Dr. Rebecca Greenbaum and colleagues analyzed how underlying feelings of fear or shame may impact employed parents’ productivity in the workplace.
An online survey of 201 individual working parents and 259 sets of spouses who were both working parents was conducted.
Key findings include:
1.) Parental identity threat was defined as a blended work-family experience where working parents attend to their parenting identities while at work.
— Parental identity threat resulted in same-day reductions in work productivity.
2.) Employees with higher emotional stability may be better positioned to handle self-image discrepancies, as parental identity threat had a lesser impact on their productivity compared to employees with lower emotional stability.
3.) Organizations should have an understanding of the psychological challenges working parents face and try to reduce feelings of shame among those employees.
— Managers should be careful in how they speak to and about working parents.
— Managers can offer schedule flexibility to show employees that their work and parenting aren’t in conflict.
— Employers should acknowledge the difficulties of managing roles as both a parent and an employee.
Read the original research here.
