Entitlement to Work‐Life Balance Support: Employee/Manager Perceptual Discrepancies and Their Effect on Outcomes

• Author: Christiana Ierodiakonou,Eleni Stavrou
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/hrm.21745
• Published date: 01 September 2016
• Date: 01 September 2016

Human Resource Management, September–October 2016, Vol. 55, No. 5. Pp. 845–869

© 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com).

DOI:10.1002/hrm.21745

Correspondence to: Eleni Stavrou, Associate Professor, Department of Business and Public Administration, University of

Cyprus, P.O. Box 20537, CY-1678 Nicosia, Cyprus, Phone: +357 22893613, Fax: +357 22 895030, E-mail: eleni1@ucy.ac.cy

ENTITLEMENT TO WORK-LIFE

BALANCE SUPPORT: EMPLOYEE/

MANAGER PERCEPTUAL

DISCREPANCIES AND THEIR EFFECT

ON OUTCOMES

ELENI STAVROU AND CHRISTIANA IERODIAKONOU

We broaden contemporary understandings of the relationship between HR

practices that support work-life balance and organizational as well as individual

outcomes, through a focus on perceptual discrepancies of entitlement. To theo-

rize this notion, we adopt the self-perception accuracy model and extend it by

investigating whether any employee/management discrepancies in perceptions

of entitlement mediate the relationship between HR practices supporting work-

life balance and outcomes. We use data from 20 European countries and apply a

multilevel statistical methodology. Our results did not reveal signifi cant media-

tion effects, but the perceptions of managers, not of employees, are related to HR

practices that support work-life balance. Furthermore, employees tend to have

higher expectations of entitlement than does management. Finally, the more

aligned management and employee perceptions of entitlement, the higher the

positive organizational and individual outcomes over and above contextual idi-

osyncrasies. Findings denote that, in achieving positive outcomes for employees

and organizations, managing perceptions regarding organizational support for

work-life balance is more important than actual support practices. © 2015 Wiley

Periodicals, Inc.

Keywords: work-life balance, HR support practices, employee/manager discrep-

ancies, employee entitlement

A

prevalent discourse in management

studies the past few decades has been

the reconciliation of employment with

the needs of life beyond paid work,

typically labeled as work-life balance

(Den Dulk, Peper, Sadar, & Lewis, 2011; Knijn &

Smit, 2009). Managers have increasingly enforced

HR practices to support employees in reconcil-

ing work and nonwork responsibilities (Aryee,

Chu, Kim, & Ryu, 2013; Wang & Verma, 2012).

These practices include flexible work schedules,

reduced working hours, family services or allow-

ances, and leave schemes (Abendroth & Den

Dulk, 2011; Kassinis & Stavrou, 2013; Yuile,

846 HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT, SEPTEMBER–OCTOBER 2016

Human Resource Management DOI: 10.1002/hrm

The relationship

between HR practices

and outcomes is

mediated by individual

perceptions, and

specifically by

the discrepancy

of employee/

management

perceptions regarding

entitlement to

organizational

support for work-life

balance. In other

words, we argue

that HR practices

are only indirectly

related to individual

and organizational

outcomes when the

discrepancy between

manager and

employee perceptions

of entitlement is low;

low discrepancy

suggests common

expectations for

support among both

stakeholder groups.

The notion of “entitlement” in this article

refers to the normative belief that organizations

have an ethical obligation to support employee

needs to reconcile employment with other aspects

of life (Den Dulk, Peters, & Poutsma, 2012; Lewis

& Smithson, 2001). Numerous studies investigate

the separate employee and management percep-

tions of entitlement to organizational support (for

an overview, see McCarthy et al., 2013). However,

perceptual discrepancies of entitlement between

the two groups and the effects of those discrepan-

cies have not been researched to date. Considering

how instrumental the organizational environ-

ment is to balancing work and personal life (Allen,

2001; McCarthy, Darcy, & Grady, 2010), research-

ing employee/manager discrepancies may help

determine employee and management expec-

tations as well as respective outcomes. Aligned

perceptions of entitlement imply a culture of con-

sensus in the organization, whereas discrepancies

relate to imbalances in the employee-employer

exchange relationship that in turn may have

negative consequences for both parties (Shore &

Barksdale, 1998). Knowing the levels of discrep-

ancy, managers may be in a better position to

manage employee perceptions more effectively

or explore which organizational support, if any,

should be provided to employees in helping them

satisfy their work-life balance needs.

To theorize how perceptual discrepancies may

mediate the relationship between HR support

practices and outcomes, we rely on Yammarino

and Atwater’s (1993) conceptual model of

self- perception accuracy. Expanding the self-

perception accuracy model and adapting it to the

work-life literature, we propose that it is not the

HR practices per se but the discrepancy in per-

ceptions that has a direct relationship with indi-

vidual and organizational outcomes. Individual

outcomes involve perceived ease in managing

work and personal activities, while organizational

outcomes involve employee retention, motiva-

tion, and absenteeism. To conduct this investiga-

tion, we use firm data from 20 European countries

and apply a multilevel statistical methodology.

This methodology allows us to conclude which of

the relationships explored hold over and above

any national-level factors (Peterson, Arregle, &

Martin, 2012) because a number of scholars note

that neither support for work-life balance nor per-

ceptions of it are uniform across national contexts

(Den Dulk et al., 2012; Kalleberg, 2000; Kassinis

& Stavrou, 2013; Mauno et al., 2005; Ollier-

Malaterre, Valcour, Den Dulk, & Kossek, 2013).

In turn, the contribution of our study is four-

fold: (1) we explore a new mediator to the relation-

ship between HR practices and outcomes; namely,

Chang, Gudmundsson, & Sawang, 2012). The

assumption pertaining to the use of such support

practices is that they will have positive effects

for both the employees and the

organization (Gregory & Milner,

2009). However, research on these

relationships has produced mixed

results (Bourhis & Mekkaoui, 2010;

Mauno, Kinnunen, & Pyykko, 2005;

Perry-Smith & Blum, 2000; Yuile

et al., 2012), preventing us from

drawing safe conclusions about

links between HR practices and out-

comes. This diversity of findings

denotes the need to identify addi-

tional factors that may explain the

“black box” between relevant HR

practices and outcomes for employ-

ees and organizations (Aryee et al.,

2013).

In attempting to uncover this

“black box”, it has been suggested

that HR practices are often indi-

rectly related to individual and

organizational outcomes (Allen,

2001; McCarthy, Cleveland, Hunter,

Darcy, & Grady, 2013). As Blair-Loy,

Wharton, and Goodstein (2011, p.

432) noted, simply having policies is

an insufficient indicator of the qual-

ity of work-life balance initiatives.

It seems that much depends on fac-

tors such as organizational norms,

culture, and manager informal sup-

port and perceptions, affecting how

policies are implemented (Aryee

at al., 2013; Den Dulk et al., 2011;

Hayman, 2009; Lewis & Smithson,

2001).

We contribute to the aforemen-

tioned discussion by proposing

that the relationship between HR

practices and outcomes is medi-

ated by individual perceptions,

and specifically by the discrepancy

of employee/management per-

ceptions regarding entitlement to

organizational support for work-

life balance. In other words, we

argue that HR practices are only

indirectly related to individual and

organizational outcomes when the

discrepancy between manager and

employee perceptions of entitle-

ment is low; low discrepancy suggests common

expectations for support among both stake-

holder groups.