Emotion work, that is, the regulatory effort to express organizationally desired emotions, is an
integral part of service work. The concept of emotional competence encompasses skills that focus
on how people deal with and regulate their own affect and that of others. Although focusing on
similar processes, there has been a lack of integration between these two concepts. The general
hypothesis in this study was that emotional competence can be regarded as an important personal
resource in service work because it moderates the relationships between work characteristics,
emotional dissonance, and outcome variables. Eighty-four service employees completed a
questionnaire on their working conditions and their well-being. In additions, peer-ratings for
emotional competence were completed. We found that emotional competence moderated most of
the proposed relationships (1) between work characteristics and emotional dissonance, (2)
between emotional dissonance and outcome variables, and (3) between work characteristics and
outcome variables.