The Increasing Call for Work-Life Balance (@ BusinessWeek)
The economic downturn has placed tremendous pressure on employees over their long-term job security. Employees are responding by seeking out employers that offer a better work-life balance, and research shows they work harder for those that do.
In the current economic environment, work-life balance now ranks as one of the most important workplace attributes—second only to compensation, according to research conducted by the Corporate Executive Board among more than 50,000 global workers. And employees who feel they have a better work-life balance tend to work 21% harder than those that don't.
The critical need to ensure an adequate work-life balance for employees in the downturn is largely being neglected by employers as more and more pressure is put onto employees. In 2006, 53% of employees felt they had a good work-life balance; that number fell to 30% in the first quarter of 2009.
