Concerns of Inflexible Working Hours for Men and its Impact on Women's Careers

The report analyzes the impact of inflexible working hours of men on women's careers, particularly during the caregiving and parenthood phase. It identifies the key human resource issues and provides recommendations on how workplace equality can be implemented.

Report on Concerns inflexible working hours for men could be
damaging women's careers for the
Human Resource Manager

Executive Summary
The report deliberately provides an analysis of the interrelationship between the flexible working
hours of the men to that of the career of the women. The focus is primarily on the caregiving and
parenthood phase where the chances of the come back to the work life for women are the least
owing to the responsibility norms and psychological perspective to be that of women. All these
perspectives have critically analysed with the aim of identifying and understanding the
relationship and contradictions as well. Upon these the recommendations as to how the
workplace equality in its fullest can be implemented is provided within the report.

Table of Contents
1.0 Introduction................................................................................................................................4
2.0 Men within the workforce are not allowed flexible working options.......................................4
2.1 Brief Summary of the Story...................................................................................................4
2.2 Identification and discussion of the key human resource issues............................................5
3.0 Factors in relation to the implication of the work and family in perspective of Gender
Difference........................................................................................................................................6
3.1 Brief Summary of the Story...................................................................................................6
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................7
Recommendations............................................................................................................................7
References........................................................................................................................................8

1.0 Introduction
A critical as well as contextual evaluation and analysis has been presented within this report
focusing on the different aspects of how inflexible working hours of men are highly potential of
damaging the career of men. The report by focussing on the contemporary news story mentioned
above is going to further identify the issues in context of human resource management with
gender as well as parenthood perspectives. An intense research on the available literature and
scholarly resources have been referred in order to fulfil the aim of this report to identify the
human resource issues that are contemporary in relation to the terms of impact on the career of
the women particularly from the inflexible hours of work that is done by women. The different
prospects and wage development and other factors are critically reviewed from the
organizational perspective as well as the implications of the caregiving roles that are integral to
the working profile of the are investigated (Jacobs &Padavic, 2015). The challenges in relation to
gendered mobility, work management related to men and women with its underlying socio-
economic impact are also presented within the report.
2.0 Men within the workforce are not allowed flexible working options
2.1 Brief Summary of the Story
Men are often not offered flexible timing during their parenthood due to which, most of the
responsibilities related to parenthood is on the women. The factor behind this is that there are no
organizational policies in relation to that of the flexibility for men as there are in case of men no
such policies that supports flexible working hours or timing during parenthood. This is the very
reason that the returning back to work life after motherhood is highly challenging to the women
human resource. Work, employment and society are correlated depending on which the
management of the career and the family depends that allows the couple to operate. According to
the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP), the benefits of flexible working is beneficial
for both men and women but is limited to the women in major terms (Langner, 2018). There are
only a few organizations that provide men with flexible working hours owing to the conventional
concept of wage that is related to the flexible working hours. Flexibility in the workplace is in
consideration with that of the wage structure that is often accepted by the women rather than men
(Powell, 2018). A full-time job is often a mandate for the men whereas women in their

motherhood are given parental leave but the contrary lies on some other factor. The factor is that
the comeback of the women hardly takes place as men are not offered with flexible hours of
work that leaves the whole responsibility on women where there are fewer chances of getting
into a full-time job (Prance, 2017). There are different types of monetary benefits that yielded
through flexible timing but the benefit is mostly limited to the men since women require to
provide their commitments as often reasons of responsibility hinder the working career for
women (Langner, 2018).
2.2 Identification and discussion of the key human resource issues
The key human resource issue in relation to men and women flexibility and how that impacts the
working career of the women is dependent refers to the conventional norms that is behind the
development of the organizational policies. The organizational policies are improvising with the
changes in the legislation in relation to that of the Employment Equality but that does not exist in
terms and in case of parenthood or any other work-life balance flexibility that is required by men
as well (Pedulla&Thébaud, 2015). Therefore, it is quite evident that, the socio and economic
perspectives of the human resource manager is the determinant of these type of human resource
policy. However, changes in the scenario is taking place that are evident from the
exemplification for the media story of Rick Breumelhof was approved for four months leave
which he took for his daughter. Rick Breumelhof worked in Deloitte that allowed him to take the
leave which was the very reason for which her wife Stephanie was able to take up her previous
profession of teaching on a full-time basis ("Could men's inflexible working arrangements be
damaging the career prospect of their wives?", 2018). Deloitte that is one of the 17 companies
within South Australia that in collaboration with the other companies from different industries
that formed the group of Gender Equity where this organization in the chief. It is very important
that more and more companies improve their organizational policies which are the key factor the
effective human resource in relation Gender Equality perspective. Issues in the form of social
concepts are still prevalent as such; fathers cannot be the primary, caregiver that is the notion of
being considered in the gender equality concept of human resource management. Another
instance includes the case of Victoria MacKirdy who was the mother of five and the fifth being 8
months old, was offered a full-time job of general manager role at Alexandrina Council. It was
then her husband, a physio was able to cut down his practice into part-time that Victoria

MacKirdy could take the full-time job. Thus, it is quite evident how the flexible working hours
of men are the determinant of the career of women, especially after motherhood.
3.0 Factors in relation to the implication of the work and family in perspective
of Gender Difference
3.1 Brief Summary of the Story
In this era of globalization and technology, despite the issues discussed above in relation to that
of the concept of gender equality and the scope of its implications that is yet overt, the approach
of the men and women in relation to that of the managing workplace and caregiving roles are
simultaneously taking place. The psychological perspective of this idea is that stress among the
caregivers especially in case of women is high. More stress is evident when the women alone
tries to pull off both the role of in workplace and caregiver as well. The most obvious factor
behind this type of stress and condition of women is that the male partner in the parenthood is a
full-time employee or there is no chance of getting flexible work timings so that women can also
focus on the career without being stressed. Again the aspirations of the women towards
organizational engagement and development as well is also at question owing to the involvement
of women at work who is come back in the professional life (Hoobler, Lemmon & Wayne,
2014). Less career engagement and less career motivation are some of the allegations that are
accused as factors behind the decrease in the career development of the women, This is where
again the contribution of the male partner in relation to that roles within the household they play
and the lack of work flexibility makes it crucial for women to take up the leading role there
rather than in the career development (DePasqualeet al. 2017). This psychoanalytic factor can
never be avoided and requires consideration while making organizational policies.
3.2 Identification and discussion of the key human resource issues
There are numerous organizations that have the different human resource management policy in
relation to the couples who operate within the same organizations or there are policies of flexible
working in case any male employee asks for the same. The initiation of the men towards the
caregiving roles in the family is also very important. It is quite obvious that parenting a shared
role but that sharing is dependent on the employment factors where one is employed. The very
concept of women being the superhuman who have been strongly balancing and taking the
responsibility of both a mother and working professionals is true but with the fact that the stress
level underlies over the very fact (Nomaguchi& Johnson, 2016). There are challenges like and

unfriendly societal norms worldwide in Asian countries where these factors facilitate working
men with supportive social conditions and the women are more restricted in terms of social
mobility autonomy that are contradictory to the socio-economic changes owing to struct
structural inequalities (Gaetano, 2017). According to (Slaughter, 2015), the equality that is
claimed on the legislative level as well as within the values if organizational policies, there
persists some gaps between the adoption of the initiative and its implications. A constant
pounding thoughts always persist among the women which cannot be related to the concept of
flexible working hours being the reason behind the less chances of coming to professional. This
is argued in the psychoanalytic perspective where, it is found that women even after getting back
to work is highly concerned about the child care during the workplace activities which may be
the reason that human resource managers allow flexibility for parenthood to women more than to
women (Berns, 2017).
Conclusion
Through the above analysis, diverse constraints, point of view and egalitarian relationship has
been evident that allows the understanding of the whole concept that is related to that of the
flexibility of being one of the major determining factor of women’s career. Internal Factors of
the human resource management in relation to that of the women workforce is yet another factor
that have been evident through the analysis.
Recommendations
According to Pedulla &Thébaud (2015), the changes in the implication of the gender equality in
relation needs proper monitoring of the implication where, men are also allowed to take parental
leave. Moreover, one of the member being in home psychologically may give the other partner,
the satisfaction of the caring responsibilities. This is how the sharing responsibility with the
support of the human resource practices is going to provide the support to the come back career
of women as well (Yavorsky, Kamp Dush&Schoppe‐Sullivan, 2015). The flexibility and the
schedules are required to be well aligned with the wages so as to ensure the implementation of
modern day customized human resource management practice that is highly recommendable for
the managers as well (Jacobs &Padavic, 2015). Mere commitment of the women will not work
wonders, the flexible working hours of the men is also required to be provided by the human
resource manager as per which the deserved designation must be offered to women and not any
part-time activity.

References
Berns, S. (2017). Women Going Backwards: Law and change in a family unfriendly society.
Routledge. London, UK
Could men's inflexible working arrangements be damaging the career prospect of their wives?.
(2018). Retrieved from http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-31/calls-for-better-working-
hours-for-men/10184968?section=business
DePasquale, N., Polenick, C. A., Davis, K. D., Moen, P., Hammer, L. B., & Almeida, D. M.
(2017). The psychosocial implications of managing work and family caregiving roles:
Gender differences among information technology professionals. Journal of family
issues, 38(11), 1495-1519. Doi: 10.1177/0192513X15584680
Gaetano, A. M. (2017). Women, Work, and Marriage: Challenges of Gendered Mobility in
Urban China. In China’s Urbanization and Socioeconomic Impact (pp. 109-
124).Springer, Singapore. Doi: 10.1007/978-981
Hoobler, J. M., Lemmon, G., & Wayne, S. J. (2014). Women’s managerial aspirations: An
organizational development perspective. Journal of Management, 40(3), 703-730. Doi:
10.1177/0149206311426911
Jacobs, A. W., &Padavic, I. (2015). Hours, Scheduling and Flexibility for Women in the US
Low‐Wage Labour Force. Gender, Work & Organization, 22(1), 67-86.
Langner, L. A. (2018). Flexible men and successful women: the effects of flexible working hours
on German couples’ wages. Work, employment and society, 32(4), 687-706. Doi:
10.1177/0950017017708161
Nomaguchi, K., & Johnson, W. (2016). Parenting stress among low-income and working-class
fathers: The role of employment. Journal of family issues, 37(11), 1535-1557. Doi:
10.1177/0192513X14560642
Pedulla, D. S., &Thébaud, S. (2015). Can we finish the revolution? Gender, work-family ideals,
and institutional constraint. American Sociological Review, 80(1), 116-139. Doi:
10.1177/0003122414564008
Powell, G. N. (2018). Women and men in management.Sage Publications. New Jersey, USA
Prance, G. (2017). Natural clocks. In About Time (pp. 26-38). Routledge. London, UK
Slaughter, A. M. (2015).Why women still can't have it all (pp. 84-102). OneWorld. Retrieved
from https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/cfawis/slaughter.pdf

Yavorsky, J. E., Kamp Dush, C. M., &Schoppe‐Sullivan, S. J. (2015). The production of
inequality: The gender division of labor across the transition to parenthood. Journal of
Marriage and Family, 77(3), 662-679. Doi: 10.1111/jomf.12189