Recommendations

There is no "one size fits all" solution to the issue of work-life balance. The data from this study show quite clearly that different policies, practices and strategies will be needed to accommodate employees at different stages of their careers and life cycles. That being said, the data indicate that there are a number of strategies and approaches that employers and governments can use to reduce work-life conflict. Recommendations targeted at both of these groups are given below.

What Can Employers Do to Reduce Work-Life Conflict?

To reduce work-life conflict and improve overall quality of life, employers need to focus their efforts on four sets of initiatives:

• increasing the number of supportive managers within the organization;
• providing flexibility around work;
• increasing employees' sense of control; and
• focussing on creating a more supportive work environment.

Specifically, we recommend that:

1. Employers should devote more of their efforts to improving "people management" practices within their organization. They can increase the number of supportive managers within the organization by giving managers at all levels:
   
   
   1. the skills they need to manage the "people" part of their job (i.e. communication, conflict resolution, time management and project planning skills, how to give and receive feedback),
      
      
   2. the tools they need to manage people (i.e. appropriate policies, the business case for support, training on how to implement alternative work arrangements, Web sites and other resources on how to handle different human resource problems, referral services to help employees deal with specific problems such as childcare and eldercare),
      
      
   3. the time they need to manage this part of their job (i.e. people management has to be seen as a fundamental part of a manager's role, not just as an "add on" that can be done in one's spare time - an overworked manager finds it difficult if not impossible to be a supportive manager),
      
      
   4. incentives to focus on the "people part" of their job (i.e. measurement and accountability, 360-degree feedback, rewards focused on recognition of good people skills, performance of the "people part" of the job should be part of promotion decisions, hiring decisions, etc.)
      
      
2. Employers need to provide employees with more flexibility around when and where they work. The criteria under which these flexible arrangements can be used should be mutually agreed upon and transparent. There should also be mutual accountability around their use - employees need to meet job demands, but organizations should be flexible with respect to how work is arranged. The process for changing hours or location of work should, wherever possible, be flexible.
   
   
3. It is very difficult (if not impossible) to implement flexible work arrangements in organizations where the focus is on hours rather than output and on presence rather than performance. This means that organizations that want to increase employees' work-life balance need to introduce new performance measures that focus on objectives, results and output (i.e. move away from a focus on hours to a focus on output). To do this they need to reward output, not hours, and what is done, not where it is done. They also need to publicly reward people who have successfully combined work and non-work domains and not promote those who work long hours and expect others to do the same.
   
   
4. Employers need to create more supportive work environments. While the preceding recommendations all aim to make the work environment more supportive, we recommend the following specific steps be taken by organizations that wish to focus their efforts on cultural change:
   
   
   • Work with employees to identify which types of support they would like (i.e. diagnose the situation) and which types could be accommodated within the organization. Not all supportive policies are feasible and practical in every context.
     
     
   • Develop and implement appropriate supportive policies. The development phase should include an analysis of the potential problems associated with the implementation of each policy and suggestions on how these problems could be addressed.
     
     
   • Communicate to employees the various policies that are available. Indicate how these policies can be accessed and any restrictions on their use. Repeat these communications on a regular basis (e.g. every couple of months). Publish data on the company's intranet.
     
     
   • Encourage employees to use the policies by having senior management model appropriate behaviour, conducting information sessions on the policies and how they can be used (e.g. "lunch and learns"), communicating how these policies are being used successfully in the organization and in others (i.e. communicate best practices), etc. Employees must be made to feel that their careers will not be jeopardized if they take advantage of supportive policies.
     
     
   • Measure the use of the different supportive policies and reward those sections of the organization that demonstrate best practices in these areas. Investigate those areas where use is low.
     
     
5. Employers should give employees the right to refuse overtime work. Some organizations may want to give management limited discretion to override the employee's right to refuse overtime (i.e. emergency situation, operational requirements), but this should be the exception rather than the rule. Implement time-off arrangements in lieu of overtime pay.
   
   
6. Employers should provide a limited number of days of paid leave per year for childcare, eldercare or personal problems.
   
   
7. Employers need to make it easier for employees to transfer from full-time to part-time work and vice versa. They should introduce pro-rated benefits for part-time work, guarantee a return to full-time status for those who elect to work part-time and allow an employee's seniority ranking and service to be maintained.
   
   
8. Employers need to examine workloads within their organizations. If they find that certain employees are consistently spending long hours at work (i.e. 50 or more hours per week), they should determine why this is occurring (e.g. career ambitions, unbalanced and unrealistic work expectations, poor planning, too many priorities, lack of tools and/or training to do the job efficiently, poor management, culture focused on hours instead of output) and how workloads can be made more reasonable.
   
   

What Can Governments Do to Reduce Work-Life Conflict?

We also recommend that governments take the following actions:

1. As one of the largest employers in the country, the federal government should, itself, become a best practice and model employer in the area of work-life balance (i.e. introduce appropriate policies, enact forward-thinking legislation, change accountability frameworks). Provincial governments should also take this tack. Such an approach will give governments the moral authority to ask for changes in this area from others.
   
   
2. The lack of availability of affordable, quality childcare services is, for many workers, a critical work and family issue. We echo many others when we recommend that the Government of Canada, in conjunction with the provinces, develop and implement a national childcare program that addresses the needs of children of all ages (i.e. affordable, quality daycare, supervision for older children, before and after school care, extracurricular programs).
   
   
3. Furthermore, in the context of a rapidly aging population and increasing life expectancy and the resulting greater need for working-age individuals to provide care for their parents or other elderly relatives, we recommend that the Government of Canada, in conjunction with the provinces, develop and implement a national eldercare program.
   
   
4. An elderly parent can require full-time care for a longer period than can be granted under short-term leave. This need is infrequently recognized. We recommend that labour legislation include specific language around long-term, unpaid leave for the care of a parent.
   
   
5. Governments should also make it easier for family members who wish to stay home to care for their children or elderly dependants. At this time, such a choice often has negative tax implications for the family.
   
   

The data also indicate that families who have greater financial resources are better able to cope with work-life balance. The exact causal mechanism is hard to determine but is probably linked to the fact that families with greater disposable incomes report higher perceived control (i.e. these employees feel they can afford to leave a non-supportive work environment, and can purchase goods and services that increase balance). This would suggest that one way to reduce work-life conflict is to find ways to "make work pay." Options in this regard could include tax credits, changes to the minimum wage, etc.

Finally, it should be noted that policy makers will miss reaching the needs of real families if they continue to base public policy on outmoded definitions of what a family is. Many policies are based on decades-old definitions of a male breadwinner or the idealized nuclear family of mother, father and dependent children. Increased longevity, divorce and remarriage trends, and non-traditional family structures have changed what a "family" is. Public policy should reflect this.