Abstract:

The virtual team work mode has become an inevitable trend for the organization work, resulting in a significant characteristic, “boundarylessness”, with a high overlap between the work and family domains. Such boundaryless trend changes the premise of previous research and practice that work and family can be distinguished. Responding to this problem, some scholars suggested to follow this boundaryless trend and promote work-family integration. However, the managerial practice based on this principle resulted in a series of negative effects. This raises an important research question needed to be resolved under the trend of virtual team work mode: is the traditional work-family differentiation principle or the current work-family integration principle more suitable to enhance work-family balance? Do we need other new perspective to resolve this problem? In order to resolve this important research question, the current project comprising two studies relies on social identity theory to assist the insufficient explanatory logic of conservation of resources theory, discussing the mechanism of team virtuality on employees’ work-family integration behavior, as well as the managerial intervention principle to achieve work-family harmony.

First, based on conservation of resources theory and social identity theory, respectively, this project explores the dual mechanisms of team virtuality on employees’ work-family integration behaviors and their work-related and family-related outcomes, which offers a theoretical understanding of the work-family balance strategies preferred by employees in virtual team work mode. Specifically, informed by the conservation of resources theory, team virtuality enhances employees’ control and utilization of resources (e.g., sense of control, psychological availability, and vitality), thereby contributing to an increase in employees’ work-family integration behavior, wherein they use work-available resources for family activities and family-available resources for work activities. This integration behavior, while beneficial for enhancing work-related outcomes, may be detrimental to family-related outcomes. informed by the social identity theory, team virtuality decreases employees’ identification with the team while increasing their identification with the family. Consequently, employees are inclined toward family-to-work integration behavior (i.e., using work-available resources for family activities), thereby enhancing family-related outcomes. Moreover, although employees also reduce their work-to-family integration behavior (i.e., using family-available resources for work activities), which is detrimental to work-related outcomes, the improved family-related outcomes offset this negative effect. Through the dual mechanisms of resources and identity, it is evident that as the degree of team virtuality intensifies, employees may not prefer mutual integration of work and family; instead, they may lean towards family-to-work integration. This implies that in the trend of virtual team work mode, employees seek a distinction between work and family, showing a preference for allocating resources to the family domain.

Second, this project extends its investigation into the moderating role of family identity on the impact of employees’ control and utilization of resources on work-family integration behavior, thus bridging the research perspectives of conservation of resources theory and social identity theory to form an integrative theoretical framework for the field of work-family balance research. Specifically, identification with the family (e.g., family identity, family identity salience) directs employees to allocate resources to the family domain rather than the work domain. Therefore, when employees possess a certain degree of control over resources (e.g., sense of control, psychological availability, and vitality), it further motivates them to engage in family-to-work integration behavior while reducing work-to-family integration behavior. Ultimately, this dynamic results in divergent impacts on work-related and family-related outcomes. By investigating this moderating effect, the study provides insights into which strategies are more suitable for work-family balance in the trend of virtual team work mode. This also addresses the apparent contradiction between the resource and identity perspectives, integrating previous resource-focused viewpoints into a unified identity-focused research framework, thus building a holistic theoretical framework for investigating work-family balance in the context of virtual team work mode.

This project contributes to the literature on work-family balance in the context of virtual team work mode by constructing a novel and integrative theoretical framework for understanding the mechanisms of team virtuality on employees’ work-family balance. By integrating the previous perspective of conservation of resources theory into social identity theory, this project provides a new theoretical perspective for research in the field of work-family balance and extends the current research logic of conservation of resources theory in the context of work-family balance. In addition, the project assists organizations in reevaluating their managerial approaches to work-family balance in the age of virtual team work, offering new management strategies to achieve work-family harmony.

Key words: work-family balance, team virtuality, conservation of resources theory, social identity theory, work-family integration