Understand what contemporary management issues and challenges are in modern organisationsCLO2Apply relevant theories to crit

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PERSPECTIVE published: 30 November 2018

doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02414

Edited by: Montgomery Anthony,

University of Macedonia, Greece

Reviewed by: Sebastian Molinillo,

Universidad de Málaga, Spain Marinella Coco,

Università degli Studi di Catania, Italy

*Correspondence: Justin Craig Field

[email protected]

Specialty section: This article was submitted to

Organizational Psychology, a section of the journal Frontiers in Psychology

Received: 27 July 2018 Accepted: 16 November 2018 Published: 30 November 2018

Citation: Field JC and Chan XW (2018)

Contemporary Knowledge Workers and the Boundaryless Work–Life

Interface: Implications for the Human Resource Management of the

Knowledge Workforce. Front. Psychol. 9:2414.

doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02414

Contemporary Knowledge Workers and the Boundaryless Work–Life Interface: Implications for the Human Resource Management of the Knowledge Workforce Justin Craig Field1* and Xi Wen Chan2

1 UNE Business School, University of New England, Armidale, NSW, Australia, 2 School of Management, College of Business, RMIT University, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

In the last decade, knowledge workers have seen tremendous change in ways of working and living, driven by proliferating mobile communication technologies, the rise of dual-income couples, shifting expectations of ideal motherhood and involved fatherhood, and the rise of flexible working arrangements. Drawing on 54 interviews with Australian knowledge workers in the information technology sector, we argue that the interface between work and life is now blurred and boundaryless for knowledge workers. By this, we mean that knowledge workers are empowered and enslaved by mobile devices that bring work into the home, and family into the workplace. Knowledge workers take advantage of flexible working to craft unique, personal arrangements to suit their work, family, personal and community pursuits. They choose where and when to work, often interweaving the work domain and the home–family domain multiple times per day. Teleworkers, for example, attain rapid boundary transitions rending the work–home boundary, thus making their experience of the work–life interface boundaryless.

Keywords: work–life theories, boundaryless work–life interface, knowledge workers, human resource management, organizational psychology

INTRODUCTION

Ways of working and living have changed dramatically in post-industrial economies in the last decade. First, proliferating information and communication technologies (ICT), often mobile, are connecting people, but also intensifying work beyond traditional offices and working hours (Ciolfi and Lockley, 2018). Second, more women are working. Dual-income couples are now the norm (Abele and Volmer, 2011). Third, expectations of parenthood are changing. Mothers are working more, while balancing parenting with working. Fathers are increasingly more involved in parenting, shifting from exclusively being breadwinners (McGill, 2014). Finally, companies are offering flexible working arrangements (FWAs), so that employees can vary the time, schedule and location of work, to suit their needs.

Knowledge work is dominating in post-industrial economies. Knowledge work involves manipulating and transmitting ideas, rather than goods. In particular, knowledge workers use

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ICT to exchange meaning. Knowledge processes are unconstrained, occurring in any location and at any time (Nelson et al., 2017), but they are subject to the influence of organizational culture, technological support, and supervisory arrangements, as well as the agency of knowledge workers to subvert or comply with organizational norms.

Considering rapid technological change, demographic change, societal change and the rise of knowledge work, we propose a new appreciation of the boundaryless work–life interface for flexible knowledge workers. Despite intense work and non- work activities, we contend flexible knowledge workers do not emphasize the distinction between work and non-work. Rather, they work at any place and time, but also manage to achieve harmonious balance in their lives. Existing work–life theories do not present the work–life experiences of flexible knowledge workers accurately. Hence, we describe a richer conceptualisation of the work–life interface for this group and discuss implications for human resources (HR) policies and management methods in the digital economy.

EXISTING THEORIES ON THE WORK–LIFE INTERFACE

Work–life theories can be classified into three streams: (1) negative side of the work–life interface, stemming from role strain theory, (2) positive side of work–life interface, stemming from role accumulation theory, and (3) blurred boundaries between work and non-work, stemming from boundary and border theory.

Negative Side of the Work–Life Interface Role strain theory, which originated from Goode’s (1960) scarcity perspective, contends that multiple roles lead to role strain and subsequently interrole conflict (work–family conflict) as it becomes difficult to perform each role due to conflicting demands on time, energy and attention among the roles (Greenhaus and Beutell, 1985). Defined as “an individual’s experience that work and family roles are incompatible in some respect, as a result of which participation in one role is made more difficult by virtue of participation in the other role” (Greenhaus and Beutell, 1985, p. 77), work–family conflict had dominated work– life research owing to the rise of dual-income households with children. However, Marks (1977) argued that role strain was not a result of incompatible role demands, but by role imbalance, as there is a difference in the importance of roles assumed. Marks (1977) added that no role strain would occur if all commitments were equally positive or negative. Barnett and Hyde (2001) also reasoned that having several roles was not the issue, it was the quality and combination of roles that contributed to role strain.

Positive Side of the Work–Life Interface As research on work–family conflict matured, Greenhaus and Powell (2006) responded to calls to examine the positive side of the work–life interface. Drawing on role accumulation theory, Greenhaus and Powell (2006, p. 73) proposed the concept of work–family enrichment, defined as “the extent to which

an individual’s experiences in one role improve his or her quality of life in other roles.” Role accumulation theory was jointly developed by Sieber (1974) and Marks (1977), both of whom argued that having multiple roles is more rewarding than stressful, and that the more roles individuals took on, the more resources they possessed, and the more opportunities they were exposed to. Research on work–family enrichment increased drastically in the past decade in large part due to the positive psychology movement and demographic trends which have given rise to workplace policies that seek to enhance employees’ work and life (Brough and O’Driscoll, 2015). The strongest criticism on work–family enrichment is it does not acknowledge the negative side of the work–life interface, which many researchers argue cannot be dismissed since people tend to struggle with managing their work and non-work responsibilities.

Blurring of Boundaries Between Work and Life In this research, we use “work–life” as opposed to “work– family” or “work–home” to acknowledge non-work roles (e.g., community, social and personal pursuits) (Moen, 2011). Alongside work–family enrichment and conflict are several theories on work–life balance, including Ashforth et al.’s (2000) boundary theory and Clark’s (2000) border theory. However, research on work–life balance has not advanced theoretically because of inconsistent definitions of work–life balance (Kalliath and Brough, 2008). Border theory and boundary theory contribute to the study of work–life linkages by describing how varying levels of work–life integration affect well-being, and addressing how people construct and cross boundaries between work and life.

Boundary Theory Boundary theory focuses on the meanings people assign to work and life (Nippert-Eng, 1996) and the ease and frequency of transitioning between roles (Ashforth et al., 2000). Boundaries are clearer when roles are separated, while role transitions are easier when roles are integrated. Role blurring is the experience of confusion or difficulty in distinguishing work from non-work roles, especially when roles are highly integrated (Desrochers et al., 2005). Boundaries can be classified by their flexibility and permeability. Flexibility is the “extent to which the physical time and location markers, such as working hours and workplace, may be changed”; permeability is “the degree to which a person physically located in one domain may be psychologically concerned with the other” (Hall and Richter, 1988, p. 215). Roles can be arranged along a segmentation– integration continuum: when role boundaries are inflexible and impermeable, the roles are segmented; when boundaries are flexible and permeable, roles are integrated (Ashforth et al., 2000). Studies (e.g., Hyland and Prottas, 2017) using boundary theory have found that permeability is asymmetrical—work demands tend to spill over into non-work domains. Individuals with strong segmentation preferences face challenges crossing boundaries; while those with strong integration preferences face challenges in creating and maintaining boundaries. Drawing on Weiss and Cropanzano (1996) affective events theory, Hunter et al. (2017)

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extended boundary theory by incorporating goal obstruction as the explanatory mechanism linking work-to-family conflict and job satisfaction. Specifically, boundary violation events (e.g., taking a phone call from a family member at work) occurring at work were appraised as obstructing one’s work goals due to time and attention redirected from meeting work goals to meeting family needs.

Boundaryless work–life interface of knowledge workers Knowledge work tends to involve a high degree of both flexibility and permeability, facilitating role blurring or, increasingly, a state of “boundarylessness” (Albertsen et al., 2010). Unlike traditional “9-to-5” jobs, knowledge work is characterized by a less rule-based and more flexible regulation, especially in terms of time, space, and jobscope (Allvin, 2008). That is, knowledge workers typically have individualized schedules, temporal and geographical flexibility, and more job autonomy (Albertsen et al., 2010). “Boundarylessness” does not necessarily suggest the complete absence of boundaries between different life domains, but it illustrates weak to virtually absent domain boundaries (Ezzedeen and Zikic, 2017). Since the concept of “boundarylessness” is a new and novel phenomenon, we focus on understanding the boundaryless nature of knowledge workers’ work–life interface. Accordingly, the pursuit of empirical observations is important as it contributes to theory development and decision-making for employees, managers and organizations (Albertsen et al., 2010).

Border Theory Border theory is devoted only to work and family domains. Work–family balance is the outcome of interest, defined as “satisfaction and good functioning at work and at home, with a minimum of role conflict” (Clark, 2000, p. 751). It differs from boundary theory in that definition of borders includes psychological categories and also tangible boundaries that divide the time, place and people associated with work and life. Borders are characterized by their strength, from weak to strong. Weak borders are more likely to be permeable and flexible, facilitating blending between roles. Strong borders are more likely to be inflexible and impermeable, preventing role blending (Clark, 2000). Border-keepers are members of a domain who are influential in defining the border and the domain. Conflict may arise when border-keepers and border-crossers do not agree on the exact boundaries of a domain. They may also disagree about the flexibility and permeability of the boundary.

Research Question In this study, our goal is to illuminate the poorly understood boundaryless nature of knowledge workers’ work–life interface. Existing work–life theories do not adequately and accurately account for knowledge workers’ work and non-work experiences. Therefore, we seek a deeper understanding of how flexible knowledge workers perceive and navigate their life domains, and to discover various contextual and socio-cognitive factors that influence their perceptions and decisions. Therefore, a qualitative design is particularly apposite for our research. We interpretively explored three questions: (1) How do flexible

knowledge workers perceive, think about, and experience the interface between their work and non-work domains? (2) How do flexible knowledge workers perceive and manage role boundaries between their work and non-work domains? (3) What contextual and socio-cognitive factors account for flexible knowledge workers’ differing perceptions and decisions when managing their work–life interface? In sum, we qualitatively explored the perceptions and decisions of flexible knowledge workers with the understanding that these have implications for their individual, work and family functioning (Ashforth et al., 2000).

METHODS

To answer our research questions, we conducted an exploratory case study, using an embedded single-case design (Yin, 2009) to examine knowledge workers’ perceptions about balancing work and life. Each participant represented an embedded sub-case within the case study. We adopted an interpretive research approach, giving voice to participants’ interpretations and perceptions of the work–life interface. The participants’ point of view is the foundation of our analysis. This section provides a detailed description of our method, to support dependability and transferability (Lincoln and Guba, 1985).

Data Collection The research site was the Australian affiliate of a multi- national technology company (referred to as “Tech”). Tech had around 130,000 employees worldwide at the time of the study, with around 2,100 employees in Australia. Access to employees at the research site was negotiated with the HR director. Before we approached Tech, we sought ethics approval from the University of New England’s Human Research Ethics Committee. The HR director allowed us to gather data in two ways. First, semi-structured interviews were the principal source of information about participants’ thoughts, feelings and perceptions about work–life balance and how they arranged their working and personal lives. Confidentiality was protected by a written informed consent agreement with each participant. Second, we gathered policy documents, people directory entries and corporate broadcast emails from Tech’s intranet, and we downloaded Tech’s statutory reports to government agencies, as triangulation sources. In addition, the principal researcher wrote field notes after each interview to document researcher responses and states, using ongoing reflective commentary (Shenton, 2004) to capture assumptions, emotional states and possible bias.

Semi-Structured Interviews The lead researcher conducted all interviews to maintain a consistent data collection approach. He conducted pilot interviews with five participants drawn from Sales, Human Resources and Research & Development departments at Tech. Pilot participants used FWAs in different ways: three were teleworkers, one was part-time, and one was full-time, about to begin parental leave. The purpose of the pilot interviews was to test the interview template (see Appendix 1) against the research

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questions, across different jobs and different demographic attributes, and to enhance dependability by following a consistent procedure, per guidelines of Miles et al. (2014).

We developed the interview template for the pilot interviews from a study of the literature, focusing on satisfying the research questions. Prior to the pilot interviews, we reviewed the interview template with academic colleagues, to enhance objectivity and confirmability (Lincoln and Guba, 1985). Sample questions included: What triggered your request for flexible working? How do you balance work versus home and family? How do you define what is work time and what is non-work time?

Following the pilot interviews, the interview template was revised with supplementary questions. For teleworkers, we found it useful to ask: Do you ever work very early or very late? Is this your choice or has your manager directed you? How do you blend work tasks and home or childcare tasks, when working from home? For part-time participants, we asked: To what extent do you work on a non-working day? Is this your choice or has your manager directed you? We also found it useful to ask all participants about availability: When do you make yourself strictly unavailable? Do you ever disconnect? These questions explored richer detail about participants’ methods of forming and dismantling boundaries, and their perceptions of organizational norms and their personal responses to such expectations.

Document Gathering We gathered relevant documents from Tech’s intranet, including people directory entries for all participants, copies of published policies, and corporate broadcast emails from business leaders or Tech HR team. We also gathered Tech’s statutory reports to the Workplace Gender Equality Agency.

Sampling and Saturation To identify participants accessing FWAs, Tech’s HR team provided reports listing Tech employees with part-time hours, with flexible or remote working arrangements, and with completed leaves of absence (other than annual and sick leave). We used non-probability purposive and snowball sampling techniques (Bernard and Ryan, 2010). We used the reports to identify the population of all employees using FWAs, and we invited all employees in the population to participate in interviews. We also asked Tech HR managers and interviewees to recommend other employees who might have relevant experiences to share. This was productive because we discovered some employees using informal FWAs (e.g., working at home as a personal arrangement with the manager) did not appear on Tech’s official records.

Overall, we interviewed 54 participants at Tech (Field, 2017). Participants fell into three categories: part-time, teleworkers, and sabbaticals. Some participants had multiple experiences, so they fell into multiple categories. Participants represented 39% of all part-time employees at Tech Australia, and 40% of all teleworkers at Tech Australia, giving credibility and depth to the findings of this case study. Because sabbaticals were infrequent and episodic, it was not possible to calculate a participation rate.

Saturation for part-time participants was achieved after 12 of 24 interviews. After the twelfth interview, we heard repeated

themes of work expanding into non-work time and efforts to juggle work and family. Saturation for teleworker participants was achieved after 15 of 30 interviews. After the fifteenth interview, we heard repeated themes of blending work and home/family during the work day and being available outside of conventional working hours. Turning to sabbatical participants, it was not possible to establish whether saturation was reached. Only five interviews were conducted, because employees going on sabbaticals are rare at Tech.

Data Preparation All recorded interviews were transcribed into text files (one participant did not consent to audio recording). We provided the text files to participants for verification, if they had made this request before interview, to enhance credibility and authenticity of the study (Miles et al., 2014). During transcription, the lead researcher recorded transcription memos to capture generative insights, connections and themes (Sunstein and Chiseri-Strater, 2012). Each transcript was made anonymous by introducing pseudonyms and code numbers for each participant. We used MAXQDA for data coding and analysis, and uploaded interview transcripts, field memos, transcription memos, and gathered documents. The data corpus consisted of 53 interview transcripts and one interview summary (Field, 2017), plus 177 other documents including field notes, transcription memos, coding memos, company policies, company statutory reports, company emails and people directory entries. There was a total of 473,206 words in interview documents, and 106,466 words in the other documents.

Data Analysis We use the technique of thematic qualitative text analysis (Kuckartz, 2014) to examine common elements between participants and groups, differences between participants and

TABLE 1 | Deductive coding and analysis from literature review and theory.

Theoretical area Category Codes

Role strain theory Work–life conflict • Work conflict at home/family

• Home/family conflict at work

Role accumulation theory

Work–life enrichment

• Work enrichment at home/family

• Home/family enrichment at work

Boundary theory and Border theory

Boundaries and borders

• Defining work domain boundaries

• Defining home/family boundaries

• Crossing boundaries

• Perceptions of boundary keepers

• Perceptions of boundary crossers

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groups, and relationships within the data. The principal unit of analysis was each participant’s interview transcript. We read through each transcript closely multiple times, identifying segments addressing our research questions.

We began data analysis with a primarily deductive approach, in order to examine participant perceptions in light of role strain theory, role accumulation theory, boundary theory and border theory. We developed thematic categories (Kuckartz, 2014), displayed in Table 1, then coded all interviews using the broad thematic categories. We chose the unit of coding to be at the paragraph level, in interview transcripts. We also wrote individual case summaries.

In the second cycle of coding, we retrieved all segments within a category, then used an inductive method, in alignment with our research questions, to formulate sub-categories from the data. For example, when investigating ‘Crossing boundaries’ and ‘Work conflict at home/family’ for part-time participants, we coded for the health status of dependent children, the nature of the day (working or non-working), the clock time (within or beyond conventional working hours), and the organizational hierarchical status (e.g., vice president or individual contributor) of the co-workers making contact.

To enhance credibility, preliminary themes and findings were shared with academic colleagues and discussed at length, to challenge the analysis, using the peer debriefing method (Kuckartz, 2014). The purpose of this debate was so that findings would not rely on the interpretations of a single analyst alone, enhancing trustworthiness of the analysis (Miles et al., 2014). We also used negative and deviant case analysis (Richards and Hemphill, 2018), aiming to find excep

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