Finding an Extra Day a Week: The Positive Influence of Perceived Job Flexibility on Workand Family Life BalanceAuthor(s): E. Jeffrey Hill, Alan J. Hawkins, Maria Ferris, Michelle WeitzmanSource: Family Relations, Vol. 50, No. 1 (Jan., 2001), pp. 49-58Published by: National Council on Family RelationsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/585774 .Accessed: 29/06/2011 07:47

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Finding an Extra Day a Week: The Positive Influence of Perceived Job Flexibility on Work and Family Life Balance*

E. Jeffrey Hill,** Alan J. Hawkins, Maria Ferris, and Michelle Weitzman

This study examines the influence of perceived flexibility in the timing and location of work on work-family balance. Data are from a 1996 International Business Machines (IBM) work and life issues survey in the United States (n = 6,451). Results indicate that perceived job flexibility is related to improved work-family balance after controlling for paid work hours, unpaid domestic labor hours, gender, marital status, and occupational level. Perceived job flexibility appears to be beneficial both to individuals and to businesses. Given the same workload, individuals with perceived job flexibility have more favorable work-family balance. Likewise, employees with perceived job flexibility are able to work longer hours before workload negatively impacts their work-family balance. Implications of these findings are presented.

T he demographic composition of the United States work- force has changed dramatically in recent years. This work force now includes more dual-earner couples who have

responsibility for the care of children or elderly dependents, as well as more dual-professional couples where both have careers, not just jobs (Bond, Galinsky, & Swanberg, 1998). In addition, extensive downsizing by large corporations has lengthened the average workweek for many employees. The average American worker now spends additional time equivalent to six extra 40- hour weeks per year on the job, when compared with the late 1960s (Schor, 1992), and three extra 40-hour weeks compared with just five years ago (Bond et al.). This means that for many, especially for dual-career parents and those with elder-care re- sponsibilities, juggling the demands of the workplace and the home has become a more difficult balancing act.

Work-family advocates have long championed the adoption of a variety of family-friendly benefits to positively influence work-family balance (Galinsky, 1992). Flexibility in the timing (flextime) and location of work (flexplace) are two characteristics that are repeatedly seen as a way to achieve balance in work and family life in this challenging environment (e.g., Christensen & Staines, 1990; Galinsky, 1992; Galinsky & Johnson, 1998; Ze- deck, 1992). Scholars agree that individuals can better manage long work hours with the unpredictable demands of dependent care when given a measure of control over when and where work is done (Barnett, 1994; Shore, 1998). The percentage of com- panies offering flextime and flexplace is increasing (Galinsky & Bond, 1998). Nonetheless, simply demonstrating the personal benefit is insufficient to convince companies to adopt flexibility. A solid business justification must be made as well. Surprisingly few studies have attempted to quantify how job flexibility is related to work-family balance or how such flexible arrange- ments may benefit individuals and businesses (Hill, Miller, Wei- ner, & Colihan, 1998). This investigation attempts to do so. The results of our study should be of interest to work and family researchers and to practitioners because it will provide objective

*We thank International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) for providing the sup- port and cooperation needed to collect the data used in this article. Ideas expressed are the opinions of the authors, not necessarily of IBM.

**Address correspondence to: E. Jeffrey Hill, School of Family Life, Brigham Young University, P.O. Box 25524, Provo, UT 84602-5524; e-mail: jeff_hill@byu.edu

Key Words: flexplace, flextime, job flexibility, telecommuting, virtual office, work and family.

(Family Relations, 2001, 50, 49-58)

information on which to make policy decisions and help guide individuals to effective decisions.

This study uses an ecological conceptual framework (cf. Bronfenbrenner, 1986; Bubolz & Sontag, 1993) and a work-fam- ily substantive theory called spillover theory (Zedeck, 1992). A strong work-family mesosystem is proposed and assumes that the work microsystem and the family microsystem significantly influence one another through a permeable boundary (Bromet, Dew, & Parkinson, 1990). Work-family balance may be defined as the degree to which an individual is able to simultaneously balance the temporal, emotional, and behavioral demands of both paid work and family responsibilities. Research has extensively examined the conditions under which spillover between the work microsystem and the family microsystem is positive or negative. If work-family interactions are rigidly structured in time and space, then spillover in terms of time, energy, and behavior is generally negative (Barnett, 1994; Williams & Alliger, 1994). Research also offers support for the notion that flexibility in work arrangements, which enables individuals to integrate and overlap work and family responsibilities in time and space, is associated with positive spillover and is instrumental in achiev- ing a healthy work and family balance (Barnett; Bond et al., 1998; Galinsky, Bond, & Friedman, 1993).

A review of the literature indicates that increased demands on the job and at home have made managing work and family life increasingly difficult (Shore, 1998). Although flextime and flexplace programs have been adopted at many companies, they may not be fully utilized by employees (Hochschild, 1997). Thus, more empirical research is needed to measure the influence of flextime and flexplace on work-family balance.

Work-Family Balance

Both academic and corporate research are confirming the existence of work-to-family and family-to-work spillover and the importance of healthy work-family interface for families and businesses. In most of these studies, there are measures of spill- over that are associated with family and business outcomes. Ex- amples of outcomes associated with negative work-to-family spillover from the peer-reviewed academic literature include withdrawal from family interaction (Paden & Buehler, 1995; Re- petti & Wood, 1997), increased conflict in marriage (Bolger, DeLongis, Kessler, & Wethington, 1989; Crouter, Perry-Jenkins, Huston, & Crawford, 1989), less knowledge of children's ex- periences (Bumpus, Crouter, & McHale, 1999; Crouter, Helms- Erikson, Updegraff, & McHale, 1999), less involvement in housework (Aldous. Mulligan. & Biarnason. 1998: Crouter et

2001, Vol. 50, No. 149

al.), shorter period of breast-feeding for mothers with full-time employment (Lindberg, 1996), depression (Beatty, 1996), greater likelihood to misuse alcohol (Frone, Russell, & Cooper, 1993), and overall decrease in the quality of life (Rice, Frone, & McFarlin, 1992).

Less academic research has focused on family-to-work spill- over, the "neglected side of the work-family interface" (Crouter, 1984). Examples documented in scholarly studies of outcomes associated with negative family-to-work spillover include more pronounced psychological distress due to poor marital and pa- rental role quality (Barnett, Marshall, & Pleck, 1992), decreased job satisfaction (Burke, 1989), decreased quality of work life (Higgins, Duxbury, & Irving, 1992), greater likelihood of leav- ing the company (Burke), and increased absenteeism (Goff, Mount, & Jamison, 1990). In an interesting attempt to link fam- ily-to-work spillover to the business objective of increasing bot- tom-line profits, Forthoffer, Markman, Cox, Stanley, and Kessler (1996) documented $6.8 billion worth of annual work loss in the United States associated with the absenteeism attributed to marital distress.

Recent corporate-sponsored data from a nationally represen- tative sample of workers in the United States confirm that work- family balance often is problematic for employees and employ- ers. This type of research is different from academic research in that the objective is to provide descriptive data from which to make decisions regarding company policy. The 1997 National Study of the Changing Workforce (NSCW), sponsored by the Families and Work Institute with grants from large corporations, revealed that today's jobs consume more physical and emotional energy, are more unpredictable, and require longer hours than were required 20 years ago (Shore, 1998). In a recent study at one large corporation, inability to balance work and personal and family life was tied with compensation as the leading reason employees gave for why they would potentially leave the com- pany (Galinsky & Johnson, 1998). Moreover, in the past, work- family balance has been considered a women's issue; recent stud- ies indicate that men are as likely as women to have difficulty managing work-family demands (Hill, Campbell, & Koblenz, 1997; Levine & Pittinsky, 1997; Milkie & Peltola, 1999).

Paid Work Hours

American workers appear to be expending more hours in paid labor than in recent years. Schor (1992) indicated that, on average, American workers in 1987 worked the equivalent of an extra six 40-hour weeks when compared with workers in 1969. The NSCW, documenting this trend over the past 5 years, reports that in 1992, employed men spent, on average, 48.8 hours per week and employed women spent 41.7 hours per week in job- related activities (Galinsky et al., 1993). By 1997 this had in- creased to 52.0 hours per week for men and 43.2 hours per week for women (Bond et al., 1998). In contrast, Robinson and God- bey (1997), using time diary data, found that the actual number of hours worked has not increased over the past 30 years, but because the pace of work has increased, many employees think they are working longer. An increase in work hours is likely to be real for some and perceptual for others, and work hours may affect some occupational groups more than others. Nonetheless, scholars agree that, overall, workers feel as if they are working longer hours and that this may be related to problematic family outcomes. Judge, Boudreau, and Bretz (1994) found a strong re12tionshin between the number of paid work hours and work-

family conflict, especially for those with preschool children. Shamir (1983) reported that working more than 9 hours a day resulted in much greater conflict between work and nonwork facets of life. In addition, the number of hours spent on the job has been shown to relate to the degree to which spouses choose to participate in family work (Almeida, Maggs, & Galambos, 1993), especially men's involvement in child care (Aldous et al., 1998). Longer work hours by husbands also has been shown to be associated with greater marital conflict (Kluwer, Heesink, & Van de Vliert, 1996).

Unpaid Domestic Labor

For some time, scholars have lamented that the degree to which fathers participate in household chores and child care does not match the emerging egalitarian culture of fatherhood (La- Rossa, 1988; Nock, 1998). However, a summary of recent find- ings indicates that men are now indeed doing more (Levine & Pittinsky, 1997; Pleck, 1997). Findings from the NSCW reveal that employed married fathers increased their time in child care significantly from 19.4 hours per week in 1977 to 24.3 hours per week in 1997. The time that employed, married mothers spent with their children stayed constant during this period (31.1 hours per week in 1977 and 31.6 hours per week in 1997). Between 1977 and 1997, the amount of time men report doing household chores increased from 14.4 hours per week in 1977 to 21.2 hours per week in 1997. During the same period, the amount of time women reported doing household chores declined from 32.9 hours per week in 1977 to 27.7 hours per week in 1997. Men are closing the gap. In 1977, married employed women reported doing 18.5 hours more housework per week than employed mar- ried men. That gap has been cut by about two thirds to 6.5 hours per week (Bond et al., 1998). Moreover, dual-earner men gen- erally work longer hours than dual-earner women (Levine & Pittinsky). Though men are working more hours at home, there is continued gender segregation in household tasks. Men tend to have more discretion and flexibility in when they do tasks around the home (e.g., mow the lawn, household repairs, etc.), whereas women continue to be responsible for tasks (e.g., fixing meals, child care, etc.) that have less flexibility (Milkie & Peltola, 1999). In addition, research continues to show that wives' dis- satisfaction with the household division of labor is related to marital conflict (Kluwer et al., 1996) and that dual-earner women who participate in more domestic labor experience greater work- family conflict (Wiersma & van den Berg, 1991).

Flextime

Flextime is broadly defined as the ability to rearrange one's work hours within certain guidelines offered by the company. There are often core hours (e.g., 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.) during which all employees must be working and may be required to be on-site. Employees are then given varying degrees of control over when they choose to fulfill their work commitment.

Studies indicate that flexibility in the timing of work have generally been well received by workers and have contributed to organizational goals. Nonetheless, the degree to which these programs are actually available to the individual depends on the immediate manager (Powell & Mainiero, 1999). Current research indicates that some form of flextime is offered in most large companies, but research indicates its link to personal and busi- ness benefits is equivocal. A recent study of more than 1,000 U.S. companies revealed that about two thirds (68%) allow em-

50 Family Relations

ployees to change starting and stopping times periodically, al- though only one quarter (24%) allow this change on a daily basis (Galinsky & Bond, 1998). The NSCW reveals that employees with flextime were "more satisfied with their jobs, more likely to want to remain on the job, and showed more initiative than workers with no access to these policies" (Galinsky & Johnson, 1998, p. 9). Glass and Camarigg (1992) linked schedule flexi- bility to job-family compatibility. In a review of flextime re- search, however, Christensen and Staines (1990) concluded that "no compelling case can be made for flextime solely on the grounds of employers' conventional concerns with organization- al effectiveness, organizational membership, or job attitudes" (p. 475). Shinn, Wong, Simko, and Ortiz-Torres (1989) found that the perception of flexibility in the timing of work was weakly related to the well-being of working parents, but that the pres- ence or absence of a formal flextime program was unrelated. In addition, the fact that flextime policies exist does not necessarily mean that employees feel the option is truly available. In the absence of cultural support within the organization, family- friendly policies, including flextime, may be used infrequently (Hill et al., 1997; Hochschild, 1997). In any case, there is little research in this area, and how individuals allocate their time over various roles is an important area of continued research (Bray- field, 1995).

Flexplace

Flexplace is broadly defined as giving employees varying degrees of control over where their work is done. Flexplace in- cludes telecommuting, which is the option for employees to work from another fixed, offsite location, usually the home. Tele- commuting is sometimes fulltime, but is often 1 or 2 days a week. Flexplace also includes an emerging work form called the "virtual office." In the virtual office employees are given the portable means to do their job wherever and whenever it makes sense.

Despite extensive publicity given to telecommuting in the national press (Shellenbarger, 1997), fewer companies offer flex- place than offer flextime, and fewer employees choose to use this option when available. About half (55%) of the companies allow employees to work at home occasionally, and one third allow employees to work at home or off-site on a regular basis (Galinsky & Bond, 1998); however, only about one fifth of workers reported that they work any of their regularly scheduled hours at home (Bond et al., 1998). Some managers are hesitant about authorizing flexplace arrangements because they feel that teamwork would be adversely impacted or that employees need face-to-face supervision to be successful. Some employees be- lieve that if they spend less time in the office, they will be less likely to be promoted, and there is recent research to support that viewpoint (Judiesch & Lyness, 1999).

Forecasts are that because of the decreasing cost of the tech- nology required for telecommuting and the increasing cost of office space, the number of employees utilizing flexplace will increase significantly in future years (Piskurich, 1996). The ben- efits documented for flexplace include greater productivity, the perception of improved morale, and better work-family balance (Hill et al., 1998). Nonetheless, research using a quasi-experi- mental design did not show that employees using flexplace had better work-family balance than those without flexibility in the location of their work (Hill, Hawkins, & Miller, 1996). Other research indicated home-based work enabled women to spend

more time on domestic work than those employed at the com- pany location (Silver & Goldscheider, 1994).

Purpose

This study examined the perceived influence of job flexi- bility in the timing (flextime) and location of work (flexplace) on work-family balance. Rather than examine the use of formal flextime and flexplace programs, we looked at the perceived flex- ibility as seen by employees, regardless of the formal program offered. We hypothesized that, as predicted by spillover theory, perceived job flexibility will be related to improved work-family balance. We also hypothesized that, given the same workload, individuals with perceived job flexibility will have less difficulty with work-life balance. Finally, we hypothesized that those with flextime and flexplace will be able to work longer hours before having difficulty with work-family balance. Few studies have attempted to quantify how perceived job flexibility is related to work and family life balance or what type of benefits such flex- ible arrangements may have for individuals and businesses. We hope this study will begin to fill this gap in the research.

Method

The data for this study came from a work and life issues survey administered online by International Business Machines (IBM) in the United States in 1996. This survey was designed to gather data to help IBM's diverse workforce achieve its busi- ness objectives while fostering work and personal and family life balance. During recent years, IBM has implemented numer- ous policies to enable its employees to better harmonize their personal and family needs with the needs of the business. Some of these policies include child and elder care referral services, financial support for near-site dependent care facilities, personal and parental leave policies, online and call-in parenting assis- tance, permanent part-time job opportunities for professionals and managers, and domestic partner benefits.

Recent internal surveys reveal that IBM employees perceive the flexibility to choose when, where, and how work is done to be the most beneficial IBM offering to enhance work-family bal- ance (Hill et al., 1997). As a result, aggressive policies to en- hance flexibility in the timing and location of work have been adopted. For example, individualized work schedules give em- ployees the flexibility to start work up to 2 hours before or after the normal start time at their location with stop times adjusted accordingly. Meal-break flexibility enables employees to take a minimum of 30 minutes or up to a maximum of 2 hours for a meal break. This window of time in an employee's workday can be used for personal-choice activities, such as attending a child's school function, caring for an elderly relative, or participating in a sports activity. Compressed workweeks make it possible for employees to work their 40-hour week in fewer than 5 work days, for example, four 10-hour days (International Business Machines, 1996).

Likewise, other policies enable greater flexibility in the lo- cation of work. As of the late 1990s, about 25,000 IBM em- ployees in the United States no longer had individual company- provided office space but had been supplied the portable elec- tronic means (e.g., laptop computer, fax, modem, cellular phone, etc.) to work from a variety of locations (Apgar, 1998). Using this virtual offce, IBM employees have the capability to better harmonize their personal-family and professional needs by work- ing from home when needed. Other programs enable IBM em-

2001, Vol. 50, No. 1 51

Table 1 Descriptive Statistics and Correlations

(1) (4) (5) (7) Work/ (2) (3) Preschool- Occup. (6) Domestic

Variables M SD Family Gender Married ers Level Paid Work Labor

1. Work-family balance 2.98 0.80 2. Gender (0 = male, 1 = female) 0.32 0.47 .02 3. Married (0 = single, 1 = married) 0.78 0.42 -.07** -.17** 4. Preschoolers (0 = no, 1 yes) 0.24 0.43 -.06** .03 .25** 5. Occupational (level 1 = hourly, 2 = professional, 3 = manager) 1.87 0.58 -.21** -.05* .09** .05** 6. Paid work hours 55.23 9.14 -.47** -.12** .06** -.04* .34** 7. Unpaid domestic labor 23.44 16.64 -.10** .12** .14** .37** -.09** -.05* 8. Flexibility 2.97 0.78 .41** -.01 .00 .03 .13** -.09** -.04*

aWork-Life Balance (Cronback alpha: .83) 1. How easy or difficult is it for you to balance the demands of your work and your personal and family life (5-point scale: very easy to very difficult)? 2. I have sufficient time away from my job at IBM to maintain adequate work and personal/family life balance (5-point scale: strongly agree to strongly disagree). 3. When I take a vacation, I am able to separate myself from work and enjoy myself (5-point scale: strongly agree to strongly disagree). 4. All in all, how successful do you feel in balancing your work and personal/family life (7-point scale: extremely successful to extremely unsuccessful)? 5. How often do you feel drained when you go home from work because of work pressures and problems (5-point scale: never to almost always)?

bFlexibility (Cronbach alpha: .72) 1. How much flexibility do you have in selecting the location of where you work (5-point scale: complete flexibility to none)? 2. How much flexibility do you have in scheduling when you do your work (e.g., scheduling hours, time of day, etc.) (5-point scale: complete flexibility to none)? 3. How much flexibility do you have in scheduling what work you will do (e.g., content of work, processes used, etc.) (5-point scale: complete flexibility to none)? 4. I have sufficient flexibility in my job at IBM to maintain adequate work and personal and family life balance (5-point scale: strongly agree to strongly disagree). *p < .01; **p < .001

ployees to work from home on a regular basis to better meet both business and personal-family needs (Hill et al., 1997).

Data Collection and Sample A 9% representative sample of all IBM employees in the

United States was invited to take this online survey; 58% (n = 6,451) responded. Characteristics of the 1996 IBM sample com- pared with a 1997 national sample of United States workers (shown in parentheses; Bond et al., 1998) include the following: female, IBM: 32% (48%); college graduate, IBM: 64% (31%); annual income greater than $50,000, IBM: 67% (-45%); mar- ried, IBM: 78% (65%); in dual-earner households, IBM: 63% (51%); with children under 18 years of age, IBM: 59% (45%); with elder care responsibilities, IBM: 20% (25%); with both child and elder care responsibilities, IBM: 11% (-20%); man- agers and professionals, IBM: 75% (34%); nonexempt (hourly, paid for overtime) employees, IBM: 24% (66%). The types of jobs were indicative of the high level of skills needed by IBM: programmers, 19%; engineers, 12%; services, 11%; sales, 9%; consultants, 4%; project managers, 4%; exempt professionals, 21%; and other job categories, 20%. To get a general sense for whether those who responded were systematically different from those who did not respond, the self-report demographics were compared with those in IBM's human resources data base. Al- though statistically significant differences were found, the ab- solute size of the differences were relatively small. The largest difference was that women were slightly overrepresented in the sample (i.e., 32% of respondents were women vs. 29% in the human resources database). This response difference is consis- tent with other IBM studies.

The survey was administered electronically, and IBM has conducted online surveys since 1986. Survey data indicate a high degree of confidence in the confidentiality and anonymity of the data. To preserve anonymity, the electronic mail address was deleted from the data before it was sent to the survey adminis- trator. Electronic reminder notes were sent three times to all sur- vey invitees to encourage participation. Compared with the pen- cil-and-paper method, online survey administration at IBM has

yielded higher participation rates, more and longer write-in com- ments on open-ended survey items, quicker data analysis, and faster implementation of new policies based on the data (Hill et al., 1997). All IBM employees had access to and knew how to use computers at work, so there was no danger of biasing the survey by limiting survey access to only those who were com- puter literate.

Measurement The dependent variable for this study was work-family bal-

ance, measured by a composite of five questions about the ability of employees to balance the demands of work and their own personal and family life. (See Table 1 for list of questions and response scales.) The primary independent variables were paid work hours, unpaid domestic labor, and perceived job flexibility. Paid work hours was the sum of the average reported weekly work hours and the average reported weekly commute hours. Unpaid domestic labor was the sum of the average reported weekly hours in household chores and child care. For multivar- iate analyses, perceived job flexibility was measured by a com- posite of four questions related to the respondent's perception of the degree of flexibility in the timing and location of work. Flex- time and flexplace were tested as individual variables but did not contribute additional explanation of the variance, probably be- cause they were highly correlated (r = .52). For other descriptive analyses, however perceived job flexibility included discrete var- iables for flextime and flexplace. Demographic variables includ- ed gender, marital status, presence of preschool children, and occupational level. Occupational level was coded (1 = hourly employees; 2 = professional salaried employees, and 3 = man- agers). Although technically ordinal-level data, occupational lev- el is treated as interval-level data so it can be used in multivariate analyses. Presence of preschool children was the demographic variable associated with dependent care because in preliminary analyses, we also looked at presence of children of any age, presence of elders, presence of any dependent, and presence of preteens. Except for presence of elders, each was significantly related to work-family balance. Because of problems with mul-

52 Family Relations

Table 2 Multiple Regression: Betas, and Cumulative R2 Values (Dependent Variable Work/Life Balance)

Cumulutive Variables [ Adjusted R2

Demographic .05 Gender -.02* Marital status -.02 Presence of preschoolers -.04*** Occupational level -.13***

Workload .24 Paid work hours -.40*** Unpaid domestic labor hours -.09***

Flexibility .39*** .39

Note: N = 5,980. *p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001.

ticolinearity, however, only one variable could be used. Presence of preschool children had the strongest correlational relationship. The means, standard deviations, alpha reliabilities, and intercor- relations for all variables are presented in Table 1, as are the wording of the items used as composite scores.

Plan for Analyses Multivariate analyses were conducted to determine if per-

ceived job flexibility was significantly related to work-family balance after controlling for workload and demographic vari- ables. Various interaction terms were tested (e.g., gender by do- mestic labor, gender by presence of preschoolers, occupational level by gender, occupational level by marital status, occupa- tional level by presence of preschoolers, and many other com- binations), but none added significantly to the explained vari- ance. The standardized betas and cumulative R2 values are pre- sented in Table 2.

To demonstrate the personal benefit of perceived job flexi- bility given a reasonable workweek, we compared the percent- ages of a variety of groups who indicated they were having a difficult or very difficult time balancing the demands of their work and family life. We compared those with both flexplace and flextime to those with neither flexplace nor flextime; com- pared those with flexplace to those without flexplace; and com- pared those with flextime to those without flextime. We calcu- lated the percentage of these groups reporting work-family dif- ficulty for those who indicated they worked 40 to 50 hours per week, a workweek we considered to be of reasonable hours. Results for these analyses are found in Table 3.

To demonstrate the business benefit of perceived job flexi-

bility in terms easily understood by a manager (who generally does not have substantial training in multivariate statistical anal- ysis), a break-point-balance-point analysis was designed. The break point was defined as the number of weekly paid work hours at which 50% of the sample responded they had a difficult or very difficult time balancing the demands of their work and family life. This level of effort might be what would be expected from employees during a peak workload or "crisis mode" pe- riod. The balance point was defined as the number of weekly work hours at which 25% of the sample had difficulty with work- family balance. This might represent the number of work hours sustainable over a long period without undue hardship to family lives. The break point and balance point represent arbitrary sta- tistical points designed for illustrative purposes. They were se- lected because the balance point generally reflected the percent- age of employees with work-family difficulty in the 1986 IBM survey "when employees were more balanced," and the break point reflected the percentage of employees with work-family difficulty found in the 1996 IBM survey "when employees were not as balanced."

The break-point and balance-point figures were calculated by a regression equation where work hours per week was the independent variable and work-family balance (percentage of employees having difficulty with work-family balance) was the dependent variable. We calculated the break point and balance point for various groups by setting work-family balance equal to .50 or .25 respectively, and solved for paid work hours. We cal- culated the break point and balance point for those with and without flexplace and for those with and without flextime sepa- rately. We separated these two types of perceived flexibility be- cause they each represent different plans of action that could be taken to increase flexibility. Results for these analyses are found in Table 4.

Results

Descriptive statistics revealed that about half of the employ- ees had difficulty with work-life balance. Paid work hours was strongly and negatively correlated and perceived flexibility was strongly and positively correlated with work-family balance (see Table 1). Of note, gender was not significantly correlated to work-family balance or to perceived flexibility, indicating that men and women report similar levels of work-family balance and perceived flexibility on the job. In harmony with a nationally representative sample (Bond et al., 1998), we found that men reported somewhat longer work hours, and women reported

Table 3 Percentage of Respondents Reporting Difficulty With Work-Family Balancea

Both FT and Neither FT FP nor FP Difference With FP Without FP Difference With FT Without FT Difference

Total 28% 46% 18% 29% 40% 11% 29% 44% 15% Women 30% 43% 13% 31% 41% 10% 33% 43% 10% Men 27% 48% 21% 28% 40% 12% 27% 45% 18% Women with preschoolers 53% 66% 13% 57% 61% 4% 55% 65% 10% Men with prechoolers 38% 59% 21% 39% 55% 16% 39% 58% 19% Managers 37% 60% 23% 39% 46% 7% 37% 56% 19% Exempt professionals 30% 51% 21% 31% 42% 11% 30% 49% 19% Nonexempt hourly 18% 42% 24% 21% 38% 17% 21% 40% 19%

Note: Includes employees working between 40 and 50 hours per week. N = 3.898. FP = flexplace; FT = flextime. aPercentage responding "Very difficult" or "Difficult" to the question, "How easy or difficult is it for you to balance the demands of your work and your personal/ family life?"

2001, Vol. 50, No. 1 53

Table 4 Break Point-Balance Point Analysis: Hours of Work per Week at Which 50% (Break Point) or 25% (Balance Point) of Respondents Reported They Had a Difficult or Very Difficult Time Balancing the Demands of Work and Family

Break Point Analysis (50% Difficulty) Balance Point Analysis (25% Difficulty)

Without Without Without With FP FP Difference With FT FT Difference With FP Without FP Difference With FT FT Difference

Total 59.3 54.4 +4.9 60.4 52.3 +8.1 44.1 41.1 +3.0 45.1 39.1 +6.0 Women 59.2 54.5 +4.7 60.6 52.9 +7.7 42.1 38.4 +3.7 39.3 38.4 +0.9 Men 59.6 54.3 +5.3 60.3 52.0 +8.3 45.3 42.2 +3.1 47.7 39.0 +8.7 Women w/pre 43.1 32.3 +10.8 41.4 31.0 +10.4 20.7 -1.0 +21.7 12.3 1.2 +11.1 Men w/pre 53.4 46.3 +7.1 53.6 44.9 +8.7 37.6 32.0 +5.6 40.3 30.7 +9.6 Managers 55.4 51.0 +4.4 58.4 40.1 +18.3 34.7 35.2 -0.5 41.2 18.6 +22.6 Professionals 58.0 53.8 +4.2 59.2 50.9 +8.3 42.7 40.5 +2.2 43.4 36.5 +6.9 Nonexempt hourly 82.6 56.3 +26.3 73.4 53.6 +19.8 51.0 41.7 +9.3 51.5 41.5 +10.0

Note: N = 5,980. FP = flexplace; FT = flextime; pre = preschoolers.

somewhat more hours in domestic labor. Women were somewhat less likely to be married than were men.

Multivariate analyses (see Table 2) indicated that paid work hours accounted for the greatest portion of the variance in work- family balance, adding an adjusted R2 of .19. Additionally, per- ceived job flexibility, including both flextime and flexplace, add- ed 15% to the explained variance of the model. Then, the model was run with the discrete variables as well as using interaction terms, and neither scenario added significantly to the explanation of the variance. Occupational level was the demographic variable that contributed the most to explained variance in the model. The higher the level of one's occupation, the more difficulty with work-family balance. The other demographic variables, gender and presence of preschoolers, although statistically significant predictors, did not add appreciably to the predictive power of the model.

Comparing standardized betas is another way of indicating the relative influence of paid work hours and perceived flexibility on work-family balance and provide a basis for a cost-benefit analysis for different means to promote work-family balance. By dividing the standard deviation of paid work (9.14) by its stan- dardized beta (-.40), we can see it would take a decrease of 22.8 hours of paid work per week to improve work-family bal- ance by one standard deviation. By dividing the standard devi- ation of perceived flexibility's (.78) by its standardized beta (.39), we see that it would take a movement of 2.0 on a 5-point flexibility scale to improve work-family balance by one standard deviation. Then by dividing 22.8 paid work hours per week by 2.0, we see that a 1-point improvement on a 5-point flexibility scale (e.g., from a little to some, from some to a great deal, etc.) is equivalent to a decrease of about 11.4 paid work hours per week, as far as they relate to improvement in work-family bal- ance.

The personal benefit of perceived flexibility in the timing and location of work was clearly demonstrated by the decreased percentage of employees with work-family difficulty, given the hours of a reasonable workweek (see Table 3). For example, for those working 40 to 50 hours per week, only 28% of those with both flextime and flexplace responded they had difficulty with work-family balance, compared with 46% of those with neither flextime nor flexplace, an advantage of 18%. Whereas only 29% of those with flexplace had difficulty with work-family balance, 40% of those without flexplace had work-family balance diffi- culty, an advantage of 11%. In addition, only 29% of those with flextime had work-family difficulty, compared with 44% of those without flextime, an advantage of 15%. The personal benefit for perceived flexibility was evident for both men and women. This

finding was particularly pronounced for men with preschoolers. For this group, only 38% of those with both flextime and flex- place had work-family difficulty, compared with 59% of those with neither flextime nor flexplace, an impressive advantage of 21%. The occupational group with the least perceived flexibility (nonexempt hourly employees) indicated the greatest advantage for flexibility. For this group, only 18% of those with both flex- time and flexplace had work-family difficulty, compared with 42% with neither flextime nor flexplace, an advantage of 24%.

Break-point and balance-point analyses (see Table 4) dem- onstrated the business benefit of greater perceived flexibility. Employees with perceived flexibility in the timing and location of work were able to work longer hours than those without per- ceived flexibility before experiencing a difficulty in balancing their work and family life. For example, the break point and balance point for those with perceived flexibility in the timing of work were 60 hours per week and 44 hours per week, re- spectively. The break point and balance point for those without perceived flexibility in the timing of work were 52 hours per week and 41 hours per week, respectively. Calculating the busi- ness benefit, in a heavy workload environment, perceived flexi- bility in the timing of work enables the employee to work "an extra day a week" (60 hours per week with flextime - 52 hours per week without flextime = 8 hours more work) before work- family balance becomes difficult. It should be reemphasized that this "break point" is conceptually the number of weekly work hours during a peak workload period of short duration. It is not thought of as the number of weekly work hours sustainable for a long period of time.

The business benefit of perceived flexibility in the location of work was most apparent for women with preschoolers. Their work-family break point in a heavy workload environment with flexplace was 43 work hours per week but without flexplace it was 32 work hours per week, an advantage of 11 hours per week. The regression equation indicated that the balance point for women with preschoolers with flexplace was 21 work hours per week, but without flexplace it was - 1 work hour per week, an advantage of 22 hours per week. It appears that, for mothers with preschool children, perceived flexibility in the location of work, coupled with a part-time work assignment, would yield work and family balance. The greatest benefit for flexplace was in the break point analysis for nonexempt hourly (paid for over- time) employees where there was an advantage of 26.3 hours (see Table 4). The greatest benefit for flextime was in the balance point analysis for managers with an advantage of 22.6 hours (see Table 4).

54 Family Relations

Discussion

The data clearly indicate that perceived flexibility in the tim- ing and location of work is related to positive outcomes from both personal and family and business perspectives. Perceived job flexibility, given a reasonable workweek, enables more em- ployees to have work-family balance (personal and family ben- efit) and also enables employees to work longer hours before impacting work-family balance (business benefit). In harmony with spillover theory, these results empirically document that after controlling for job hours, household work hours, gender, marital status, and occupational level, perceived job flexibility is significantly and positively related to work-family balance. Giv- en a workweek of reasonable length, employees who perceive flexibility in the timing and location of work have less difficulty with work-family balance. In addition, employees with perceived flexibility in the timing and location of work can work longer hours before work-family balance becomes difficult. These find- ings have significant personal and family and organizational im- plications.

Personal and Family Implications These findings linking work-family balance to perceived

flexibility, coupled with findings from previous research, indicate the individual and family have a lot to gain from flexibility. The literature indicates that possible benefits include less marital con- flict, better monitoring of children, increased period of breast- feeding after the birth of an infant, less depression, and so forth (see Beatty, 1996; Bolger et al., 1989; Bumpus et al., 1999; Crouter et al., 1989, 1999; Lindberg, 1996). What is it about job flexibility that proves beneficial to work-family balance?

One possible benefit of flextime and flexplace has to do with a reduction in the stress associated with the daily commute. The daily commute now consumes an average of about 45 minutes per day (Bond et al., 1998). In a rigid environment, the commute usually occurs during rush hour and can be very stressful. Prob- lems are compounded in bad weather when the commute may be dangerous but must be undertaken because there is no alter- native. In a flexible environment, it is possible to schedule the commute at a time other than rush hour and thus reduce stress. In times of inclement weather, the flexplace employee may forgo the commute altogether and telecommute safely from home. This reduction in stress associated with the daily commute also may explain part of the favorable results found in this study related to perceived job flexibility.

Flexplace also provides more options for where an employee might choose to live. Without flexplace, an employee has to live within commuting distance of the work location, which is often in or near large metropolitan areas. With flexplace an employee would have greater opportunity to live in a small town or rural area. One IBM survey respondent indicated that he worked elec- tronically from a small town in Logan, Utah, but his department was physically located in New York.

The results indicate perceived flexibility in the timing and location of work to be particularly beneficial to parents. One possible benefit is that flextime enables parents to schedule their work hours to be more synchronized with the schedules of their school-age children. For example, if the elementary school starts at 9 am, a traditional 8 to 5 work schedule would require finding child care both before and after school. With flexibility in the scheduling of work hours, needed child care often can be limited to after school. In some cases, where both spouses enjoy flex-

time, the need for before- or after-school care may be completely eliminated. By coordinating work schedules, one spouse could care for the children before school and the other after school. This simplifying of child-care logistics may enable parents of school-age children to better manage work-family balance.

Flextime also may contribute to quality time, both at work and at home. The highest quality work hours are not always between the hours of 8 and 5. It may be that the best strategic ideas come to one at 5 a.m. or at 11 p.m. Perhaps an important report can be better written between 9 p.m. and midnight than during normal work hours when interruptions occur frequently. Likewise, the highest quality personal and family hours may not always be outside the regular workday. A child's play may be at 2 p.m., or the best time to hear about children's school ex- periences may be right after they come home from school. Put- ting one's time to its best use, regardless of the time, may trans- late into better work-family balance.

Another major benefit of both flexplace and flextime may be an increased capacity for parents to overlap work time effec- tively with unexpected child-care situations. For example, when a child becomes ill at school, a parent in a rigid work environ- ment would be stressed about leaving work and finding care for the sick child. Many parents are forced to use their vacation days or to call in sick to care for sick children. In fact, a recent study shows that only 22% of sick days are actually used because the employee is ill. Many sick days are used for dependent care needs (Lang, 1998). With flextime, the parent can leave work to pick up the ill child. With flexplace, the parent can continue to work, albeit at a reduced pace, while caring for the ill child at home. The parental peace of mind of knowing that one has the flexibility to care for a sick child effectively may contribute to a more favorable perception of work-family balance.

For those with responsibility to care for elders or to guide adolescents, flexplace may be particularly beneficial. Elders and adolescents often do not require constant care, but simply some- one in the same home with whom they can interact from time to time. The ability to work from home may save the expense and alleviate the logistical difficulty of arranging for adult day care. It also may provide the ability to monitor an adolescent more effectively.

Many jobs include periods of peak work demands. In a rigid work environment, these times make it extremely difficult si- multaneously to meet the demands of work and family life be- cause the work has to be done physically from the work location. In such times, a worker might go to the office early in the morn- ing, eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner at the workplace, and return home late at night. Workers in such conditions could go weeks with little quality family time. By contrast, in a flexible work environment, an employee can work the same long number of hours, but intersperse several hours of quality family time each day. For example, the individual may arise early and work from home for a few uninterrupted hours at the beginning of the day. Then he or she could be available to provide family members breakfast and to get the children off to school or to other care arrangements. In the evening, the flexible worker could be at home for a couple of hours with the family during the dinner hour and then continue work for several hours from home after the children are in bed. This kind of flexibility might explain the results suggesting that workers with flexibility in the timing and location of work can work more hours without impacting work- family balance.

2001, Vol. 50, No. 1 55

Organizational Implications Work and family issues are increasingly problematic in the

corporate world. These data present evidence that implementing flexibility programs sufficient to improve employee perception of flexibility by 1 point on a 5-point flexibility scale is statisti- cally equivalent to reducing workload by 11 hours per week per employee as related to perception of improving work-family bal- ance. The fact that flexibility programs apparently help amelio- rate these problems and require little or no expense to the com- pany makes a strong business case for their adoption. Some com- mon job flexibility programs that might be considered include flexible work hours, meal-time flexibility, part-time work, job sharing, compressed workweek, telecommuting, and the virtual office.

If flexibility programs are so beneficial and inexpensive, why is it that they are not more widely used? There are obstacles to making flexplace and flextime culturally acceptable. Fried- man, Christensen, and DeGroot (1998) report that many leaders of organizations see work-family programs as a zero-sum game in which "every time an employee's personal interests 'win,' the organization pays the price in its bottom line" (p. 119). Flexible work programs enabling employees to better manage the de- mands of their work and family lives may be irrelevant to some business managers unless financial benefits to the business can be demonstrated as well.

Another implication for business relates to the performance evaluation systems of flexible workers. Adoption of increased flexibility in the timing and location of work usually means that the employee will be working less frequently at the same time and place as the manager. This potential for change points out the need for careful consideration of performance evaluation sys- tems to assure they are based on the measurable results delivered, rather than just on the subjective view of the manager. Some managers hold the attitude, "If I don't see my employees, how do I know if they are working?" The company that embraces job flexibility also should move away from a "face-time" busi- ness culture to a "results-oriented" business culture (Friedman et al., 1998), and performance evaluation systems must adapt to include more specifically measured objectives.

Another issue may be the size of the organization. Larger organizations may have greater resources to support the tech- nology required for flexplace, and this type of flexibility may be less prevalent in small companies. Also, larger organizations have a greater pool of workers for coverage issues that might arise from flextime. On the other hand, some types of small companies may be flexible by their very nature (e.g., the "dot.com" start-up companies) and even more suitable for flex- ibility than larger companies. In any case, further research ad- dressing size of company needs to be conducted.

The differences noted by occupational level indicate that the benefits of perceived flexibility vary according to the kind of job and responsibility inherent in that job. For example, it appeared that flexplace was of little benefit to managers, but of more im- portance to others. It also is interesting to note that the occu- pational group that could benefit most from flexibility (nonex- empt hourly employees) is the group with least access to flexi- bility. In some cases, there are good reasons for less flexibility (e.g., flexplace doesn't make sense for the manufacturing em- ployee who is assembling computers on the line). Nonetheless, it may be that companies could expend more effort to see how to implement flexibility programs among lower level employees.

Finally, these data support the fact that work-family balance is an issue for all employees. There is no longer a gender prob- lem. The need for work-family balance and the benefits of flex- ibility are equally applicable to men and women.

An important aspect of this study for practitioners is that much of the past work-family balance training in work settings and other informal education has focused on how to manage child-care responsibilities. These data suggest that training about how to create opportunities for flexibility in the timing and lo- cation of work also should be given priority. Given the nature of this material, however, practitioners should be forewarned that there may be little patience for traditional classroom-type deliv- ery programs. This kind of training may be addressed more ap- propriately with an interactive CD-ROM or Internet approach to deliver the information.

In summary, the results of this study indicate that perceived flexibility in the timing and location of work offers the promise of enabling employees opportunities to better balance work and family life in this era of increasing workload. These offerings appear to be true win-win solutions to help mitigate the personal toll of increased work demands. If visionary business leaders and empowered individuals adopt greater flexibility, we may see the end to the "zero-sum game" (Friedman et al., 1998) and set up a "virtuous cycle" in which work-family balance programs le- verage on each other to promote individual well-being, family solidarity, and organizational success.

Limitations Several limitations are apparent in this study. The respon-

dents all worked for IBM in the United States. Employees of IBM, in general, are more highly educated, have higher salaries, and have more experience with computer technology than the general population. For these reasons, the degree to which these results may be generalized to other companies and in other parts of the world is uncertain. Even if the IBM sample is represen- tative of employees working for large corporations, it may not be representative of the majority of men and women who work for smaller firms or are self-employed. In addition, most IBM employees work in or near urban centers, so the applicability of this research to those who work in rural settings is uncertain also.

This survey is one of many that IBM uses to address chal- lenges in the work environment. At IBM, there is a 30-year history of taking action based on survey data. One limitation to self-report data particularly salient in this survey may be the tendency for respondents to answer questions in a way to gen- erate the changes they want, rather than answering the questions at face value. There is also a question of how the 42% nonre- spondent employees might systematically differ from the 58% who responded. Although respondents seemed to be demograph- ically representative, they may differ in other ways. It may be that those who are working the longest hours did not have the time to respond, so those with the most workload may be under- represented here. On the other hand, it may be those with the fewest work-family issues chose not to invest time in taking this survey because they did not have a felt need to participate.

Another concern is the nature of self-report data in a survey, especially when respondents are asked to estimate time in work activities. Robinson and Godbey (1997) have shown that self- report data of time in work activities are substantially inflated. Even though this is an anonymous survey, employees may over- estimate their hours to appear to be working hard. More central

56 Family Relations

to this study than work hours are employees' perceptions of flex- ibility in their work arrangements, which are appropriately mea- sured by self-report questions.

All these limitations point to the need for more research on the influence of flextime and flexplace on work and work and family balance. This research should expand to a variety of groups. It might be fruitful to examine those in academic settings as a group that has flexibility and could make suggestions about implementing flexible work options. In addition, research using nonsurvey (e.g., interview and observation) methodologies might be useful.

Conclusion

We hear much about the changing nature of families as we enter the 21st century. Less often do we attend to the substantial transformations occurring in the way we work. Just as flexibility in family processes diminishes potential family stress, flexibility in work processes can help employees manage the contemporary stresses associated with balancing work and family demands. In fact, this study empirically documents how greater flexibility in the timing and location of work decreases employees' sense of stress at meeting the needs of work and family. Data such as these can reinforce management's efforts to provide greater flex- ibility in the workforce, especially when the results are so clear and the costs of such efforts are relatively small. Just as impor- tant, these data may help encourage employees to take advantage of the flexibility that is increasingly offered so that they can more effectively care for their families. As more companies offer flex- ibility in the timing and location of work and more individuals use that flexibility, the work-family imbalance that was problem- atic for employees in the twilight of the 20th century can become the balance so many seek in the 21st century.

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E. Jeffrey Hill is an Associate Professor in the Department of Marriage, Family, and Human Development at Brigham Young University and works at IBM in Global Workforce Diversity.

Alan J. Hawkins is an Associate Professor in the Department of Marriage, Family, and Human Development at Brigham Young University.

Maria Ferris works at IBM in Global Workforce Diversity.

Michelle Weitzman works at American Express Corporation.

Received 1-4-00 Revised & Resubmitted 7-18-00 Accepted 7-19-00

DEPARTMENT OF

HUMAN DEVELOPMENT AND FAMILY STUDIES UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI-COLUMBIA

Ph.D. * Human Development and Family Studies 0 M.A / M.S. * Child Life * Early Childhood Development 0

* Family Mediation * Four-year J.D./M.S. degree / 9* Family Studies * Human Services in Administration or Public Policy

* Life Span Development

Program Emphasis Our unique focus is a commitment to family diversity and a multicultural perspective in teaching and research. Faculty research emphases include divorce, single-parent families, stepfamilies, African American families, development of racial identity, family and child care contributions to child and adolescent development, sibling relationships, aging, and parent-child relations across the life course.

Financial Assistance Teaching and research assistantships, including fee waivers, are available. All currently- enrolled students who desire funding (90%) are receiving it. Special support also is available for minority students.

Graduate Faculty Marilyn Coleman, Teresa Cooney, Mark Fine, Sara Gable, Lawrence Ganong, Bob Hughes, Jean Ispa, Amanda Kowal, Johnetta Morrison, Lynn Blinn Pike, Pamela Raya-Carlton, Kathy Thornburg

Contact Marilyn Coleman, Director of Graduate Studies Phone: (573) 882-4035 Dept. of Human Development & Family Studies Fax: (573) 884-5550 University of Missouri-Columbia Email: colemanma@missouri.edu 314 Gentry Hall, Columbia, MO 65211 WWW: www.missouri.edu/-hdfswww

58 Family Relations