working-from-home (WFH) relate to work engagement, using a longitudinal person-centred approach grounded in Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) theory. Building on a value-based redefinition of resources and demands, we argue that WFH elicits a constellation of work and non-work characteristics whose impact depends on how employees personally value them. Drawing on survey data from two independent samples collected during and after the COVID-19 pandemic (N1 = 338; N2 = 923), we identified five distinct profiles of WFH valuation, reflecting different configurations of perceived resources and demands: a dominantly demanding, a moderately demanding, an ambiguous, a moderately resourceful, and a dominantly resourceful profile. Latent Transition Analyses revealed that while profile membership appeared largely stable over time, societal context was associated with profile distribution, with more demanding valuations prevalent during the pandemic. Work engagement varied significantly across profiles, with higher engagement reported in more resourceful profiles. Contrary to expectations, changes in WFH frequency did not consistently predict profile transitions, though frequency negatively impacted engagement in the most demanding profile. These findings highlight the importance of considering individual differences in valuation of WFH, the need for context sensitivity, and temporal dynamics when assessing WFH’s impact.