Work life balance and job satisfaction

Document Type:Thesis

Subject Area:Psychology

Document 1

POS- Perceived Organizational Support Abstract Research on work-life balance has generated a lot of interest for researchers and business professionals. Work-life balance is not something that can be considered an individual choice. Today, it is a human resource management tool that is used to attract and retain employees who are highly qualified. WLB is a growing important attribute of business practice that is supported by many studies that show the impact that work-life balance has on organizations and employees. The literature review shows that work-life balance has a significant effect on the job satisfaction of employees and the organizations they work for in many ways. Introduction 1. Overview Research on work-life balance has generated a lot of interest for researchers and business professionals.

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Work-life balance is not something that can be considered an individual choice. Today, it is a human resource management tool that is used to attract and retain employees who are highly qualified. It is a constantly growing attribute of business practices and development. This can result in imbalance between work and life. In addition, there are also changes and developments outside the work environment that can cause work-life imbalance. Particularly, there are changes in the socio-economic environment that open many possibilities with regard to where work is carried out and when it is carried out. This can cause imbalances between family and work responsibilities (Wessels, 2012). What is more, the shift from the traditional image of the family towards more and more single-parent families and more women taking part in the labor force present factors that call for increased work-life balance.

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By ensuring that there is a favorable balance between work and personal life, WLB contributes greatly to employee satisfaction and helps employers to reap the benefits of employee satisfaction (Gregory & Milner, 2009). Job satisfaction is the personal opinion of the employees and an evaluation of their work on the basis of some set of intrinsic and extrinsic factors of the job (Bozionelos & Kostopoulos, 2010). “A good WLB improves an employee’s perception of their employment greatly” (Moran, 2016). Work Life Balance makes employees to be more committed to their jobs and increase in productivity and prevents the effects of a poor WLB which are increased absenteeism and employee turnover which can be costly for the organization (Mas-Machuca, et al. If the time commitments to work are greater than to personal life for employees, they are likely to be dissatisfied with their jobs which increases absenteeism and other factors that are harmful to the organization.

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This part also shows the reason this research was worth doing. The literature review for this paper is found in chapter 2. This part provides the theoretical perspective of the effects of work-life balance on job satisfaction. It contains great definitions, descriptions and explanations from past studies and research that is relevant to the research topic. This section also presents the demographics and variables that can have an impact on work-life balance. Chapter 7 is a conclusion recaps the objectives and aims of the study as well as a brief discussion of what was found out from this research and whether or not it is in support of already existing literature on the topic of the impact of work-life balance on the job satisfaction of employees.

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Literature Review This chapter deals with the literature that is already available and which is relevant to the topic of this thesis. A number of sources will be used in this section. The first section of the chapter will deal with Work Life Balance and all the factors that are involved in it. In this first section, the effects of WLB and its benefits are discussed. ” This study will focus on the use of the term “work-life balance” because it is inclusive of “family, community, recreation and personal time” (Grady et al. It captures all aspects of the personal life and the work life of employees, suggesting that it should place its focus on families, individuals, communities, societies and workplaces as a whole.

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WLB has been defines as “satisfaction and good functioning at work and at home, with a minimum of role conflict” (Clark, 2000, p. Chatrakul Na Ayudhya et al. (2015, p. Such borders can be psychological, physical or temporal (Clark, 2000). Another theory that has been advanced to address work-life balance is the compensation theory. According to this theory, workers strive to get more satisfaction from either their job or their family or personal life so as to compensate for the lack of satisfaction that abounds in the other (Edwards & Rothbard, 2000). The spill-over theory stipulates that any emotions, behaviors and feelings that have been generated in one of the two areas can be easily transferred into the other (Rothbard & Dumas, 2006). A conceptual model has also been proposed in which work-life balance can be measured by any conflict between work and personal life (Grzywacz & Marks, 2000).

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The role-strain perspective hypothesizes that different responsibilities in the domains of work and family life and constantly in competition with each other for the limited time available, physical energy and psychological resources. This causes negative results in the two domains (Greenhaus & Beutell, 1985). On the other hand, according to Barnett & Rivers (1996), the enhancement perspective states that taking part in different roles can result in better functioning in all the domains of life. The definition of work-life balance by Clark (2000) is the most relevant for this paper, which states that work-life balance is achieved when people are satisfied with their roles in both the family and work domains and when role conflict does not exist. This is because the satisfaction of employees with their work in this study focused on the balance between work and family roles.

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Effects of Work-Life Balance and Imbalance Because of the fact that owners, investors and leaders of organizations are acknowledging that WLB is of great importance in today’s workforce, it is coming to the forefront of a great majority of organizations globally. WLB is influenced by many factors which include work location, working hours and organizational policies that favor an effective balance as well as workload and deadlines among others (Visser et al. Some of the factors to which the increase in adoption of WLB in organizations can be attributed are technological advances, dynamic workforce, globalization and current business processes (Chandra, 2012). Lack of an effective balance between work and life causes depression among workers. This causes high absenteeism and a decrease in productivity because of low morale (Seligman, 2011).

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Organizations and employers who promote WLB have a great chance of retaining workers who enjoy WLB. There is the risk of work-life conflict is the WLB priorities of employees differ from those of their employers. One of the factors that is favorable for WLB is workplace flexibility. Employees who have work schedules that are flexible tend to achieve WLB that is better, which, in turn, causes a higher level of satisfaction with their jobs, little role conflict and a higher satisfaction with their home activities (Clark, 2000). Many organizations and employees have come to understand the importance of WLB as one of the important factors in ensuring the job performance and satisfaction of employees is achieved. Job Satisfaction 2. Definition Many theories have tried to define job satisfaction.

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It is defined as the extent of satisfaction and fulfilment an employee derives from their job which impacts the way they perform on the job (Landis, Vick & Novo, 2015). Just like WLB, it is important for employers to ensure that they cater for job satisfaction among their employees. This is because the extent of satisfaction is likely to have an effect on the attitude of the employees towards the organization and their mindset (Moran, 2016). Organizations understand that the overall performance of the employee is depended on the effective and efficient performance of employees at the individual level (Arif & Farooqi, 2014). Many leaders in organizations believe that financial benefits, including salaries, are a great way of increasing job satisfaction among employees. This is true as even employees contend that salaries can increase work satisfaction, which can cause an improvement in the performance of employees (Arif & Farooqi, 2014).

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However, salary is only able to raise job satisfaction among employees when other factors are well addressed. Some of the other factors that can be used in measuring employee job satisfaction in the place of work are employee relations and the working environment (Arif & Farooqi, 2014). When an employer provides their employees with training, empowerment and improvement opportunities and support, the job satisfaction of those employees goes (Chung et al. Work flexibility is also a major cause of job satisfaction as this allows people to be able to take other responsibilities that they have apart from their jobs. The personal opinion of an employee regarding various factors in their job such as whether they feel valued within the organization has a great bearing on whether they will be satisfied with their job (Chung et al.

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Job dissatisfaction is caused by the same factors that lead to job satisfaction. These include stress, working hours, lack of training and supervision, benefits and pay and communication. Customer experience determines whether or not they are going to frequent the business and this determines the amount of sales the business is going to make (de Menezes, 2012). In the retail sector, sales assistants and customers are very important. When an employee is dissatisfied with their job, they do not take care to ensure that they perform their duties effectively and in how they deal with customers (Gounari & Boukis, 2013). Employees are meant to portray a company’s values to clients and join a company’s service system with the customers so as to give feedback of the experience of the customers to the organizational managers.

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The greater commitment and productivity that comes from job satisfaction on the part of the employees also ensures that the products that are produced are of high quality. This means that there will be constant disruption of the processes and operations of the business as people who are responsible for performing certain important tasks exit the organization. When a few employees leave the organization, they are likely to trigger a mass exodus from the organization as employees who see their peers leaving will also want to leave (Chen et al. The staff who remain in the organization will be left with the burden of having to cater for the positions of the employees who left the organization. This will lead to an increase in tension and levels of stress among the employees.

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There will be too much work to be done within a limited time frame because. Such a behavior leads to an increase in displeasure and stress among the other employees and result in a toxic working environment (Moran, 2016). A high level of job dissatisfaction among the employees is also likely to cause unionization. The threat of employees striking will increase. This can be harmful to the reputation of the organization with regard to employment (Jodlbauer et al. The time that is consumed in all this impacts the company’s ability to achieve its strategic goals because time is usually a very important factor when it comes to organizational goals. This means that they feel highly positive with regard to their employer.

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In turn, this causes increased job satisfaction (Mas-Machuca et al. When organizational leader understand the importance of WLB in business and come up with policies that promote it, the satisfaction of employees with their jobs will improve. In turn, this will be beneficial to the business. When an organization has a WLB program and executes it well, there is a healthy extent of job satisfaction among the employees (Blazovich et al. The results of a study carried out by Styhrea (2011) established that if there is poor WLB as a result of job insecurity or long working hours, employees are likely to become dissatisfied with their jobs. The risks that are involved with job dissatisfaction can determine the type of people the organization is going to get applying for jobs with it in the future.

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Poor WLB leads to job dissatisfaction and the organization incurs the negative effects of job dissatisfaction among employees like increased absenteeism and increased levels of employee turnover. Research problem and the Rationale for the Study 3. Introduction In the literature review, it has been shown that existing literature shows there is an important relationship between Work-Life Balance and the level of job satisfaction in employees. Research Framework Independent Variable (WLB) Dependent Variable (Job Satisfaction). Hypotheses H1: Work-Life Balance is positively related to job satisfaction. H2: Long hours of working have a negative impact on the job satisfaction of employees. H3: Flexible working conditions have a positive impact on the job satisfaction of employees. Research Methodology 4. A total of 102 participants took part in this survey.

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All the employees that took part in the study had job roles that were different from each other. The participants were both male and female. The minimum age requirement for one to take part in the survey was 18 years. The ages were divided in age groups of 5 years and ranged from 18 to 55 years of age. 45%), 1 American Indian, 1 North African and 3 (4. 11%) members of other ethnicities. 67%) of the participants work in India. 33%) work in New Zealand and 36 (48%) in the United States of America. Each of the participants was given a questionnaire to fill which showed the various factors of work-life balance and their relationship with employee satisfaction. Another measure that was used to determine inclusion and involvement is the Perceived Organizational Support (POS) in Eisenberger, Huntington, Hutchinson, and Sowa (1986) Survey of Perceived Organizational Support (SPOS), abbreviated POS-University.

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The workers were to answer with the most appropriate answer with regard to the support they receive from their organization. The Answers ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree. The Question was as follows: 2. Please rate your agreement with the following statements as they relate to your work at this organization overall. This scale measures the vigor, absorption and dedication dimensions of work engagement. The workers were to respond with the answer that best describes their situation within their jobs with regard to the statements in this scale. The answers ranged from never to always. The questionnaire question was as follows. The following statements are about how you feel at work. The answers ranged from “less than once per month or never” to “several times per day.

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” The Question was as follows: 1. How often do you find it difficult or impossible to do your job because of. ? Poor equipment. Organizational rules and procedures. I often think about quitting. I will probably look for a new job in the next year. In general, I do not like my job. I am actively looking for a new job. In general, I like working here. However, I am confident that they did not occur. However, it is important to consider such errors when analyzing the data (Crowther & Lancaster, 2012).  The cause of non-sampling error is low rates of responses from the participants. Such errors occurred in that some people skipped the questions, failing it provide the answers as expected. Other factors that could have impacted the results of this survey are personal opinions, personal interpretations of questions and experiences.

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Results and Data Analysis The main objective of this study is to find out the impact of WLB on job satisfaction. The two main variables used in the study are work-life balance, which is the independent variable, and job satisfaction, which is the dependent variable. The three hypotheses that were proposed before the start of the research were also tested. Data obtained from the research was analyzed by use of SPSS which created various tables and diagrams that showed whether the results of the study supported the hypotheses stated or not. Reliability 5. 715 was achieved. Cronbach’s Alpha N of Items. 715 8 Table 3. Reliability Statistics- Cronbach’s Alpha- WLB I believe it shows positive correlation and positive impact of WLB. employees ans proves that most of the employees were satisfied overall and ratio is above 7 I guess 5.

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Work-Life Balance The participants agreed that work-life balance is very important in organizations. Only 4 of the participants were dissatisfied with their work-life balance while the rest showed a healthy balance between their work and lives. Discussion 6. Objective of the Study The main objective of this study was to show the impact that Work-Life Balance has on employee job satisfaction. The two variables for the study were work-life balance and job satisfaction. It will allow them to reap the benefits of employee satisfaction in the organization which include increased organizational commitment and performance on the job. Work-life balance is achieved when employers implement effective practices that allow their employees to gain a balance between their work and their personal lives. The greater the level of work-life balance practices, the greater the level of job satisfaction.

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This supports research by Kaliannan et al. (2016) which established that employees who have a greater work-life balance have greater job satisfaction levels. According to Chowdhary (2013), long working hours have a negative effect on job satisfaction. The third hypothesis was that flexible working conditions have a positive impact on employee job satisfaction. It was found out that flexible working conditions positively impact employee job satisfaction as employees feel some level of autonomy with their jobs. Poor WLB that results in working for long hours causes employees to be dissatisfied with their jobs and increases the risk of stress and depression among them as well as the negative consequences of job dissatisfaction in the organization as a whole. Failure to give employees a chance to express their ideas and opinions is another aspect of poor WLB that causes job dissatisfaction in employees.

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The results of the study showed that there is appositive relationship between work-life balance and job satisfaction. It confirmed the hypothesis that work-life balance has a positive impact on the job satisfaction of employees. The correlation showed that effective work-life balance programs and practices result in a desirable impact on the part of the employees and the organization they work for. This is because the level of employee satisfaction increases as work-life balance increases. It was also confirmed from this study that work-life balance leads to lower rates of employee turnover as the individuals who showed a health work-life balance were satisfied with their jobs and did not show any intention of quitting their organizations or looking for jobs elsewhere.  Journal of Organisation & Human Behaviour, 3.

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