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Abstract
This article is based on a comprehensive review of work-life balance programmes in IT companies. Some of the leading IT companies have indeed pioneered innovative work-life balance programmes which are worthy of being termed as the best practices with universal appeal across industries. In this paper, the authors have reviewed the work-life balance programmes of five companies viz. Google, SAS Institute, NetApp, AutoDesk and National Instruments which are drawn from various authoritative lists of best places to work brought out by Forbes, Fortune or Glassdoor from time to time. HR practitioners and consultants can take cues from this article to develop effective work-life balance programmes for greater impact while academics can take it further in terms of deeper inquiry on this theme.
Keywords: Work-life balance, Best Practices, IT Companies
Introduction
Comprehensive work-life balance programmes are limited to a small number of large companies in the world while a vast majority of employees across the globe have no access to such interventions leading to dysfunctional turnover, exhaustion, depression, and burnout among executives (Jha & Malviya, 2015). This paper is a humble attempt to showcase some of the best practices in implementing work-life balance programmes so as to kick-start a larger thrust in popularising innovative and high-impact interventions in the field based on experiences from top five IT companies viz. Google, SAS Institute, NetApp, AutoDesk and National Instruments. These companies have been selected for the study based on their consistent track record of being the top ones in the best places to work lists published from time to time by Great Places to Work Institute, Glassdoor, Forbes and Fortune.
Google finds a place in the list of Great Places to Work Institute's top MNCs of the world. Work-life balance programs of google have been reported and discussed on various on-line platforms and scholarly studies. Bock (2014) observes that Google uses a scientific approach to work-life balance by conducting an annual g-DNA within survey which is unlike run on the mill researches. The g-DNA survey is used to design and implement work-life balance programs for its employees in different parts of the world. The g-DNA survey revolves around innate characteristics (nature) of the employees and their surroundings (nurture) as both these factors determine their...