Editorial: Work–life Balance: A Matter of Choice?

Gregory, Abigaïl; Milner, Susan

doi:10.1111/j.1468-0432.2008.00429.x

Cited by 297 publications

(228 citation statements)

References 37 publications

(43 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

213

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…It has been widely acknowledged that women take more responsibility for household labour and childcare (Posig and Kickul, 2004;Grönlund, 2007;Gregory and Milner, 2009) and that gender moderates the relationship between family-work conflict and job performance (Yavas, Babakus and Karatepe, 2008). In this study, married women described how they worried about office tasks while they were at home (for example, having 'sleepless nights' over clients in arrears) and about how their work sometimes left them exhausted.…”

Section: Gender In the 'Field' And Social Contextmentioning

confidence: 98%

Microfinance and Loan Officers’ Work Experiences: Perspectives from Zambia

Siwale

2016

The Journal of Development Studies

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The article studies the challenges faced by microfinance institutions in Zambia, whose remit it is to provide financial services to the poor. It focuses on loan officers -the agents of delivery on the ground. With reference to loan officers' experiences and words, the paper examines how gender and class shape and structure their day to day encounters. The study finds that different social spaces -'the office' and 'the field' -and wider context explains the gendered, culturally complex and multidimensional nature of developmental work at grassroots level. Social expectations emerge as major pressure points more for female loan officers than their male counterparts, making them less suitable for microfinance work, which has traditionally targeted poor women. However, in the process of delivering financial services, managers and clients not only come to depend on loan officers to maintain the quality of services provided, but also place varied and often conflicting expectations on them. Notwithstanding loan officers' critical role in the functioning of microfinance, less scholarship has focused on their work realities and how their everyday encounters at the grassroots with borrowers can leave them disillusioned with the seemingly 'noble' work of microfinance. Little is known, for example, about how social factors such as education, gender and location influence and complicate the work of loan officers in extending credit and other financial services to the poor. In addition, less is known about whether male and female loan officers consequently perform or are judged differently.As the analysis of two Zambian MFIs will show, these social factors do structure loan officer-client encounters and are capable of adding complexities to an already difficult jobespecially for female loan officers. Examining how education, gender and location intersect 1 Other titles such as field staff, credit officers and fieldworkers have also been used to refer to such MFI employees. This study adopts the title of loan officers. 2 Microfinance generally includes a range of financial services, including loans, savings deposits, insurance and money transfers provided to low income clients who lack formal financial access (Tomaselli et al., 2013). In this study we focus on provision of microcredit in a group-based lending methodology.

show abstract

Section: Gender In the 'Field' And Social Contextmentioning

confidence: 98%

Microfinance and Loan Officers’ Work Experiences: Perspectives from Zambia

Siwale

2016

The Journal of Development Studies

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Following traditional sex/gender divisions of labour, these discourses implicitly or explicitly assume that the subject of the work/life balancing act was a "generic female parent" (Smithson and Stokoe, 2005), whose primary responsibilities outside of work were domestic and reproductive labour (Ransome, 2007;McKie et al, 2002). This focus remains at the heart of the discourse, driven now by declining fertility rates and an aging population (Gregory and Milner, 2009). With more women in paid employment, work/life balance has been adapted to create space for reproductive labour and family care work -crucial economic concerns for any government.…”

Section: Work Life Balancementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Two other factors driving the work/life balance discourse are globalization and technological change (Gregory and Milner, 2009). Globalization, it is claimed, brings in its wake increased competition among businesses, with a concomitant rise in working hours and intensity.…”

Section: Work Life Balancementioning

confidence: 99%

“…As well as leading to disproportionate attention on working mothers (Edwards and Wajcman, 2005;Lewis, Gambles and Rapoport, 2007;Gregory and Milner, 2009), this focus on "life as family" has neglected other "life" activities such as leisure and recreation, in part because child-rearing is legitimated as a productive activity (Ransome, 2007).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Clutterbuck, 2003;Nadeem and Metcalf, 2007). This interest has been driven by various factors, including globalization, new technology and, in some countries, aging populations and declining fertility rates (Gregory and Milner, 2009). The last two dynamics have generated commentary that focuses on "family friendly" employment policies designed to balance effective social reproduction with efficient production.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Surf ’s Up: Work, Life, Balance and Brand in a New Age Capitalist Organization

2010

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This paper reframes the notion of work/life balance through analysis of branding and the immaterial labour process in a "new age capitalist" organization. The company does not manufacture material products; rather, value is produced through branding imported goods to promote "alternative" ways of living. This is achieved through incorporation of leisure activities and lifestyles of key employees, effectively putting their "lives" to "work" in the creation of value for the company. For employees, therefore, much work actually takes place notionally outside or on the margins of their formally employed space and time. We argue that this qualitatively transforms the conceptions of, and relations between, work and life that underpin the concept of work/life balance. We conclude by exploring the tensions generated by organizational incorporation of employee autonomy in the pursuit of aspirational branding. KEY WORDSauthenticity / branding / identity / New Age capitalism / work/life balance

show abstract

References

2017

Work‐Life Advantage

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Editorial: Work–life Balance: A Matter of Choice?

Cited by 297 publications

References 37 publications

Microfinance and Loan Officers’ Work Experiences: Perspectives from Zambia

Microfinance and Loan Officers’ Work Experiences: Perspectives from Zambia

Surf ’s Up: Work, Life, Balance and Brand in a New Age Capitalist Organization

References

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About