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Work–life balance: A review of the meaning of the balance construct
Thomas Kalliath
School of Management, Marketing and International Business, Australian National University, Canberra ACT
Paula Brough
School of Psychology, Griffith University, Mt Gravatt QLD
Abstract
Although the term work-family/life balance is widely employed, an agreed definition of this term has proved elusive. Instead, an array of definitions and measures populate the literature. The variety of work-life definitions and measures provide limited value for both the theoretical advancement of the construct and for practical human resource (HR) interventions. In this article, we review six conceptualisations of work-life balance found in the literature:
- Multiple roles
- Equity across multiple roles
- Satisfaction between multiple roles
- Fulfilment of role salience between multiple roles
- A relationship between conflict and facilitation; and
- Perceived control between multiple roles
Based on our review of this research we identify the two primary features of the work-life balance definitions and propose a new definition of this construct.
In the past 15 years, there has been increasing interest in work-family balance in the popular press and in scholarly journals. This increase in interest is in part driven by concerns that unbalanced work-family relationships can result in reduced health and performance outcomes for individuals, families and organisations. It is however interesting to note that while the term ‘work-family balance' is widely adopted a formal definition of this term remains elusive.
Although a number of conceptualisations of work-family balance occur within the literature, there is as yet no direct well developed measure of the construct, which constrains our ability to investigate the phenomenon fully. For instance, without a direct measure of work-family balance, it is difficult to investigate the impact of ‘family-friendly' policies on key individual and organisational outcome variables.
We also acknowledge a recent shift in terminology used to refer to this phenomenon, with many organisations using the term ‘work-life balance' so as to include employees who are not parents but who desire balance for non-work activities such as sports, study, and travel.
In this paper, we therefore use the term ‘work-life balance' to refer to all activities in the work and non-work domains. The paper examines six common conceptualisations of work-life balance and identifies the prime features that appear to best encapsulate the construct of work-life balance.
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