scholarly journals Agency and Capabilities in Managerial Positions: Hungarian Fathers’ Use of Workplace Flexibility

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 61-71 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nikolett Geszler
Keyword(s):  
Organizational Culture ◽  
Qualitative Content Analysis ◽  
Workplace Flexibility ◽  
Home Office ◽  
Family Balance ◽  
Flexible Working ◽  
Flexible Schedule ◽  
Work Family Balance ◽  
Managerial Positions ◽  
Work Family

This article analyses the agency freedom of manager fathers in Hungary to claim work–family balance through corporate flexible working arrangements. Hobson’s interpretation of Sen’s capability approach (Hobson, Fahlén, & Takács, 2011) is applied to appraise the effect of individual resources and organizational and national context on managers’ work–family balance, as well as their influence on organizational culture. An interview-based case study was undertaken at the Hungarian subsidiary of a Scandinavian multinational company, wherein 43 personal interviews were conducted with fathers in managerial positions. The interviews were analysed according to structuring qualitative content analysis. Managers benefitted from corporate flexibility (home office and flexible schedule), but experienced power asymmetries in terms of access to and use of the former according to hierarchy and department. Even though the men in these positions are assumed to be change agents, the majority of them perceived limited agency freedom to convert flexible working into work–family balance, or to influence organizational culture. The privileged position of managers was detected at the level of their individual agency. Most managers could economically afford to maintain a male breadwinner model. Therefore, limitations related to securing parental and flexibility rights were due to traditional gender norms, and the strong sense of entitlement to work. Consequently, the extent and means of use of flexibility did not challenge deeply rooted assumptions about ideal employee norms.

Work-family balance through border theory lens: the case of a company “driving in the fast lane”

2015 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eleonora Karassvidou ◽  
Niki Glaveli
Keyword(s):  
Organizational Culture ◽  
Work Attitudes ◽  
Work Setting ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Border Theory ◽  
Family Balance ◽  
Work Family Balance ◽  
Work Family ◽  
A Company ◽  
Work Domain

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to seek to provide support and extend work-family Border Theory (BT) in order to investigate organizational and individual factors that determine the complex nature of work-family balance (WFB). Design/methodology/approach – Qualitative research was conducted in a company in Greece. In total, 20 in-depth interviews were conducted. Data analysis was guided by interpretative phenomenological analysis. Findings – The key findings illustrate that strong borders protect the investigated, powerful, work domain and expand only to accommodate its’ needs. In congruence with BT, employees choose to be central participants in the powerful, highly impermeable and inflexibly bordered, work domain. The deeply entrenched organizational culture, as well as leaders’ behavior and leadership style, support the development of an array of positive work attitudes which boost central participation in the work domain. Due to the strongly bordered work setting, employees were found to choose segmentation as a WFB cope strategy; however, shifts in the participants’ life phase, as well as unfulfilled expectations, lead them to reset priorities and reevaluate their central participation in the dominant work domain. Practical implications – The present study has implications for HR practitioners. Communication and open discussions on work-family themes reveal issues that can positively contribute to WFB. Further to this, organizations need to consider individual differences when they deal with WFB issues and frame interventions to facilitate this process. Originality/value – This paper adds to current thinking in BT by illustrating that organizational culture, leadership and work attitudes have a strong impact on the nature of the work domain and its borders, as well as on employees’ central participation in the work setting and the attained WFB.

Feminist Convergences

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Rottenberg
Keyword(s):  
Human Capital ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Unfinished Business ◽  
Market Rationality ◽  
Family Balance ◽  
Political Boundaries ◽  
Work Family Balance ◽  
Work Family ◽  
Liberal Thought

This chapter examines Ivanka Trump’s Women Who Work in conjunction with Megyn Kelly’s memoir Settle for More and Ann-Marie Slaughter’s Unfinished Business. It first demonstrates how Women Who Work should be read as a neoliberal feminist manifesto. Trump’s how-to-succeed guide encourages the conversion of “aspirational” women into generic human capital by reworking motherhood in managerial terms, whereby women are exhorted to carefully manage the time they spend with their children. Yet, the notion of a happy work-family balance continues to serve as the book’s ideal, rendering it part of the neoliberal feminist turn. The chapter then provides a comparative analysis of all three “how-to” books, revealing how an identical market rationality undergirds all three—despite being authored by women who identify with opposing political camps. It thus highlights how neoliberal rationality’s colonization of more domains of our lives has undone conceptual and political boundaries constitutive of liberalism and liberal thought.

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