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Reduced Hours Work/Part-Time Work (2003)
Author: Rosalind Barnett, Brandeis University- Community, Families & Work Program Basic Concepts & Definitions Most definitions of work time are based on the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics definition (1995); namely, 35 or more hours a week is full-time, fewer than 35 hours per week is considered part-time. However, there are some obvious exceptions to this rule. For example, among elementary school teachers, full-time is 32 hours per week; among nurses, 24 hours per week may be considered full-time if those hours are spent in back-to-back 12-hour shifts on weekends. One reason for an agreed-upon definition concerns payment for overtime hours. Workers covered by the Fair Labor Standards Act are entitled to time-and-a half for hours worked in excess of 40 per week. Many workers, including professionals and managers, are exempt from the provisions of this act. In contrast to most full-time jobs, most part-time jobs in the U.S. are "bad" jobs; i.e., jobs that typically have low salaries, limited or no career advancement opportunities, and few, if any, benefits (e.g., health care, sick leave, vacation time). In short, they are dead-end jobs. Most people working in these jobs are involuntarily employed on a less-than-full-time basis (notable exceptions are students working for extra money, seniors phasing out of full-time employment, and mothers of young children who choose part-time work). Recently, a new category of part-time jobs has been created, especially in the professions and management. These are "good" part-time jobs; i.e., jobs that have prorated salaries and benefits and a career ladder (Tilly, 1992). To mark this development, a new term • reduced hours • has been added to the lexicon. Unlike part-time workers, reduced-hours workers often work more than the 35 hours defined as full-time according to the BLS. For example, in a study of 82 reduced-hours professionals and managers in 42 firms, the mean number of hours worked per week was 31.9, but the range was from 20 to 55 hours per week (Lee, MacDermid, & Buck, 2000). A similar pattern obtains in medicine and law. Although far less research has been done on reduced-hours compared to part-time work, the focus of this chapter is on reduced-hours work. Reduced hours refers to the number of hours worked; however, there are different types of reduced-hours work. One type is job-sharing, an arrangement in which two people agree to do the work of one. Job-sharing usually occurs when an organization wishes to maintain consistency with respect to its clients. For example, in an accounting firm, one accountant with a well-established client list who wants to reduce her/his work hours might recruit another accountant who also wants to reduced hours and is able and willing to pick up a significant portion of her/his client work. At a minimum, such an arrangement requires considerable coordination and trust and may not be an option in many situations. One other form, which is relatively rare in the U.S., is V-time (Christensen & Staines, 1990). In this arrangement an employee agrees to work an annual number of hours, typically at less than full-time. However, the hours are scheduled throughout the year in such a way that some weeks might require 45 or more hours, whereas other weeks would require substantially fewer hours. Reduced-hours options in the professions are typically voluntary and are usually arranged on a case-by-case basis; in contrast, conventional part-time jobs are generally negotiated on a formal basis. If a doctor wants to work fewer hours and her supervisor is agreeable, the chances are good that they can arrange a reduced-hours schedule. However, like any other such informal arrangement, it is unstable. If, for example, the supervisor changes her mind or is replaced, the reduced-hours schedule must be renegotiated. The informal nature of these arrangements also leaves open such important issues as seniority, performance review, criteria for promotion, on-call hours (where appropriate), and so forth. Issues of this type are typically spelled out in traditional part-time jobs. With respect to organizational outcomes, there is growing consensus that reduced-hours workers are at least as productive as their full-time counterparts (Committee on Part-time Careers in Clinical and Investigative Medicine, 2000; Olmstead & Smith, 1994). For example, in 1998, Catalyst studied 2,000 managers and their supervisors in four companies (i.e., a Fortune 100 pharmaceutical company, a Fortune 100 technology company, a leading law firm, and a major consulting firm). The majority of the part-time workers and their supervisors reported that their work arrangement either improved or didn't affect the employee's productivity. Moreover, 46% agreed that individuals working part-time realized productivity gains. Other studies suggest that absenteeism and turnover is lower among reduced-hours compared to full-time employees (Blank, 1990). In addition, part-time workers tend to take fewer breaks and less personal time while on the job (Epstein, 1999). Moreover, increased organizational commitment and increased likelihood of returning to one's job after leaves of absence have been associated with reduced-hours schedules. Importance of Topic to Work-Family Studies Several demographic and economic factors are driving the creation of reduced-hours career options. These factors include: (1) the increasingly long work weeks of highly educated workers; (2) the growing numbers of women working long hours; (3) the high proportion of dual-earner couples (59% in 1997); (4) the widespread dissatisfaction expressed over long work hours; (5) the high turnover of young professionals; and (6) the high cost of recruiting and training new employees. In addition, several scholars have called for reduced-hours options as a means to increase employee flexibility, thereby reducing work-family conflict and stress-related job and family outcomes, as well as increasing quality of life (QOL). (Although the specific operationalizations of QOL differ from study to study, there is general agreement that QOL refers to: low levels of stress-related mental- and physical-health problems, burnout and turnover; and high levels of life satisfaction, career satisfaction, and job-role, marital-role, and parent-role quality.) Because of the widespread, if uncritical, call for more reduced-hours career options, it is crucial to ask whether they are in fact achieving the aims for which they are being designed. State of the Body of Knowledge Highly educated workers, both male and female, express similar levels of dissatisfaction with their work hours, and both report a willingness to forgo future pay increases for more nonwork time. In practice, however, few professionals take advantage of the reduced-hours options that are available to them (Boston Bar Association, 1999; Women's Bar Association of Massachusetts, 2000), and most of those who do take advantage of these options are female. A major reason for not opting for reduced hours is fear of negative career consequences (Jacobs & Gerson, 1997), a fear that appears to be well grounded. Along with the escalating call for reduced-hours careers is the amassing of evidence that, at least for women, part-time compared to full-time work is associated with lower organizational rewards (i.e., wages and benefits), and often with poorer QOL outcomes. (Until more men opt for reduced-hours schedules, we will not be able to determine whether these relationships differ by sex.) They receive substantially fewer benefits, including sick pay, holidays, health insurance, and pension coverage, as well as receiving fewer unemployment and social security benefits. Women who work part-time are more likely to be assigned to routine jobs, to receive less training (particularly important for workers without a college education) and fewer promotions, and to be laid off. They also frequently work irregular hours at the discretion of the employer. Part-time workers also tend to have far less job security than full-time workers (Ferber & Waldfogel, 1998). In addition, longitudinal analyses indicate a strong tendency for part-time employment to persist over time (Ferber and Waldfogel, 1998). And, both men and women who have ever been in nontraditional employment have far lower benefit coverage rates than employees with entirely traditional work histories. Moreover, to the extent that long-term part-time employment is associated with multiple job changes, the total number of jobs ever held has a substantial negative effect on wages and a highly significant negative impact on whether an individual has health insurance, as well as a negative impact on retirement plans both for men and for women (Ferber & Green, 2003). Yet some studies find that working reduced hours, in contrast to part-time, is not a sure career-breaker. In a major Boston-area law firm that has formal reduced-hours career options, a few women who had been with the firm for a long time, had switched from full-time to reduced hours and then switched back to full-time did become partners. And a study of 78 female reduced-hours managers and professionals reported even more positive results (MacDermid, Lee, Buck & Williams, 2001). While working on a reduced schedule, 35% of the women were promoted. A critical factor in affecting the career outcomes of reduced-hours workers is the support of management; a top-down approach in which work-hour policy is formally integrated with policies affecting other key aspects of employment seems essential for positive results (Barnett & Hall, 2001). With respect to stress-related work, health, family, and QOL outcomes, the findings are not as encouraging. Compared to full-time workers, reduced-hours workers report more symptoms of physical-health (Herold & Waldron, 1985) and mental-health (Wethington & Kessler, 1989) problems, lower career satisfaction (Barnett & Gareis, 2003), and lower marital-role quality (Barnett & Gareis, 2002). Other studies show that work hours per se are unrelated to such outcomes as burnout (Barnett, Gareis & Brennan, 1999), psychological distress, job-role quality, and intention to leave one's current position within a year (Barnett & Gareis, 2000a), and life satisfaction (Barnett & Gareis, 2000b). Importantly, many of these findings take into account any tendency for employees in poor health to opt for reduced-hours work. It is also important to note that compared to reduced hours, long hours are typically associated with higher pay and benefits, which have a direct and positive effect on health outcomes. Such contradictory and counterintuitive results suggest that the focus on objective work hours per se as the "cause" of work-family and QOL problems needs to be rethought. Several studies propose an alternative way of thinking. Specifically, it has been suggested that subjective indicators of the meaning of work hours are better predictors of outcomes than work hours. Subjective indicators include the extent to which one's own and one's partner's work schedule meets one's own and one's family's needs (i.e., schedule fit); the extent to which the employee is distressed because of the professional activities he/she had to give up in order to have more nonwork time (i.e., difficulty of tradeoffs); and the extent to which the employee experiences more rewards than concerns associated with her/his reduced-hours schedule (i.e., subjective experience of work schedule). It has also been proposed that more systematic attention be paid to the processes (e.g., mediation and moderation) linking work hours to outcomes. Studies focusing on subjective indicators have yielded a series of interesting and nuanced views of the relationship between work hours and a host of outcomes. For example, schedule fit is related to such outcomes as psychological distress, life satisfaction, burnout, job-role quality, and marital-role quality (Gareis & Barnett, 2001). In other words, regardless of the number of objective number of hours you work • whether full-time or reduced-hours • if your work schedule is a good "fit," then your distress is low and your QOL is high. If you are working long hours and that schedule fits your needs, then your distress will be low. Alternatively, if you are working reduced hours and that schedule does not meet your needs, your distress will be high. Two other subjective indicators • difficulty of tradeoffs and subjective experience of work schedule • produced similarly provocative results. These findings suggest strongly that if we are interested in improving employees' QOL and reducing their stress-related problems, we need to pay close attention the meanings employees attach to their work schedules • not just to the objective number of hours they work. Recent studies also indicate that to fully understand the linkages between work hours and stress-related and QOL outcomes, we need to move beyond an exclusive focus on direct effects and include indirect effects; mediation and moderation. Mediators are variables through which a predictor affects an outcome. Moderators are variables that affect the magnitude and/or direction of the relationship between a predictor and an outcome. For example, among reduced-hours physicians:
Thus, reduced-hours careers are only related to positive outcomes under particular conditions. Reduced hours is not the panacea envisioned by many. Implications for Practice and Research Several avenues of research need to be pursued in the future. One is to establish the conditions under which reduced hours have salutary effects for employees and their employing organizations. These conditions need to be broadly conceptualized to include workplace, family, and personal conditions. For example, employees might be encouraged to do a careful self-assessment of the costs and benefits they are likely to experience if they opt for a reduced-hours schedule. Another is to determine how best to create reduced-hours options that meet the sometimes conflicting needs of managers and employees. One possibility is to focus more heavily on maximizing employees' schedule fit and other subjective indicators rather than searching for a one-size-fits-all policy. A third is to study how first-line managers implement reduced-hours career options (Powell & Mainiero, 1999). Another, is to explore the correlates of such other subjective indicators as perceived insider status (Stamper & Masterson, 2002). Another is to study the impact on job-related indicators when reduced-hours and full-time employees work together. The effects of reduced hours on employee outcomes would also be greatly influenced by changes in current employment law. If professionals and managers were included under the provisions of the Federal Labor Standards Act, then employers would be far less likely to insist on long work hours. Once the long-work-hours culture in management and the professions was no longer valorized, the stigma and negative effects associated with reduced-hours career options would wane. Under these circumstances, it is likely that the potential benefits of reduced hours would be realized. References Barnett, R. C., & Gareis, K. C. (2003, March). Feelings about work schedules and turnover among part-time health professionals. Paper to be presented at the 5th APA/NIOSH Interdisciplinary Conference on Occupational Stress and Health, Toronto, Canada. Barnett, R. C., & Gareis, K. C. (2002). Full-time and reduced-hours work schedules and marital quality: A study of female physicians with young children. Work and Occupations, 29(3), 364-379. Barnett, R. C., & Gareis, K. C. (2000). Reduced-hours employment: The relationship between difficulty of trade-offs and quality of life. Work and Occupations, 27(2), 168-187. Barnett, R. C., & Gareis, K. C. (2000). Reduced-hours job-role quality and life satisfaction among married women physicians with children. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 24, 358-364. Barnett, R. C., Gareis, K. C., & Brennan, R. T. (1999). Fit as a mediator of the relationship between work hours and burnout. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 4(4), 307-317. Barnett, R. C., & Hall, D. T. (2001). How to use reduced hours to win the war for talent. Organizational Dynamics, 29(3), 192-210. Blank, R. M. (1990). Are part-time jobs bad jobs? In G. Burtless (Ed.), A future of lousy jobs?: The changing structure of U.S. wages (pp. 123-155). Washington, D.C.: The Brookings Institute. Boston Bar Association Task Force on Professional Challenges and Family Needs. (1999). Facing the grail: Confronting the cost of work-family imbalance. Boston, MA: Boston Bar Association. Christensen, K. E., & Staines, G. L. (1990). Flextime: A viable solution to work/family conflict? Journal of Family Issues, 11(4), 455-476. Committee on Part-time Career Tracks in Clinical and Investigative Medicine. (2000). Interim Report, April 2000 (unpublished report). Boston, MA: Brigham & Women's Hospital. Epstein, C. F., Seron, C., Oglensky, B., & Saute, R. (1999). The part-time paradox: Time norms, professional lives, family, and gender. New York: Routledge. Ferber, M. A., & Green, C. A. (2003, January 3-5). The long-run effect of part-time work. Paper presented at the ASSA Meeting, Washington, DC. Ferber, M. A., & Waldfogel, J. (1998). The long-term consequences of nontraditional employment. Monthly Labor Review, May, 3-12. Gareis, K. C., & Barnett, R. C. (2001, August). Schedule fit and stress-related outcomes among women doctors with families. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association. Herold, J., & Waldron, I. (1985). Part time employment and women's health. Journal of Occupational Medicine, 27, 405-412. Jacobs, J. A., & Gerson, K. (1997). The endless day or flexible office? Working hours, work-family conflict, and gender equity in the modern workplace (Report to Alfred P. Sloan Foundation). New York. Labor force statistics: Annual average data 1994. (1995). Washington, DC: U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Lee, M. D., MacDermid, S. M., & Buck, M. L. (2000). Organizational paradigms of reduced load work: Accommodation elaboration, transformation. Academy of Management Journal, 43(6), 1211-1226. MacDermid, S. M., Lee, M. D., Buck, M., & Williams, M. L. (2001). Alternative work arrangements among professionals and managers: Rethinking career development and success. Journal of Management Development, 20(4), 305-317. Olmsted, B., & Smith, S. (1994). Creating a flexible workplace: How to select and manage alternative work options. New York: AMACOM. Powell, G. N., & Mainiero, L. A. (1999). Managerial decision making regarding alternative work arrangements. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 72, 41-56. Stamper, C. L., & Masterson, S. S. (2002). Insider or outsider? How employee perceptions of insider status affect their work behavior. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 23, 875-894. Tilly, C. (1992). Two faces of part time work: Good and bad part time jobs in U.S. service industries. In B. D. Warme, K. L. P. Lundy & L. A. Lundy (Eds.), Part time work: Opportunity or dead end? (pp. 227-238). New York: Praeger. Wethington, E., & Kessler, R. C. (1989). Employment, parental responsibility, and psychological distress: A longitudinal study of married women. Journal of Family Issues, 10(4), 527-546. Women's Bar Association of Massachusetts Employment Issues Committee. (2000). More than part-time: The effect of reduced-hours arrangements on the retention, recruitment, and success of women attorneys in law firms. Boston, MA: Author. Other Recommended Readings on this Topic: (Click on titles to link to citations/annotations in the Literature Database.) Barnett, R. C., & Gareis, K. C. (2002). Full-time and reduced-hours work schedules and marital quality: A study of female physicians with young children. Work and Occupations, 29(3), 364-379. Barnett, R. C., Gareis, K. C., & Brennan, R. T. (1999). Fit as a mediator of the relationship between work hours and burnout. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 4(4), 307-317. Barnett, R. C., & Hall, D. T. (2001). How to use reduced hours to win the war for talent. Organizational Dynamics, 29(3), 192-210. Boston Bar Association Task Force on Professional Challenges and Family Needs. (1999). Facing the grail: Confronting the cost of work-family imbalance. Boston, MA: Boston Bar Association. Ferber, M. A., & Waldfogel, J. (1998). The long-term consequences of nontraditional employment. Monthly Labor Review, May, 3-12. Herold, J., & Waldron, I. (1985). Part time employment and women's health. Journal of Occupational Medicine, 27, 405-412. Lee, M. D., MacDermid, S. M., & Buck, M. L. (2000). Organizational paradigms of reduced load work: Accommodation elaboration, transformation. Academy of Management Journal, 43(6), 1211-1226. Tilly, C. (1992). Two faces of part time work: Good and bad part time jobs in U.S. service industries. In B. D. Warme, K. L. P. Lundy & L. A. Lundy (Eds.), Working part time: Risks and opportunities (pp. 227-238). New York, NY: Praeger.
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