Drivers of Work Life Balance

Transcription

1 Drivers of Work Life Balance S.Karthick* and V.Balaji^ *Ph.D Research Scholar, Dept. of Business Administration, Annamalai University ^Assistant Professor, Dept. of Business Administration, Annamalai University, Tamilnadu, India Abstract In recent years the challenge of maintaining a balance between work life and personal life has grown significantly influential in modern life style. Employees face greater workload, increasing time pressure and growing obstacles in satisfying both job and personal life demands. At work the demand for efficiency leads to more tasks, which have to be fulfilled in a shorter period of time, that disturbes the balance of work life. This study intend to identify the drivers of work life balance using the strategical tools; Percentages Analysis, t -Test, Chi Square Test, Analysis of Variance having taken 80 number of respondents from Private Hospitals in Tanjore. The study shows that Work Life Balance of Nurses affected by key drivers of Work Life Balance. Key words: Work Life Balance, Work Life Conflict, Health Care Industry, Private Hospital, Nurses Introduction The Indian healthcare industry has the potentital to become a global hub for healthcare services. The sheer importance of the nurse s role in overall health care industry in any country should never be under-estimated. The World Health Organization (WHO) recognises that nurses are the largest regulated health professional group of any country (WHO: 2002). The main work force group has work life balance issues reported in several studies. Work-life balance is a broad and complex phenomenon, lacking in a universal definition, extent to which an individual is equally engaged in and equally satisfied with his or her work role and family role (Greenhaus & Singh, Collins & Shaw). Work-life balance consists of three components: 1) Time balance refers to equal time being given to both work and family roles, 2) Involvement balance refers to equal levels of psychological involvement in both work and family roles and 3) Satisfaction balance refers to equal levels of satisfaction in both work and family roles. Therefore, in order to achieve a work-life balance these components should be considered. Work life balance is about people having a measure of control over when, where and how they work. It is achieved when an individual s right to a fulfilled life inside and outside paid work is accepted and respected as the norm, to the mutual benefit of the individuals, business and society. To change in life style of the society and the priorities and career plans of the individual are setting new trends and demands in life. The Sum of the work situations are time bound, target bound and result oriented, the individual is unable to have an ideal private life. Spending enough time at home with spouse, children, parents, relatives and friends is as important as being at the workplace. After all, one is working for a happy living. Issues of WLB The effective management of work life balance (WLB) is an issue increasingly recognized as of strategic importance to organizations and of significance to employees. WLB is an issue because Work Life Conflict (WLC) brings about a variety of undesirable consequences. Many of the consequences are health related, but not exclusively so. The effects on employee health are well - documented. In addition to the effects on individual health, there are also significant corporate health impacts. WLC has been shown to contribute health impacts. WLC has been shown to contribute to higher absenteeism and /or attrition rates, low morale, a great number of work-related compensation claims and productivity losses. Work can be organized is such a way as to reduce WLC and to promote WLB; for instance, giving employees more control over working time through flexible hours, telework and so on. Work life issues are an important bottom line concern. Effective work/life strategies that meet the needs of an organization and its employees EJCMR SPECIAL ISSUE 1,

2 are vital to maintain a competitive edge in today s rapidly changing business environment. Striking the Best WLB There are certain strategies and initiatives listed below to manage Work life balance according to individual s need. Simplify Life: learn to say no if it comes in the way of your schedules. Staying home once in a while helps ease the frenetic pace of the workplace. Learn to de-stress: A certain degree of stress often enables people to perform better, but the key is to maintain it at manageable so that it can enrich and motivate. Sometimes it makes sense to take it easy. Distribute the work load: An orderly and clean home reduces unnecessary tensions and makes life simpler. However, when the time is tight, learn to let go of expectations of extreme cleanliness. Even at workplace, learning to trust colleagues and delegating tasks and duties helps in sharing the burden. Identify and Implement: Keep a record of all the work-related and non-work related activities performed during a given week. After identifying the most important and meaningful activities, those activities which are done out of guilt or are deemed unnecessary can be delegated, if possible. Manage time efficiently: Planning household chores and duties/tasks well ahead of time prevents last-minute panic and tension. Efficient scheduling of appointments or tasks which can be clubbed together on the same day minimizes missed work time. Find out about flexi - work practices: Make enquiries in the organization if there is an option of flexible working arrangements and the criteria to opt for such policies. Nurture your self: Managing both household and work efficiently is quite challenging. Nurturing yourself to relish the lost energy is a good investments towards WLB. Some of the activities like taking a walk at lunch time, meditation, yoga or engaging in an activity most enjoyed can be good way to recharge. Setup a work-free and chore-free day: Create atleast one day in a week that is free of any job-related tasks and chores. This time can be utilized to develop a hobby and relax. Business benefits of improved WLB Organizations stand to gain by introducing employment policies that promote a healthier WLB for employees. Increased productivity - the quality of work improves and the productivity rises as they are more focused on work. Improved recruitment and retention - the recruitment and training costs can be brought down due to improved staff retention. An improved customer experience. Lower rates of absenteeism - there is reduced number of sick leaves absence as the employees stay healthier. Adopting flexible and WLB - oriented policies builds a positive perception about the employer. This leads to better relations with the employees, continued staff loyalty, motivation and commitment. Review of Literature: Restubog et al. (2006) states that, employees experience (perception) of work-life balance cause their positive response such as affective commitment and this favorable attitude leads then to behaviors that promote their contributions to their organization. Moore and Fiona (2007) conducted a research to compare work-life balance issues workers and managers of an MNC. It was concluded that many of the managers are not able to achive work-life balance. Dundas (2008) argues that work-life balance is about effectively managing the juggling act between paid work and all other activities that are important to people such as family, community activities, voluntary work, personal development and leisure and recreation. According to Hayman (2009) Flexitime supports significantly higher levels of WLB than do traditional, fixed-hour working schedules. Hill et al. (2010) found that flexitime assists employees to manage their work and family responsibilities by allowing them to reduce work family conflict and to improve functioning and performance at work and at home. Ioan Lazar et. al (2010) found the outcomes and the benefits of implementing worklife balance practices not only for employees themselves, but also for their families, organizations and society. Janeen Baxter and Jenny Chesters (2011) findings indicate that negative perceptions of workfamily balance are linked to long work hours, having to work extra hours and unpredictable work hours. This suggests that what women need most is control over the length and scheduling of their working hours. Rincy and Panchanatham (2011) revealed that role overload, dependent care issues, quality of health, problems in time management and EJCMR SPECIAL ISSUE 1,

3 lack of proper social support are the major factors influencing the WLB of women entrepreneurs in India. Merideth Ferguson et al. (2012) identified that work-family balance plays a mediating role in assisting social support s contribution to both job & family satisfaction. Senthilkumar et. al (2012) results show that there is a close relationship between the demographical variables and the level of stress in balancing work and personal life. It is divulged from this analysis that majority of the respondents were not satisfied with their work life balance. Chandrasekar et al. (2013) found that, there are some factors of work demand that interferes with the personal life which leads to an imbalance state, work-life balance is different based on gender and nature of jobs, work life balance has a positive relationship with job satisfaction. The study concluded that an efficient Work life Balance is detrimental to an employee for improving their job satisfaction and productivity. Abhilasha Joshi Sharma (2013) identified the most significant factor to influence and enhance Work- Life Balance is organization commitment as well as an individual s and also suggested that work-life Balance strategies can aid organizations in creating stress free environment for working women & thus facilitate improved Work life balance. Hye Kyoung Kim (2014) identified that there is no direct effect of work-life balance on inrole performance. However, it was found that employees experience of work-life balance increases affective commitment and that affective commitment has a positive influence on in-role Result and Discussion: Table 1 Classification based on Personal Factors performance. Sussanna Shagvaliyeva and Rashad Yazdanifard (2014) examined flexible working hours from its positive point of view. The investigation showed that introduction of flexible working hours brought some benefits for both employee and employer. Also, flexibility in the workplace gives employees time to perform outside of the work roles and it helps balance employees work and life. Objectives of the study 1) To study the drivers of work life balance of nurses in private hospitals 2) To find out the influence of demographic factors on the dimensions of work-life balance. Research Methodology The research design chosen is descriptive in nature. This type of research deals with quality of responses from the respondents, attitudes, interests, technical skills, experience, behavioral, beliefs and values, emotions, personality, self concept etc. The universe of the study refers to the nurses of private hospitals in Tanjore. The sample size taken to conduct the research is 80 nurses. The respondents were selected by using convenient sampling technique. Structured interview schedule was used for primary data collection. Secondary data was collected from earlier research work, various published journals, magazines, websites and online articles. Simple Percentage Analysis, Analysis of variance (Anova), Chi Square Analysis and T- Test are the tools used by the SPSS (Statistical package for social sciences) for data analysis. S N o Personal Factors No. of Respondents Below 25 years Percentage (%) 1 Age years Above 35 years Marital Status Married EJCMR SPECIAL ISSUE 1,

4 Unmarried Below 1 year years Experience 3-5 years Above 5 years Yes Children No Source: Primary Data : Thus the above table shows that majority 72.5% of the respondents belong to the age group of below 25 years and only 3.8% of the respondents belong to above 35 years. Majority 72.5% of the respondents are unmarried and only 27.5% of the Table 2 respondents are married. Maximum 33.8% of the respondents have above 5 years of experience and only 17.5% of the respondents have below 1 year of experience. Majority 75% of the respondents do not have children and only 25% of the respondents having children. Classification based on Study Factors S. N o Study Factors Level Opinion of No. of Respondents Flexible Percentage (%) 1 work schedule shift Not flexible Less than 3 hour hour Hours in a day spend with family & friends 4-5 hour hour More than 6 hour Suffer Stress disease from related Hypertension Frequent Headaches EJCMR SPECIAL ISSUE 1,

5 Obesity Diabetes Yes Able to balance work life No Music Entertainment Manage stress arise from work Spending time with family Hang out with friend Miss important personal activities due to time spent on work Never Rarely Sometimes Often 4 5 Very often Never Rarely Difficult maintain personal life to Sometimes Often Very often Never Rarely Difficulty getting done in work Sometimes Often Very often EJCMR SPECIAL ISSUE 1,

6 Source: Primary Data : Thus the above table reveals that majority 83.7% of the respondents feels that their work shift schedule is flexible and only 16.3% of the repsondents feels that their work shift schedule is not flexible. Maximum 28.7% of the respondents spend 4-5 hours in a day spend with family and friends and only 13.8% of the respondents spend morethen 6 hours in a day spend with family and friends. 43.7% of the respondents suffer from frequent Headaches and 2.5% of the respondents suffer from diabetes. Majority 98.7% of the respondents say that they balance their work life and only 1.3% of the respondents say that they could not able to balance their work life. Maximum 33.8% of the respondents reduce their stress through spending time with their family and 15% of the respondents reduce their stress through entertainment. Maximum 30% of the respondents never miss their important personal activities due to time spent on work and 5% of the respondents often miss their important personal activities due to time spent on work. Maximum 35% of the respondents do not have difficulty in maintain their personal life and 1.3% of the respondents very often difficult to maintain their personal life. Maximum 31.3% of the respondents sometimes face difficulty in getting work done and 2.5% of the respondents very often face difficulty in getting work done. Table 3 t -Test between Marital status and factors of work life balance Factors Marital status N Mean S.D F P Married ours in a day spend with family & friends Unmarried Married Able to balance Unmarried work life Married Difficulty in getting work done Unmarried EJCMR SPECIAL ISSUE 1,

7 From the above table it is inferred that there is a significance mean differenc that exist on balance work life based on marital status and there is no significance mean difference that exist on hours in a day spend with family & friends and difficulty in getting work done. Table 4t -Test between Children and factors of work life balance Factors Children N Mean S.D F P work shift Yes schedule is No flexible Miss important Yes to time spent on work personal activities due No Thus the above table reveals that there is significance mean difference that exists on work shift schedule based on having children and it is not significant with miss important personal activities due to time spent on work. Table 5 Chi-Square Test showing the Association between Age and Stress related diseases Alternative Hypothesis (H 1 ): There is an association between age and stress related diseases Null Hypothesis (H 0 ): There is no association between age and stress related diseases Parameters Value df Asymp. Sig. (2-sided) Pearson Chi-Square Likelihood Ratio Linear-by- Linear Association a Hence, the Alternative Hypothesis (H 1 ) is accepted. There is an association between age and stress related diseases. Table 6 Chi-Square Test showing the Association between Age and difficult to maintain personal life Alternative Hypothesis (H 1 ): There is an association between age and difficult to maintain personal life. EJCMR SPECIAL ISSUE 1,

8 Null Hypothesis (H 0 ): There is no association between age and difficult to maintain personal life. Parameters Value df Asymp. Sig. (2-sided) Pearson Chi-Square Likelihood Ratio Linear-by- Linear Association a Hence, the Alternative Hypothesis (H 1 ) is accepted. There is an association between age and difficult to maintain personal life. Table 7 Chi-Square Test showing the Association between Age and difficulty in getting work done Alternative Hypothesis (H 1 ): There is an association between age and difficulty in getting work done. Null Hypothesis (H 0 ): There is no association between age and difficulty in getting work done. Parameters Value df Asymp. Sig. (2-sided) Pearson Chi-Square Likelihood Ratio Linear-by- Linear Association a Hence, the Alternative Hypothesis (H 1 ) is accepted. There is an association between age and difficulty in getting work done. Table 8 One-way analysis of variance between Age and manage stress Age N Mean S.D F P Below 25 years years EJCMR SPECIAL ISSUE 1,

9 35-45 years Total Thus the above table shows that there is a significance mean difference that exists on managing stress on the basis of age group. Table 9 One-way analysis of variance between Experience and manage stress Experienc e N Mean S.D F P Below 1 year years years Above 5 years Total Thus the above table shows that there is a significance mean difference that exists on managing stress on the basis of experience. Managerial Implications: Marital status has significance influence on balance work life. Hours in a day spend with family & friends and Difficulty in getting work done are not significance influence with Marital status. So the Hospital management should provide training about balance of work life irrespective of marital status. The factor of children affects the balance of work life interms of shift work. So the management should provide flexible work shift for those having children to make them having better work life. Age and stress related diseases showing significance association which tells the management that stress related diseases arises irrespective of differenty age group and the less age group should be provided with stress reducing training and the higher age group employees to learn the techniques to cope the stress. Age significantly associated with difficult to maintain personal life. So, employees who feels that personal life is difficult to manage is 15% and others do not feel the same. Therefore Training and Development programs should be provided to those who feels that prsonal life maitanance is too dificult. Age and difficult in getting work done is closely associated and the higher age people feels comfortable in getting work done and young age people feels difficult to get work done which shows experence is a certain factor in health industry. Analysis of variance shows significance mean differences that exist on manage stress based on age group. People who are at the entry level of employment they do not know how to manage the work situation by which they get stress. They should be treated and trained to manage stress related problems. The experienced person knows how to manage the complicated EJCMR SPECIAL ISSUE 1,

10 problems that arises stress by which they solve the problems of stress related issues. Conclusion: Based on the study it is concluded that there is a significant relationship between personal factors (age, marital status, exerience, and children) and work life balance of nurses. The relationship between personal factors and work life balance of nurses will be an important input in designing appropriate policies for nurses to address their work life balance issues. The Private hospitals in Tanjore, should address the work life balance issues and support the nurses to manage their work life balance which would be add to the performance of these nurses. The results also indicated that the private hospital nurses work life balance is a challengable one. Their need to be a periodical review in terms of their work and personal life satisfaction, otherwise they would be subjected to severe stress. Reference: Abhilasha Joshi Sharma, Balance between Work and Life: Challenges and Solutions, International Journal of Applied Research and Studies (IJARS) Volume 2, Issue 11, Nov ember Chandrasekar.K.S, Suma S.R, Renjini S. Nair, Anu, Study on Work - Life Balance among the Executives in IT Industry with special reference to Technopark, Trivandrum, Kerala, Asian Journal of Multidimensional Research Vol.2 Issue 3, March Dundas. K, Work-Life Balance: There is no one-size-fits-all solution, in K O'Rourke (ed.), Managing Matters, Graduate College of Management, Southern Cross University, New South Wales, (Summer), Vol. 3, pp.7-8, Greenhaus, H.J., Collins, M.K. & Shaw, D.J., The relation between work-family balance and quality of life, Journal of Vocational Behaviour, Vol. 63, Hayman. J.R, Flexible Work Arrangements: Exploring the linkages between perceived usability of flexible work schedules and work/life balance Community, Work and Family, 12(3), , Hill. E.J, Erickson. J.J, Holmes. E.K, & Ferris. M, Workplace flexibility, work hours and work-life conflict: Finding an extra day or two. Journal of Family Psychology, 24(3), , Hye Kyoung Kim, Work-Life Balance and Employees Performance: The Mediating Role of Affective Commitment, Global Business and Management Research: An International Journal Vol. 6, Ioan Lazar, Codruta Osoian and Patricia Ratiu, The Role of Work-Life Balance Practices in Order to Improve Organizational Performance, European Research Studies,Volume XIII, Issue (1), 2010 Janeen Baxter and Jenny Chesters, Perceptions of Work-Family Balance: How Effective are Family-Friendly Policies?, Australian Journal of Labour Economics, Volume 14, Number Merideth Ferguson, Dawn Carlson, Suzanne Zivnuska and Dwayne Whitten, Support at Work and Home: The Path to Satisfaction through Balance, Journal of Vocational Behavior, Vol. 80, pp , Moore and Fiona, Work-life Balance: Contrasting Managers and workers in an MNC, Employee Relations, Vol.29, Issue 4, Restubog.S.L.D, Bordia.P, and Tang. R.L, Effects of psychological contract breach on performance of IT employees: The mediating role of affective commitment, Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, Vol. 79 No.2, pp , Rincy V. Mathew and N. Panchanatham, An Exploratory study on The Work-Life Balance of Women Entrepreneurs in South India, Asian Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 16, No. 2, , July 2011 Senthilkumar.K.G, Chandrakumaramangalam.S and Manivannan.L, An Empirical Study on Teaching Professionals'Work-Life Balance in Higher Learning Institutions with Special Reference to Namakkal District, Tamilnadu, Bonfring International Journal of Industrial Engineering and Management Science, Vol. 2, No. 3, September Sussanna Shagvaliyeva and Rashad Yazdanifard, Impact of Flexible Working Hours on Work-Life Balance, American Journal of Industrial and Business Management, Vol. 4, Pg.20-23, 2014 EJCMR SPECIAL ISSUE 1,