Fostering sustainability: Assessing the interplay of incivility, wellbeing, and job performance in the workplace

This study investigates the effects of employee well-being and supervisor incivility on job performance in Sri Lanka’s tea plantation sector. Data were collected from a random sample of 205 executive-level employees from three large-scale plantation companies using an online survey. The analysis was conducted using SPSS-AMOS, applying correlation and regression techniques to test the proposed hypotheses. The study examined the direct effects of social, physical, and mental well-being on employee performance and the moderating role of supervisor incivility. The findings reveal that social well-being (β = .351, p = .021) and physical well-being (β = .289, p = .034) significantly and positively influence employee performance, while mental well-being shows no significant direct effect (β = .174, p = .193). Moderation analysis indicates that supervisor incivility significantly alters the relationships between well-being and performance. The interaction between mental well-being and supervisor incivility is significant (b = .131, p = .050), suggesting that the impact of mental well-being on performance becomes stronger under higher levels of incivility. Similarly, supervisor incivility moderates the social well-being–performance link (b = .148, p = .011), strengthening its effect in adverse supervisory contexts. However, no moderating effect is found for physical well-being. Overall, the results highlight that social and physical well-being directly enhance performance, while supervisory behaviour acts as an important boundary condition shaping how well-being translates into employee performance.