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Work from home has become as regular as the traditional commuting system after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Previous studies have discussed the influence of working at home on the work–family interface. However, there is limited understanding of how diverse workforces manage their work–family issues with various family-friendly policies. This study aims to bridge this research gap by examining the collective influence of work conditions and family-friendly policies on work–family balance.

A survey experiment featuring two working conditions (work from home or commuting) × four family-friendly policies (household subsidy, family-friendly supervisor, financial profit, paid leave vs no policy) was approached based on 703 valid responses in China.

The results indicate that family-friendly policies are more effective under the work-from-home condition than the commuting condition, household subsidies and financial profits are considered more helpful for work–family balance under the work-from-home condition and employees’ policy preferences depend on personal identity and work conditions, which help them maintain work and family issues concurrently.

This study explores the joint impact of work conditions and family-friendly policies from a situational perspective. This study indicated that professional organizations need to perform delicacy management considering policy preferences. Moreover, changing working arrangements help employees facilitate their work–family balance.

Although women have advanced in the economic sphere, the gender pay gap (GPG) remains a persisting problem for gender equality. Using Acker's theory of gendered organisations, this study strives to gain a better understanding from a macro and micro approach, how family and work-related policies, especially family-friendly measures (FFMs), and their uptake, contribute and maintain the GPG in Malta and specifically within the Financial and Insurance sector.

Two research instruments were used. National policy documents were analysed through the gender lens, followed by structured interviews with HR managerial participants within this sector.

Findings suggest that at a macro level, family and work-related policies could be divided into two broad categories: A set of family-friendly policies that contribute to the GPG because of their gendered nature, or because the uptake is mostly taken by women. These include make-work pay policies, which initially appear to be gender neutral, but which attracted lower educated inactive women to the Maltese labour market at low pay, contributing to an increase in the GPG. Second, a set of policies that take on a gender-neutral approach and help reduce the GPG. These include policies like the free childcare and after school care scheme that allow mothers to have a better adherence to the labour market. At the micro level within organisations, pay discrepancies between women and men were largely negated and awareness about the issue was low. Here, “ideal worker” values based on masculine norms seemed to lead to covert biases towards mothers who shoulder heavier care responsibilities in the families and make a bigger use of FFMs. Because men are better able to conform to these gendered values and norms, the GPG persists through vertical segregation and glass ceilings, among others.

Since not all the companies in the Eurostat NACE code list participated in this research, results could not be generalised but were indicative to future large-scale studies..

At the macro and policy level, some FFMs take on a clear gendered approach. For example, the disparity in length between maternity (18 weeks) and paternity leave (1 day) reinforces gender roles and stereotypes, which contribute to the GPG in the long run. While some FFMs like parental leave, career breaks, urgent family leave, telework, flexible and reduced hours seem to take on a more gender-neutral approach, the uptake of FFMs (except childcare) seems to generate discriminatory behaviour that may affect the GPG. When considering the make-work pay policies such as the “in-work benefit” and the “tapering of benefits”, this study showed that these policies attracted lower educated and low-skilled women into the labour market, which in turn may have further contributed to the increasing GPGs. On the other hand, the childcare and after school policies relieve working mothers from caregiving duties, minimising career interruptions, discriminatory behaviour and overall GPGs.

This study confirmed that organisations within the Financial and Insurance sector are gendered and give value to full-time commitment and long working hours, especially in managerial roles. Managerial positions remain associated with men because mothers tend to make more use of FFMs such as parental leave, reduced, flexible hours and teleworking. Mothers are indirectly penalised for doing so, because in gendered organisations, the uptake of FFMs conflict with the demands of work and ideal worker values (Acker, 1990). This maintains the vertical segregation and widens the GPG within the Financial and Insurance sector.

By using the gender lens and taking a wider and more holistic approach from the macro and micro level, this study highlights how interlinking factors lead to and sustain the GPG in the Financial and Insurance sector in Malta.

This paper explores working mothers’ coping strategies concerning paid and unpaid work in Chile and Argentina during the Covid-19 pandemic. The paper aimed to understand the influence of cultural norms on motherhood and neoliberal workplace practices on mothers’ sensemaking processes and coping strategies. This study focuses on mothers living in Chile and Argentina where governments established mandatory lockdowns between March and September 2020. Drawing on the notion of neoliberal motherhood, women’s demands were analyzed when paid work and mothering duties collide in time and space.

Open-ended interviews were conducted with 17 women in Chile and Argentina. All interviewees had at least 1 child below the age of 6 and were working from home during the lockdown.

Neoliberal workplace demands, and disadvantageous government policies greatly heightened the dual burdens of working mothers. Women were expected to fulfill the discourses of the neoliberal worker and the good mother, while also adopting additional strategies in the wake of the lockdown. The data highlights mothers’ strategies to cope with care and work duties by adjusting to new routines involving their partners, relatives and the wider community.

The generalizability of the results is limited by the small sample of 17 interviewees, all from middle to middle-upper class. The changing scenario due to Covid-19 makes the collected data not sufficient to grasp the impact of the pandemic, as during the interviews (December 2020 and January 2021) the process was still ongoing.

Organizations should assess their role in the management of paid and unpaid work for both genders, as the neoliberal discourse views the worker as masculine, full-time, always available and productive, ignoring women’s additional care duties outside of the workplace.

The Covid-19 pandemic provides a unique opportunity to reflect on care work and gender, collective versus individual responses to care and work demands and the idea of organizing.

After summarizing what has been learned so far, the purpose of this review is to suggest several promising avenues for future research on work-to-family enrichment (WFE) and family-to-work enrichment (FWE).

This is a literature review. After reviewing the existing research and searching for gaps in the literature, new areas of research will be proposed to fill these gaps.

While much has been learned about the antecedents and consequences of work–family enrichment in both directions, WFE and FWE, much remains to be learned.

Three important outcomes – job performance, organizational citizenship behavior, and counterproductive work behavior – need to be studied regarding WFE and FWE. Although supervisor support has been studied, the field needs to incorporate leadership theories and models to understand this phenomenon. Additional predictors of work outcomes – including emotional intelligence, leadership, emotional labor, social support, gender, and cross-cultural variables – need to be examined. Experience sampling methods and advanced research methodologies should also be used.

Although prior research has demonstrated the important effects of WFE and FWE, the practical effects on organizations in terms of job performance still need to be investigated.

The literature review conclusively demonstrates that WFE and FWE are both related to job satisfaction and family satisfaction.

This is the first review to summarize the existing meta-analytical research in this area and to propose the particular avenues of research advocated in this article.

Drawing upon the capability approach, this study aims to investigate the impact of sense of competence on work–life and life–work enhancements. It also examines the mediating roles of mindfulness and flow at work in the above relationships.

A sample of 254 medical doctors in various hospitals in Vietnam was surveyed to validate the measures via confirmatory factor analysis and to test the model and hypotheses using structural equation modeling.

The results demonstrate that mindfulness and flow at work fully mediate the effects of sense of competence on both work–life and life–work enhancements, but sense of competence does not have any direct effect on both.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is among the first to examine the roles of sense of competence, mindfulness and flow at work in work–life and life–work enhancements, adding further insight into the literature on work–life balance. It also offers evidence for the capacity approach in explaining work–life and life–work enhancements in an emerging market, Vietnam.

The purpose of this study is to empirically examine how the seven human resource management (HRM) practises, namely, leadership development, professional investment, egalitarian practises, developmental appraisals, family-friendly practises, engagement practises and generous benefits, are associated with perceived organisational support (POS) and destructive deviance in the context of Indian organisational culture.

In total, 265 middle-level IT personnel provided the study's data. To test the suggested study hypotheses, confirmatory factor analysis and PROCESS Macros were used.

Results show that putting in place leadership development, professional investment, egalitarian practises, developmental appraisal, family-friendly practises, engagement practises and generous benefits generates POS that, in turn, significantly contributes to reducing destructive deviance. Additionally, POS was found to partially mediate the relationship between perceived HRM practises and destructive deviance.

The results would help firms reduce detrimental employee deviation. To do this, managers must develop and put into effect the seven HRM practises, which demonstrate to workers that the organisation appreciates their contributions and cares about their well-being, thereby lowering disruptive deviance. In essence, IT businesses should carefully plan and implement the HRM practises they expressly want to use rather than mindlessly copying those of rival organisations. Furthermore, to adapt to the workforce's evolving needs, these HRM practises must be properly matched with both individual and organisational goals.

By including destructive deviance as a result of POS, this study adds to the body of research on organisational support theory. The literature on POS and negative behaviours will take a new turn with such a focus on destructive deviance. Additionally, this study encourages academics to investigate an underlying mechanism that accounts for how HRM practises affect employees' conduct. This study also adds to the sparse body of knowledge on POS for non-Western workers. The study's findings confirm that POS is a crucial concept for both Asian and Western workers.

Work-life balance (WLB) policies have become a popular topic in both academic literature and organizations. However, previous studies in this area have provided mixed results, and the impact of WLB policies on various indicators of organizational financial performance remains unclear. There has been no comprehensive review that synthesizes the current state of knowledge and indicates future research directions. This review addresses this gap and provides a systematic review of published papers investigating the relationship between WLB policies and organizational financial performance.

The review follows the PRISMA-ScR guidelines for scoping reviews. An analysis of 421 relevant records in Web of Science and Scopus databases identified 22 original empirical studies that focused on the relationship between WLB policies and financial performance at the level of the organization.

Most reviewed studies indicated a weak positive relationship between WLB policies and financial performance. There was the strongest support for the effectiveness of flexible working hours and job sharing, while there was mixed support for the policy of working from home. There were a higher proportion of positive results in studies conducted in Western countries compared to Asian countries, which indicates a potential moderating effect of culture. This review also describes the primary limitations of previous studies, namely, low test power and insufficient evidence about causality.

This review summarizes the growing body of quantitative research on the relationship between WLB policies and organizational financial performance. It presents a model that includes moderators and mediators of this relationship and indicates potentially fruitful areas for future research.

Drawing on the work as calling theory, the purpose of this study is to explore how and when career calling promotes taking charge by focusing on the mediating effects of work meaningfulness and felt obligation and the moderating role of family-friendly human resource practice (FF-HRP).

The authors collected data from 293 supervisor–employee dyads at three time points in southeastern China. Path analysis and bootstrap method were used for hypothesis testing.

Employees' perceived career calling positively affected taking charge through work meaningfulness and felt obligation. The positive effects of career calling on work meaningfulness and felt obligation as well as the indirect effect of career calling on taking charge are stronger when employees perceive high levels of FF-HRP.

Organizational interventions should be designed to enhance employees' sense of calling, and the organization should inspire employees to take charge by awakening their perception of work meaningfulness and obligation. Moreover, FF-HRP should be implemented as a form of organizational support.

This research identifies work meaningfulness and felt obligation as mediators that link career calling to taking charge and reveals the role of FF-HRP in amplifying the positive impact of career calling.

This paper addresses the issue of the underrepresentation of women in leadership positions within the information and communication technology (ICT) and engineering fields. The study examines the complex issue of vertical segregation and gender equality by exploring the barriers that women encounter and the potential coping strategies they adopt to advance in their careers.

The study employs a qualitative approach, conducting semi-structured interviews with 17 women at middle and upper management levels in the ICT and engineering sectors. This approach aims to better understand women's workplace experiences and gain deeper insights into the nature of the barriers they face.

The study identifies four main factors hindering women's progression toward senior management positions, namely working hours, work-family conflict, social role stereotypes and second-generation bias. The results also offer useful insights into the coping strategies adopted by women to overcome these barriers.

The study highlights the persisting underrepresentation of women in senior positions, indicating a societal and organizational lag in terms of inclusion and equity. It underscores the importance of developing effective policies to address the challenges faced by employees striving to balance their work and family commitments. Training is recognized as an important tool for raising awareness about gender stereotypes among employees and reducing second-generation bias.

This study provides valuable lessons derived from its findings, including potential strategies that organizations can implement to help women navigate and overcome workplace barriers in the ICT and engineering fields.

Despite several policies in the Arab Gulf States aimed at promoting women’s empowerment through employment, women’s career progress has not met the expected gains. Workplace empowerment is a critical aspect of women’s economic empowerment. Therefore, this paper aims to investigate the factors that contribute to workplace empowerment for women in the Qatari public sector.

This research uses a mixed-methods approach to explore workplace empowerment among female civil servants in the State of Qatar. The study combines surveys (N = 310) and interviews (N = 30) and uses an inductive thematic approach that considers women’s narratives as the primary source of knowledge construction.

The authors’ findings strongly suggest that perception-related factors have a more significant impact on workplace empowerment than structural ones. The results indicate that feelings of disempowerment are influenced by perceptions of gender-based discrimination, poor relationships with supervisors and dissatisfaction with work–life balance. Women feel empowered when they have access to decision-making opportunities and perceive that their workplace supports their professional growth and advancement.

Although this paper focuses solely on women’s perceptions, additional research is necessary to compare the experiences of both men and women regarding workplace empowerment. While individual and organizational factors were examined in this paper, future studies should also consider societal factors. The results highlight the importance of equal and supportive organizational practices and cultures to foster empowerment among women in the workplace, providing valuable insights for policymakers.

This paper addresses a critical research gap on the intersection of gender, work and management in the Middle East. It responds to the need for more diverse contextual research on Arab women’s work experiences and provides methodological diversity by using an exploratory, mixed-methods design with a grounded approach. The study highlights the interaction between structural and psychological factors, emphasizing the gap between policies and resources and women’s lived experiences and perceptions of workplace empowerment.