Work-life balance

Work-life balance in its broadest sense can be defined as a person’s satisfaction with their level of involvement in the multiple roles in their life. The broader adoption of work-life balance as distinct from work-family balance recognises both a broader concept of family and the recognition that care of dependent children is not the only important non-work function that employees struggle to balance. In addition to the care of dependent children, other life activities that need to be balanced with employment may include caring for ageing parents or extended family members, volunteer work, sport and exercise, study and hobbies. Research has shown that the benefits for organisations providing work-life balance initiatives include increased productivity, organisational commitment, improved morale and job satisfaction, reduced absenteeism, and reduced turnover.³⁸

Despite widespread commitment to the principles of work-life balance, the reality for many employees is not always consistent with the rhetoric. The availability of work- life policies does not always result in employee uptake of these initiatives. Managerial support is seen as the key to either encouraging or discouraging employees’ efforts to achieve work-life balance. The perception of negative career consequences can also influence access to work-life balance, including the need to be seen to be at work and the degree of co-worker support.³⁹

Legislative framework relating to work-life balance

The Commissioner’s Directions require agency heads to:

• put in place measures directed at ensuring that employment and workplace arrangements take appropriate account of employees who are seeking to balance individual needs and the achievement of organisational goals
• assist employees to balance their work, family and other caring responsibilities effectively by encouraging the development of mutually beneficial work practices in the agency.⁴⁰

In addition, agency workplace diversity programmes are required to include measures aimed at ensuring that ‘workplace structures, systems and procedures assist employees in balancing their work, family and other caring responsibilities’.⁴¹

Agency support for work-life balance

The 2005 agency survey asked about measures used in agencies to promote work-life balance for employees. Table 9.20 sets out the overall frequency of strategies used by agencies to promote work-life balance in 2004–05. The strategies most frequently used by agencies were maternity leave at half pay, with over 95% of agencies providing this option; purchased leave arrangements, with 83% of agencies providing 48/52 leave arrangements; automatic rights to work part-time on return from maternity leave, provided by 77% of agencies; time off in lieu arrangements for EL employees, with 73% of agencies providing this option; and paid paternity leave, provided by 61% of agencies.

Other work-life strategies included: family care and/or nursing mothers’ rooms; a prayer room; a health and wellbeing payment of up to $200 for health-related activities and equipment to promote a healthy lifestyle; reimbursement of reasonable expenses arising from additional dependent care arrangements incurred because of business travel; working from home arrangements; and in some agencies computer drives and email accounts available via a remote dial-in facility. Some agencies also provided a school holiday care allowance; holiday care programmes run during school holidays; dependent care referral services; employee assistance programmes; annual leave buy back options; and flexbank provisions allowing staff to bank flex for a period of 16 weeks each year during times of high workload.

Table 9.20: Work/life balance strategies available in agencies, 2004–05

Note: Results do not include agencies that did not respond to the question relating to the particular strategy.

Source: Agency Survey

Maternity leave, and adoption and paternity leave

One of the measures that help women with young children balance their work and family responsibilities in the APS is access to maternity leave, both paid and unpaid. This measure is a key one for agencies in encouraging the retention of their female employees.

There has been a slight decline in the total number of women commencing a period of maternity leave (from 2468 in 2003–04 to 2402 in 2004–05), but still a higher number than was reported five years ago (1608 in 2000–01). This equates to 3.6% of the total number of ongoing women in the APS.

Of the women who commenced maternity leave in 2003–04, 11.7% had separated from the APS by 30 June 2005.

The Workplace Relations Act 1996 provides a minimum entitlement to 52 weeks of unpaid parental leave following the birth or adoption of a child. This also includes one week unpaid paternity leave around the birth of a child and up to three weeks of unpaid leave as a couple when adopting. However, as mentioned above, both paid and unpaid maternity leave are provided to women in the APS.

Some agencies are providing more than the mandatory 12 weeks paid maternity leave as provided for under the Maternity Leave (Commonwealth Employees) Act 1973.

Agencies were asked about a number of work-life strategies relating to the birth and/or adoption of a child. Frequency results for these strategies can be found at Figure 9.13. Thirty-seven per cent of agencies indicated that they provide more than 12 weeks paid maternity leave. This additional maternity leave ranges from 1–24 additional weeks, with most agencies providing an additional two weeks. It is more prevalent in small (46%) and medium (35%) agencies than in large agencies (24%).

Some agencies are also providing paid adoption and paternity leave to employees. These entitlements are generally covered in agency CAs.

Paid adoption leave from 1–14 weeks is available in 71% of agencies, with 22 agencies providing more than 10 weeks. Adoption leave is more prevalent in large (90%) than in small (69%) and medium (58%) agencies.

Paid paternity leave is provided by 61% of agencies and is prevalent in two-thirds of small and large agencies and half of medium agencies. Most paid paternity leave is one or two weeks in length with only five agencies providing more than two weeks paid paternity leave.

Providing the maternity leave entitlement at half pay has proved to be a popular strategy, with 95% of agencies making it available.

Figure 9.13: Work-life strategies related to the birth or adoption of a child, 2004–05

Source: Agency Survey

Carer responsibilities

The 2005 employee survey asked respondents about their carer responsibilities. Thirty-nine per cent of employees said that they had carer responsibilities, up slightly from last year’s result (36%). Carers were most likely to care for children between five and 16 years of age (61% of carers), followed by children under five years old (29%), dependent children over 16 years of age (19%) and aged parents (15%). Carers were much less likely to care for disabled dependants (2%). Five per cent of employees indicated they had other carer responsibilities. The most common ‘other’ response was a spouse and/or partner with acute and/or long-term health problems, and/or a disability or mental illness. There was a variety of other responses, including aged relatives (other than parents) and other extended family members.

As was the case last year, more women than men had carer responsibilities (45% compared to 33%). Women and men were equally likely to care for children, although men were more likely to report having a responsibility to care for children under five years old (32% compared to 26%). Last year women were identified as being more likely to care for aged parents; this year men were as likely as women to report having a responsibility to care for this group.

Caring responsibilities were associated with:

• employment status, with ongoing employees more likely to have carer responsibilities than non-ongoing employees (40% compared to 13%)
• working hours, with part-time workers more likely to have carer responsibilities than full-time employees (69% compared to 36%).

Most carers had only one form of carer responsibility (72%). This was lower than last year’s result (83%). Twenty-eight per cent of carers had two or more different types of caring responsibility; this was an increase on last year’s findings (17%).

Carers were asked how often over the last 12 months they had personally used leave or some other arrangement at short notice to care for those for whom they are responsible. The results are shown at Figure 9.14. Carers were most likely (64%) to take between one and five days of carer’s leave (or similar arrangement) with only 11% taking no such leave. This was similar to last year’s results.

Figure 9.14: Proportion of carers reporting days used for carer’s leave or similar arrangements, 2003–04 and 2004–05

70

Source: Employee survey

There were no statistically significant differences for use of carers leave based on the EEO groups.42

Part-time employment

Data on part-time work from APSED, presented in Chapter 2, shows a substantial increase in part-time work over the last ten years (see Figure 2.6 in Chapter 2). In 2005, the proportion of ongoing employees working part-time increased again to 11.3%, compared to 10.2% in 2004. Women are much more likely to be employed part-time (18.0% of women employed as ongoing employees were working part-time compared with 3.3% of men). Female non-ongoing employees are more likely to work part-time than any other group, with over one quarter of non-ongoing women employees working part-time.

Average hours worked in the last six months

The high satisfaction rates for support for flexible working arrangements are particularly important for employees in balancing their work and outside work commitments, given that many continue to report working long hours. Sixty-three per cent of employees reported working more (42%) or significantly more (21%) than their ‘standard or agreed’ hours, or for SES employees a ‘reasonable’ number of hours, on average over the last six months. This is similar to the proportion for 2003, when 62% of employees reporting working more than ‘standard/agreed’ or ‘reasonable’ hours and slightly higher than 2004 (58%).

Not surprisingly, the number of employees who reported working more, or significantly more, than their agreed hours generally increased with classification, with EL (76%) and SES (77%) employees working longer hours than APS 1–6 employees (59%) (see Figure 9.15 for these results by classification).

Figure 9.15: Proportion of employees working more, or significantly more, than a standard or agreed number of hours on average over the past six months, 2003–04 and 2004–05

Source: Employee survey

Working more than standard and/or agreed (or reasonable) hours was associated with employment status, with full-time workers more likely to work more hours (65%) than part-time workers (47%). However, this year saw a significant increase in part-time employees working more than their standard or agreed hours compared to last year’s result of 38%.

There was a wide variation among large agencies in the proportion of employees reporting that they had worked significantly more than their standard or agreed hours. The result ranged from a low of 16% to a high of 42%, with the lowest results being at ABS and ATO.

Satisfaction with agency and supervisor support for the use of flexible work practices

When employees were asked to rate how supportive their workplace culture was in enabling them to achieve work-life balance, 68% of respondents agreed that their workplace was supportive in helping them to achieve work-life balance. Agreement within large agencies ranged from a low of 37% to a high of 85%, with the highest agreement rates at ABS, CRS, Defence, and DEH. Employees of small agencies were more likely to agree that their workplace is supportive of work-life balance (78%) than were the employees of medium (70%) and large (67%) agencies.

By comparison, in WA, 71% of public servants in the health and education sectors who responded to a 2004–05 public sector climate survey agreed that their workplace culture supported them to achieve a good work-life balance.⁴³

An important measure of work-life balance is whether employees are satisfied that their supervisor would support their use of flexible work practices. The APS continues to perform well against this measure. Eighty-one per cent of respondents to the employee survey were satisfied that their supervisor would support the use of flexible work practices such as flex-time, personal leave, flexible working hours, and part-time work. The result was similar in 2004. Ten per cent were neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, and a further nine per cent were dissatisfied.

Of those employees who agreed that their workplace culture supports people to achieve a good work-life balance, 92% are satisfied that their supervisor would support their use of flexible work practices. It is noteworthy that of those employees who disagree that their workplace culture supports people to achieve a good work-life balance, 49% are satisfied that their supervisor would support their use of flexible work practices.

The strong satisfaction level in the APS is high (81%) compared to a similar survey conducted in Victoria. The Victorian Government’s People Matter Survey 2004 found that 69% of respondents agreed that their organisation offered practical ways to achieve work-life balance.⁴⁴

The SA Government’s Workplace Perspective Survey 2004 does not have any directly comparable data, but it did find that while employees’ overall awareness of flexible working arrangements was high, the use of flexible working arrangements was very low with the exception of flex-time.⁴⁵

The 2005 APS employee survey results suggest that satisfaction with support for flexible work practices is related to the type of work undertaken by the employee, and the effectiveness of their supervisor’s management skills. In particular:

• APS 1–6 employees (82%) were more likely to report satisfaction with their supervisor’s support for flexible work practices than were EL employees (79%), who were again more likely to report satisfaction than SES employees (65%). These findings are similar to last year’s.
• Seventy per cent of employees who reported working significantly more than their standard or agreed hours were satisfied with their supervisor’s support for flexible work practices compared with 82% of employees working around their standard or agreed number of hours. What is noteworthy is that those reporting they worked more than their standard or agreed number of hours (85%) were more satisfied than either group. Last year’s result found that both groups who identified as having worked more hours were less satisfied.⁴⁶
• Ninety-one per cent of employees who gave their supervisor a high rating for effectiveness in managing people, also reported satisfaction with their supervisor’s support for flexible work practices, compared to 59% of employees who rated the effectiveness of their supervisor at managing people as low.

Other factors associated with employees’ satisfaction with their supervisor’s support of flexible practices were:

• employment status, with more full-time employees (80%) less satisfied with their supervisor’s support for flexible practices than part-time employees (89%)
• age, with the highest satisfaction among those aged 35–44 years (82%), and the lowest satisfaction among those aged over 55 years (74%)
• employees in small agencies (86%) were much more satisfied than employees in medium or large agencies
• Indigenous heritage, with Indigenous employees much more satisfied (91%) than non-Indigenous employees.

There was no relationship between satisfaction that supervisors would support the use of flexible work practices and people with disabilities or NESB1 status.

Employees made a number of comments about agency support for work-life balance and flexible working arrangements, both positive and negative.

38 Hudson, 20:20 Series/The Case for Work/Life Balance: Closing the gap between policy and practice, <http://www.hudson.com.au>

39 ibid.

40 Clauses 2.11(1) and 3.2(2), PS Commissioner’s Directions.

41 Clause 3.3(b), PS Commissioner’s Directions.

42 In this context the results were not statistically significant at the 95% Confidence Interval (see Appendix 2 for more information on confidence intervals).

43 Office of the Public Sector Standards Commissioner, Western Australia, Public Sector Climate Survey, 2004–05.

44 See <www.ope.vic.gov.au>. Caution should be exercised in comparing the results because of the differences in wording of the questions, and differences in methodologies between the two surveys.

45 Office for the Commission of Public Employment, SA Workplace Perspectives Survey 2004. Results can be found at <http://www.ocpe.sa.gov.au >

46 SES employees were asked to report on whether they had worked more than ‘a reasonable number of hours’.

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