Work-Life Balance in India: Perspectives and Challenges for Women

Work–life balance (WLB) is an important concern for all workers irrespective of their age, sex, education level, family structure, or occupation. This study analyzes WLB’s mediating effects and the ease of using WLB programs in the relationship between WLB organizational culture of hotels and turnover intention of its culinary staff. We conducted a survey featuring 320 culinary staff members at hotels in Incheon from 10 to 30 August 2020 and performed statistical analysis using 290 responses. We find that the company’s willingness for WLB, empathetic communication with colleagues, material support of colleagues for WLB, and the ease of using WLB programs in organizational culture had a positive impact on WLB. The company’s willingness for WLB, boss’s consideration for WLB, empathetic communication with colleagues, and material support of colleagues for WLB in organizational culture had a negative impact on turnover intention. The ease of using WLB programs had no indirect effect on the relationship between organizational culture and turnover intention. However, WLB had an indirect effect on the relationship between the four components except for the boss’s consideration for WLB and turnover intention. Hotel management should create an organizational culture that supports the WLB of culinary staff.

This article examines whether fullness of work-life balance (WLB) programs influence employee satisfaction and whether this relationship is moderated by employee income. Using the data collected from 2972 Japanese employees, the present study reveals a significant positive effect of WLB programs on satisfaction with WLB, job, and organizations for male employees, but a significant effect only on satisfaction with organizations for female employees. Further, some of these relationships are found to be moderated by annual employee income such that the effect of WLB program fullness is greater for higher income employees than for lower income employees.

Our study aims to investigate the effect of work-life balance programmes on Chinese nurses' psychological well-being, directly and indirectly, via learning goal orientation. Our research also aims to investigate the moderating role of servant leadership, a holistic leadership style that prioritizes serving employees, in the association between work-life balance programmes and psychological well-being. A questionnaire-based, time-lagged study (1-week interval). From September 2022 to October 2022, we collected a total of 211 matched and valid responses from nurses working for hospitals in Jiangsu Province, China. Data regarding work-life balance programmes, servant leadership, learning goal orientation and psychological well-being were gathered using a survey administered in two waves, 1 week apart. We utilized the PROCESS Model 5 to test the moderated mediation model. Work-life balance programmes significantly improved nurses' psychological well-being. Moreover, learning goal orientation mediated the relationship between work-life balance programmes and psychological well-being. However, servant leadership did not moderate the association between work-life balance programmes and psychological well-being. Our study contributes to extant nursing literature by attending to the organizational strategies that promote psychological well-being. This study is novel because it evaluates the mediating and moderating process through which work-life balance programmes improve nurses' psychological well-being. The provision of work-life balance programmes could enhance learning goal orientation, resulting in possible improvement in nurses' psychological well-being. Moreover, servant leadership styles may contribute to psychological well-being. Our study can help nurse managers enhance their organizational strategies (e.g. work-life balance programmes) and leadership resources (e.g. servant leadership styles) to address nurses' well-being issues. This paper addresses the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goal 3 regarding 'Good Health and Well-being'.

Finding a balance between the demands of the role requirements of work, family, and social life is a challenging problem for modern society and is particularly relevant for the growth of women’s participation in the workforce. These role conflicts may result in significant psychological stress for individuals. For corporations, stressed employees are also a problem. Work–life balance (WLB) programs to address these issues have emerged in Western countries in the past three decades and have been evaluated in various ways in multidisciplinary studies which have employed sociological and psychological methodologies. WLB programs in developed countries often reflect the ethos of particular cultures, and Western models may not be wholly relevant for cross-cultural comparison. The present study explores these issues using the methodology of critical realism in companies in the telecommunications sector of Palestine. This qualitative study develops a complex model of a newly identified set of factors, which may be relevant for other Arabic cultural settings. Further exploration of this model using psychometric techniques is proposed.

The decline in employee performance achievement at the Ministry of Religious Affairs Office of Jepara Regency in recent years indicates issues related to work-life balance and self-efficacy, which may affect job satisfaction and performance. This research seeks to examine how the balance between work and personal life, along with self-confidence, influences job performance, considering job satisfaction as a mediating factor. A quantitative method with an explanatory framework was used for the study. The population consisted of 138 employees, and a sample of 103 respondents was selected using purposive sampling. Information was gathered through a Likert-scale survey and examined using multiple linear regression and Sobel tests with the help of SPSS. The results show that work-life balance has a positive and significant effect on job satisfaction (β=0.329; p<0.05) and employee performance (β=0.241; p<0.05). Self-efficacy also has a positive and significant effect on job satisfaction (β=0.417; p<0.05) and employee performance (β=0.275; p<0.05). Furthermore, job satisfaction significantly influences employee performance (β=0.356; p<0.05) and mediates the relationship between work-life balance, self-efficacy, and performance. These results emphasize the significance of handling work-life balance and enhancing self-confidence to boost job satisfaction and employee effectiveness. The practical implication is that human resource management in government institutions needs to develop policies that support work-life balance and employee capacity-building programs to achieve sustainable performance improvement.

Working from home has increasingly become the norm since the outbreak of COVID-19, and as a result, it has taken a toll on both work and family life for many people around the world, including in Singapore. This research aimed to explore the role of transformational leadership in work-life balance and employee performance in Singapore after the pandemic. A pilot study was conducted using a cross-sectional quantitative design and an online survey with 31 participants. The data collected were statistically tested, and it was found that work-life boundary management had a significant positive relationship with both work-life balance and employee performance. In addition, work-life balance was shown to have a significant positive relationship with employee performance. The pilot study did not find any support for the impact of work-life policies and practices on work-life balance or employee performance. Work-life balance did not mediate the relationship between work-life boundary management or work-life policies and practices and employee performance. The moderating effect of transformational leadership was absent in all relationships in the proposed research model. These findings suggest that employees who can manage their work-life boundaries well have better work-life balance and perform better. Organisations should also do their part in facilitating the achievement of even greater work-life balance for their employees.

Female employee labor turnover of information technology industry in Sri Lankan is in the higher level. Therefore, the general objective of the research is to assess the impact of major work life balance policies influence on retention of executive women employees in Information technology organizations in Sri Lanka. Five selected work-life policies namely flexible working hours, company leave policy, training and career development opportunities, compressed workweek and workload management were examined with employee retention. Base on random sampling method one hundred two completed questionnaires used to analyze the data. Descriptive statistics, correlation and multiple regression utilized to analysis the data. Work-life balance and employee retention levels are in the satisfactory level in the IT industry in Sri Lanka. Multiple regression result of the study shows that work-life balance policies positively influence on the executive women employee retention. Selected five policies of work-life balance and employee retention were examined using multiple regression model. Training and career development opportunities and workload management positive influence on employee retention. Although rest of three work life balance policies namely flexible working hours, company leave policy and compressed work week didn’t show the significant impact of employee retention. Policymakers and top management of companies should improve work-life balance to increase employee retention. Moreover, they can use training and career development opportunities and workload management to increase employee retention.

Psychiatric nurses’ work environment factors, including long hours, heavy workloads and leadership issues, can serve as barriers to achieving a healthy work-life balance. However, for both individuals and organizations, that balance is crucial as it is a key determinant of job satisfaction and leaving intentions. To address the limiting evidence to that topic, this study had two objectives: (1) to describe the work-life balance of nurses working in psychiatric inpatient settings; and (2) to examine those nurses’ work-life balance and its associations with individual (i.e., age, gender), psychosocial (i.e., leadership) and structural factors (i.e., employment percentage). To analyze these factors and their impacts, we conducted a cross-sectional study in a sample of 1209 nurses from 116 units in 13 psychiatric hospitals of the German-speaking part of Switzerland and analyzed the resulting data via multilevel analysis. This led to three main results. First, nurses reported a high mean value regarding their work-life balance. Second, multivariable regression results indicated that their work-life balance ratings correlated directly with certain psychosocial work environment factors (leadership and support of nurses, perceived staffing resources) and inversely with structural factors (employment percentage, overtime). And third, we found an interaction between leadership and support of nurses and the patient-to-nurse ratio: the lower the leadership level, the stronger the inverse association between patient load and work-life balance. No individual factors were significantly associated with work-life balance. Overall, though, we found that organizational factors are vital to nurses’ work-life balance. Therefore, interventions to improve nurses’ work-life balance should be institution-level, and should focus on improving either leadership or structural factors, e.g., employment percentage, overtime, and patient-to-nurse ratios.

Work-life policies are offered to employee to help manage conflicting demands stemming from work and life. Yet findings on the actual outcomes of such policies are mixed. Indeed, most research tends to bundle different work-life policies instead of taking into consideration their differential nature. One exception is the enabling – enclosing conceptualisation of work-life policies (Bourdeau et al., 2019). In this paper, a series of four cross-sectional studies with various samples of potential and actual work-life policies users was conducted, in order to 1) empirically validate that work-life policies can be classified using the enabling – enclosing proposition; 2) investigate how the use of enabling, mid-range and enclosing policies relates with various intraindividual outcomes; and 3) integrate the self-determination perspective (Ryan & Deci, 2017) in order to explore the mediating role of autonomy satisfaction in these relationships. Confirmatory factorial analyses in all 4 studies confirmed the 3-factor model, both for projected use (Study 1, N = 292; Study 2, N = 168) and actual use (Study 3, N = 284; Study 4, N = 251) of work-life policies. Furthermore, structural equation modeling analysis showed that higher use of enabling policies leads to higher levels of satisfaction with life, career, and work-life balance, whereas higher use of enclosing policies leads to higher levels of burnout and turnover intentions, both directly (Study 3) and through the mediating role of autonomy satisfaction (Study 4). We discuss theoretical and practical implications of this research.

This article provides an overview of the various ways of interactions of actors composing the local system of work-life balance policies in Lombardy. Starting with a theoretical analysis under the organizational perspective of the elements forming the so-called welfare mix, work-life balance policies in Lombardy have created, since 2010, a new and innovative coordination style among the different actors (State, Market, Family and Third Sector). This type of coordination allows a new system of governance at the local level, with a real commitment of public and private agents. The present paper describes an empirical case study based on the results of four different workshops developed in order to induce Lombardy’s provinces and all the public bodies involved, to reflect about this Work-Life Balance Territorial Plan. Directing all the policies according to a work-life balance point of view, and creating a high level of active interaction between public and private organisations, can contribute to get over the welfare state crisis that we are now experiencing. Creating networks, being agents of changing, encouraging dialogue between different organisations, leads the public bodies to an innovative way of administrating both public finances and the relationships with local actors, reaching high level of performance and higher rates of female employment. Finally, it allows the creation of a territorial administration receptive to its citizens' work-life balance issues.

The purpose was to construct a comprehensive instrument to study the impact of moderating variables on the independent variables with respect to work life balance in IT companies in India. The Design/Methodology/Approach included questions that were made for the specific social culture based on the objective of the study. Experts’ opinion was gathered and an iterative process ensured that the instrument was corrected. Content validity test, pilot study and reliability test were performed to finalize the instrument before the data collection exercise started. The instrument created through the above-mentioned process ensured easy data classification and relevance to the research. Various hypotheses were tested and a detailed analysis was possible due to the way the questions and options were offered to the respondents. This instrument was administered to IT employees in India, which has a unique social fabric due to its diversity and cultural differences.

This paper investigates the relationship between work–life balance programs (WLBPs) and organizational outcomes. First, to balance the human cost approach that emphasizes the costs associated with WLBPs and the human investment approach that supports the positive benefits associated with WLBPs, we examine the effect of WLBPs on organizational profitability (revenues minus expenditures per employee). Second, we extend the discussion on the job demands-resources model by considering how and why WLBPs, a type of organizational job resources, can mitigate non-job demands such as personal health and wellness, and family duties and responsibilities. Specifically, we test the moderating role of the availability and usage of WLBPs in the relationship between WLBPs and organization profitability. Our findings support that these two dimensions of organizational job resources (availability and usage) influence organizational profitability. The availability of WLBPs was positively associated with organizational profitability, while the usage of WLPBs was negatively associated with organizational profitability. The availability of WLBPs significantly moderate the WLBPs-profitability relationship, and the usage of WLBPs marginally significantly moderate the WLBPs-profitability relationship. We discuss the theoretical and practical implication of the findings.

This research aims to understand the influence of different dimensions of organizational culture on the effectiveness of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) practices in the Indian IT sector. It examines how these cultural frameworks shape and implement corporate social responsibility practices, such as health and safety programs, work-life balance, community involvement, and environmental sustainability programs to promote employee well-being and happiness. The data was collected using questionnaires which is distributed amongst the IT sector employees in India. The analysis is done through structural equation modeling to understand the influence of various types of organizational culture, such as clan, adhocracy, market, and hierarchy, on CSR and its impact on employee happiness. The findings reveal that internal CSR programs significantly boost employee happiness within clan and hierarchy cultures. External CSR practices do not have a direct impact on employee happiness; thus, the employee-oriented CSR strategy must be developed in specific cultural contexts.

Paid work and private life: the view of topmanagers Paid work and private life: the view of topmanagers The past few decades have seen growing interest in the integration of paid work and private life. This interview study (N = 24) examines the view of Dutch senior managers (CEOs, executive directors and managing directors) on the changing relationship between work and private life and their attitude toward current state and organizational work-life policies. How can we explain differences in their views and what implications do these views have for the sustainable, modern organisation of work? The study reveals that Dutch senior managers tend to have three different attitudes toward work-life policies: (1) they reject such policies and support the male breadwinner model; (2) they support such policies in exchange for worker commitment; (3) they regard employees as 'entrepreneurs' both in their jobs and in their work-life balance. Organisational characteristics influence whether senior managers consider it necessary to support work-life policies and the cost and benefits of introducing such policies. Although a majority of senior managers consider work-life policies conducive both to employee welfare and organisational efficiency, in the everyday workplace practice they struggle to find a sustainable win-win situation.

This research paper explores the impact of employee engagement strategies on organizational performance in India, focusing on the challenges, trends, and future prospects in the Indian context. Employee engagement, defined as the emotional commitment of employees towards their organization, is a critical factor in enhancing productivity, reducing turnover, and improving overall business outcomes. The paper examines the significance of engagement strategies in various sectors, with an emphasis on industries such as IT, manufacturing, and services. It discusses the key challenges faced by Indian organizations in implementing effective engagement initiatives, such as hierarchical structures, limited resources, and work-life balance issues. Additionally, the paper highlights emerging trends in employee engagement, including the integration of technology, personalized engagement experiences, and a growing focus on work-life balance. Through secondary data analysis, this study provides insights into the current state of employee engagement in India and offers practical recommendations for organizations aiming to improve engagement levels. The paper concludes by highlighting the future direction of employee engagement in India, emphasizing the need for organizations to adapt to changing workforce expectations and leverage emerging trends to foster a more engaged and productive workforce.