Shoot for engagement: workplace sport participation and the psychological conditions of engagement

Organisations are increasingly searching for innovative yet sustainable ways to cultivate engagement among employees. While most strategies focus on formal job roles or human resource development (HRD) initiatives, our study examines how voluntary workplace sport participation may provide a potential pathway to engagement. The study extends engagement theory by applying Kahn’s framework to workplace physical activity. Drawing on Kahn’s conditions of meaningfulness, safety, and availability, we investigated how Noonball, a lunchtime basketball programme at a large university, shaped employees’ experiences of psychological meaningfulness, safety, and availability at work. A phenomenologically informed qualitative approach was used, drawing on semi-structured interviews with 10 employees who regularly participated. Findings suggest workplace physical activity may offer a pathway for supporting the psychological conditions associated with engagement by fostering authentic self-expression, strengthening interpersonal connection, and enhancing the psychological resources employees need to be present and perform at their best. While grounded in a U.S. higher‑education setting, the findings offer a conceptual lens for examining how informal workplace practices may shape engagement and the psychological conditions underlying it across diverse international contexts where norms surrounding leisure, hierarchy, and participation may differ and where opportunities for discretionary participation vary.