Work-life balance: comparative international perspectives from Hospitality workers

The issue of work life balance (WLB) has attracted the attention of researchers for some time now, due mainly to the impact on personal and professional lives as well as the organisation's productivity. In the 24/7 labour intensive hospitality industry, balancing work, family life and other activities such as studying, the need to address the issues impacting on a work life balance is especially important. While some studies have examined WLB in the hospitality industry (see, for example, Wong and Ko, 2009; Chiang, Birtch and Kwan (2010), none have investigated whether there are variations across countries in the perceptions of WLB. This paper seeks to address this gap through a comparative study of hospitality employees' perceptions of WLB in Australia, New Zealand (NZ) and the United Kingdom (UK). Data from 513 respondents were analysed using a variety of techniques; factor analysis, for example, yielded eight robust factors that were subsequently used in regression analysis. The results from the regression analysis found that the factors of 'Stress and Frustration with Work', 'Supportive Work Colleagues', 'Balanced Time', 'Control over Work and Working Times', 'Behavioural Commitment', 'Working Hours' and 'Work Change and Flexibility' were statistically significant predictors of WLB. These results and others are discussed and the implications for industry and further academic research are provided