Eva-Maria Bauer. Top Executives Work Relationship and Work-Family Balance

Transcription

1 Eva-Maria Bauer Top Executives Work Relationship and Work-Family Balance

2 GABLER RESEARCH Neue Perspektiven der marktorientierten Unternehmensführung Herausgegeben von Professor Dr. Ruth Stock-Homburg, Technische Universität Darmstadt Professor Dr. Jan Wieseke, Ruhr-Universität Bochum

3 Eva-Maria Bauer Top Executives Work Relationship and Work-Family Balance Taxonomy Development and Performance Implications With a foreword by Prof. Dr. Ruth Stock-Homburg RESEARCH

4 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at Dissertation Technische Universität Darmstadt, 2009 D 17 1st Edition 2009 All rights reserved Gabler GWV Fachverlage GmbH, Wiesbaden 2009 Editorial Office: Claudia Jeske Britta Göhrisch-Radmacher Gabler is part of the specialist publishing group Springer Science+Business Media. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright holder. Registered and/or industrial names, trade names, trade descriptions etc. cited in this publication are part of the law for trade-mark protection and may not be used free in any form or by any means even if this is not specifically marked. Umschlaggestaltung: KünkelLopka Medienentwicklung, Heidelberg Printed on acid-free paper Printed in Germany ISBN

5 V Series Foreword Current developments like rapidly changing customers requirements, shortened product life cycles, increasing globalization, and demographic change associated with skilled worker and manager shortage present organizations with completely new challenges. The successful handling of these challenges requires the development of new business management concepts. These concepts should consider the following points: the increase of the companies market and innovation orientation (e.g., by the adaptation of the organizational structure respectively the promotion of the employees innovation and customer orientation), the implementation of new working principles (e.g., customer-oriented and virtual global teams), the long-range maintenance of managers and employees employability (e.g., by the setup and expansion of intercultural competences as well as targeted steps towards the promotion of the work-life balance), right up to the preservation and expansion of human resources (e.g., by personal marketing activities such as targeted steps towards the advancement of elder and female employees as organizational potential). The variety of possible starting points shows: a scientific consideration from the viewpoint of a single economic discipline meets these various challenges only to some extent. The series Neue Perspektiven der marktorientierten Unternehmensführung is dedicated to successful concepts of managing current and future developments in organizations practical experiences and presents an interdisciplinary perspective. This interdisciplinary approach is accounted for by a parallel illumination of different economic disciplines (i.e., marketing, innovation management, and human resource management). Additionally, the interface of different facets of business economics and psychology (i.e., work and organizational psychology) is of particular importance. The dissertations being published in the series Neue Perspektiven der marktorientierten Unternehmensführung orient themselves content wise and conceptually towards international

6 VI Series Foreword scientific standards. Starting from a stringent theoretical foundation the respective research topic is qualitatively and quantitatively investigated. The present titles deal with central questions in market-oriented business management. Thereby the single volumes provide scientists with new insights and suggestions for their research in that they approach the topics in different ways. For organizations practical experiences the different dissertations offer implications for dealing with current and future challenges of the market-oriented business management. Darmstadt and Bochum, January 2009 Ruth-Stock Homburg and Jan Wieseke

7 VII Foreword The importance of top executives for the success of their organizations is virtually undisputed for approximately three decades. For this reason, in the last years scientific papers in the area of management and market-oriented business management increasingly dealt with answering the question on what top executives success depends. Within the scope of market-oriented business management mainly underlying circumstances (e.g, intensity of competition and market dynamics) as well as executives demographic characteristics (e.g., age and tenure) were investigated. Thereby influencing variables on the level of attitudes and behaviors remained almost unregarded. Mrs. Eva-Maria Bauer closes this gap and pursues with her work the goal to provide a deeper understanding of top executives psychology in order to explain organizations success. In her work the author captures a rather broad management perspective. Although market-related magnitudes are considered in this work, it nevertheless is also relevant for research in the area of market-oriented business management. Together with psychological variables the author considers two phenomena which are deepened in her work: top executives relationship to their occupation in a specific organization (called top executives work relationship) as well as the balance top executives perceive between their work and family life (called top executives work-family balance). This work has as its goal to both theoretically and empirically investigate these two phenomena. Thus, it decisively contributes to the extension of the scientific state of knowledge in these areas. Former empirical works primarily carried out dependence analysis regarding top executives relevance for organizations success. In contrast, the author chooses a classification approach. For both investigated areas top executives work relationship and top executives work-family balance the author selects theoretically stringent and well-founded central variables in order to describe the respective phenomenon. The existent empirical literature multiplicatively proved differences between the occupations of diverse hierarchical levels. The present work explicitly highlights the differences within a population which is frequently implicitly categorized as relatively homogenous: the top executives in organizations. At the beginning of her work, the author develops a systematic procedure for the development of a theoretically-based taxonomy. By means of this approach, she extends previous taxo-

8 VIII Foreword nomic research, which often starts with an empirical part without in advance specifying extensive theoretical bases. Additionally, the author recommends an explorative qualitative study prior to a quantitative empirical taxonomy development in order to better permeate little-known and equally complex phenomena. In my opinion, the process of taxonomy development elaborated in this work should be trend-setting for future works which underlie classifications. Corresponding to this process, the author initially conducts a qualitative study and interviews over 40 top executives about facets of their work relationship as well as characteristics of their work-family balance. The interviews are analyzed by means of a very sophisticated procedure of content analysis which is established in the leading international management research. In the second step, the author successfully surveys around 220 top executives regarding their work relationship and work-family balance. This relatively large sample is remarkable because top executives are an extremely difficultly accessible target group in the context of empirical studies. The author nevertheless manages to generate this sample by means of a very sophisticated procedure, in which she offers the top executives an individualized profound report of the results in respect to their personal work-life balance. Beyond that, in addition to the investigation of top executives, the self assessments of their life partners are also gathered. With her multi-methodological design as well as the dyadic quantitative study the author succeeds in generating a data basis, which to my knowledge, in this form, exists neither in national nor in international top management research. On the basis of a comprehensive data set, the author develops two taxonomies concerning top executives work relationship and work-family balance. Beyond that, she shows that top executives highly differ concerning their work relationship and their work-family balance. The results regarding the investigated variables related to these phenomena are interesting. On the basis of variance analysis the author shows that the top executives clearly differentiate in respect to their well-being and performance. Against the background of the frequently conducted debate on top executives relevance for the success of their organizations, the results of this work are not only novel but also highly relevant for the economic management research. The present work essentially extends the scientific state of knowledge involving two highly interesting phenomena top executives work relationship and work-family balance. In addition, for organizations practical experiences interesting insights are generated. A broad diffusion in science and business practice is desirous for this thesis. Darmstadt, July 2009 Ruth Stock-Homburg

9 IX Acknowledgements First of all, I must thank Prof. Ruth Stock-Homburg, Ph.D., for her many ideas and enormous engagement in supervising me in my years as doctoral student, during which I have learned valuable skills for life. Additionally, I thank Prof. Ralph Bruder, Ph.D., who accepted the cocorrection of this thesis. I am very grateful to the Darmstadt Technical University for the scholarship, which enabled me to dedicate so much time to my research. Furthermore, I thank the German Research Foundation (DFG) for sponsoring this research project (grant number STO 477/9-1). Particular thanks go to the executives and their life partners, who participated in my study. With your openness and time you enabled the gathering of the data on which this thesis is based. Additionally, I am indebted to Tilo Guter, who transcribed the interviews and typed and re-typed the hundreds of pages that ultimately were distilled into this work. I would like to deeply thank my dear colleagues Gisela Bieling, Julia Pescher, and Nadine Ringwald. Without your willingness to help, suggestions, and support, this PhD thesis would not have been written. Furthermore, thanks a lot for the hours you spent copy reading and checking. Many thanks to Heather Lüft for proofreading my English! I cordially thank my brother for sharing his experience with me and for all the articles he has sent to me. Additionally, I sincerely thank our Dad for spending so much time in the last corrections of this thesis. Thanks a million to Grandma Waltraud and Grandma Barbara, who tenderly cared for Jakob, while I have spent hour after hour writing this thesis. Most of all I thank my family, Mathias and Jakob. For everything. I love you so much! Ludwigsburg, August 2009 Eva-Maria Bauer

10 XI Table of Contents 1 Introduction Relevance of the Thesis Managerial Relevance Scientific Relevance Major Goals and Structure of the Thesis Conceptual Background Procedure of Taxonomy Development Literature Review Research on Top Executives Research on Work Relationship Research on Work-Family Balance Specification of Investigated Phenomena Theoretical Background of Top Executives Work Relationship Taxonomy The Job Demands-Resources Model Upper Echelons Theory Theoretical Conclusion for the Understanding of Top Executives Work Relationship Theoretical Background of Top Executives Work-Family Balance Taxonomy Role Theory Mechanisms of Work-Family Linkage Theoretical Conclusion for the Understanding of Top Executives Work-Family Balance Basics of the Empirical Studies Qualitative Study Data Collection and Sample Process of Qualitative Content Analysis Quantitative Study Data Collection and Sample Process of Scale Validation... 78

11 XII Table of Contents Process of Cluster Analysis Process of Analysis of Variance Investigation of Top Executives Work Relationship Preliminary Conceptual Framework of Top Executives Work Relationship Qualitative Results Regarding Top Executives Work Relationship Final Empirically Grounded Framework of Top Executives Work Relationship Job-Related Demands Job-Related Resources Related Variables of Top Executives Work Relationship Well-Being and Satisfaction Top Executive Performance Organizational Performance Measurement of Top Executives Work Relationship Measures of Active Cluster Variables Constituting Top Executives Work Relationship Top Executives Job-Related Demands Top Executives Job-Related Resources Measures of Related Variables of Top Executives Work Relationship Executive-Related Variables Well-Being and Satisfaction Top Executive Performance Organizational Performance Interpretation of Cluster Solutions Related Variables of Top Executives Work Relationship Types Investigation of Top Executives Work-Family Balance Preliminary Conceptual Framework of Top Executives Work-Family Balance Qualitative Results Regarding Top Executives Work-Family Balance Final Empirically Grounded Framework of Top Executives Work-Family Balance Top Executives Satisfaction Top Executives Functioning Top Executives Work-Family Conflict Related variables of Top Executives Work-Family Balance Individual Variables

12 Table of Contents Work-Related Variables Family-Related Variables Measurement of Top Executives Work-Family Balance Measures of Active Cluster Variables Constituting Top Executives Work-Family Balance Top Executives Satisfaction Top Executives Functioning Top Executives Work-Family Conflict Measures of Related Variables of Top Executives Work-Family Balance Individual Variables Work-Related Variables Family-Related Variables Interpretation of Cluster Solution Related Variables of Top Executives Work-Family Balance Types XIII 6 Discussion Contribution of the Thesis Content-Related Contribution Conceptual Contribution Methodological Contribution Implications for Business Practice Limitations and Future Research References Appendix

13 XV List of Figures Figure 1-1: Course of the thesis... 7 Figure 2-1: Procedure of taxonomy development (Stock-Homburg/Bauer 2009) Figure 2-2: Focuses of top executive research Figure 2-3: Major areas of research on work relationship Figure 2-4: Major areas of research on work-family issues Figure 2-5: Facets of top executives work relationship Figure 3-1: Cluster methods used in this thesis Figure 4-1: Preliminary conceptual framework of top executives work relationship Figure 4-2: Final empirically grounded framework of top executives work relationship Figure 4-3: Top executives work relationship types (expanded according to Bakker & Demerouti, 2007) Figure 4-4: Plot of mean scores for underlying job-related demands and resources of the four clusters Figure 5-1: Preliminary conceptual framework of top executives work-family balance Figure 5-2: Final empirically grounded framework of top executives work-family balance137 Figure 5-3: Plot of mean scores for underlying variables of the five clusters

14 XVII List of Tables Table 2-1: Selected studies on top executives Table 2-2: Studies on job-related demands and resources Table 2-3: Studies on work-family issues Table 2-4: Overview of the job demands-resources model by Demerouti et al. (2001) Table 2-5: Overview of upper echelons theory by Hambrick and Mason (1984) Table 2-6: Overview of job-demands resources model and upper echelons theory Table 2-7: Overview of role theory by Katz and Kahn (1978) Table 2-8: Overview of mechanisms of work-family linkage among others by Near (1984). 67 Table 2-9: Overview of role theory and mechanisms of work-family linkage Table 3-1: Criteria of scale validation Table 4-1: Examples for top executives statements and corresponding field notes Table 4-2: Frequency of assigned codings Table 4-3: Scale names, coefficient alpha, and composite reliability of active cluster variables Table 4-4: Descriptive statistics, and intercorrelations among active cluster variables Table 4-5: Scale names, coefficient alpha, and composite reliability of related variables Table 4-6: Descriptive statistics, and intercorrelations among related variables Table 4-7: Results of testing between subjects effects of active cluster variables Table 4-8: Statistical cluster description Table 4-9: Results of testing between subjects effects of related variables Table 4-10: Related variables of cluster membership Table 5-1: Examples for top executives statements and corresponding field notes Table 5-2: Frequency of assigned codings Table 5-3: Scale names, coefficient alpha, and composite reliability of active cluster variables Table 5-4: Descriptive statistics, and intercorrelations among active cluster variables Table 5-5: Scale names, coefficient alpha, and composite reliability of related related variables Table 5-6: Descriptive statistics and intercorrelations among related variables Table 5-7: Results of testing between subjects effects of active cluster variables

15 XVIII List of Tables Table 5-8: Statistical cluster description Table 5-9: Results of testing between subjects effects of active cluster variables Table 5-10: Related variables of cluster membership Table 6-1: Scales scored only by top executives (alphabetical order): Scale items with corresponding item-to-total correlations and factor loadings Table 6-2: Scales scored only by life partners (alphabetical order): Scale items with corresponding item-to-total correlations and factor loadings Table 6-3: Scales scored by top executives as well as life partners (alphabetical order): Scale items with corresponding item-to-total correlations and factor loadings

16 XIX List of Abbreviations ANCOVA ANOVA AVE CEO CFO CR df EBIT Ed. F ICC Coefficient alpha Analysis of variance Analysis of variance Average variance extracted Chief executive officer Chief financial officer Composite reliability Degrees of freedom Earnings before interest and taxes Editor Test statistic of Duncan s multiple-range test Intraclass correlation coefficient MANCOVA Multivariate analysis of covariance MANOVA Multivariate analysis of variance s. d. Standard deviation t p r R 2 2 Test statistic of t-test Significance level Correlation coefficient Coefficient of determination Test statistic of chi-square test