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Published August 2009

Challenges to Work-Life Balance

 

  Brian Kropp

The uncertain economic environment has placed tremendous personal and workplace pressure on employees. Corporate Executive Board (CEB) analysis has shown a drastic decline in employee engagement since the start of the economic downturn, with the number of disengaged employees having risen dramatically from 1 in 10 in 2006 to 1 in 3 in the first quarter of 2009.

With financial instability fueling growing demands in many areas of employees' lives, it comes as no surprise that leveraging work-life balance practices provides employees with much needed flexibility and can greatly improve employee engagement overall. In this volatile economic climate, with downsizing and restructuring efforts having left employee morale low and workloads heavy, creating opportunities that can improve employee work-life balance can also have a tangible bottom-line impact for the business. Implementing effective work-life balance initiatives, however, can be challenging, and is directly linked to how well today's workforce development executives can identify and provide the right mix of benefits that are highly valued by the workforce.

The Business Case for Work-Life Balance

CEB research of more than 160,000 employees across industries and geographies has identified an interesting correlation between work-life balance and today's economic environment. While work-life balance has risen on employees' priority lists, their overall satisfaction with achieving it has fallen. CEB has been surveying employees throughout the downturn, and as of the second quarter of 2009, employees now rank work-life balance third only behind compensation and future career opportunities in terms of employer attributes that are of importance to them, compared to a ranking of sixth in 2006. Yet, today, the study shows that only 30 percent of employees are satisfied with their work-life balance, as compared to 53 percent prior to the downturn.

These trends directly affect companies' bottom lines in the form of decreased employee productivity. CEB's research also shows that more than 30 percent of employees miss time from work in order to meet their work-life needs. CEB's study has shown that effective work-life balance offerings can bolster lagging employee effort levels. Specifically, surveys show that employees who feel they have a better work-life balance work 21 percent harder than those who don't, which can dramatically improve the performance of organizations in the current economic environment. In addition, employees who are satisfied with their work-life balance are 33 percent less likely to leave their current organization than their peers who are not satisfied. While turnover might not be at the top of the agenda for most organizations right now, improving work-life balance can also result in better retention when the economy rebounds.

The Common Challenges for Organizations

While it is clear that improving employee work-life balance has real value to organizations, defining and improving the work-life balance of employees can be challenging. To better understand how organizations can most effectively deliver and maximize ROI in this area, CEB analyzed the most essential elements of employee work-life balance and determined the key lies in creating the right work-life proposition (WLP). The WLP is a set of work-life practices that employees perceive as the value they gain through employment in the organization. This includes six categories: work time, work location, family, development, services and health.