An exploration of female underrepresentation on executive boards in the Dutch hotel industry through an ethical lens

PurposeThis paper elucidates female underrepresentation on executive boards in the Dutch hotel industry through a “feminist” stakeholder perspective, which persists despite public opinion and government initiatives to resolve this enigma. It contributes to this discussion by examining Rhenish governance structures through a “feminist” stakeholder-focused rationale, complementing prevailing Anglo-Saxon shareholder-focused governance research.Design/methodology/approachEleven in-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with hotel executive board representatives and five with sublevel management representatives. Saturation was achieved by interviewing all females on Dutch hotel corporate boards regarding their career experiences compared with those of female general managers and male counterparts.FindingsThis paper finds a prevailing “masculinist” perspective of an idealized shareholder-orientated executive and a “feminist” perspective of a humanized stakeholder-orientated executive expressed within the interviews. While the former sacrifices family for their career, the latter balances their family with their career. The former fosters presupposed gender norms, with females commonly sacrificing their careers while males sacrifice their families. Notably, most executives predominantly supported the humanized stakeholder-orientated executive, while recognizing that micro-, meso- and macro-structural barriers remain.Originality/valueThis paper addresses a lacuna in the ethical literature in exploring female executive representation in Rhenish stakeholder-focused governance structures, as opposed to Anglo-Saxon shareholder-focused ones. It found a “masculinist” perspective of an idealized shareholder-focused executive archetype and a “feminist” perspective of a humanized stakeholder-focused executive archetype. Notably, contrary to perceived business norms, several interviewees rejected the former as it is incompatible with family and work, instead seeking the latter which balances between family and work.

Our Changing World

COVID-19 has dramatically changed our world in terms of telework specifically and remote life in general. We are still learning new things about balancing family and work; trustworthiness, performance, and accountability issues; important changes and discoveries about the way the world goes to work; and discussions of the dynamic ways people communicate. This chapter examines reasons for resistance to telework to shed light on how COVID-19 has changed us. The discussion that follows centers on qualitative interviews concerning telework, an evaluation of employee engagement now and in the future, and ideas and actions that should prove helpful to organizations. Analyzing the interviews reveals several common threads: distractions, fatigue, accountability, communication, productivity, technology, coping, work hours, resources, and plan approaches.

Women's Home Office

The study investigated the implications for women from the coast of Paraná, Brazilin regard to the home office in life, family, and work during the COVID-19 pandemic. The research was conducted on 20 women, and 3 (three) categories of analysis were taken into consideration: woman, family, and work. For data analysis, the content of Bardin analysis technique was used. The study revealed that the imposition of the home office brought new challenges for women to reconcile home care, family, and work, which caused an overload of responsibilities leading to fatigue due to the multiple tasks performed; as well as the lack of preparation of companies to adopt the modality, which results in an environment that hinders the performance of their functions and affects the quality of life of workers.

Perceived Accomplishment in Later Life: The Influence of Past Decisions Between Family and Work

Whereas previous studies have investigated life regrets, little attention has been paid to the important accomplishments older adults include in their autobiographic life narratives. Phenomenon such as the memory positivity effect suggest that accomplishments should be observed. We used a Health and Retirement Study 2017 Life History Mail Survey (N = 2,165) to examine the characteristics of participants over age 65 who reported accomplishments (max = 3), what was reported, and whether early-life decisions about balancing family and work are associated with the reports. Women, whites, and people with at least high school education and normal cognitive status were more likely to report accomplishments (67%). We categorized reports as family-related (39%), personal (19%), combined family/personal (25%) or other (16%). Multinominal logistic regression models revealed that participants who themselves favored family over work in early life or whose spouse decided for family, were more likely to report family-related accomplishments.

A comparative study of the work-family conflicts prevalence, its sociodemographic, family, and work attributes, and its relation to the self-reported health status in Japanese and Egyptian civil workers

Background Cross-cultural studies studying work-family conflicts (W_F_Cs) are scarce. We compared the prevalence of W_F_Cs, factors predicting it, and its association with self-rated health between Japan and Egypt. Methods Among 4862 Japanese and 3111 Egyptian civil workers who were recruited by a convenience sample in 2018/2019 and reported self-rated health status, we assessed the W_F_Cs by the Midlife Development in the US (MIDUS) and attributed it, by linear regression analyses, to sociodemographic, family, and work variables, and assessed its gender- and country-specific associations with self-rated health by logistic regression analyses. Results W_F_Cs were more prevalent in Egyptian than Japanese women (23.7% vs. 18.2%) and men (19.1% vs. 10.5%), while poor self-rated health was more prevalent in Japanese than Egyptians (19.3% and 17.3% vs. 16.9% and 5.5%). In both genders of countries, longer working hours, shift work, and overtime work predicted higher scores of the work-to-family conflict (WFC). In contrast, single status predicted lower scores of the family-to-work conflict (FWC). Living with children, fathers, or alone in Japan, while education in Egypt was associated with the conflicts. The OR (95% CI) for poor self-reported health among those with the strong, in reference to weak W_F_Cs, was 4.28 (2.91-6.30) and 6.01 (4.50-8.01) in Japanese women and men and was 2.46 (1.75-3.47) and 3.11 (1.67-5.80) in Egyptian women and men. Conclusions Japanese and Egyptian civil workers have different prevalence and correlated factors of W_F_Cs and self-rated health. W_F_Cs were associated in a dose-response pattern with poor-self-rated health civil workers of both countries.

Family planning in the U.S. military: The gendered experiences of servicewomen

LAY SUMMARY Balancing family and work is always challenging for working women; however, military service presents especially nuanced and unique challenges to women serving in the U.S. military. Family planning, and in particular marriage and children, have distinct impacts on servicewomen’s professional careers. Their chosen professions often intersect and detract from their family planning choices. Within a larger study of gendered experiences, women from all four branches of the U.S. military, representing a variety of familial statuses and occupations, noted the complex and challenging intersections of family and work they encountered over the course of their military careers. As in other professions, military women bear disproportionate familial burdens compared with their male counterparts, and challenges pertaining to marriage and children regularly affect their professional careers. However, the military presents heightened professional demands on family planning, including marital status, marital partners’ professions, pregnancy, maternity, and parenthood. These additional challenges women in the military face regarding family planning often run counter to organizational efforts to encourage women’s participation, promotion, and retention in the military.

Destination Emotions, Loneliness, and Reasons to Travel: Predictors and Moderators of Tourism Well-being

This study aims to determine predictors and moderators of tourism well-being among destination emotions (DES) (total, joy, love, and positive surprise), loneliness (UCLA) (total, affinities, and isolation) and reasons to travel. Regression and moderation analyses were carried out; factor analysis (exploratory and confirmatory) to validate the emotions destination scale were performed. Marital status, family as a reason to travel, love (DES), positive surprise (DES), and affinities (UCLA) explain tourism well-being variance. Of the motivations for traveling, only family and work proved to moderate the relationship between DES and its subscales and tourism well-being. Traveling in Portugal or abroad was a moderator in the relationship between DES and its subscales and tourism well-being. The relationship between destination emotions and tourism well-being is stronger when people do not travel for family or work; this relationship is also stronger when people travel within Portugal than when traveling outside Portugal.

Outcomes of the Work and Family Conflict Among Arab Israeli Female Teachers

In line with the literature that describes conflicts between commitment to work and to family in patriarchal societies undergoing cultural changes, including the cultural empowerment of women, this study examines whether such a development is evident among teacher-mothers in Arab society in Israel, and if so, how it affects their functioning in both settings. 537 teacher-mothers from high schools in Arab society in Israel, representing the population in all districts of the country, completed questionnaires that examined conflictual characteristics and their implications for the teachers’ functioning. It was found that the teachers are in a bidirectional conflict between commitment to family and work but that they cope with it successfully. A model was validated that describes the systemic significance of the commitment conflict between family and work. Identifying conflict factors may facilitate the proposal of means to moderate them. The possibility of expanding the model in further research is discussed.

Willpower hijacked. The science of addictions

Surely, we all know someone close to us who uses drugs. Consider, for example, tobacco or alcohol, or even marijuana. They may at some point have tried to stop using and, after somewhat longer or shorter periods of abstinence, have started using again. Not every drug user develops an addiction: addicts’ lives revolve around compulsive drug-seeking and use; they lose control over their own decision-making and end up relapsing. This occurs because addiction is a brain disease that can modify its structure and functioning, affecting the areas of the brain responsible for controlling our behaviour. Addiction is a public health problem affecting a high percentage of the population and leads to health, family, and work-related problems.