2.1.1 Defining Human Energy at Work
First of all, what is human energy at work? The word energy is derived from the Greek words ‘energeia’,
reflecting the activity or the operation (Harper, 2001). As Taylor & Casey (2011) noted, the sustainability of an
organization depends upon its ability to maintain the contributions of its human resource energy. Moreover,
Energy can be defined as a type of positive affective arousal, which people can experience as emotion or mood
(Taylor, 2012). According to Schippers (2011), people can be completely focused and energetic in all domains as
sports, games, hobbies, or work. The Chambers English dictionary defines energy as ‘the capacity for vigorous
activity, liveliness or vitality’, ‘force or forcefulness’, or ‘the capacity to do work’. This definition is basically
reflecting the physical energy but it also can help to understand HR energy within organizations (Schiuma, 2011).
Energy can also be reflected in terms of the energy around a project or people inside the organization to describe
energetic people or groups (Cross et al., 2003).