Work and Well-being: Strategies for Work-Life Balance

This assignment discusses work-life conflicts in a telecommunication company and suggests strategies to develop a work-life balance. It includes literature research on work-life conflicts and critiques of the strategies. The focus is on improving employee well-being and managing work-life conflicts.

WORK AND WELL-BEING
STUDENT DETAILS

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Abstract
In this assignment, a telecommunication company is selected in which their old MD laid
off 100 employees. The company also has the call center department for sales and technical
support. There call center department runs in three-shift for 24hours and 7 days. Due to attending
inflexible working shifts and heavy work pressure. It has been noted that employees deal with
work-life conflict issues. This is the psychological issues which also affects physical health. In
this study various methods are suggested through this the employees can manage their work-life
conflicts. In this assignment, literature evidence is also given.

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Statement of the issue......................................................................................................................4
Work-life conflicts key components and strategies to develop a work-life balance.......................5
Strategies for developing a work-life balance.............................................................................6
Literature research on the work-life conflicts..................................................................................8
Critique and cautions of strategies for work-life balance..............................................................10
Below ways should not be adopted by the company.....................................................................12
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................13
References......................................................................................................................................14

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Introduction
Work and wellbeing are the key issues that an individual should pay attention to. The
organization is also focusing on the employee wellbeing to keep them satisfied and motivated at
their working stations. The organization is making efforts in keeping employee wellbeing
because a happy and satisfied workforce is more productive than an employee who is not
satisfied with their organization's culture (Aarseth, Layton & Nielsen, 2016). For this
assignment, a case study is given which states about a large telecommunication company. The
selected company deals in all broadband networks and mobile phone infrastructure. In this
company, 4000 employees with 4000 contractors are working, the company also runs a call
center for 24*7 for the sales department and another call center unit works for technical support.
The employee is working hard and even they attain uneven shifts like 7 am to 3 pm, 3 pm to 11
pm and 11 pm to 7 am. The company announces employee restructuring in which over 1000
people had to lose their jobs. Now, the workload is divided among the remaining people. The
Managing Director (MD) who made these rule has stayed only for 3 months post the
redundancies and then left. Now, the newly appointed MD has changed old rules with his
creative thinking process. The selected topic for this assignment is "Work-Life Conflict”. There
will be a discussion about the work-life conflict and the ways to develop a work-life balance.

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Statement of the issue
In this company, employees are working on 3 shift that is: 7 am to 3 pm, 3 pm to 11 pm
and 11 pm to 7 am. 12 months ago the company announces employee restructure due to this
1000 employees had to lose their jobs. The workload is distributed among the remaining
workforce and revised performance targets are set for everyone. Now, the remaining employees
were loaded with high work pressure. Apart from the new Managing Director who made all these
changes stayed only for 3 months and then left. New MD of the company has figured out that the
primary goal of the company to keep the employee satisfied instead of putting additional
workloads. It is extremely important to identify problems which are related to the work-life
conflicts as the company operates at the different night shifts and also laid off 1000 employees.
Such actions also threaten existing employees for their job security.
It is the common assumption that today’s employees especially people who born after
1982 are the frequent “job hoppers” (Aarseth, Layton & Nielsen, 2016). They quit/change the
job very frequently because they do not want to handle any work extra work pressure. The new
MD has identified that the company has removed 1000 employees and now the workload is
shifted to the existing employee. Now, if the workload remains the same, then the remaining
employees can also leave the job which will eventually increase the employee attrition ration
which is not a positive inclusion for the company’s future. The new MD has changed the
leadership and allocated managers with new roles and responsibility for running the department
smoothly and effectively.

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Work-life conflicts key components and strategies to develop a work-life balance
Employees used to work for satisfying their professional as well as the person living.
Employees always struggle for enhancing their lifestyle, they're professional as well as their
personal growth. It is has been noted that for satisfying their personal and family’s wants,
employees even work on overtime and as a freelancer. Now, work-life conflicts arise when an
individual faces incompatible demands between work and family roles (Cahil, McNamara, Pitt-
Catsourphes & Valcour, 2015). Due to fulfilling multiple roles and responsibility of their
professional life, a person fails to fulfill their family responsibility. This imbalance creates an
intense situation in the family as well on the work station of an individual. For example, It has
been noted that when an individual fails to fulfill their family responsibility due to work pressure
then it creates conflict at the work-life interface (Deerey & Jago, 2015).
An individual experience work-life conflicts when the commitments and responsibilities
of work interference with family life. A situation such as irregular or inflexible working hours,
job stress, extensive travel, strict rules of the company, etc. This situation arises the work-life
conflicts which lead to damage psychological as well as physical health of an individual. Apart
from this, work-life conflicts also diminish the production of the employees which also put an
adverse impact on the organization (Erdamar & Demirel, 2016). The company and an individual
employee need to understand that work-life conflicts give birth to the increase in occupational
burnout, job stress, devalued job performance, adverse effects on the health condition, etc. For
example, inflexible working hours and unexpected meeting can prevent a parent from picking up
their child from school (Germeys & Gieter, 2017).

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Strategies for developing a work-life balance
 In the company it has been noted due to inflexible working hours employees are not able
to manage their professional and family life which gives birth to the work-life conflicts. It
is suggested that the company should allocate work from home system to the employees.
By doing this, employees will be able to manage their time more effectively and
employees will give more time to their family members (Karkoulian, Srour & Sinan,
2016).
 The management should plan for a quarterly or half-yearly family get-together at the
workplace will help the family in understanding their partner's work culture and
practices. For example: when families will see how hard their parents and companions
are working in the office then they may understand why their parents are spending more
time in the office (Lyonette, 2015).
 Providing good health coverage at work-life also benefits the employees in handling their
work-life conflicts. For example: starting quarterly or half-yearly body checkup camps in
the company will help the employees in monitoring their health. By consistent health
monitoring, employees will become serious for their health condition and they will also
try to reduce their work conflicts on their own (Deery & Jago, 2015).
 Offering more breaks and allowing unpaid time off for life events will encourage the
employee to work more effectively. For example, the company can announce that those
employees who are working at night shifts are allowed to take the break of an extra 20
minutes than usual. Apart from this, the company can further announce that employee is
entitled to get paid leave for life events such as marriage, birth and death of their family
members (Orkibi & Brandt, 2015).

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 Wellness benefits will also succor the company in managing the work-life conflicts of
their employees. Wellness benefits include gym memberships, healthy snacks, massage
treatments, etc.
 As an organization, they need to take their employees on vacations or on picnics for
mental relaxation from work pressure or from working on inflexible hours. Regular
picnics will surely increase the company's expenditure but this will help the company in
keeping the work-life balance of their employees.
 Offering childcare services at work-life. Many employees are single parents or when both
parents are working then they keep worrying about the children. So, if the company can
provide the facilities of childcare services at the work station then it will beneficial for
the employees (Prowse & Prowse, 2015).
 During peaks season, the company expected from an employee to deliver more targets. In
this situation, the workload creates on the employees. Now, the employee needs to
understand that they need to set priorities for as per the deadline of tasks instead of
imagining the intensity of work pressure. Work-life conflicts affect the psychological
state of the mind which directly put an adverse condition on physical health like high
blood pressure, headache, pain, etc (Richert-Kaźmierska & Stankiewicz, 2016).

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Literature research on the work-life conflicts
This literature-based evidence showed how leisure benefits affect the employee's work-
life balance. Front line employee’s deals with the frequent face-to-face interaction with the
clients or they deal directly with the clients over the telephone (Lin, Wong & Ho, 2013). Work
schedule of call centers employees is typically different from the normal schedule of Monday to
Friday working till morning to evening. This literature has proved that how rotating shifts or
irregular pattern hours affects the professional as well as a family lifestyle of employees. The
author has also concluded as per the perspective of the company when they desire to deliver high
customer satisfaction for 24*7 hours then they need efficient human resources for performing
duties like handling calls, addressing customer’s query, replying them over the emails or chat,
etc (Cahill, McNamara, Pitt-Catsouphes & Valcour, 2015).
However, this literature proved that the organization is required to understand that
customer satisfaction is attained with complete employee satisfaction. Organization research
indicates that work-life conflict or family life conflict causes cross-domain spillover effects
which the psychological as well as the physical health status of the employee (Lin, Wong & Ho,
2013). As per the study concluded which defines that work-life conflicts slowly and steadily
decrease the productivity of employees. Due to not keeping balance in the work-life and family
culture, it is expected that an employee may go in the depression. As per the author, job design
and social support are the two weapons that can be effectively utilized by the employer and
employee to mitigating work and personal conflicts. The author suggested that the company
should keep the flexible working hours with monetary benefits so that employee can give time to
their family members as well (Lin, Wong & Ho, 2013). Apart from this, the author also
concluded that many time due to the organization's working culture it is not possible that the

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management set flexible working hours for every-one. In this case, the company should give
employee extra pay with more days off. This strategy will keep the employees relax and enhance
their loyalty to the company.
Apart from this, it has been concluded through this evidence that workers from belongs
from the late '80s or '90s prefer to be in relaxation and healthy work environment irrespective of
the demand of the organization’s working culture. To keep engage such an employee, the
company needs to provide effective measures such as better monetary advancements, more
incentive perks, timely week offs, etc. The employee should also be trained with the compliance
and importance of delivering better customer satisfaction practices. An employee needs to
understand that delivering effective and efficient customer service is extremely important
because it brings the revenue in the company and efficient customer service help the company in
accomplishing their targets (Lin, Wong & Ho, 2013).

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Critique and cautions of strategies for work-life balance
Many strategies are suggested in this report for keeping the balance between work life
and professional life. However, these methods are to be adopted by the employer to keep the
employee away from work-life conflicts. Apart from this, all these methods cannot completely
solve the problem of work-life conflict (Sirgy & Lee, 2018). For completely overcoming all such
challenges, every employee needs to prioritize their tasks and need to accomplish their goal
accordingly. All the suggested methods are the ways through which the selected company can
deliver ways through which employee can establish proper balance in their life. The cost of fixed
and variable expenses will be increased but even after doing this, no theory or practical evidence
can be concluded that employee will attain high life of satisfaction or employees will attain
proper balance in their life.
These strategies will only work when every individual employee figure out their issues
specifically. Some people cannot create balance in their work-life due to their adverse health
condition and due to symptoms like depression or anxiety. People need to understand that they
should provide their body proper nourishment and they need to exercise daily for keeping their
mental condition settle because many times it is noted that employee themselves assumes that
their organization is torturing them and transferring huge workloads on them, but in reality their
organization is excepting only for the minimal targets from them instead (Starmer, Frinter &
Freed, 2016).
Thus, the major critique for these strategies is that employee itself also need to settle their
mindset with the working culture of their respective organization. Employee and employer both
have to take appropriate measures to establish a balance between the work-life. The company

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cannot change the habits and family situation of employees, they have to take steps. The
company can only create a healthy working environment for them (Tan-Wilson & Stamp, 2015).

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Below ways should not be adopted by the company
When management started thinking for the welfare of their employees then they try to
give their best that helps the employees to overcome challenges like facing difficult in work-life
balance. Many time management allows a waiver to an employee for late coming and allows
them to take casual leaves. In such a situation the atomic habits of the employee's forms which
create a major barrier for themselves as well as for the organization. Giving approval for late
coming, allowing casual leaves, tolerating working errors and deliberate mistakes of employees
will make them lazier and less productive (Bragard, Dupuies & Fleet, 2015). Through these
steps, it may be possible the work pressure from is reduced but their performance will also
diminish. However, the company should use measures like giving extra incentives for additional
work, allowing work from home, taking employees on vacations, giving meals in office, etc
(Aarseth, Layton & Nielsen, 2016).

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Conclusion
It has been concluded that the company needs to adopt measures for helping the
employees in keeping the balance between work-life and professional life. Around 12 months
before, the old Managing Director of the company had laid off 1000 employees and the workload
of the 1000 employees is shifted to the existing employee. Apart from this, in this study, it is
concluded that when an employee struggle with the work-life conflicts then it affects their
physical health also. The company should allow work from home, more monetary perks and
incentives, outings, etc. for helping the employees in managing their tensions. However, the
employee also needs to figure out their issues. Employees should operate from a positive mindset
for the job because this will enhance their productivity.

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References
Aarseth, H., Layton, L., & Nielsen, H. B. (2016). Conflicts in the habitus: the emotional work of
becoming modern. The Sociological Review, 64(1), 148-165.
Bragard, I., Dupuis, G., & Fleet, R. (2015). Quality of work life, burnout, and stress in
emergency department physicians: a qualitative review. European Journal of
Emergency Medicine, 22(4), 227-234.
Cahill, K. E., McNamara, T. K., Pitt-Catsouphes, M., & Valcour, M. (2015). Linking shifts in the
national economy with changes in job satisfaction, employee engagement and work–
life balance. Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics, 56, 40-54.
Deery, M., & Jago, L. (2015). Revisiting talent management, work-life balance and retention
strategies. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 27(3), 453-
472.
Erdamar, G., & Demirel, H. (2016). Job and life satisfaction of teachers and the conflicts they
experience at work and at home. Journal of Education and Training Studies, 4(6), 164-
175.
Germeys, L., & Gieter, S. (2017). Clarifying the dynamic interrelation of conflicts between the
work and home domain and counterproductive work behaviour. European Journal of
Work and Organizational Psychology, 26(3), 457-467.
Karkoulian, S., Srour, J., & Sinan, T. (2016). A gender perspective on work-life balance,
perceived stress, and locus of control. Journal of Business Research, 69(11), 4918-
4923.

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Lin, J. H., Wong, J. Y., & Ho, C. H. (2013). Promoting frontline employees' quality of life:
Leisure benefit systems and work-to-leisure conflicts. Telecommunication
Management, 36(1), 178-187.
Lyonette, C. (2015). Part-time work, work–life balance and gender equality. Journal of Social
Welfare and Family Law, 37(3), 321-333.
Orkibi, H., & Brandt, Y. I. (2015). How positivity links with job satisfaction: Preliminary
findings on the mediating role of work-life balance. Europe's journal of
psychology, 11(3), 406-432.
Prowse, J., & Prowse, P. (2015). Flexible working and work–life balance: midwives’ experiences
and views. Work, employment and society, 29(5), 757-774.
Richert-Kaźmierska, A., & Stankiewicz, K. (2016). Work–life balance: Does age
matter?. Work, 55(3), 679-688.
Sirgy, M. J., & Lee, D. J. (2018). Work-life balance: An integrative review. Applied Research in
Quality of Life, 13(1), 229-254.
Starmer, A. J., Frintner, M. P., & Freed, G. L. (2016). Work–life balance, burnout, and
satisfaction of early career pediatricians. Pediatrics, 137(4), 343-354.
Tan-Wilson, A., & Stamp, N. (2015). College students’ views of work–life balance in STEM
research careers: Addressing negative preconceptions. CBE—Life Sciences
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