work-life balance: the impact of family friendly policies on

APPENDICESon Employees’ Job Satisfaction and Turnover Intention
BY
Human Resources Management Option
An Honors Degree Project Submitted to the School of Business in Partial Fulfillment of the Graduation Requirement for the Degree of Bachelor of
Business Administration (Honors)
Hong Kong
April 2007
Work-Life balance: The impact of Family Friendly Policies on Employees’ Job Satisfaction and Turnover Intention
i
CONTENT
CHAPTER II – LITERATURE REVIEW AND HYPOTHESIS ....................................................5 2.1 Family Friendly Policies ............................................................................ 5 a) Compressed Workweeks (Five day work week) ......................................... 6 b) Flextime ....................................................................................................... 7 c) Family Leave ................................................................................................ 9 d) Employee Assistance Programs ................................................................ 10 2.2 Turnover intention ................................................................................... 12 2.3 Job satisfaction......................................................................................... 12 2.4 Job satisfaction and Turnover intention.................................................. 12 2.5 Meditating effect of job satisfaction ........................................................ 13 2.6 Conceptual Model of Hypotheses ............................................................ 14 3.1 Sample ...................................................................................................... 15 3.2 Measurement Instruments....................................................................... 16 3.3 Data Analysis............................................................................................ 17
CHAPTER IV- RESULT ................................................................................................................19 4.1 Sample and Descriptive Statistics............................................................ 19 4.2 Cronbach Alpha Reliability Test ............................................................. 20 4.3 Independent Group t-test......................................................................... 21 4.4 Mean, Standard Deviations and Zero-order Correlation ....................... 21 4.5 Regression Analysis.................................................................................. 23
CHAPTER V- DISCUSSION AND RECOMMENDATION .........................................................25 5.1 Discussion ................................................................................................. 25 5.2 Practical Implications .............................................................................. 29 5.3 Study Limitations..................................................................................... 30 5.4 Recommendations for future research .................................................... 32 5.5 Conclusion ................................................................................................ 33
APPENDIX A………………………………………………………………………..40 APPENDIX B……………………………………………………………………..…47
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ACKNOWLEDGMENT
First, I would like to express my truthful gratitude to my Honors Project Supervisor –
Dr. Vivienne Luk for her generous and priceless guidance. I am grateful for her
patience and support throughout this project.
In addition, a thousand thank to my mentor Mr. MF Cheng for his generosity and
tremendous assistance in helping distributing questionnaires in the research process.
Also, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to all my dear classmates, friends
and family members for their whole-hearted support during the research process.
Finally, I would like to thank to all of the respondents for spending their valuable time
to complete the questionnaire.
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ABSTRACT
This study aims to investigate the relationship between a full set of family friendly
policies which includes five day work week, flextime, family leave and employee
assistance programs and turnover intention. It also demonstrated that the mediating
effect role of job satisfaction of this relation.
Data were collected from 112 full time employees. They were asked to indicate the
availability of a list of 12 family friendly policies in their organizations, job
satisfaction and their intention to leave the current job. Significant negative relations
were found in regressing turnover intention on the whole of family friendly policies,
five day work week policy, flextime policy, family leave policy and employee
assistance programs. Moreover, job satisfaction was found only to have significant
positive effects on five day work week policy an employee assistance program.
1
CHAPTER I- INTRODUCTION
Work- life balance seems to be an important part of corporate social
responsibility nowadays. Good employers need to recognize their obligations so that
they can ensure employees are not working so hard to damage their lives outside of
work or lead to health problems. A work-life balance survey conducted in 2004 by
Community Business reported that Over 75% of 1,000 respondents are suffering from
stress and said they don’t have a healthy balance between their personal and work
lives (Community Business, 2004).Increasing levels of stress can rapidly lead to low
employee morale, poor productivity and decreasing job satisfactory. More and more
employees are expressing significant to severe stress over workload and work-time
pressures( Brooks 1999, Families and Work Institute 1998). Prior research showed
that the benefits of implementing family friendly policies in organization can
significantly address employee retention, job satisfaction, employee morale and
productivity. (Lockwood, 2003).
In response to the current situation, the Hong Kong Administrative Region
Government also remarked the importance of having family friendly environment in
the year 2005 to 2006 Policy Address. The government encouraged private
organizations and social services to deliberately introduce the family friendly policies
in the workplace of Hong Kong to help employee to balance their work and life. The
2
arrangement of five day work week in Hong Kong Government has been smoothly
implemented to some departments from 1 July 2006 in phase one. Most of the staff
welcome the new arrangement since they can spend more time with their family;
pursue further studies, sports and recreational activities during the longer weekend.
In fact, there are many western countries like Australia and USA, an increasing
number of family friendly policies have been adopted in organization to achieve
work-life balance (Saltzstein & Ting, 2001; Strachan & Burgess, 1998). Organizations
which adopted the policies most benefit from reducing absenteeism and improving
productivity (Clifton & Shepard, 2004). Some researches also showed that employees
with assess to the policies express less intention to leave the organization and a higher
commitment. (Grover & Crooker, 1995).
1.1 Statement of problem
In recent years, there has been an increasing trend for organizations to implement
more family friendly policies such as five day work week, flextime, family leave, and
employee assistant programs to improve employee morale and productivity by
reducing absenteeism and turnover. However prior literatures primarily investigated
the impact of separate components of the family friendly policies, but not consider the
multiple policies. In order to effectively cultivate a family friendly workplace in Hong
3
Kong, it is essential to promote comprehensive policies to all the organizations. For
example, five-day work week is believed as initiative that would most assist
employees in achieving work-life balance. Hong Kong’s biggest employers, the SAR
Government has already implemented this policy for the civil services. However, the
research findings from Community Business (2006) reported that there is only 28.1%
of the employers provides five-day work week in the workplace nowadays. Therefore,
a comprehensive study on the impact of entire family friendly policies is needed in
gaining a better understanding of the policies in order to make the implementation in
the future.
1.2 Purpose of the study
The purpose of this study is to look at the impact of family friendly policy on
employees’ job satisfaction and turnover intention. Results of this study will be useful
for organization to better decide the policy to use, consequently helping organization
increase the productivity and effectiveness and retain the talents. Besides, this study
can also aim to cultivate a family friendly workplace in Hong Kong as a result to help
employee achieve work life balance.
4
1.3 Research Questions
1) There is positive relationship between family friendly policies and employees’ job
satisfaction.
2) There is negative relationship between family friendly policies and employees’
turnover intention.
3) There is positive relationship between employee’s job satisfaction and turnover
intention.
4) Job satisfaction as a mediator between family friendly policies and turnover
intention.
5
2.1 Family Friendly Policies
Family Friendly Policies is defined as any benefits and working conditions that
an organization has in place to assist an employee balance their work and life
(Bardoel, Moss, Smyrnios & Tharenou, 1999). Literatures revealed family friendly
policies that are in place to help employee achieve a balanced work life. It can be
effective tools in promoting job satisfaction, productivity and company loyalty among
employees. Also, it seemed to generate continued support within the business
community. (Saltzstein & Ting, 2001). Some researches showed the impact of family
friendly policies on employee’s turnover intention. Employees who had access to
family-friendly policies showed significantly greater organizational commitment and
expressed significantly lower intention to quit their jobs (Grover & Crooker, 1995).
Moreover, social justices predict that employees will have more positive attitudes
toward organizations that are perceived as treating employees fairly (Greenberg,
1990). For instance, employees will be more committed to the organizations when
they were treated with an equitable management system. As a result, the following
hypothesis is tested.
Hypothesis 1: Family friendly policies will be positively related to employees’ job
6
satisfaction.
Hypothesis 2: Family friendly policies will be negatively related to employee’s
turnover intention.
In order to get a better understanding of which component of family friendly
policies has shown the greatest impact on job satisfaction and turnover intention. The
four main components below are tested individually. They are a) five day work week,
b) flextime, c) family leave policies and d) employee assistance programs.
a) Compressed Workweeks (Five day work week)
A compressed work week is an arrangement where an employee works the
standard number of hours in a one or two week period, but compresses those hours
into fewer work days thereby working longer hours at work (Enterprise One Insights,
2006). This article suggested that compressed workweeks are suitable for employees
who do not need to deal with incoming work on a daily basis or there are several
employees doing the same job. It revealed that organization can reduce stress;
employee absenteeism and turnover thereby increase employee morale and loyalty.
Since there is only a few literature review about five day work week which as a new
practice start implementing in Hong Kong‘s workplace. According to the report of
Hong Kong Institute of Human Resource Management, 80% of 524 Human
7
Resources professionals in Hong Kong support the implementation of five day work
week policy in the workplace. The reason was that they believed it would help
employees achieve a better work-life balance. Also, a shorter working week is
believed to enhance employees’ performance and productivity (HKIHRM, 2006).
Besides, Hong Kong Government began phasing this policy from July 1 2006. About
300 respondents were interviewed, over 70% of respondents expected that civil
servant’s morale would increase (Hung, 2006). The survey by the Clerical and
Professional Workers' Association found that 65.5% of workers believed a five-day
work week would help them better manage their private matters, while half of
respondents said it would allow them more time with family and improve their quality
of life (Moy, 2006). Thus, the following hypothesis is proposed.
Hypothesis 1a: Five day work week will be positively related to employees’ job
satisfaction.
Hypothesis 2a: Five day work week will be negatively related to employees’ turnover
intention.
b) Flextime
Flexible working arrangements take a number of forms. These include the
flexibility in working time arrangement, the number of hours worked and with regard
8
to place of work (Papalexandris & Kramar,1997). Nowadays organizations adopt
various kinds of flextime policies such as flexible scheduling program, job sharing,
part- time work, teleworking etc in workplace. Prior researches on flextime examined
that absenteeism and turnover could be reduced and employees’ job satisfaction was
improved when implementing such flexible programs (Narayanan and Nath, 1982;
Pierce and Newstrom, 1983). For employees, flexible working arrangement can
facilitate the reconciliation of work and family needs and allow individuals to balance
both responsibilities and thereby achieve quality of life. The benefits of flexible work
policies were demonstrated in a bank of Australia with improved customer services
and reduced turnover and absenteeism. (Papalexandris & Kramar,1997). Besides,
Grover and Crooker(1995) also reported a negative relationship between this policy
and turnover intention. Therefore, it is believed that employees are more likely to stay
in the organization when they were adopted flexibility work schedule.
Hypothesis 1b) Flexible working schedule will be positively related to employees’ job
satisfaction.
Hypothesis 2b) Flexible working schedule will be negatively related to employee’s
turnover intention.
9
c) Family Leave
Family leave policies allow employees to be away from the workplace for
varying period of time in order to deal with family responsibilities (Bond & Wise,
2003).
However, some specific policies for time away from work for maternity,
paternity, or adoption are at the discretion of the employer in different organizations.
In Hong Kong only maternity leave is compelled by law, other forms of families leave
are different between employers and employers. Female employees are entitled to
have a minimum of 10 weeks maternity leave in case of pregnancy. Similar to
flextime policies mentioned above, family leave policies help employees achieving a
balance of work life by increasing job satisfaction and reducing the intention to leave
the organization. Therefore, the following hypothesis is proposed.
Hypothesis 1c) Family leave policy will be positively related to employees’ job
satisfaction.
Hypothesis 2c) Family leave policy will be negatively related employee’s turnover
intention
10
Employee assistance programs are designed to recognize the interaction between
people’s domestic and working lives and to offer confidential counseling to staff to
address personal or other problems, including work-related stress that may be
affecting their performance (Clemmet, 1998). The nature of today EAPs is different
from organizations to organizations. The typically examples of EAPs included
providing assistance in the areas of personal issues, relationship issues, eldercare,
childcare, parenting issues, harassment, substance abuse, job stress, balancing work
and family, financial or legal and family violence. Some EAPs providers are also able
to offer other services including retirement or lay-off assistance, and wellness and
health promotion and fitness while others may offer advice on long term illnesses,
disability issues, counseling for crisis situation. Therefore, EAPs does not just limit on
counseling services and may include life skills programs and fitness programs. It can
assist employees in managing stress and resolving personal problems as well. Carolyn
& Cooper (1994) reported that EAPs are an important to improve employee mental
and physical well-being so that they have better performance at work and enhanced
job satisfaction and reduced turnover intention. Therefore, the following hypothesis is
proposed.
Hypothesis 1d) Employee assistance program will be positively related to employees’
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Hypothesis 2d) Employee assistance program will be negatively related to employee’s
turnover intention
12
2.2 Turnover intention
Turnover intention as the thought of quitting, the intention to search for another
job elsewhere, and the intention to quit as assessed in the turnover model of Mobley et
al. (1978). It is assumed that employees with high degree of turnover intention from
an organization will subjectively assess that they will be leaving the organization in
the near future (Mowday et al., 1982). Grover& Crooker (1995) had investigated the
relationship between different family friendly policies and turnover intention.
2.3 Job satisfaction
According to Weiss, Dawis, England and Lofquist(1967), job satisfaction is the
overall summary evaluation a person make regarding his/her work environment.
Spector (1997) defined job satisfaction as an individual’s cognitive, affective and
evaluation reactions towards his or her job. Cranny et al. (1992) also defined job
satisfaction is a combination of cognitive and affective reactions to the differential
perceptions of what an employee wants to receive compared to what he or she
actually receives.
Some literatures demonstrated that employees’ job satisfaction and employees’
commitment are predictors of turnover ( Mowday, Porter, and Steers, 1982; Cotton
13
and Tuttle, 1986; Carsten and Spector, 1987). Besides, Ostroff (1992) also showed the
close association among job satisfaction, organizational commitment and reduced
turnover, and demonstrated the clear influence that job satisfaction had on the
turnover intention of engineering staff. Spector (1997) has also investigated the
relationship between job satisfaction and turnover intentions. Therefore, the following
hypothesis is tested.
Hypothesis 3: Employees’ job satisfaction will be negatively related to employee’s
turnover intention.
2.5 Meditating effect of job satisfaction
Base on the above literatures reviews closely supported the relationship among
family friendly policies, job satisfaction and turnover intention. It should be
interesting to examine that the mediating effect of job satisfaction between family
friendly policies and turnover intention. Therefore, the following hypothesis is
proposed.
Hypothesis 4: The mediating effect of job satisfaction between family friendly policies
and turnover intention.
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IV MV
2) Flextime
Programs
DV
15
3.1 Sample
Data will be collected using a questionnaire and measures of the impact of
family friendly policies on employee job satisfaction and turnover intention.
Questionnaires will be distributed to full time employees in different organizations
such as Hong Kong Housing Authority, educational institution and other business
organizations through mentor, friends and relatives. Cover letter will be attached to
inform participants the purpose of this research study is to assess employees work
related attitude on family friendly policies implementation among Hong Kong
companies. Participants are fully voluntarily and respondents are assured of the strict
confidential of their information and responses. The questionnaires were sent and
collected personally. A total of 112 out of 150 questionnaires distributed were returned,
yielding a response rate of 74.6%.
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3.2 Measurement Instruments
For demographic factors, respondents were asked to indicate their gender, age,
education level, marital status, presence of dependent children, industry and company
size.
a) Family friendly policies
A list of 12 individual family friendly policies was derived from prior researches
based on its commonness in researches and the suitableness of workplace in Hong
Kong case. According to the reference of Grover and Crooker(1995), the 12 family
friendly policies items were selected and divided into four main categories which
were compressed work week (Five day work week), Flextime policies (four items),
Family Leave policies (five items) and Employee assistance program( three items.)
respondents were asked to answered whether those policies are provided in their
organization with the option of (1= Provided, 0= Not provided). The alpha reliability
is .73 for the whole family friendly policies (12 items) and .41 for flextime, .40 for
family leaves and .70 for employee assistance programs.
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b) Job satisfaction
Job satisfaction was measured by Wright and Cropanzano(1998) 4 item scale.
Responses to these items were on a five-point scale ranging from (1 = strongly
disagree to 5= strongly agree). The sample items are “All in all, I am satisfied with
my working hour.” and “All in all, I am satisfied with my pay” The alpha reliability of
this scale was .74.
c) Turnover intention
The scales were based on Mobley et al (1978). Their scale was used to assess
withdrawal intention from the organization. The items were: 1) I think a lot about
leaving the organization 2) I am actively searching for an alternative to the
organization. 3) As soon as it is possible, I will leave the organization. Responses to
these items were on a five-point scale ranging from 1=strongly disagree to 5= strongly
agree. The alpha reliability of this scale was .90.
3.3 Data Analysis
There are several steps for analyzing the data through SPSS. First, using factor
analysis to have data reduction and explain the pattern of correlations within a set of
observed variables. Second, independent t-test was be conducted to compare mean
difference of job satisfaction and turnover intention for whether the policies provided
18
such as with or without five day work week. Third, zero-order correlation was also
performed to indicate the general relationship among all the variables included control
variable. Fourth, regression analysis was conducted to examine the relationship
between family friendly policies and job satisfaction; the relationship between family
friendly policies and turnover intention, and finally the mediating effects of job
satisfaction on the relationship between family friendly policies and turnover intention.
The SPSS for Window Statistical Package was used to run above regression models.
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4.1 Sample and Descriptive Statistics
Table 1 (Refer to Appendix A) shows the demographics of the respondents of the
observed sample. Male with 42.9% and female with 56.3% in the sample. A large
proportion of the respondents were single (75.9%) and the married respondents
accounted for merely one-fifth of the respondents (21.4%). The majority respondents
aged between 20 to 30 years old (59.8%). Over 80%of respondents did not have
dependent children and only 0.9% of respondents had 3 or more children. Moreover,
about half of the respondents were the bachelor degree holder (40.2%). One fourth of
them had education level at matriculation or below and diploma and associate degree.
Besides, in term of business sector, the majority of respondents worked in Banking/
Finance/ Insurance(30%) while 15.2% worked in Garment and Government.
Approximately 40% of the respondents have worked with their present job less than 2
year while one fifth of them have worked with their job for between 2 to 4 years.
Finally, near half of the respondents (47.7%) worked in the organizations which were
more than 500 people and one fourth of them worked in the organization which are
less than 100 people.
Table 2 (Refer Appendix A) shows the availability of family friendly policies
20
among 112 respondent’s organization. Of all the 12 family friendly policies, the most
common item are the five day work week policy and compassionate leave ( 57.1%),
followed by life skill program (49.1%) and professional counseling (42.9%). The
most common category is employee assistance program which had 44.37% in average.
Moreover, Table 2a (Refer to Appendix A) shows the follow up question about
five day work week policy. It indicated that 91% of respondents supported the
implementation of five day work week policy in workplace. The majority respondents
(75%) think this policy will help employees to achieve a better work-life balance
since they can enjoy more their personal life. Besides, half of respondents believed a
shorter working week can easily arrange schedules to deal with family issues and
household work.
4.2 Cronbach Alpha Reliability Test
In this research, two scales were adopted from other studies. In order to test the
reliability of the scale, Cronbach’s Alpha coefficient was examined. According to
Pallant (2001), a scale with Cronbach’s Alpha coefficient of 0.70 or above is
acceptable. Two of the scales used in this research were over 0.70, therefore they are
fully accepted. Table 4 (Refer to Appendix A) shows the alpha of job satisfaction was
0.72 and the alpha of turnover intention was 0.80. However, the reliability of the scale
21
for measuring job satisfaction and turnover intention had slightly lower than the
original one.
4.3 Independent Group t-test
Table 3 (Refer to Appendix A) shows an independent samples t test for the Five
day work week policies. To compare the mean differences to job satisfaction and
turnover intention of the five day work week policy. Sub-sample with five day work
week had a higher mean (M= 3.66, SD= .654) on job satisfaction than without such
policy. Moreover, sub-sample with five day work week had lower mean (M= 2.48, SD
= .91) on turnover intention then without such policy. Five day work week policy
showed a positive significant effect to job satisfaction (t = 3.98, p< .001) while
showed a negative significant effect to turnover intention (t = -.4.59, p<.001).
Therefore, hypothesis 1a & 2a was supported.
4.4 Mean, Standard Deviations and Zero-order Correlation
The mean, standard deviations and zero-order correlations of all variables
involved in the research are presented in Table 5 (Refer to Appendix A). As shown in
the table, only two of the family friendly policies which were five day work week
policy (r = .35, p< .01) and employee assistance programs (r = .25, p< .01) were
significantly positive related to job satisfaction. The remaining two, flextime and
22
family leave policy were not significant in this relation. Overall Family Friendly
Policies (r = .29, p < .01) was also significantly positive related to job satisfaction.
Furthermore, all of the component of family friendly policies which were five
day week work policies (r = -.40, p< .01), flextime (r = -.24, p< .05), family leave (r =
-.23, p< .05) and employee assistances program (r = -.34, p< .01) and finally the
whole family friendly policies (r = -.46, p< .01) were significantly negative related to
turnover intention.
Besides, job satisfaction (r = -.51, p< .01) was also shown to be significantly
negative related to turnover intention. Base on the result of zero-order Correlations,
the above proposed hypotheses of this study are preliminary supported while only
hypotheses 1b and 1c were not supported.
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4.5 Regression Analysis
Mediating effect of Job Satisfaction on Family Friendly Policies and Turnover
Intention.
Four separate regression analysis were conducted in order to test the mediation
effect of job satisfaction on turnover intention (Refer to Appendix A, Table 6) or
below Figure 1.
Equation 1 examines the influence of the independent variables on the mediator.
Job satisfaction was regressed on the control variables as well as the independent
variables (Family Friendly Policies). As shown in Table 7, family friendly policies
(beta = .409, p< .01) was positively related to Job satisfaction. Therefore, the result
supported hypothesis 1.
Equation 2 examines the influence of the independent variable on the dependent
variable. Family Friendly Policies (beta = -.467, p<.001) was significantly and
negatively related to turnover intention. Therefore, the hypothesis 2 was also
supported.
Equation 3 examines the influence of the mediator on dependent variable. Job
satisfaction (beta = -.543, p<.001) was significantly and negatively related to turnover
intention. Hence, hypothesis 3 was supported.
24
Policies
Equation 4 examines the mediating effect of job satisfaction on the relationship
between family friendly policies and turnover intention. Turnover intention was
regressed on the control variables, family friendly policies and the job satisfaction.
The previously significant relationship between family friendly policies and turnover
intention shown in equation 2 became less significant when job satisfaction was added
into the regression equation (beta = -.273, p<.01). This pattern of result indicated that
the relationship between family friendly policies and turnover intention were partially
mediated by job satisfaction. As a result, job satisfaction was examined as a partial
mediating effect between family friendly policies and turnover intention. Thus, the
hypothesis 4 was supported.
β=.40** β= -.54***
Figure 1: Finding of Regression analysis (Partial mediating effect)
25
5.1 Discussion
The results of this study demonstrate similar finding with other previous
researches. The entire family friendly policies were found to be positively related to
job satisfaction and to be negatively related to turnover intention. The concept of
“psychological contracts” by Rousseau (1995) may offer an explanation of this
finding. Since psychological contracts refer to beliefs that individual hold regarding
promises made, accepted and relied upon between themselves and another.
Perceptions of family friendly workplace may result in increase attachment to the
organization and overall satisfaction of employees. First, the individual may perceive
the organization’s offering such family friendly policies as representing the
organization’s concern for both work and family. Employee may see this as
“psychological contract” since they can be able to balance multiple responsibilities
about work and family. Second, having those policies available in the organization
can improve employee perception about their employer and thereby increase
employees’ overall positive feeling toward employer which probably impact job
satisfaction.
Another explanation of this finding is “social comparison process” proposed by
26
Adam (1965). Since employees may compare their situations to peers in other jobs or
organizations that not offer those family friendly programs. This kind of comparison
should increase the value of the employees’ psychological contract to their
organization.
Apart from that, Crooker and Grover (1993) also demonstrated that providing
family benefits to employees positively influences their attachment to work through
the symbolic action. Since employer provided policies which were responsive to
employees’ need. Employees may contribute with greater loyalty to the organization
and better morale in response to the offering of such family friendly policies. Based
upon the idea that family friendly policies represent an aspect of the contract between
employee and employer in the previous literature, it is expected the perception of
family friendly policies to be related to job satisfaction. Therefore, the above
significant relations are explained.
Contrary to the predication, in examining the relationship between the four
categories of family friendly policies and job satisfaction, only two of them which are
five day work week and employee assistance programs were found to have
significantly positive effect with employee’s job satisfaction. The possible explanation
of these findings is the commonness of these two policies in Hong Kong’s workplace.
In the sample (N=112), about half of the respondents enjoy the five day work week
27
policy and employee assistance programs in their organizations. Base on the result of
table 3, the mean difference indicates the higher level of job satisfaction and lower
level of turnover intention of the people who had five day work week policy. Most of
them think five day work week is beneficial for them to have better work-life balance
as they can have longer periods of time off work. It can be more flexibility with
personal time and accommodate family needs as well.
In addition, employee assistance programs nowadays play an important role in
helping employees resolve personal problems and achieve healthy body. It may
positively impact their work performance, conduct, health and well-being. The
increasing health awareness of Hong Kong people strengthens the significant
relationship of employee assistance programs to job satisfaction and turnover
intention. In order to achieve both psychological and physical well-being for
employees, organizations nowadays not only provide medical benefit or insurance
package, but also offer different activities such as professional counseling in stress or
emotional problem and fitness centre. Thus, employees who gain the benefits from
these policies are more likely to have less personal problem and thereby lead to better
performance and consequently to lower level of turnover intention ( Carolyn &
Cooper, 1994).
As for the other two policies, flextime and family leave policy were found
28
unrelated to job satisfaction. The failure to support this relationship may be due to
some contradictions between what policies organization claim to exist and what
policies employees actually perceive to exist. It could be a problem of communication.
For example, those family friendly policies do exist in the organization, but not
clearly communicate to employees. It could also be the problem of organizational
culture; that means the policies do exist but are not supported by management.
(Chinchilla, N. & Cardona, P., 2003) Aryee et.al. (1998). Prior researches also
revealed that if there is no supportive organization culture, implementing family
friendly policies may not achieve the desired effects (Bown, 1988; Galinsky & Stein,
1990). As the result, the lack of organizational supportive culture may hinder the
positive outcomes of adopting those family friendly policies.
Even flextime policy is provided in some of Hong Kong’s organizations. The
purpose of this policy is still not achieved in helping people balance their work and
life due to the long working hours. Base on the research by Community Business
(2006), over 80% of respondents who work overtime because they have too much
work to do. Even flextime is available in the organization; employees generally fail to
enjoy the benefits of this policy. Therefore, flextime policy has no effects on
impacting employees’ job satisfaction.
Family leave policy seems quite common in Hong Kong, most of the companies
29
provide at least one or two leave policy to employees dealing with family issues.
Compassionate leave is the most common one, but employees somehow not regard it
as benefits. They do not have much idea how this policy contribute to their life.
Besides, another reason was due to the sample size, since the majority of respondents
was single and do not have family responsibility, therefore they have relatively less
use of family leave. As a result, there is no relation between this policy and job
satisfaction.
Finally, company size was found significantly relationship with family friendly
policies, particularly for the five day work week policy. Goodstein (1994) and
Osterman (1995) also revealed that the role of organization size as a factor of
implementing family friendly policies. Generally speaking, big companies can offer
more family friendly policies than the same one because of plenty of resources.
5.2 Practical Implications
The results of this study have practical implications for organization which
interested in implementing family friendly policies in the near future. Given the
literature demonstrated the desirable outcomes associated with job satisfaction and
turnover intention towards to employees. Family friendly policies such as five day
work week and employee assistance programs have a significant impact of
30
employees’ job satisfaction and turnover intention. The benefits of adopting more
family friendly policies to the business are clear, a health and productive workforce is
crucial for them to compete for the best talents and become a differentiator as an
employer of choice.
Meanwhile, the finding of this study supports the Hong Kong Special
Administrative Region Government keep going to cultivate a family friendly
workplace to Hong Kong employees. It also persuades organizations to take a
proactive role for developing more supportive cultures on the policies implementation.
It is hoped that these results encourage further investigation and applications of family
friendly policies in organizations.
5.3 Study Limitations
As with most survey researches, this study is subjected to several limitations.
First, 12 items family friendly policies were selected from work of Bardoel et. al
(1999) which are mainly used for western countries. It might not exactly reflect the
practical policies implemented in Hong Kong workplace. Second, since family
friendly policies are quite new in Hong Kong, employees might not actually know or
recognize the benefits of these policies in their workplace. Also, definition for each
policy defined was lack in questionnaire might cause different perceptions towards
31
the option provided to respondents. Therefore, it might affect the actual percentage of
the policies availability in organization. Third, convenience sampling and relatively
small sample sized was used in this study. Moreover, due to the cross-sectional nature
of the data collection in this study, drawing causal inferences among constructs
examined may not be appropriate. The collected data were also too limited to
determine the impact of the family friendly policies to the job satisfaction and
turnover intention towards employees. .
32
5.4 Recommendations for future research
This study only gives a general idea of how family friendly policies affect the job
satisfaction and turnover intention in the workplace of Hong Kong. Even different
categories of the whole policies was used for regression analysis, the explanation and
insight are quite limited for support the finding. Therefore, the regression approach is
suggested for further research to determine which category contributes the greatest
extent on the impact on job satisfaction and turnover intention.
As several studies have revealed that the implementation of family friendly
policies does not ensure their actual utilization. Without the supportive company
culture, especially for managers and colleagues‘s support, the desired outcome of
implementing the policies will be weakened. The creation of family friendly work
culture is one of the most important concerns for future research. It is suggested using
organization support or culture as a mediator on family friendly policies and turnover
intention or other positive outcome such as organizational commitment, employee
retention and reduced related stress.
Apart from that, future research should also examine the barriers to the
utilization of family friendly policies. It can be determined how and why family
friendly policies are utilized and the impact of job-related attitudes and career
33
outcomes.
5.5 Conclusion
This study examined the significant impact of family friendly policies on
employee’s job satisfaction and turnover intention. Since the family friendly policies
are not very common in Hong Kong workplace. Many employees with little
understanding on the policies and so not recognize it purposes behind. Therefore, the
impact of adopting the policies is not very remarkable.
The finding of this study shows family friendly policies to have a significant
positive relation with job satisfaction and negative relation with turnover intention.
The significant impact of whole family friendly policies to job satisfaction is mainly
from five day work week policy and employee assistance programs. There is no
support for flextime and family leave polices even they are two components of entire
family friendly policies. The finding of this study indicates that the relationship
between family friendly policies and turnover intention were partially mediated by job
satisfaction.
The benefits to the organization for adopting more family friendly policies are
clear, to gain a healthy and productive workforce. The findings of this study support
and encourage more family friendly workplaces in Hong Kong. It serves as reference
34
for organization to propose more effective policies in the future.
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APPENDIX A
41
Demographic Variable Frequency Percentage Gender
Male 48 42.9% Female 63 56.3%
Age <20 3 2.7% 20-30 67 59.8% 31-40 25 22.3% 41-50 15 13.4% >50 2 1.8%
Education Level Matriculation or below 29 25.9% Diploma/ Associate degree 28 25% Bachelor’s degree 45 40.2% Master degree or above 10 8.9%
Marital status Single 85 75.9% Married 24 21.4% Divorced 2 1.8%
Presence of dependent children 0 90 81.1% 1 11 9.9% 2 9 8.1% 3 or more 1 0.9%
Job nature Banking / Finance / Insurance 33 29.5% Accounting 13 11.6% Garment 17 15.2% Education 10 8.9% Government 17 15.2% IT / Engineering 13 11.6% Others 9 8%
Tenure < 2 44 39.3% 2-4 23 20.5% 5-7 17 15.2% 8-10 10 8.9% >10 18 16.1%
Company size < 100 29 26.1% 100-200 11 9.9% 201-500 18 16.2% >500 53 47.7%
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Table 2: Items of family friendly policies (N=112)
Items of family friendly policies Percentage Provided Not Provided Five day work week 57.1% 42.9%
Flextime
Work at home 8% 92% Part time work 32.1% 67.9%
Average: 22.82% 77.18% Family leave
Shorter work days for family issues 18.8% 81.3% Compassionate leave 57.1% 42.9%
Extended paid maternity leave 33% 67% Paid leave to care for sick family members 19.6% 80.4% Average: 32.13% 67.87%
Employee Assistance Programs(EAPs)
Professional counseling. E.g. family/career 42.9% 57.1% Life skill programs e.g.: stress management 49.1% 50.9% Subsidized exercise or fitness centre 41.1% 58% Average: 44.37% 55.63%
Table 2a (N=112)
Five day work week follow up question Percentage YES NO Q2. Do you support the implementation of five day work week policy in the workplace?
91% 9%
Q2a. If YES, how will you spend your leisure time during weekend? (may choose more than one)
Percentage
Take care of children 8.03% Deal with family issues/ household work 55.4% Continuing education 35.7% Enjoy the personal life 75% Others 4.5%
43
Five day No Five day Mean SD Mean SD t 1) Gender .53 .50 .62 .88 2) Age 2.8 .88 2.06 .43 3) Education level 2.4 1.0 2.1 .85 4) Marital status 1.43 .63 1.06 .24 5) Dependent children 1.4 .75 1.08 .40 6) Job nature 4.9 2.1 4.14 2.06 7) Company size 3.4 .89 2.1 1.33 5.87*** 8) Job satisfaction 3.66 .654 3.16 .667 3.98*** 9) Turnover Intention 2.48 .916 3.27 .855 -4.59***
Reliability Coefficients Turnover Intention Alpha .801 0.90 (Original alpha) N of cases 112 N of items 3
Reliability Coefficients Job Satisfaction Alpha 0.720 0.74 (Original alpha) N of cases 112 N of items 4
Table 4 Alpha Reliability
Notes: *p<.05
For the Five day work week policies, t-test for independent samples was conducted: company size, job satisfaction and turnover intention were found significant.
Table 3: Mean and Standard Deviations for sample with five day work week policy (N=64) and sample without five day work week policy. (N=48)
***p<.001 ** p<.01
Variables Mean S.D. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 1) Gender a .58 .51 2) Age b 2.52 8.28 -.113 3) Education Level c 2.32 .96 -.086 -.087 4) Marital status d 1.28 .54 -.091 .684** -.104 5) Presence of dependent
children e 1.29
-.013 .598** -.083 .579**
6) Industry 3.36 2.06 -.008 0.17 .046 -.90 -.193 7) Tenure g 2.42 1.48 -.121 .733** .006 .518** .438** .054 8) Company size h 2.86 1.27 -.071 .286** .312** .191* .107 -.122 .302** 9) Five-day work week .57 .49 -.094 .479** .197* .345** .276** -.219* .381** .504** 10) Flextime .23 .23 -.008 .142 -.003 .058 .075 .056 .140 .176 .246** 11) Family Leave .38 .29 -.079 .024 .157 -.003 .284** -.291** .009 .155 .084 -.105 12) EAP .45 .41 -.101 .251** .062 .080 .242* -.336** .273** .528** .385** .141 .357** 13) FFP .37 .20 -.114 .273** .149 .120 .348** -.345** .263** .503** .508** .412** .706** .794** 14) Job Satisfaction 3.45 .75 .040 .247** -.019 .115 .067 .025 .200* .099 .355** .100 .124 .253** .291** 15) Turnover Intention 2.82 .97 .004 -.388** .194* -.245** -.271** .124 -.357** -.212* -.401** -.243* -.238* -.338** -.459** -.511**
44
f. Banking/ Finance/ Insurance= 1; Accounting= 2; Garment = 3; Education = 4; Government= 5; IT/ Engineering =6; Others=7
c. Matriculation or below = 1; Diploma/ Associate degree = 2; Bachelor’s degree = 3; Master degree or above = 4
Table 5: Means, Standard Deviations and Zero-order Correlations (N=112)
g. < 2 years = 1; 2-4 years = 2; 5-7 years = 3; 8-10 years = 4; >10 years = 5
Notes: ** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed). * Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).
b. <20 = 1; 20-30 = 2; 31-40 = 3; 41-45 = 4; >50 = 5
h. <100=1; 100-200=2; 201-500=3; >500=4
e. 0 = 1; 1 = 2; 2 = 3; 3 or more = 4
d. Single= 1; Married = 2; Divorced= 3
a. Male = 0; Female = 1
45
Table 6: Results of Regression Analysis of Family Friendly Policies and Turnover Intention with the mediating effect of Job Satisfaction
Notes: *p<.05
Variables
Job Satisfaction (MV)
Turnover Intention (DV)
Variables Beta Beta Beta Beta Controls Gender .121 -.076 .009 -.019 Age .192 -.068 .017 .023 Educational level -.010 .225 .222 .221 Marital status .019 -.049 .035 -.040 Presence of dependent children
-.148 .051 -.094 -.020
Industry .106 -.039 .093 .011 Tenure .064 -.185 -.170 -.155 Company size -.137 -.003 -.171 -.068 Main Effects Family Friendly Policies (IV)
.409** -.467*** -.273**
Job Satisfaction (MV) -.543*** -.474*** R² .170 .344 .491 .531 Adjusted R² .093 .284 .445 .483 R² Change .098** .128*** .274*** .187***
APPENDIX B
46
47
15P
URe: Survey of the impact of family friendly policies
I am a final year student majoring in Human Resources Management at Hong Kong Baptist University. This study is a partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Bachelor of Business Administration (Hons) Degree offered by Hong Kong Baptist University. The objective of the study is to examine the impact of family friendly policies on employee job satisfaction and turnover intention. Please spend a few minutes to complete the attached questionnaire. Data will be used for academic purpose only. All information collected will be kept strictly UCONFIDENTIAL Uand UANONYMOUSU. Please put the completed questionnaire into the collection box. Thank you for your kind participation. If you have any enquiry, please feel free to contact me at 96654415 or via email: [email protected]. Yours sincerely, _______________ Chan Hak Fun, Peggy Final Year Student BBA – Human Resources Management Option Hong Kong Baptist University
U

U
48
Family Friendly Policies Questionnaire
PART A Family friendly policies Listed below are the items of family friendly policies. Please indicate your answer by ticking the appropriate box.
“ ” Five-day work week 1) Has your company implemented the five-day work week policy in workplace?
?
Yes No
1a) If NO, is there any plan that the policy will be implemented in your company within the coming two years? ,
?
Yes No Do not know
2) In your opinion, do you support the implementation of five-day work week policy
in the workplace? , ?
Yes, reason:: ___________________________ _ No, reason: : _____________________________________
2a) If YES, how will you spend your leisure time during weekend? , ?
(may tick more than one choice)
Take care of children Deal with family issues/ household work /
Continuing Education
Enjoy the personal life (e.g. entertaining or gathering with friends) (: )
Others: _______________
49
Provided Not Provide
3) Family leave a) Shorter work days for family issues
b) Compassionate leave
c) Extended paid maternity leave
, d) Paid leave to care for sick family members

(: / )
b) Life skill programs. e.g: stress management (: ) c) Subsidized exercise or fitness centre

5) Flextime a) Flexible scheduling program b) Job sharing (several employees doing the same job)
c)Work at home d) Part time work

50
PART B Listed below are statements describing employees’ job satisfaction towards their career. For each statement, please circle one response to indicate your level of agreement or disagreement. ,
1 = Strongly disagree, 2 = Disagree , 3 = Neutral , 4 = Agree , 5 = Strongly agree Strongly disagree Strongly agree 1) All in all, I am satisfied with my working hour. 1 2 3 4 5 , 2) All in all, I am satisfied with my co-workers. 1 2 3 4 5 , 3) All in all, I am satisfied with my supervisors. 1 2 3 4 5 , 4) All in all, I am satisfied with my pay. 1 2 3 4 5 , PART C Listed below are statements describing employees’ turnover intention towards their career. For each statement, please circle one response to indicate your level of agreement or disagreement. ,
1 = Strongly disagree, 2 = Disagree , 3 = Neutral , 4 = Agree , 5 = Strongly agree Strongly disagree Strongly agree
1) I think a lot about leaving the organization. 1 2 3 4 5 2) I am actively searching for an alternative to the organization. 1 2 3 4 5 3) As soon as it is possible, I will leave the organization , 1 2 3 4 5
51
PART D Personal Information The information will be used for research purpose only. Please be assured that your personal information will be treated as strictly CONFIDENTIAL. 1) Gender Male Female 2) Age < 20 20-30 31-40 41-50 >50 3) Education level
Matriculation or below Diploma/ Associate degree /
Bachelor degree Master degree or above
4) Marital status Single Married Divorced
5) Presence of dependent children 0 1 2 3 or more
6) Industry Banking/ Finance/ Insurance// Accounting Garment Education Government IT/ Engineering / Others:_______________ 7) Tenure (Year) < 2 2-4 5-7 8-10 >10 8) Company size: number of employees : < 100 100-200 201-500 > 500
--End of Questionnaire-- ----

work-life balance: the impact of family friendly policies on

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