From conflict to balance: Using work life balance to understand the work family conflict outcome relationship

Transcription

1 From conflict to balance: Using work life balance to understand the work family conflict outcome relationship Associate Professor Jarrod Haar Waikato Management School

2

3 Introduction The challenge of balancing work and family demands is one of today s central concerns for both individuals and organizations. Attention towards the work family interface has culminated in a number of approaches including the established work family conflict; the emerging work family enrichment; and intermitted and varying approaches towards work family balance

4 Work Life Balance Attention towards work life balance has begun to grow. Given common criticism of work family research for its homogenous focus on groups such as parents, work life balance allows for a wider, more encompassing, and more generalizable approach to understanding the interface between an employees work and their other roles. The present study argues that work life balance creates an additional level of influence on outcomes over and above that from the established approaches of work family conflict and enrichment.

5 Work Life Balance Relationships with siblings, friends, eldercare, sporting groups, exercise, church groups, community roles and hobbies may all provide additional demands on employees towards seeking greater balance. Term work family draws towards family and parents, which has been criticized as being too narrow in focus. Similarly, balance is a misnomer, as it assumes that only through achieving balance will employees find happiness and success. However, for some employees, greater happiness may be achieved through imbalance, such as working mothers who work part time to be available for their children after school and during school holidays. E.g. imbalance is a choice and a preferred and successful one. Suggest work life harmony as a better term

6 Theoretical Model Work life harmony Work family enrichment Work family conflict

7 Measuring Work Life Harmony Work life harmony perception based rather than allocation model. The perception approach should allow us to tap into an employee s perception of importance and harmony between their roles, as opposed to a strict model of pre determining 50/50 balance. Expansion theory help us to understand how employees with multiple roles, even those already enriching and conflicting, are able to achieve enhanced outcomes through feeling greater harmony and balance. This approach also reconceptualise the links between work life balance and the work family literature and operationalizes this in a differ manner than other balance studies (e.g. Greenhaus et al., 2003; Valcour, 2007). Thus, employees with greater harmony are better able to meet the challenges of their multiple roles, extracting additional benefits.

8 Hypotheses Hypothesis 1: Higher work life harmony will be positively related to job satisfaction, over and above the effects of work family and familywork conflict and enrichment. Hypothesis 2: Higher work life harmony will be positively related to job satisfaction, over and above the effects of work family and familywork conflict and enrichment.

9 Method (Study 1) Study 1 focused on a broad number of firms and employees, while study 2 focused on small business owners private company and study 3 focused on blue collar workers from a construction firm. Currently, analyses are kept separate due to their differing natures. [although in the future ] In Study 1, data were collected from a wide regional area of New Zealand in mid 2008 (314 responses from 500 random employees), average age 31 years, 56% male, and 57% single. They worked on average 37 hours per week.

10 Method (Study 2 & 3) Study 2 had 200 surveys of business owners (146 returned), average age 42 years, 55% male, 88% married, and worked 45 hours per week on average. Study 3 had 140 surveys to blue collar workers (100 responses), average age 41, 89% male, 80% married, and worked 50 hours per week on average.

11 CFI (Study 1) WLH WFE FWE WFC FWC Job Sat Life Sat χ2 (188) = (p =.000), CFI =.96, TLI =.95, RMSEA = 0.047, and CMIN/DF =

12 Alternative Models Model χ2 df CFI TLI RMSEA CMIN Hypothesized 7-factor model (WFC, FWC, WFE, FWE, WLH, job satisfaction and life satisfaction) 6-factor alternative model with conflict measures combined 6-factor alternative model with enrichment measures combined 6-factor alternative model with satisfaction measures combined 5-factor alternative model with conflict measures combined with WLH 5-factor alternative model with enrichment measures combined with WLH *** *** *** *** *** ***

13 Correlations (Study 1) Variables M SD Hours Worked WFC ** FWC ** WFE ** FWE ** WLH ** -.22**.37**.27** Job Satisfaction ** -.17** -.20**.49**.16**.32** Life Satisfaction ** -.28**.31**.17**.49**.33**.77

14 Results (Study 1) Variables Job Satisfaction Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Controls: Age *.17** Gender Marital Status Education.15**.15**.10*.11* Hours Worked.17**.20**.17**.20 Conflict: WFC FWC -.16* -.15** -.12* Enrichment: WFE FWE Harmony: WLH.27 R 2 Change.21.04** Total R Total Adjusted R Total F Statistic *p<.05, **p<.01, p<.001. Standardized regression coefficients (two-tailed tests)

15 Results (Study 1) Variables Life Satisfaction Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Controls: Age.21**.18* Gender.09.12* Marital Status Education Hours Worked Conflict: WFC -.14* FWC -.21** -.20** -.15* Enrichment: WFE.24.13* FWE Harmony: WLH.43 R 2 Change.06* Total R Total Adjusted R Total F Statistic 2.906* *p<.05, **p<.01, p<.001. Standardized regression coefficients (two-tailed tests)

16 Discussion Consistent with expansion theory, work life harmony was linked positively to job and life satisfaction, over and above the influence of work family and family work conflict and enrichment [and confirmed in Study 2 & 3]. Work life harmony accounted for sizable amounts of variance directly towards the satisfaction outcomes (5%=job & 13%=life) over and above conflict and enrichment. These findings support the argument that additional roles do not always lead to detrimental outcomes and support the additional benefits of employees achieving greater balance Limitations: cross sectional data