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The contemporary world's pressure, oriented on flexibility and quick actions, has permanently changed work characteristics. Taking the employees' perspective into account, it seems important to identify whether and which of the employees' individual resources help them cope with those job demands. Therefore, the main research question is what is the relation between holistically conceptualised employees' individual resources and perceived work overload?

Based on the literature on individual resources and job demands, the authors test for relations between three components of individual resources (physical, emotional, spiritual potentials) and job characteristics (work variability and work diversity) and the perceived work overload. Data were collected using a survey method amongst 336 Polish knowledge workers.

The results partially supported the posed hypotheses. Both work variability and work diversity relate positively to work overload. Only the physical potential is related directly and negatively to perceived work overload. The spiritual potential relates indirectly to work overload through work diversity. The authors also found that age moderates the relation between physical and spiritual potential and overload.

Human resource management (HRM) practitioners and supervisors need to consider the level of employee's individual resources, especially when dealing with older employees and their physical resources.

This study contributes to research on the causes of work overload perception by identifying the role of individual resources and employees' age, thereby indicating that taking care of those resources could be another way of preventing occupational burnout in demanding work conditions.

The purpose of this paper is to propose holistic approach to human resources in the situation of organizational acceleration. Authors are postulating that the holistic approach to HR helps in maintaining sustainable individual resources of employees in the situation of continuous organizational changes and time pressure that further can prevent from the individual resources exhaustion.

This conceptual paper builds on the problem of occupational stress that is connected with organizational acceleration. Authors define stress as the individually perceived inability to match expectations caused by the deficiency of individual resources. They conceptualize the individual resources of employees basing on the concepts of human capital and the individual energy at work and propose a framework of individual resources of employees that enables holistic view of an individual in an organization.

In the situation of organizational acceleration HRM function plays important role in sustaining individual resources of employees in order to minimize threat of occupational stress and further burnout. HR practices should apply multidimensionality of individual resources and threat it holistically aiming at sustaining all four potentials – spiritual, intellectual, emotional and physical.

Authors indicate that managers need to understand how to deal with the acceleration in order to overcome the negative consequences for individuals. There is still need for identifying HR practices that are the key success factors in the situation of organizational acceleration.

Authors take up the current problem of organizational acceleration from the individual perspective. They propose a concept of individual resources of employees and connected to it holistic approach to HR in the times of great time pressure, work overload, occupational stress and burnout threat.