scholarly journals Family-Friendly Policy and Work-Family Conflict Mitigation: The Role of Work-Family Boundary Negotiation

2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 17-26
Author(s):  
Hooi-Ching Khor ◽  
Azura Abdullah Effendi

Family-friendly policy is impossible to fit all working individuals. The circumstance has been revealed in work-family literature which relationship between the policy use and the work-family conflict mitigation has been found inconsistent. Little focus is given in the past studies to ensure the human resource policy is truly useful in meeting individuals’ needs. Work, family or both work and family life could be important to individuals. The distinctive life centrality requires individuals to negotiate with the significant others who have influence on their work and family life arrangements to access and use the preferred and needed family-friendly policy. Boundary management practices seem to be useful for working individuals to reduce work-family conflict. This conceptual paper aims to propose work-family boundary negotiation to buffer the relationship of family-friendly policy use and work-family conflict. Boundary theory is the underlying theory embedded to explain the phenomena. Boundary negotiation style that could be employed for accessing the policy and managing work-family boundary effectively is identified. Future directions and implications for research on negotiation in dealing with work-family issue are discussed.

2015 ◽  
Vol 34 (8) ◽  
pp. 726-741 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tri Wulida Afrianty ◽  
John Burgess ◽  
Theodora Issa

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the effectiveness of family-friendly programs at the workplace in the Indonesian higher education sector. The focus is the impact that these programs have on employees’ work family conflict. Design/methodology/approach – A survey of academic and non-academic staff from 30 higher education institutions across Indonesia participated in the research. A total of 159 completed questionnaires from 109 academic and 50 from non-academic staff are reported and statistically analysed using SPSS. Findings – Work and family experiences in Indonesia do not positively align with the findings reported in most academic literature pertaining to western societies where the use of family-friendly programs (i.e. flexible work options, specialized leave options and dependent care support) leads to a reduction in employees’ work family conflict. In fact, some of the programs were found to have the opposite effect in the Indonesian context. Research limitations/implications – The design of family-friendly support has to take into account the context in which the policies will operates; these policies are not transferable across countries in terms of their effectiveness. Originality/value – This is one of the first studies that has examined the operation and effectiveness of family-friendly support programs in an Indonesian context.


Societies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 67
Author(s):  
Mikael Nordenmark ◽  
Niclas Almén ◽  
Stig Vinberg

Studies have indicated the importance of family life and psychosocial working conditions for mental wellbeing. More recently, studies have highlighted that a good balance between work and family is crucial for good mental wellbeing. However, few studies compare the relative importance of these factors for mental wellbeing. The main aim of this study was to analyse the relative importance of psychosocial working conditions, family conditions and work/family conflict for mental wellbeing. The analyses are based on a Swedish data set, including questions regarding working life, family life and mental wellbeing. A total of 12,461 married/cohabiting individuals employed in Swedish organisations were included in the study. Results show that psychosocial working conditions, family conditions and work/family conflict all were related to mental wellbeing. In the final regression model, the strongest correlation was found between mental wellbeing and the variables work/family conflict, satisfaction with private life and partner relationship, with work/family conflict appearing to be of greatest importance. These findings highlight the necessity of including measurements of work/family conflict when studying the importance of work and family conditions for individual mental wellbeing. For workplace health promotion and improvement, it may be beneficial to consider not only psychosocial working conditions, but also family conditions, and particularly work/life conflict.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 103
Author(s):  
Cláudia Andrade ◽  
Eva Petiz Lousã

Even though research has been showing that telework, under regular circumstances, could benefit the integration of work and family life, mandatory telework during the COVID-19 lockdown brought additional challenges, with potential to create conflicts between work and family spheres. Using regression analysis, this study examined the contribution of demographic and job-related variables to the prediction of work–family conflict among a sample of 213 workers who were involved in mandatory telework during the first lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The results revealed that role overload, after-hours work-related technology use, and low job autonomy accounted for the prediction of work–family conflict. Support from the supervisors and coworkers did not have an impact in easing the perception of work–family conflict but presented a moderation effect between after-hours work-related technology use and work–family conflict. Implications of the study for management practices related to telework, limitations of the study, and directions for future research are discussed.


2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  

Work and family life are the most important part of life for men and women in today’s workplace. The individuals are required to take the responsibilities of work and family roles. However, the development and popularization of information technology results in the time of division between work and family life becomes blurred trend. The message and information of work dumps to us by ubiquitious transmission technique everywhere and everytime even afterwork. Information technology not only increases efficency of work, but also induces pressure. It really interrups our leisure time and bothers our life. This study will examine the impact of work stress, job conflict and stress effects, and further explore the effect of communication with the instant messaging software using intelligent mobile devices to work with job stress and workplace conflicts. This study uses a web-based questionnaire to collect sample data and send a questionnaire through community sites, instant messaging tools, and e-mail. This study is intended to pressure theory and work-family conflict model, coupled with the technical pressure to do the relevant factors. The data analysis method was used to model the structural equation, and SPSS and Smart PLS were used as the main statistical analysis tools to verify the causal relationship between the variables in the research model. The results are as follows: (1)The work pressure will “positive” affect the work-family conflict. (2)There is no positive correlation between work load and work-family conflict. (3)Scientific and technological violations will “positive” affect the work-family conflict. (4)There is no positive correlation between the overloading of science and technology and Work-family conflict. (5)Work-family conflict “negative” affects job satisfaction. (6)Work-family conflict “negative” affects family satisfaction. (7)Work-family conflict will be “negative” affect the work of physical and mental health.


2014 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 158
Author(s):  
Agnieszka Maria Springer

The main purpose of this paper is to assess the influence of mediating variables in the process of perceived work-family conflict onto job satisfaction. The study in question was conducted on the sample of 533 working people, 126 of whom stated that they had a significant problem with balancing work and family life (high WFC) and 269 of whom stated that this problem did not concern them (low WFC). Simultaneously, 136 respondents stated they often brought work problems home (PWtoF) and 278 claimed they did not do that (NPWtoF). The obtained results indicate that the key variables that moderate the influence of the perceived conflict onto job satisfaction are: one's professional position and the subjective work value. In the case of people in managerial and independent positions the perceived work-family conflict does not make job satisfaction decrease. Similar reactions were observed in the case of people for whom work is essential life value. Both the sex of the respondents and the fact that they had children were totally irrelevant in the process. The above mentioned results could become a prerequisite for employers to increase the complexity and autonomy of the tasks entrusted to employees and to create value-based corporate culture.


2015 ◽  
Vol 2015 ◽  
pp. 1-7 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sanaz Aazami ◽  
Khadijah Shamsuddin ◽  
Syaqirah Akmal

We examined the mediating role of behavioral coping strategies in the association between work-family conflict and psychological distress. In particular, we examined the two directions of work-family conflict, namely, work interference into family and family interference into work. Furthermore, two coping styles in this study were adaptive and maladaptive coping strategies. This cross-sectional study was conducted among 429 Malaysian working women using self-reported data. The results of mediational analysis in the present study showed that adaptive coping strategy does not significantly mediate the effect of work-family conflict on psychological distress. However, maladaptive coping strategies significantly mediate the effect of work-family conflict on psychological distress. These results show that adaptive coping strategies, which aimed to improve the stressful situation, are not effective in managing stressor such as work-family conflict. We found that experiencing interrole conflict steers employees toward frequent use of maladaptive coping strategies which in turn lead to psychological distress. Interventions targeted at improvement of coping skills which are according to individual’s needs and expectation may help working women to balance work and family demands. The important issue is to keep in mind that effective coping strategies are to control the situations not to eliminate work-family conflict.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth J. Harris ◽  
Ranida B. Harris ◽  
Matthew Valle ◽  
John Carlson ◽  
Dawn S. Carlson ◽  
...  

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to understand the impact of techno-overload and techno-invasion on work and family. Specifically, we focus on intention to turnover in the work domain, work-family conflict in the work-family domain, and family burnout in the family domain. Furthermore, this study examines the moderating role of entitlement, a personality variable, in this process.Design/methodology/approachUsing a sample of 253 people who were using technology to complete their work over two time periods, the relationships were examined using hierarchical moderated regression analysis.FindingsThe results revealed that both techno-overload and techno-invasion were significantly related to greater turnover intentions, higher work-family conflict, and greater family burnout. In addition, entitlement played a moderating role such that those who were higher in entitlement had stronger techno-overload-outcome and technostress invasion-outcome relationships.Practical implicationsThese findings may provide managers key insights to help manage employees, especially those with an inflated sense of entitlement, to mitigate the serious negative outcomes associated with techno-overload and techno-invasion. In particular, both techno- overload and techno-invasion had minimal impact on negative outcomes when employee entitlement was lower. However, when employee entitlement was higher, techno-overload and techno-invasion had considerable negative effects.Originality/valueDue to the ubiquitous nature of information-communication technology (ICT) in organizations today, individuals often experience techno-overload and techno-invasion. This research utilized conservation of resources theory to examine these relationships. This study established the relationships of both techno-overload and techno-invasion with key organizational and family outcomes and points to the critical role of the personality variable, entitlement, in this process. The results provide theoretical and practical advancement in the role of technology with people in organizations today.


2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 51-74
Author(s):  
Kim Hwayeon ◽  
Nam Taewoo

The number of female employees in the Korean workforce has risen. However, the Korean corporate climate, characterized by collectivism, hierarchism, and senior and masculine privilege, leads them to experience worklife conflict and even halt their careers. This climate stems from a social and organizational culture deeply rooted in traditional Confucianism. In Korea, where housework and childcare have long been considered the province of women, female employees find it more difficult to balance office work and family life. The Korean corporate climate welcomes overtime work, and women who work outside the home must juggle this and family responsibilities. We conceptualize behavior such as acquiescing to overtime work as submissive loyalty and elucidate work-family conflict and decreasing job and life satisfaction as consequences thereof. The analysis, based on a structural equation model, revealed that submissive loyalty increases work-family conflict, which decreases job and life satisfaction.


2021 ◽  
pp. 104-114
Author(s):  
Shu-Ya CHANG ◽  
Chan-Fu CHUANG ◽  
Huan-Chang LIN ◽  
Hsiang-Chen HSU

Expatriates, during expatriation, would appear inadaptable feelings on work, life, and diet in different environment. Besides, expatriates, in medical technology industry, leaving home might neglect the family to result in imbalance between work and family. In this case, work-family conflict reveals the importance on expatriates. Expatriates in medical technology industry would appear psychosocial stress and conflict between work and life due to expatriation. Taking expatriates’ supervisors and expatriates in medical technology industry in southern Taiwan as the research object, total 360 copies of questionnaire are distributed, and the 278 valid copies are retrieved, with the retrieval rate 77%. The research results show that social support presents negative and significant effects on work-family conflict, work-family conflict reveals negative and remarkable effects on intention to stay, and social support appears positive effects on intention to stay. According to the results to propose suggestions, it is expected to provide healthy workplace in medical technology industry to improve expatriates’ work-family conflict and turnover.


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