Measuring organizational play in small businesses

Although traditionally seen as antinomic to work, play has always existed in work organizations. Recently, as organizations increasingly and openly embrace play, research indicates the positive effects of play, such as on employees’ well-being, attitude to work, and creativity. However, the difficulty in conceptualizing the different types of play in organizations and the absence of measurement tools have hindered large-scale study of play. In the present paper, we develop two measurement scales for two types of organizational play—diversionary and serious play. We use two datasets of French small businesses to develop and test the scales. We pre-test our initial set of items in a first dataset (N = 78). We perform correlation, reliability, and exploratory factor analyses on a second dataset (N = 278) using the items adjusted after the pre-test. Our final scales consist of ten items for diversionary play and seven for serious play. We assess construct validity by selecting a range of constructs pertaining to organizational members’ attitude and perception, as well as to the characteristics of the organization. Our measurement scales demonstrate good reliability and validity. The scales developed in the present study aim to contribute to the literature on play at workplace, the changing nature of modern work and research in entrepreneurial health.