Enabling Managers to Achieve Work-Family Balance: A Demands-Control Model of Housework Behavior and Family Satisfaction

16 Pages Posted: 3 Jun 2008 Last revised: 9 Jun 2008

See all articles by Margarita Mayo

Margarita Mayo

Fundación Instituto de Empresa, S.L.

Juan Carlos Pastor

IE Business School

Ana Isabel Sanz

Fundación Instituto de Empresa, S.L.

Abstract

The interplay between work and family has received a great deal of attention in the last two decades. We know very little, however, about the organizational factors that enable managers achieve a good balance between their work and family lives. Following Karasek (1979) demands-control model, we hypothesized that managerial workload will interact with time flexibility and task autonomy to predict the division of household labor, which in turn will influence family satisfaction. A sample of 103 managers reported their workload and their spouses reported the division of housework activities and their level of satisfaction with family life. Results show that time flexibility and task autonomy at work moderated the relationship between managers work demands and their spousal ratings of housework overload. As time demands increased, managers with low time flexibility contributed less than their spouses in household work (as reported by the spouse) than managers with high flexibility. A similar pattern emerges regarding travel and task autonomy. In turn, spousal housework overload had a negative impact on family satisfaction. Results are discussed in terms of their implications for managerial job redesign.

Keywords: Work-family balance, Housework Overload, Demands-Control Model, Stress

Suggested Citation

Mayo, Margarita and Pastor, Juan Carlos and Sanz, Ana Isabel, Enabling Managers to Achieve Work-Family Balance: A Demands-Control Model of Housework Behavior and Family Satisfaction. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1138789 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1138789

Margarita Mayo (Contact Author)

Fundación Instituto de Empresa, S.L. ( email )

Mª Molina, 12 - 5º
Madrid, 28006
Spain
915689741 (Phone)

Juan Carlos Pastor

IE Business School ( email )

Mª Molina, 12 - 5º
Madrid, 28006
Spain
+34915689742 (Phone)

HOME PAGE: http://www.ie.edu/business

Ana Isabel Sanz

Fundación Instituto de Empresa, S.L. ( email )

Serrano 99
Madrid, 28006
Spain

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