Managing Work-Family Conflict among Entrepreneurs: An Empirical Study

Abstract

Modern day entrepreneurs who operate in today's highly volatile socioeconomic circumstances are undeniably encumbered with a host of role stressors that affect their businesses and personal lives, namely role overload, role ambiguity and role conflict. Coupled with work schedule flexibility, these role stressors have a bearing on work-family conflict and are the focus of this study. Employing self-administered questionnaires via purposive sampling, data were collected from Malaysian entrepreneurs, married with at least one child. Results derived utilising the Partial Least Square (PLS) approach suggest that role conflict and role overload positively affect work-family conflict. However, role ambiguity and work schedule flexibility indicate insignificant effect on work-family conflict. Given a multitude of challenges faced by entrepreneurs in this context, an understanding of the findings can bring to light some insights on how work-family balance can be achieved to boost the development of Malaysian entrepreneurs.

Lessons from family firms: the use of flexible work arrangements and its consequences

“…In this position, they perform entrepreneurial work, which includes a bundle of activities targeted toward the creation or operation of a business venture (Shane and Venkataraman 2000 ). Entrepreneurial work typically entails a high degree of work autonomy (Freidson 1984 ), albeit directly dependent upon their stakeholders’ interests and market developments (Teoh et al 2016 ). Even without direct ownership in the business, family members’ greater autonomy in their entrepreneurial work regularly translates into psychological ownership (Bernhard and O’Driscoll 2011 ).…”

“…Numerous studies have documented a substantially higher workload for self-employed individuals compared to those in regular employment (Teoh et al 2016 ). In particular, entrepreneurial work, which is not restricted by contractual working hours, is associated with high work demands and a potential shortage of resources to meet these demands (Matta 2015 ).…”

Are the self-employed more stressed? New evidence on an old question

“…Owners experience income uncertainty, role ambiguity, long work hours, reputational threat, and even business partner betrayal (Lewin-Epstein & Yuchtman-Yaar, 1991;Schonfeld & Mazzola, 2015). Hence, theory suggests that the self-employed will experience more psychosocial stress, burnout, and health problems compared to other types of jobholders (Cardon & Patel, 2015;Harris et al, 1999;Jamal, 1997;Kara & Petrescu, 2018;Teoh et al, 2016). In fact, previous research provides evidence that job uncertainty is associated with allostatic load, a biomarker for physiological stress or "wear and tear" (Patel et al, 2018).…”

“…Currently, results from studies of entrepreneur stress are mixed. Some studies report that the self-employed experience more stress than employees (e.g.,, Harris et al, 1999;Jamal, 1997;Teoh et al, 2016). Others find that the self-employed experience less stress (e.g.,, Baron et al, 2016;Hessels et al, 2017;Patzelt & Shepherd, 2011).…”

Gerenciando o conflito trabalho-família no empreendedorismo feminino: evidências de um estudo com microempreendedoras individuais

“…Gerenciando o conflito trabalho-família no empreendedorismo feminino: evidências de um estudo com microempreendedoras individuais 96 Entretanto, o contexto atual que envolve os negócios leva o público feminino a enfrentar circunstâncias altamente voláteis que as conduzem a uma série de estressores que podem afetar sua vida profissional e familiar (Nambisan & Baron, 2019;Teoh, Chong, Chong, & Ismail, 2016). Como consequência, o problema em conciliar as atividades do empreendimento com questões familiares pode ser uma barreira para os seus objetivos de sucesso (Silva, El-Aouar, Silva, Castro & Sousa, 2019), pelas tensões provenientes de elementos como sobrecarga, ambiguidade e diversidade de papéis vivenciados (Nambisan & Baron, 2019).…”