When an organization decides to expand its business into other countries, it generally tries to increase its competitiveness in the global marketplace. This strategic decision, however, exposes it to new management challenges, related especially to cultural differences among employees from different countries. If certain employee programs seem well suited to certain cultures, can they necessarily be implemented everywhere? How do you take into account the cultural differences in the various programs implemented while preserving a strong organizational culture?
To answer this question, we interpreted the study of Stock and colleagues, published in 2016. The authors wondered about the effects of two types of organizational support on employee job satisfaction and performance: formal support, reflected by the establishment of work–family balance programs, and informal support, arising from an organizational culture promoting balance between work and family life. They wanted to understand the effects of formal and informal support on job satisfaction and performance, according to different national cultures (United States, India and China).
Legend : Recommendation of our expert
Expert adviser:
- ARIANE OLLIER-MALATERRE, professor, Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)
Authors:
- ÉTIENNE FOUQUET, research assistant, Université de Sherbrooke
RÉBECCA LEFEBVRE, research professional, Université de Sherbrooke
JOSÉE CHARBONNEAU, research assistant, Université de Sherbrooke
PATRICE DANEAU, research assistant, Université de Sherbrooke
This initiative was made possible through a collaboration with the Université de Sherbrooke.
WHAT DO WE MEAN BY:
Formal organizational support?
In this study, formal support is demonstrated by the establishment of work–family balance programs within an organization. This involves structured programs whose goal is to improve employees’ abilities to respond to both their professional and their family demands. These programs can take the form of childcare services at the workplace, flexible work hours and/or the possibility of teleworking, for example.
informal organizational support?
In this study, informal support is reflected in an organizational culture that promotes balance between work and family life – in other words, a culture in which values and beliefs are shared regarding the extent to which an organization supports and values employees’ integration of work and family life. Informal support is based on an explicit willingness to respect employees’ family life and to facilitate the compatibility of their family and professional responsibilities in fulfilling their needs when it comes to work–family balance, without creating specific programs for this purpose.
Meeting employees’ needs when it comes to work–family balance can, for example, happen through giving them flexibility regarding work hours (floating holidays, arrival and departure times, number of hours worked, etc.). In an organization where support is more informal, these aspects are part of the daily routine. Where managers incorporate this flexibility without it being officially required, policies are not needed.
Method
Participants in the study are managers from the United States, India and China who work in the secondary and tertiary sectors. The primary condition for participating in the study was to be subject to high work demands that were likely to compete with family responsibilities and to affect well-being and performance.
Data collection was done through online surveys. Corporate information banks made it possible to find managers who were invited to complete this survey.
Here is the overall portrait of study participants:
- Total number of participants: 461
- China: 247 managers: 93% are married, 91% have children and 86% are men. Average age: 39.
- India: 66 managers: 95% are married, 84% have children and 86% are men. Average age: 39.
- United States: 148 managers: 87% are married, 69% have children and 70% are men. Average
age: 43.
Because studies must always be interpreted with caution
Although proven statistical models were used for the study, the sample of Indian managers is too small, compared to that of the United States and China (66 participants versus 148 and 247, respectively), to produce conclusive results. Also, we find that Chinese organizations have few formal programs in place, unlike organizations in India or the US. This can influence the results by reducing the significance of results regarding the effect of formal support. Finally, because even today many family responsibilities fall on women’s shoulders, the results would have no doubt been more robust if the sample had included as many women as men, which is not the case here: women are very under-represented.
Cultural differences: individualism and collectivism
The authors decided to conduct their study within organizations in the United States, India and China to determine the effects of employees’ national culture on the effectiveness of formal and informal organizational support for work–family balance in terms of job satisfaction and performance. The choice of countries for the study was done according to a classification system that positions different national cultures on a continuum ranging from a more individualistic culture to a more collectivist culture.
In more individualistic cultures, personal interests are preferred to collective interests, and most families have a nuclear structure – that is, they are made up of one or two parents. In more collectivist cultures, people instead live “with” or “near” their extended family. Societies whose culture is more collectivist are therefore often characterized by strong family ties and frequent contact between family members. Members of the extended family are more available to take care of each other or to look after children, for example. Generally, the kind of economy in place is also more collectivist in nature.
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