work-life harmony productivity and peace (10!29!08)

8/3/2019 Work-Life Harmony Productivity and Peace (10!29!08)

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Work and Family Harmony:Productivity AND Peace

Work/Life Association Roundtable

E. Jeffrey Hill, Ph.D., CFLEBYU School of Family Life

[email protected]

29 October 2008

Melbourne, Australia
mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]


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Work-Life Metaphors

Metaphors influence our thoughts

Balance and Juggling: are

dominant work-family metaphors Scarcity mentality based on time

Assumes a Zero-Sum game

Emphasis on conflict Productivity comes at the expense of

individual peace.


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Harmony:

A Better Metaphor Harmonyinstead ofBalance

Person is the composer, orchestrator,

and director of his/her own life. Life roles may harmonize or be

dissonant (Work and family are pre-eminent)

Emphasis on facilitation and flexibilityas well as conflict

Productivity AND peace are BOTH

possible simultaneously


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Definition of Work-Family

HarmonyAbility to effectively integratework responsibilities and

family/personal aspirations

Assumptions:

Bothwork and family are important Work should not be at the expense of a satisfying

family/personal life and vice versa.

Work and family can benefit one another

Work and family harmony promotes productivity


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Global Trends Affecting

Work-Family Harmony Global 24/7/365 economy

Longer work hours

Pervasive technology

Greater gender equity

Dual-career families Global epidemic of work-family conflict


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Initiatives to increase harmonyand reduce conflict

Many work and family initiatives aroundthe world

Sponsored by governments, companies,and non-profit organizations

Two examples

Singapore

IBM Corporation


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2006 Singapore National Study of Work-Life Harmony

Objectives of Study Develop Singapore National Study of Work-Life

Harmony

Develop a National Measure of Work-LifeHarmony(Establish a scaled benchmark tomeasure progress over time in Singapore)

Explore relationship of Work-Life Harmony to

work and family outcomes (especially fertility) Provide data for research-based policy

discussion


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Methodology:

Conceptual model includes predictorsand outcomes of work-life harmony.

(A) Work

Characteristics(B) Individual

Characteristics(C) Family

Characteristics

(F) Work-to-Home

Conflict/Facilitation

(F) Home-to-Work

Conflict/Facilitation

(D) Work-to-HomeAdaptive

Strategies

(E) Home-to-WorkAdaptive

Strategies

(H) WorkVitality

(I) PersonalVitality

(J) FamilyVitality

(G)

Work/LifeHarmony

*Focus groups were conducted to validate the model for Singapore

(K) Community

Vitality


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The Questions

All in all, I am able to effectively integrate my work

responsibilities and family/personal aspirations.

How easy or difficult is it for you to integrate your workand your personal/family life?

My job fits well with:

My individual personality My desire to be happily married

My desired number of children

My desire to spend time with my family/children

My preferred pace (tempo) of life

My desire for social interaction (e.g. time with friends)

My personal aspirations

Singapore Measure of

Work-Life Harmony

9 Item Measure

Coefficient Alpha = .91

Highly Reliable


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Results

Workers report a sleep deficit

of 10 hours/week.

Lack of sleep has been linked to healthproblems such as obesity, diabetes, and a

lower immune system, as well asperformance problems concerning

judgment, response time, and attention.

Ideal # of hours of sleep per night M= 8.2

Actual # of hours of sleep per night M=6.8

1.4 hours deficit per night9.8 hours deficit per week500 hours deficit per year


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National Measure of Work-Life Harmony

Positive Link Between Work-

Life Harmony and Fertility

Controlling for age, education, gender, andHH income, the odds of reporting fewerchildren than ideal is more than two timesgreater for those with little work-life

harmony than those with high work-lifeharmony.

Poor work-life harmony is associated with havingfewer children than is believed to be ideal.


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Work-Life Harmony: What

Singapore workers want2006 Singapore Work/Life Harmony %

1.Flexibility in WHERE work gets done 462.Paid leave (marriage, maternity, paternity) 243.Flexibility in WHEN work gets done 234.Greater mgmt. acceptance of work-life 20

5.Greater work-life education for employees 176.Child care services 126. Part-time, job share, reduced hours 126. Sports/social activities in the workplace 12

6. Focus on needs of older workers 12


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Summary of Singapore Results:Harmony=Productivity AND Peace

Business case for work-life harmony is stronglyvalidated: it predicts valued work, personal, andfamily vitality outcomes (Productivity AND Peace). Greater job loyalty, satisfaction, opportunity, performance Less job attrition

Greater life satisfaction, physical health, mental health Enhanced marital and family satisfaction Higher fertility

Work-life harmony is predicted by: Personal: Health, sleep, income

Work: Manager support and workplace flexibility Family: Participation in family activities, and having both children

and elders living in the home

Employees express most interest in flexible workoptions (especially flextime) and paid leave

National Work-life Harmony Measure can be used as abenchmark to measure progress over time


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IBM Global Work-Life

Initiatives Started in the United States (1970s)

Three US surveys (86, 91, 96)

Three Global surveys (01, 04, 07) 2007 IBM Global Work and Life Issues

Survey Facts

75 countries, 10 languages, 88 corequestions, 59k invitees

Global Work-Life strategies


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Work-Life Harmony:

What IBM employees want2007 IBM OVERALL %

1.Flexibility in WHERE work gets done 362.Flexibility in WHEN work gets done 253.Greater mgmt. acceptance of work-life 254.Child care services 21

5.Greater work-life education for employees 216.Part-time, job share, reduced hours 167.Focus on needs of older workers 15


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Work-Life Harmony:

What IBM has implemented Workplace flexibility (flextime, mobile

work, work-at-home, part-time, job

sharing, leaves, compressed work, etc.) Supports for children/elders (care

referral, near-site care, camps for

children, homework assistance, etc.) Education for managers and employees

Results: increased work-life harmonyfacilitates achieving business results

W k l Fl ibili R l


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Workplace Flexibility ResultsDecade trend: As flexibilityincreases, work-life conflict

decreases, and vitality increases.

0

40

80

1996 2001 2004 2007

Hours Worked

Flexibility in Where Work is Done

Working from Home is Acceptable

Work/Life Conflict


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Workplace Flexibility ResultsDinnertime enhances work,

personal, and family vitality Long work hours associated with:

perceptions of unhealthy workplace greater work-family conflict lower perceived life success poorer family relationship quality

Dinnertime mediated all these relationships Workplace flexibility ==> Dinnertime Greater work, personal, and family vitality is

achieved when employees use workplace flexibilityto maintain regular family mealtime, even in theface of long work hours.

Jacob, J., Allen, S. M., Hill, E. J.,Mead, N. L. (2008). Work interference withdinnertime as a mediator and moderator between work hours and work and

family outcomes. Family and Consumer Sciences Research Journal.


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Workplace Flexibility Results

60-Hour Dual-Earner Week

Promotes Work and Family Vitality Comparison of three couple work arrangements:

FT/FT: Both partners work 40+ hours per week

60 Hour: Both partners work and at least one works part-time

FT/NE: One partner works full-time, the other is not employed 60-hour group compares favorably to the other groups

Less work-to-family conflict and greater work-family fit means: Greater work vitality

Enhanced family vitality

1.5 jobs per family seems to work best

Hill, E. J., Mead, N. T., Dean, L. R., Hafen, D. M., Gadd, R., Palmer, A. A., &Ferris, M. (2006). Researching the 60-hour dual-earner work week: Analternative to the opt out revolution.American Behavioral Scientist, 49,

1184-1203.


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Workplace Flexibility ResultsFinding an Extra Day per Week

Study uses Break Point analysis: Mathematical pointin hours per week at which 50% of respondents reportdifficulty managing work-life demands.

Overall Break Point: 52 hours/week for those without workplace flexibility 60 hours/week for those with workplace flexibility Benefit of 8 hours/week (an extra day per week)

Break Point for Women with Pre-schoolers

32 hours/week for those without workplace flexibility 43 hours/week for those with workplace flexibility Benefit of 11 hours/week (an extra day per week)

Hill, E. J., Hawkins, A. J., Ferris, M., & Weitzman, M. (2001). Finding an extraday a week: The positive effect of job flexibility on work and family lifebalance. Family Relations, 50(1), 49-58.


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TOP 10 COUNTRIES for Work-at-Home

1. United States 31% (+12)

2. UK 18% (+11)3. Australia 16% (+10)

4. Canada 16% (+ 6)

5. Germany 11% (+ 6)

6. Austria 10% (+ 4)

7. Brazil 7% (+ 6)

8. Mexico 7% (+ 5)

9. Netherlands 7% (+ 2)

10. South Africa 6% (+ 5)

Working from homeacceptable in my workgroup:US 1996 34%US 2001 51%US 2004 69%US 2007 79%IBM 2007 70%

Commitment NOT

questioned for usingflexible workarrangements:US 1996 33%US 2001 42%US 2004 48%US 2007 46%

IBM 2007 55%

Globally, work-at-home hasincreased from 5% in 01, to

10% in 04, to 15% in 07


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Telecommuters: Primarily from Home 16%

At least 10 hours/week 51%

At least 5 hours/week 70%

Of the working primarily at home percent reportingwork-at-home to be beneficial to: Job Satisfaction 81%

Productivity 86%

Moral/motivation 74%

Loyalty/Commitment 76%

Work Overall 84%

Work-Life Balance 87%

Family Life 89%

Results from telecommuters inAustralia (2007)


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Beneficial effects:

Increased job satisfaction

Improved performance Lower turnover intent

Decreased role stress

Lower work-family conflict

Concern: co-worker relationships whentelecommuting more than 2.5 days/week

Findings from telecommutingmeta-analysis of 46 studies

Gajendran, R. S., & Harrison, D. A. (2007). The good, the bad, and theunknown about telecommuting: Meta-analysis of psychological mediators andindividual consequences. Journal of Applied Psychology, 92(6), 1524-1541.


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The more extensive the telecommuting theless work-to-family conflict.

Schedule flexibility supercharges thebenefits of telecommuting.

The positive relationship betweentelecommuting and job satisfaction plateaus

at two days per week.

Those with a large household sizeexperience greater family-to-work conflict

the more they telecommute.

Research on the extent oftelecommuting


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Workplace Flexibility:


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Workplace Flexibility:One of the hallmarks of good

management practice

Workplace flexibility will become one ofthe hallmarks of good managementpractice, in part because it can producepositive outcomes for employees as wellas for workplaces.

Source: Testimony given in the United

States Senate, 28 February, 2007)


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Work and Family Harmony:Productivity AND Peace

THANK YOU!

E. Jeffrey Hill, Ph.D., CFLEBYU School of Family Life

[email protected]

work-life harmony productivity and peace (10!29!08)

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