ABSTRACT
Recent scholarship has emphasized the influence of family-friendly policies on work attitudes such as turnover intentions. However, little research in public administration has explored the preferences of family-friendly policies or the discretionary implementation of these policies. This article provides an exploratory analysis of a U.S. federal workgroup that is less adaptive to family-care needs in response to mission requirements. Using survey data collected from 1,111 female officers employed by a large federal law enforcement agency, work-family conflict is reported as the main reason for turnover intentions and five family-friendly policies are identified for potentially reducing turnover intentions among women. In addition, comparisons are made between female officers with children and unmarried female officers with children.
Acknowledgments
The author thanks the FBI for participating in this research project. In addition, the author is grateful to Dr. David Lee for his valuable feedback on an earlier draft of this article. Finally, the author thanks Daiya Lemon and Lai C. Yau for their assistance with data collection and analysis.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Helen H. Yu
Helen H. Yu is an Assistant Professor of Public Administration at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa. She is a retired Lieutenant Colonel with the U.S. Air Force, and her research interests include the recruitment, retention, and promotion of women in federal law enforcement.