Are employees plagued by work-family conflict more likely to leave their jobs?
Research has shown that work-family balance is crucial to maintaining mental health and organization well-being. When individuals experience work-family conflict, do organizations end up paying the price by losing valuable employees?
Glenn Withiam, director of publication services at the Cornell Center for Hospitality Research, recently spoke with Sean Way of Cornell University to discuss this topic. Professor Way and Chelsea Vanderpool, also of Cornell, published the article “Investigating Work-Family Balance, Job Anxiety, and Turnover Intentions As Predictors of Health Care and Senior Services Customer-Contact Employee Voluntary Turnover” in the May 2013 issue of Cornell Hospitality Quarterly. Click here to download the podcast interview and here to access the article.
Professor Way told Cornell:
“We tested a model that connected work-family balance to turnover intentions, and we found that work-family imbalance was directly connected to employees’ intention to leave,” said Way. “Then we added job anxiety to the model and we found that it fully mediated the original link. In short, if your employees are worried about how their job is affecting their family, it looks like they are going to choose their family over their job.”
Additionally, Vanderpool and Way show that work-family balance affected voluntary turnover of these health care and senior services customer-contact employees. Way points out that the healthcare workplace is similar to the hospitality industry, with 24/7 operation, odd hours, split shifts, and uncertain customer relationships. Hence, both health care and hospitality industry managers might wish to note this study’s findings. Given the cost of voluntary turnover, Vanderpool and Way conclude that their study highlights why health care and hospitality managers should be concerned about their employees’ work-family balance and should consider ways to offset the stress of imbalances.
Click here to read the paper, and here for more articles from the Cornell Hospitality Quarterly May issue.
Peter Jaskiewicz is an Assistant Professor in Strategic Management and Organization at the University of Alberta School of Business. His research focuses on family businesses, corporate governance, and entrepreneurial processes.
Karen L. Vinton, Ph.D., is assistant editor of FBR and a 1999 Barbara Hollander Award winner and Professor Emeritus of Business at the College of Business at Montana State University, where she founded the University’s Family Business Program. An FFI Fellow, she has served on its Board of Directors and chaired the Body of Knowledge committee.
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Walter D. Davis (Ph.D., Georgia Institute of Technology) is an Associate Professor of Management at The University of Mississippi, where he teaches courses in advanced human resource management, strategic management, and research methods. His research interests include employee proactivity, self-management, goal orientation, and strategic human resource management. His articles have been published in journals such as Journal of Management, Personnel Psychology, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Human Performance, Leadership Quarterly, and Group and Organization Management. He has served on the editorial review boards of Journal of Management, Journal of Business Research and The International Journal of Leadership Studies.
Clay Dibrell is an Associate Professor of Management at The University of Mississippi and a US Fulbright Scholar. Areas of research interest include family enterprises, innovation, and stewardship. His research has been published in leading academic journals including Entrepreneurship Theory & Practice, Journal of Small Business Management, Family Business Review, Journal of Family Business Strategy, Journal of Business Research, Small Business Economics, Industrial Marketing Management, Management International Review, and Journal of World Business. He is an associate editor for the Journal of Family Business Strategy, and on the editorial review boards of Family Business Review and Journal of World Business, as well as a special issue guess editor for multiple journals.
Dr. Justin B. Craig is an Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship in the D’Amore McKim School of Business at Northeastern University. Dr. Craig holds a Ph.D. in the field of behavioral science as well as a Masters of Counseling and an Honors degree in Psychology, all with an intentional focus on entrepreneurial family businesses and those responsible for their stewardship. Professor Craig’s research has been published in leading international academic journals, including the Journal of Business Venturing, Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Family Business Review, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Small Business Management, Small Business Economics, Journal of Family Business Strategy, and Journal of World Business, among others. He has been an Associate Editor of Family Business Review since 2010.
Karen L. Vinton, Ph.D., is a 1999 Barbara Hollander Award winner and Professor Emeritus of Business at the College of Business at Montana State University, where she founded the University’s Family Business Program. An FFI Fellow, she has served on its Board of Directors and chaired the Body of Knowledge committee. From 1997 through 2011, Vinton served on the editorial board of the Family Business Review, and is the current assistant editor. Before retiring, Vinton served as director for her own family’s business (negotiating its eventual sale)and had her own family business consulting practice, Vinton Consulting Services. Karen can be reached at klvinton700@gmail.com.
W. Gibb Dyer (Ph.D MIT) is the O. Leslie Stone Professor of Entrepreneurship and the Academic Director of the Ballard Center for Economic Self-Reliance. Dr. Dyer is a recognized authority on family business and entrepreneurship and has been quoted in publications such as Fortune, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and Nation’s Business. In 2007 he was given the faculty teaching award from Brigham Young University’s division of continuing education, and in 2008 was given the outstanding faculty award from the Marriott School at BYU. He was recently ranked one of the top 10 researchers in the world in the field of family business. He has published over 45 articles and 7 books that have been cited over 4000 times.
Karen L. Vinton, Ph.D., is a 1999 Barbara Hollander Award winner and Professor Emeritus of Business at the College of Business at Montana State University, where she founded the University’s Family Business Program. An FFI Fellow, she has served on its Board of Directors and chaired the Body of Knowledge committee. From 1997 through 2011, Vinton served on the editorial board of the Family Business Review, and is the current assistant editor. Before retiring, Vinton served as director for her own family’s business (negotiating its eventual sale)and had her own family business consulting practice, Vinton Consulting Services. Karen can be reached at klvinton700@gmail.com.
Dr. H. Kristl Davison is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Management at the University of Mississippi. She received her M.S. and Ph.D. in Industrial-Organizational (I/O) Psychology from Tulane University. She has worked as an Employee Selection Specialist for GTE/Verizon, and has also consulted in the areas of compensation, 
Dr. Cynthia V. Fukami is Professor in the Daniels College of Business at the University of Denver. She is currently Associate Editor of the Journal of Management Education, and serves on the editorial board for Academy of Management Learning and Education, among others. She has served on the Academy of Management’s Teaching Committee, and was the Chair of the Board of Directors of the Organizational Behavior Teaching Society (OB-1). She co-edited Sage’s Handbook of Management Learning, Education and Development with Steven Armstrong.
Professor Ann Welsh (Ph.D., University of Missouri) has maintained her passion for helping students to find their pathway to a productive and satisfying life and for helping organizations to innovate in anticipation of changing environmental conditions. Her scholarship appears in the most influential journals in business such as the Academy of Management Journal and the Academy of Management Review, Administrative Science Quarterly, Journal of Marketing Research, Management Learning and the Journal of Management Education. Her current research focuses on the use of design thinking to enhance management education, developing new pedagogical approaches for multidisciplinary critical management education.
Kathy Lund Dean holds the Board of Trustees Distinguished Chair in Leadership and Ethics at Gustavus Adolphus College She earned her Ph.D. in organizational behavior and ethics from Saint Louis University. For fifteen years she has been active in both the OBTS Teaching Society for Management Educators, where she served on the Board, and the Academy of Management. Currently, she’s researching ethics and decision-making among entry-to-mid-level managers, how religious and spiritual disputes in the workplace get resolved, and student disengagement issues.
Dmitry Khanin earned his Ph.D. in strategic management from the University of Maryland in 2006. He is currently teaching strategy and organization theory at the Texas Tech University. Dmitry has authored over twenty papers in such top-notch outlets as The Academy of Management Journal, Organization Science, Family Business Review, Journal of Small Business Management, Business Horizons and many others. His research is dedicated to entrepreneurship, family business and management education. Dmitry’s recent paper was named an outstanding field report by the consulting division of the Academy of Management.
Karen L. Vinton, Ph.D., is a 1999 Barbara Hollander Award winner and Professor Emeritus of Business at the College of Business at Montana State University, where she founded the University’s Family Business Program. An FFI Fellow, she has served on its Board of Directors and chaired the Body of Knowledge committee. From 1997 through 2011, Vinton served on the editorial board of the Family Business Review, and is the current assistant editor. Before retiring, Vinton served as director for her own family’s business (negotiating its eventual sale)and had her own family business consulting practice, Vinton Consulting Services. Karen can be reached at klvinton700@gmail.com.
management education, entrepreneurship, and as a consultant to major multinational corporations.
Debra R. Comer is a Professor of Management in the Zarb School of Business at Hofstra University. She received her B.A. with honors in psychology from Swarthmore College and her M.A., M. Phil., and Ph.D. in organizational behavior from Yale University. Her current research interests include ethical behavior in organizations, on-line learning, crisis management education, and the use of popular culture in management education. She previously served as an Associate Editor of JME.
Professor Ledley, who directs the Center for Integration of Science and Industry at Bentley University, recently joined editor Jane Schmidt-Wilk on the 
Jane Schmidt-Wilk teaches courses in management and organizational behavior, qualitative research methods, communication skills, teaching, and academic writing. Dr. Schmidt-Wilk is currently Dean of Teaching and Learning at Maharishi University of Management. She was Editor of the Journal of Management Education from 2005 to 2012 and continues to serve on the editorial boards of several academic journals in the field of management. Dr. Schmidt-Wilk has served as an ex-officio member of the Board of Directors of the OBTS Teaching Society for Management Educators and been a member of the Academy of Management and the Midwest Academy of Management. She has made numerous presentations at these and other professional conferences.
