Work-Life Conflict in Canada in the New Millennium

Chapter Seven

Conclusions and Recommendations

So .... what does the elephant look like?

The conclusions one reaches with respect to the prevalence of work-life conflict in Canada depend on what measure of work-life conflict is used and the characteristics of the group being studied. Looking at the data optimistically (i.e. taking prevalence of work interferes with family and caregiver strain as our measures of work-life conflict) we estimate that one in four Canadians working at larger organizations experiences high levels of conflict between work and family. This is the best-case scenario. The worst-case scenario (i.e. estimates calculated using role overload data) is that almost 60% of Canadians who are employed outside the home cannot balance their work and family demands.

So why should we care?

The findings from this body of research leave little doubt that reducing work-life conflict, regardless of the form it takes, will benefit all Canadians. High work-life conflict was found to be associated with a number of indicators of physical and mental health problems at the employee level. Employees who are stressed, depressed and burnt out are not as productive as those in good mental health. Stress, depression and burnout are also linked to increased absenteeism, greater use of prescription medicine and EAP, and lower levels of creativity, innovation and risk-taking. These factors, in turn, can all be expected to negatively impact an organization's bottom line and Canada's ability to be globally competitive. We have also ascertained that high work-life conflict has a negative impact on the organization's bottom line, impairs an employee's health (both physically and mentally), reduces participation in and enjoyment of family roles, negatively impacts employees' abilities to enjoy and nurture their families, is associated with reduced fertility, and significantly increases health care costs.

If things remain as they are, the proportion of the Canadian workforce at risk with respect to work-life conflict can be expected to increase due to a number of well-documented demographic and structural changes in the family⁴ and in the nature of work⁵ (Hammer et al., 2002; Barnett, 1998, Frone, 2002). It is hoped that the findings from this report will help policy-makers and employers put into place strategies, policies and interventions that stem the work-life conflict tide. This report should also prove useful to Canadians who wish to make lifestyle changes to restore balance to their lives.

Future success in an increasingly competitive business environment will depend on making the most of one's employees. While Canadian organizations have long held that 'people are our most important resource,' the policies and practices currently in place in many organizations do not reflect this view. Canadian employers, faced with an impending labour force shortage, are searching for ways to stay 'lean and mean' but effective. Dealing with the issue of work-life balance offers one strategy employees can use to increase their ability to recruit and retain employees in a 'sellers market' for labour.

Who is at risk?

Examination of the data leads to some key conclusions with respect to the prediction of the various forms of work-life conflict:

• no set of factors could be identified that substantively predicted all four forms of work-life conflict;
• organizational culture is a substantive predictor of role overload, work to family interference and family to work interference;
• employees who work in an organization with a culture of hours and a culture of work or family report higher role overload, work to family interference and family to work interference;
• employees who work for an organization with a culture supportive of work-life balance report lower levels of role overload, work to family interference and family to work interference;
• role overload and work to family interference are strongly predicted by work-related factors while family to work interference and caregiver strain are predicted by family factors;
• work to family interference was the only dimension of work-life conflict predicted by sector of employment, income, job type, work arrangement, union membership and place of residence in Canada;
• employees with higher work expectations and whose jobs require that they extend their work hours into times typically reserved for the family are more likely to report high work to family interference;
• caregiver strain is strongly associated with the provision of elder care.

Details on each of these conclusions are given below.

What can we do about it?

The following key conclusions can be drawn to reduce the various forms of work-life conflict considered in this study:

• There is 'no one size fits all solution' to the issue of work-life conflict. This body of research shows quite clearly that differing policies, practices and strategies will be needed to reduce each of the four components of work-life conflict. The workforce is not homogeneous. Gender, dependent care status, and job type are significant moderators of the relationship between many of the coping strategies examined in this study and work-life conflict. Policy planning should take these differences into account.
• The study identified several strategies at the organizational level (supportive management and perceived flexibility) and individual level (have fewer children, do not have children, get enough sleep) that are associated with an increased ability to cope with all four forms of work-life conflict.
• Employees who experience high levels of work-life conflict are, regardless of the form of conflict, less likely to have children. This finding has very important social implications as it links issues such as labour force shortages and pension plan collapse to work-life conflict. Our research suggests that one way to increase Canada's birth rate would be to implement policies and programs to help Canadians cope with work-life conflict in general and role overload and work interferes with family in particular. Suggestions on how this can be done are given below.
• Organizations can do a lot to help employees cope with work-life conflict in general and role overload and work interferes with family in particular. Virtually all of the effective coping strategies identified in this study originated in the organizational domain. With a few exceptions (such as reducing family size and not having children) the ability of personal and family coping strategies to reduce work-life conflict pales in comparison to the effectiveness of actions that can be taken by the organization.
• The same organizational interventions and personal coping strategies that reduce role overload also reduce work interferes with family - but more effectively.
• Perceived flexibility helps employees cope with work-life conflict. Flexible work arrangements do not.
• Work-life conflict depends more on who you report to within the organization than the organization you work for. Family-friendly benefits and alternative work arrangements, on their own, have little to no impact on an employee's work-life conflict. The behaviour of the employee's immediate manager (i.e. extent to which they engage in supportive and non-supportive behaviours), on the other hand, are key predictors of work-life conflict in general, and role overload and work interferes with family in particular. Who you work for is also a key predictor of how much flexibility an employee perceives they have with respect to hours of work and work schedules.
• Work-life policies and programs are necessary but not sufficient in that they will not be implemented or used if an employee's manager is non-supportive of work-life issues.
• While employers often point with pride to the many 'programs' available in their organizations to help employees meet family obligations, these programs or options do not diminish the fact that most people simply have more work to do than can be accomplished by one person in a standard work week. This study indicates that many of the ways employees attempt to cope with workload issues (i.e. decide to reduce their family size or not have children, work harder, cut back on their sleep, take prescription medicine or have a drink, reduce the quality of the work, cut back on outside activities) benefit neither employees, nor their families, employers or Canadian society in general. These findings are consistent with those noted in previous reports, and reinforce our contention that employers and governments need to recognize that the issue of work-life conflict cannot be addressed without addressing the issue of workloads.
• The majority of Canadians do not cope effectively with work-life conflict. Most Canadians attempt to cope by sacrificing their personal lives, cutting back on their social lives, foregoing having children, working harder, and getting less sleep - strategies that this research shows are associated with increased rather than decreased conflict between work and home. Relatively few Canadians cope by putting family first (i.e. modify work schedule, leave work problems at work), seeking social support and using active coping strategies such asprioritizing, delegating and planning.
• Many of the individual and family coping strategies that the research literature links to an increased ability to deal with stress, do not appear to be effective means of coping with work-life conflict. This would point to a need to consider a much broader set of coping responses that are typically studied.
• Caregiver strain has a different source than the other three types of work-life conflict. Coping strategies and organizational interventions that help employees cope with role overload and work interferes with family, in particular, have little to no impact on caregiver strain. Our research shows that policies and community supports (i.e. elder care referral, purchasing help from outside the family) are fundamental to an employee's ability to deal with caregiver strain. This indicates that governments have a great role to play with respect to helping Canadians deal with caregiver strain.

Moving Forward: Key Recommendations Arising from the Balancing Work, Family and Lifestyle National Study

The data reviewed in this report leave little doubt that there is no 'one size fits all solution' to the issue of work-life conflict and that different policies, practices and strategies will be needed to reduce each of the four components of strain examined in this analysis. That being said, this research has identified a number of concrete strategies and approaches that key stakeholders can use to reduce the different types of work-life conflict. The recommendation section is divided into four parts, each of which is devoted to one of the key stakeholders in the work-life arena: employers, employees, governments and unions.

What Can Employers Do To Reduce Work-life conflict?

To reduce work-life conflict and to improve their bottom line, employers need to focus their efforts on the following sets of initiatives:

• make work demands and work expectations more realistic,
• increase employees' sense of control,
• provide flexibility around work hours of work,
• focus on creating a more supportive work culture, and
• increase the number of supportive managers in the organization/decrease the number of non-supportive managers.

We caution the reader than most of the recommendations offered below will not have the desired impact if they organization does not address the issue of management support/organizational culture. Why do we say this? First, the data show that managers are, through their behaviours, the transmitters of culture within their organization and the ones who make employees believe that they are able to exert some degree of control over their work schedule. Managers are also implicated in our discussions concerning workload, through their ability to plan the work to be done, give clear directions and constructive feedback, and their belief in the `culture of hours'.

Decreasing demands, changing the culture to one that supports employees, and increasing perceptions of flexibility and supportive management help all employees cope with these forms of work-life conflict, so progress in these areas should produce the maximum return on investment. Employers that implement some or all of the recommendations noted below should realize significant reductions in employee role overload and work interferes with family, moderate reductions in family interferes with work and some increased ability for employees to cope with caregiver strain. Details on ways forward are given below.

Employers need to make work demands and work expectations more realistic

To reduce role overload, work to family interference and family to work interference, employers need to focus their efforts on making work demands and work expectations realistic. Work demands, rather than demands outside work, are the key predictors of role overload and work to family interference, the two most common forms of work-life conflict in Canada at this time (58% of the employees in this sample report high levels of role overload, while 28% report high work to family interference). While employers often point with pride to the many programs available in their organization to help employees meet family obligations, these options do not diminish the fact that most people simply have more work to do than can be accomplished by one person in a standard work week. Employers and governments need to recognize that the issue of work-life conflict cannot be addressed without addressing the issue of workloads. While a full discussion of workload issues can be found in Report One in this series, it is worthwhile to note the following:

"Comparisons done using the 1991 and 2001 samples suggest that time in work has increased over the decade. Whereas one in ten respondents in 1991 worked 50 or more hours per week, one in four does so now; during this same time period the proportion of employees working between 35 and 39 hours per week declined from 48% of the sample to 27%. This increase in time in work was observed for all job groups and all sectors." (Higgins and Duxbury, 2002, p. 17)

Further work is needed to determine why work demands have increased over the decade. Competing explanations drawn from the data which are discussed in chapter three of this report include 'organizational anorexia', corporate culture, increased use of technology, global competition, constant change, and the fact that employees are worried about the consequences of 'not being seen to be a contributor.' As one survey participant said:

"Changing expectations have driven us to a fast-paced and hectic lifestyle. We have less people to do the same jobs, but jobs have also changed due to technology. We are constantly revving the engine and if not enough oil gets on the pistons, the engine blows up. Business and industry and government need to recognize this and find ways to assist."

As one respondent noted at the end of the survey:

Employers need to identify ways of reducing employee workloads. Special attention needs to be given to reducing the workloads of managers and professionals in all sectors. Accordingly, we offer the following set of recommendations which we believe are critical with respect to this issue:

• 1. Employers need to examine workloads within their organizations. If they find that certain employees within their organization are consistently spending long hours at work (i.e. 50 + hours per week), they need to determine why this is occurring (e.g. ambitious, work expectations are unbalanced and unrealistic, poor planning, too many priorities, do not have the tools and/ or training to do the job efficiently, poor management, culture focused on hours not output, lack of administrative support). Once they have determined the causal factors, they need to determine how these can be addressed to make workloads more reasonable.
• 2. Unrealistic work demands are not sustainable over time and cost the organization in ways that are often not recognized or tracked. We recommend that the employer start recording the costs of understaffing and over-work (i.e. greater absenteeism, higher prescription drug costs, greater EAP use, increased turnover, hiring costs), so that they can make informed decisions with respect to this issue.
• 3. Employers need to identify ways to reduce the amount of time employees spend in job-related travel (i.e. increase their use of virtual teams, teleconferencing technology, etc.). In particular they need to reduce their expectations that employees will travel on their personal time and spend weekends away from home to reduce the organization's travel costs.
• 4. Employers need to track the amount of time employees spend working paid and unpaid overtime and capturing the number of hours it actually takes to get various jobs done. They should also collect data which reflect the total costs of delivering high-quality work in various areas on time (i.e. paid and unpaid overtime, subsequent turnover, EAP and prescription drug use, absenteeism). Such data should be longitudinal in nature, as many of the consequences of poor people management do not appear until six to 12 months after the event. This type of data should improve planning and priority setting, as well as allow senior executives to make better strategic, long-term decisions.
• 5. Many of Canada's largest employers appear to be 'anorexic' especially at the management and professional levels (i.e. they do not have enough people to do the job in a reasonable amount of time). Accordingly, we recommend that employers analyse workloads and hire more people in those areas when the organization is overly reliant on unpaid overtime.
• 6. Employers need to develop protocols around the use of office technologies such as e-mail, laptops and cell phones. They should set limits on the use of technology to support after-hours work and make expectations regarding response times and availability explicit and realistic. The following comments from survey participant speaks to this:

"The amount of work has increased dramatically in the last decade - particularly with the increase in technology. Today we can have someone in our office, an incoming phone call, voice mails and e-mails all of which we are expected to respond to at the same time. Technology has added the expectation of immediate response and solution to the workplace."

"Electronic tools have increased the expectations of availability - anytime anywhere, immediate answers expected. After hours, - during business travel - Sunday and Friday nights - you are now expected to use this time to return voice mail and e-mails."

Employers need to give employees more control over their work

Employers can also help employees deal with heavy work demands by introducing initiatives which increase an employee's sense of control. The research in this area (see work by Karasek, 1979) is quite clear-employees can cope with greater demands if they have a greater sense of control. The literature suggests a number of mechanisms that should be investigated, including increased autonomy and empowerment at the individual employee level, the increased use of self-directed work teams, increased employee participation in decision-making, increased communication and informationsharing, time management training, training on how to plan and prioritize, etc. We offer the following recommendations in this area:

• 7. Employers should provide appropriate support for their employees who work rotating shifts. What is an appropriate support should be determined by consulting with these employees. Policies that have been found to be effective in this regard include limiting split shifts, advanced notice of shift changes, and permitting shift trades (i.e. allowing employees to change shift times with one another).
• 8. To accommodate the diversity in their workforce (in terms of gender, job type, life cycle stage and ethnicity) employers should implement 'cafeteria' benefits packages which allow employees to select, on a yearly basis, those benefits that are most appropriate to their personal situation.
• 9. Employers should give employees the right to refuse overtime work. Saying 'no' to overtime work should not be a career-limiting move. 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 and not the rule.
• 10. Employers should extend their employee assistance program to cover the families of their employees (e.g. offer an employee family assistance program instead). EAP should also include child and elder care referral services
• 11. 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.

The rise in the number of dual-income families, coupled with high levels of role overload and work interferes with family, together with the appeal of part-time work, job sharing and reduced work-week arrangements, suggest that organizations should redesign the part-time job to ensure that people who engage in part-time work for a limited period of time do not suffer economic or career penalties. Introduction of part-time work, if made legitimate and detached from the traditional definition of part-time jobs as jobs requiring low skills and low potential for upward mobility, could make it easier for men and women with dependent care responsibilities to handle work and family requirements more effectively.

Employers should increase flexibility with respect to work time and work location

Despite all the talk about being 'family-friendly', many of Canada's largest employers have not yet implemented flexible work arrangements and only a minority of the employees in the 2001 sample report high perceptions of flexibility in terms of work time and work location. Accordingly, we recommend the following:

• 12. Employers need to provide employees with a greater sense of control over their hours of work and their work schedules. Specifically, to help employees cope with work-life conflict organizations need to make it possible for them to:
  • arrange their work schedule to meet personal/family commitments,
  • interrupt their work day for personal/family reasons and return to work,
  • take their holidays when they want to,
  • be home in time to have meals with their family, and
  • vary their hours of work.

The criteria, under which flexibility in each of these areas can be used, should be mutually agreed upon and transparent. There should also be mutual accountability around their use (i.e. employees need to meet job demands, but organizations should be flexible with respect to how work is arranged).

The process for changing hours of work, location of work, and vacation time should be flexible whenever possible. The increased use of flexible work arrangements would have the added benefit of reducing the amount of time spent commuting to and from work-an important predictor of role overload for women.

• 13. Employers should give employees paid time off work to attend relevant training sessions, courses and conferences. Employees should not have to choose between their family and career advancement.

The strong association between an inability to participate in career development opportunities outside of work hours, and both role overload and work interferes with family, indicate that employees with dependent care responsibility who try to maintain their professional credentials or increase their learning on their own time pay a price - increased work-life conflict. Of course, those who do not engage in learning activities pay a different price - a lack of career mobility and reduced economic benefits and job insecurity. These findings give organizations another incentive to deal with the issue of role overload: an increased ability to recruit and retain talent.

• 14. Employers need to give employees the opportunity to take a fixed number of paid days off work per year (we suggest five) to care for sick children or elderly dependents. This leave should be available on short notice and the employee should not be required to provide a reason for his or her absence. Such stipulations would give employees the flexibility to deal with personal/family matters with a large degree of confidentiality.

This study determined that greater flexibility in both these areas was associated with an increased ability to cope with role overload and both types of role interference. Implementation of these benefits should also produce additional advantages for employers outside the work-life arena as they concretely demonstrate to employees that their employer trusts them, is listening to them, and recognizes their demands outside of work. Our data also indicate that such policies are positively associated with increased levels of commitment and engagement.

Employers need to examine their organizational culture

To reduce role overload, work to family interference and family to work interference, employers must deal with their organization's culture. Work-life policies are a necessary first step to addressing work-life conflict. Unfortunately, our research shows that policies on their own will have little impact as they will not be implemented or used in a culture that is non-supportive of work-life issues. The findings from this study identified three different organizational cultures that are associated with increased work-life conflict: a culture of hours (employees who do not work long hours and who say 'no' to more work will have limited opportunities to advance in their career), a culture of work or family (family leave and family responsibilities limit career advancement) and a non-supportive culture (work environment is non-supportive of balance). The importance of addressing the issue of organizational culture cannot be overemphasized. Culture was the single strongest predictor of role overload, work to family interference and family to work interference for both men and women in our study. A policy approach on its own will not fix what is wrong in many organizations. To address the issue of work-life conflict, employers need to create supportive work cultures. This means changing reward structures, and accountability and measurement systems. Again, the need for such a focus can be seen in the following comment by a study participant:

"I think that we won't have achieved the objective until it becomes socially unacceptable to write e-mails on evenings/weekends, brag about long hours and schedule meetings outside 'core' hours. Although there is much talk about balance, long hours are still rewarded and equated to dedication to the job. Senior managers who talk the most about the need for balance are the worst offenders."

While the recommendations that precede this one will all act to make the work environment more supportive, we would recommend the following specific steps be taken by organizations that wish to focus their efforts on cultural change:

• 15. Organizations need to introduce new performance measures that focus on objectives, results and output rather than time at work (i.e. move away from a focus on hours to a focus on output).
• 16. Employers need to change their accountability frameworks and reward structures. They need to stop rewarding long hours and unpaid overtime work and instead focus on rewarding accurate work plans and sound human resource management.

It is very difficult (if not impossible) to increase perceived flexibility in organizations where the focus is on hours rather than output, and presence rather than performance. To do this, employees need to reward output, not the number of hours worked, and reward what is done, not where it is done. They also need to 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. The following comments from survey participants speak to this issue:

"I believe that existing work/balance policies are adequate, but can be improved upon. I also think that management wants to address problems but is trapped in a culture that measures performance and individual contribution by the old standard of time and ability, rather than by quality."

"Although my employer has invested a lot of effort in studying the issue of work/family balance and in promoting it, the 'work culture' speaks to a different situation. Until the management cadre start to 'walk the talk', the current situation and its implied expectations will continue (employees are considered 'serious' and 'good managers' based upon the number of hours they are at the office). Meetings with senior management are often scheduled after the end of a typical day. There is still a tendency to look down on those employees who choose to respect the normal (paid) work day, and leave to take care of family/home responsibilities."

A number of other recommendations arising from this study, which speak to the issue of culture and supportive work environments, are summarized below:

• 17. Employers need to work with employees to identify the 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.
• 18. Employers need to 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.
• 19. Employers need to communicate to employees the various policies that are available, indicate how these policies can be accessed, and inform whether there are any restrictions to their use. Repeat these communications on a regular basis (e.g. every couple of months). Publish these data on the company's Intranet site.
• 20. Employers need to encourage employees to use the policies by having senior management model appropriate behaviours, conduct information sessions on the policies and how they can be used (e.g. through lunch-andlearn sessions), and communicate how these policies are being used successfully in this organization and in others etc. Employees must be made to feel that their career will not be jeopardized if they take advantage of supportive policies.
• 21. Employers need to measure the use of the different supportive policies and reward those sections of the organization that demonstrate best practices in these areas. They also need to investigate those areas where use is low.

Finally, because culture change is considered to be transformational in nature, we recommend that:

• 22. Organizations need to offer training to senior managers on the critical success factors necessary for transformational change, provide training to managers on how to manage a change of this nature, and ensure that several people on the organization's senior leadership team have the necessary competencies to lead and manage this type of change.

Increase the number of supportive managers within the organization

The findings from this study support the idea that who one reports to within an organization has more of an impact on their ability to balance work and family than either the policies within place in the organization or the organization itself. Accordingly we recommend the following:

• 23. Employers need to increase the number of supportive managers within their organizations, while simultaneously reducing the number of managers who are seen to be non-supportive. Specifically they need to increase the number of managers within their organization who consistently display the following behaviours:
  • make work expectations clear.
  • listen to their employees.
  • are effective at planning the work to be done.
  • give employees recognition when they do their job well.
  • make themselves available to answer their employee's questions.
  • ask for employee's input before making decisions that affect their work.

  While decreasing the number of managers who:

  • have unrealistic expectations with respect to the amount of work that can be done in a given amount of time.
  • expect their employees to put in long hours, just because they do.
  • make employees feel guilty if they need to take time off work because of personal or family issues.

While all employees who work for a supportive manager are substantially more able to cope with role overload, work interferes with family, and family interferes with work, men and women in other positions in the organization benefit the most from such managers. Similarly, while all employees who work for a non-supportive manager are significantly less able to cope with role overload, work interferes with family, family interferes with work and caregiver strain, this type of manager is particularly problematic for employees with dependent care responsibilities, female managers and professionals, and for men and women who work in other positions within the organization.

How should organizations proceed with respect to this issue? Specifically, we would recommend that:

• 24. Organizations commit resources 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:
  • the skills they need to manage the 'people' part of their job (i.e. communication skills, conflict resolution, time management, project planning, how to give and receive feedback),
  • 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 child care and elder care),
  • the time they need to manage this part of their job (people management has to be seen as a fundamental part of a manager's role, not just 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),
  • incentives to focus on the 'people part' of their jobs (i.e. measurement and accountability, 360 feedback (allowing employees to evaluate their manager's performance), rewards focused on recognition of good people skills, 'people' performance should be part of promotion decisions, hiring decisions, etc., public recognition of supportive supervisors, and measurement of management support and non-support should be tied into the manager's performance appraisal system).

Other recommendations to employers:

Additional recommendations to employers arising from this body of research include the following:

• 25. Employers need to analyze their benefit costs and understand who is using which facet of their benefit plan: EAP, short- and long-term disability claims (incidence and duration), workers' compensation benefits, absenteeism, prescription drugs. Such assessment would allow the organization to put a dollar figure on the costs associated with workplace health and work-life conflict and help interested parties make a compelling case for change. As CCIH (2002) notes:

"Such a case is necessary before organizations will make the financial/cultural commitment to put together the changes necessary to move their organization towards healthier workplace practices and policies."

• 26. Human resource and occupational health and safety groups should work together to address issues associated with work-life conflict. Both groups have a key role to play in this area and have much to gain by working together (i.e. can broaden their constituencies and gain a better understanding of the big picture ). A silo approach to change in this area is likely to fail.
• 27. Employers should move away from their current reactive approach to workplace health (i.e. EAP, unpaid time off work) and instead implement benefits and practices that deal proactively with work-life conflict and its downstream impacts (i.e. child care and elder care referral services, cafeteria benefits plans, flexible work arrangements, screening programs for disease or depression, education sessions).
• 28. Employees should strategically link workplace health and work-life initiatives to broader organizational goals such as recruitment, retention and succession planning. This strategy would help those who champion such initiatives make the business case for change.
• 29. Employers should quantify the impact of their work-life and workplace health programs on key outcomes and critical success factors. Again, these data would help those who champion such initiatives establish their impact on the 'bottom line.'
• 30. Organizations should place accountability for the implementation and success of work-life and workplace health initiatives with senior management, and not on HR. Senior management has a critical role to play in creating a healthy work environment, because they make most of the decisions with respect to how, when and where and under what conditions work gets done. Their success or failure in these areas should be reflected in how they are compensated.

The data collected in this study support a number of more specific suggestions on the reduction of the different types of work-life conflict considered in this study. These additional recommendations are summarized below.

What else can employers do to reduce role overload?

• 31. Employees who wish to help employees (especially those with dependent care responsibilities) cope with role overload should implement a telework program within their organization.

Organizations and employees should, however, recognize that this reduction in role overload comes at a cost - increased work interferes with family.

What else can employers do to reduce work interferes with family?

As noted earlier, employers concerned with work interferes with family should provide appropriate support for their employees who work rotating shifts. They should also:

• 32. Provide all employees in their organization who are being moved to a new location with services to support their re-location.

What else can employers do to reduce caregiver strain?

• 33. Employers who wish to help employees cope with caregiver strain should implement flextime work arrangements in their organization.

Organizations and employees should, however, recognize that this reduction in caregiver strain comes at a cost - increased family interferes with work. Employees who are worried about their family interfering with their work are better off working a fixed, nine-to-five work schedule.

What Can Employees Do To Reduce Work-life Conflict?

While the options in this regard are more limited than what employers can do (in our opinion many families are using all available options with respect to coping), we offer the following recommendations to individual employees with respect to what does and does not help:

What not to do - work harder, reduce standards at home, cut back on sleep

• 1. Employees should not attempt to cope with work-life conflict by:
  • 'just working harder and trying to do it all'
  • reducing the quality of things that they do, especially at home
  • cutting back on their sleep

These three coping strategies, which are used by the majority of employed Canadians in this study, are associated with increased levels of all four forms of work-life conflict examined in this study. These strategies are particularly problematic for men and women in managerial and professional positions, where the reward for doing a good job and exceeding work expectations is often more work!

Employees have to recognize that 'No one can balance your life but you'

While we offered a number of suggestions on how employers can increase employees' sense of control, the findings from this study indicate that many of the solutions to this issue ultimately come back to how individual employees behave. We recommend that:

• 2. Employees need to say 'no' to overtime hours if work expectations are unreasonable.
• 3. Employees need to limit the amount of work they take home to complete in the evenings. Employees who do bring work home should make every effort to separate time in work from family time (i.e. do work after the children go to bed, have a home office).
• 4. Employees need to turn their PDAs and Blackberry devices off when engaged in family activities and/or when their children are awake. They should also resist checking their e-mail during these time periods.
• 5. Employees need to limit the amount of time they spend in job-related travel.

Seek help from your family physician

Our study indicated that 'toughing it out' and 'trying and do it all' often exacerbates rather than alleviates work-life challenges. The data shows that employees who have experienced high levels of all four forms of work-life conflict for a sustained period of time would benefit from a visit to their doctor and prescription of appropriate medication. Accordingly we recommended the following:

• 6. Employees who are experiencing challenges balancing work and family roles consult their family physician.

Such a strategy, while effective, does however come at a cost: increased demand on Canada's health care system, increased spending on prescription medication, and the potential of negative side effects from continual use of such medication. In other words, we make this recommendation knowing that this is a 'band-aid solution' which will do little to alleviate work-life conflict over the long run. As such we recommend that it be employed in conjunction with a number of the other strategies included in this report.

Just 'trying to forget about it' does not solve anything

• 7. Employees need to educate themselves on how to deal effectively with work-life conflict. Things such as financial planning courses and nurturing an awareness of which community resources are available for those with child care and elder care responsibilities are likely to help employees increase the amount of control they have over these issues.

A number of respondents indicated that they coped with work-life conflict by 'just trying to forget about it.' Unfortunately, we determined that the use of this strategy is associated with increases in role overload, family to work interference and caregiver strain for employees in general and men and women with dependent care responsibilities in particular. Family problems and challenges at home do not go away just because we ignore them, and employees have to personally take the appropriate actions needed to reduce work-life conflict. A number of these actions are summarized in the recommendations given below.

Employees should use active coping strategies such as delegation and prioritization

This study determined that the use of active coping strategies were effective at alleviating role overload and family interferes with work for some of the groups in the study. For this reason we recommend that:

• 8. Employees with dependent care responsibilities prioritize and delegate work to others.

It should be noted that these strategies are most effective when family roles are given priority.

Family members should not try and cope by sacrificing their personal needs

• 9. Employees need to maintain a healthy social life.
• 10. Employees need to maintain personal standards at home.

A substantive number of the employees in this study attempted to cope with work-life conflict by leaving things undone around the house and cutting down on outside activities. On a positive note, moderate (i.e. weekly) use of these strategies was associated with a reduction in role overload and work interferes with family for employees with dependent care responsibilities and women in managerial and professional positions. On a negative note, both of these strategies were associated with increased levels of role overload and work interferes with family when used several times a week or more. Employees, therefore, need to use both these strategies in moderation.

Employees should make a concerted effort to leave work problems at work

This study identified two strategies that were very effective at reducing role overload and work interferes with family. Both strategies involve the employee setting boundaries between their work and family life and making a concerted effort to reduce the extent to which work intrudes on family. The following recommendations are key to the reduction of overload and the extent to which work intrudes on family:

• 11. Employees need to make a concerted effort to leave work problems at work - both physically and mentally.
• 12. Employees should modify their work schedule as necessary (i.e. reduce the number of hours they spend in work, work different hours than they do) to manage role demands at home.

These recommendations are consistent with our contention that the employee has to 'make balance happen'.

There is, however, one caveat with respect to our recommendation on modifying work schedules. The data show that for the non-professionals in our sample, modification of one's work schedule once or twice a week is ideal with respect to balancing work and family. Daily use of this strategy, on the other hand, is associated with a sharp increase in work interferes with family.

Money does help but only when used in moderation

Many of the employees in our sample bought supports from outside the family in an attempt to increase their work-life balance. Unfortunately, our results indicate that employees who cope by buying goods and services report higher levels of role overload and work interferes with family than those who are able to get such support within the family. The data is much more positive with respect to the relationship between hiring help to care for children and role overload. This strategy is very effective when used once or twice a week. Overload and family interferes with work is, however, substantially higher when reliance on paid child care is high. Similarly, hiring help to care for elderly dependents is associated with lower levels of caregiver strain for women when used moderately often. Caregiver strain is, however, substantially higher when reliance on paid elder care is high.

Accordingly we recommend the following:

• 13. Employees should occasionally hire someone to help care for children and/or elderly dependents. Employees should cover family responsibilities for each other
• 14. Employees with dependent care should cover family responsibilities for each other at home.

Men and women both benefit if they have a spouse who will cover for them at home. Higher use of this strategy is associated with lower levels of role overload for both genders. This suggests that employees can cope with extra demands at work, if they have a partner to pick up the slack and if they are willing to help out when the situation is reversed.

Other recommendations to employees from this study, which deserve mentioning, include:

• 15. Employees need to take advantage of the supportive policies and flexible work arrangements available within their organizations.
• 16. Employees need to raise work-life balance issues in their discussions within the workplace and within the community.
• 17. Employees with caregiving responsibilities should selfidentify so that their employer can try to respond. This is particularly true with respect to issues surrounding elder care, when the employer does not know that the employee is facing challenges outside work. It is difficult for an employer to assist if he or she does not know there is a problem.
• 18. Employees and managers alike need to model the type of behaviour that is associated with organizational support of work-life balance, as actions speak louder than words in this arena (i.e. do not call meetings late in the day or early in the morning, do not expect employees to travel on personal time to save money for the organization).

What Can Governments Do To Reduce Work-life Conflict?

Governments at all levels have a critical role to play with respect to this issue. Recommendations to governments arising from this body of research can be grouped into six broad areas: legislative change, child care and elder care; financial incentives for change; health promotion activities; structural changes at the governmental level, and support of relevant research and data collection.

Labour standards and legislative requirements

There is a need for consistency with respect to labour standards and legislative requirements pertaining to work-life conflict. For example, at the present time, labour standards legislation in most Canadian jurisdictions⁶ (exceptions include Manitoba, Ontario and Saskatchewan) does not provide employees with an explicit right to refuse overtime (thereby limiting their ability to control their workloads). Similarly, many jurisdictions do not allow employees the right to time off in lieu of overtime (at the present time, only Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Quebec and the Yukon have such a provision in their labour standards legislation). Such standards would provide a starting point for organizations in developing workplace policies and practices that address work-life conflict issues. We recommend that governments implement legislation:

1. Which stipulates that an employer's management rights do not include an implied right to require an employee to work overtime, except in an emergency
2. That gives employees the right to time off in lieu of overtime pay.
3. That entitles employees to up to five days of paid personal leave per year. This leave should be available on short notice and the employee should not be required to provide a reason for his or her absence. Such stipulations would give employees the flexibility to deal with personal/family matters with a large degree of confidentiality.
4. Includes specific language around long-term unpaid leave for the care of an elderly or disabled dependent (a disabled dependent can require full-time care for a longer period of time than can be granted under Canada's current compassionate care leave legislation).

Child care and elder care

Our findings from this research are clear: employees who are overloaded, experience interference between work and non-work roles and have high levels of caregiver strain, cope by having fewer children, delaying the start of their family, and deciding not to have any children. The fact that these strategies are associated with greater work-life balance for employees in general and female managers and professionals in particular, indicate that governments need to take action so that men and women in Canada can have a meaningful career as well as a fulfilling family life. Research from Europe (Sweden in particular)⁷ has found that social policies designed to help working mothers (including universal child care) are associated with increased fertility rates. Accordingly, we recommend that governments consider the following actions:

• 1. Take the lead with respect to the issue of child care. In particular, they need to determine how to best help employed Canadians deal with child care issues (i.e. develop appropriate policies for parents of children of various ages, identify and implement relevant supports in the community, provide more high-quality day care). There is no 'one size fits all' solution to the issue of child care. Some women want to work, some women need to work, and some women want to stay home when their children are young. Government policy should be designed to offer choices to Canadians families - so that they can select the option that works best for their family.

The demands on family caregivers are likely to increase as Canada's population continues to age and the provision of services shifts from institutions to home and the community. Adequate and appropriate supports for caregivers are required to support them in their role. The data examined in this report identifies the short terms costs of caregiving (i.e. poorer health, increased physician visits and prescription drug use). Recent research by Fast et al. (2000), however, indicates that this may be 'the tip of the iceberg' - that there may also be long term public expenditure implications if informal caregivers are not supported (they estimated that it would cost between $4.9 and $6.3 billion to replace the voluntary of family members with paid caregivers). Accordingly, we recommend the following:

• 2. Governments need to take the lead with respect to the issue of elder care. In particular, they need to determine how to best help employed Canadians deal with elder care issues (i.e. develop appropriate policies, identify and implement relevant supports in the community).
• 3. Governments and employers increase the range of supports for employed Canadians with elder care responsibilities. Specifically governments should consider the following types of support: making 'out of pocket' elder care expenses tax deductible; sponsoring flexible, professionally staffed in-home and community-based respite care; extension of the compassionate care leave benefit.⁸
• 4. Governments need to examine how they can reduce the 'financial penalties' associated with parenthood (i.e. determine how to concretely recognize that these employees have higher costs). Suggestions here include identifying ways to make it financially feasible for one partner to stay home during the time period when family demands are particularly great (i.e. when children are young, when a parent is dying), universal day care programs, increased respite care, and more high-quality homes for the aged.

Financial incentives

At this point in time, governments pay the lion's share of the costs associated with poor workplace health practices through their support of the country's health care system. To motivate employers to focus more attention on this issue, governments need to increase the tangible costs to employers of inaction in this area. They need to consider financial incentives to support employers that do their part to promote workplace health, and penalties for those who do not. We recommend that they consider the following activities:

• 5. Offer employers financial incentives to encourage investment in workplace health promotion. Included within this umbrella should be activities targeted to reduce role overload, role interference and caregiver strain. These incentives could take the form of a tax rebate, changes to income tax, or be provided through the Worker's Compensation Program.
• 6. Remove the financial disincentives for employers to expand their health care funding activities. This could be done by allowing employers to write off the cost of health promotion and work-life programs.
• 7. Publish report cards on organizations that link employment practices to health care systems costs. These report cards would allow tax payers to determine the extent to which they are subsidizing different organizational actions.

Governments need to create a public push for change in this area

Governments also have a critical role to play with respect to communicating the need for change in this area to the public at large, and brokering partnerships with key stakeholder groups who have an interest in addressing these issues. Such a strategy will create further incentives for change at the organizational level. To this end we recommend the following:

• 8. The costs (bottom line as well as opportunity costs) of ignoring workplace health and work-life issues should become the focus of government social marketing campaigns. These campaigns should be similar to those done for drinking and driving and cigarette smoking and should emphasize how organizations and Canadian society benefit from healthy workplace practices.
• 9. Canada should use a population health model to re-frame the business case for workplace health promotion. Instead of discussing the achievement of individual return on investment (ROI) goals, the focus should be broader social objectives linked to health, wellness, balance, fertility, and demands on Canada's health care system.
• 10. Governments need to investigate ways to increase Canadians' awareness of how social roles and responsibilities have changed over the past several decades, what changes still need to happen, and why (social marketing campaigns, education programs in schools, advertisements). Such changes are necessary to address the issues identified for female managers and professionals in this report.

Structural Changes

This issue has multiple stakeholders and it is unrealistic to think that the various levels of government can, on their own, make the changes that are necessary. The following recommendations address these issues in that they involve cooperation across the various levels of government with respect to his issue, changing of priorities and actions within. To this end we recommend that governments:

• 11. Create one central web site that serves as an electronic distribution center for knowledge and best practices in this area. This web site should provide information on both the financial and social benefits of change. Currently, information is scattered across the country, efforts are being duplicated, and many are not aware of best practice solutions.
• 12. Partner with communities and employers to find solutions to these issues.
• 13. 'Lead by example' with respect to the availability and accessibility of flexible work arrangements, workplace health promotion and work-life balance initiatives. As one of the largest employers in the country, governments need to take a leading role with respect to this issue by tangibly showing the way.
• 14. Governments at all levels need to place the work-life balance of Canadians at the top of their agenda if the want the country to remain globally competitive and the health care system to be financially viable.

Provide financial support for empirically sound research in the area

Unfortunately, there is still a need to 'prove' the business value of workplace health and work-life programs, and to develop the business case for change. There is a need for timely, accurate and reliable data. More research needs to be directed toward studies that specify the link between performance and productivity and work-life practices, work-life conflict and the decision to have children, and work-life conflict and demands on Canada's health care system. We recommend that the government:

• 15. Support research and pilot projects that establish best practice in work-life management and support the development of sound public policy in this area.
• 16. Ensure that measurement systems are put in place to collect the data that is needed to track costs and change in this area.

What Can Unions Do To Reduce Work-life Conflict?

Unions have an important role to play in the establishment of family-friendly practices in the workplace. We recommend that unions:

1. Become advocates of employee work-life balance by undertaking public campaigns to raise awareness of work-life issues and suggest ways in which the situation can be improved. This advocacy should be done outside the collective bargaining process.
2. Include work-life provisions (i.e. flexible work arrangements, family-friendly benefits) in negotiations during the collective bargaining process, with the objective of gaining new accommodations in collective agreements.
3. Include work-life provisions (i.e. flexible work arrangements, family-friendly benefits) in negotiations during the collective bargaining process.
4. Support the implementation of cafeteria-style benefits packages.
5. Set up educational campaigns to:
   • increase individual worker's knowledge of work-life balance issues, and
   • give employees the tools they need to effectively deal with situations as they arise

Closing Comments

The growing stress on the working population caused by role overload and conflict between work and family responsibilities is both an economic and social problem. Productivity is impaired, costs or production are unnecessarily high, and personal health and family well-being are at risk. The dimensions of the problem have increased over time. This stress affects both men and women in professional and unprofessional jobs. This is a societal issue. Individuals, families, employers and governments can all take actions to moderate the stress, and they can all share in the benefits if action is taken. Most of the actions reduce costs in both the shortand long-term. All that is required is a shift in attitudes, and a recognition that workers are family members and family members are workers. Canada relies on families to carry the responsibility for nurturing their children, their elderly and other dependants. We also expect people of working age to work and earn their own living. Supporting them in meeting all those responsibilities is a positive sum game.

The findings outlined in this study are somewhat disturbing in terms of what they say about Canadian values. Why is caring for our seniors and our children causing so much strain? Why are Canadian men and women foregoing having families or reducing the number of children they have? Has there been a change in values in Canada? Do Canadian organizations with a culture of work or family and a culture of hours reflect what is important to Canadians? Do such cultures give us a competitive advantage globally or are we hurting our chances of future success by focusing on short-term gains? Are we asking too much of families? Are we asking too much of employees? The data outlined in this report suggest that Canadians need to take a step back and reassess these issues.

Canadian employees and employers 'survived' the 1990s. Our ability to thrive in this millennium may well depend on how we move forward with respect to the issues outlined in this report.

The first priority is to reduce the demands on working Canadians

The data suggest that employers and governments who wish to improve the health of their workforce, reduce tax burdens on their citizens, and positively influence the health care system need to pay attention to role overload. This form of work-life conflict is strongly associated with heavy work demands, longer hours at work, higher amounts of unpaid overtime, greater amounts of work-related travel and a culture of face time - where the emphasis is on 'presenteeism' as opposed to actual output. It also represents the highest levels of relative and absolute risk to poorer physical and mental health, and to all measures of use of Canada's health care system included in this study.

The link between hours in work and role overload, burnout and physical and mental health problems suggest that these workloads are not sustainable over the long term. The data from this study reinforce this conclusion. Canadians are subsidizing, through their tax dollars and financial support of the health care system, organizational practices such as 'doing more with less,' downsizing, basing promotions on hours at work, setting unrealistic work expectations, managing by crisis, etc. Organizations that employ such strategies should bear the financial costs of such strategies - not Canadian taxpayers.

The second priority is to reduce caregiver strain

This form of work-life conflict appears to be closely linked to physical health problems and higher use of medical care services and prescription medications. The proportion of the workforce experiencing high levels of caregiver strain is expected to increase dramatically in the next decade as, first the parents of the baby boomers, and then the baby boomers themselves, require care. If steps are not taken now to put policies, procedures and institutions into place to help employees care for their aging parents, the costs associated with this kind of strain can be expected to increase dramatically in the near future.