Freedom or fallout in local government? How work–life culture impacts employees using flexible work practices

Abstract

This exploratory study investigates five conceptually distinct dimensions of work–life culture which account for the gap between work–life policy provision and utilization: ‘Manager Support’; ‘Organizational Time Expectations’; ‘Career Consequences’; ‘Gendered Perceptions of Policy Use’ and ‘Co-worker Support’, among 22 employees using flexible work practices (13 women, 9 men) in a local government organization in Australia. The findings inform the development of targeted strategies that help alleviate the cultural barriers preventing the use of work–life policies by eligible employees and contribute to the emergent area of organizational work–life culture as a theoretical construct.

Keywords:

• Work–life culture
• flexible work
• local government

Notes

1 Several departments within the organization do not report their employee data to the corporate human resource system and thus, the initial pool of 105 employees underestimates the number of staff working in these arrangements.