Sabrina Tanquerel

Work-Family Justice: Untangling characteristics of men who dare to break the "ideal worker" norm

BORDERERS

* middle-aged * perceived barriers to be an involved father * working partner but stopped working for a while * pseudo-egalitarian

INTRODUCTION

In most workplaces, a "good" employee is still considered today as a person who is totally engaged, available and fully devoted to work. The "ideal worker" norm (Williams, 2001) refers to the image of the most desirable worker as one who is totally committed to, and always available for his or her work (Acker, 1990). Straying from this image presents risks, especially for men, who are the most expected to adhere to the work-devotion norm (Blair-Loy, 2003). Men who "do not fit into the straight-jacket of conventional masculinity" (Williams, 2010) face sizable job risks such as femininity stigma, flexibility stigma, job consequences, career penalties (Coltrane et al., 2013;Rudman and Mescher, 2013;Williams et al., 2013).

Nevertheless, contemporary men evidence more and more worklife balance needs. Despite the stigmas and barriers they may experience (Tanquerel & Grau-Grau, 2020), some men dare to open other paths to increase their work-life balance. Furthermore, the hegemonic construction of masculinity continues to tie masculinity to the work sphere (Liebig and Oechsle, 2017), which is linked with the notion of the ideal worker described above. Although some men reveal their deviance (Murgia and Poggio, 2009), in general, most men continue to embrace or pass as having embraced the ideal worker image (Reid, 2015). Digressing from these norms also raises the question of one's gender identity. Asking for more flexibility in the workplace alters masculinity and has its price for men .

SCOPE OF THE RESEARCH

Until now, research has mainly focused on the consequences of male deviance from the "ideal worker" norm on their job outcomes and career structure, but little attention has been put on the characteristics of such progressive profiles. These "progressive" men challenge the dominant model of masculinity and the traditional norms that still rule contemporary organizations. They are key to increase gender equality and justice at work and home.

METHODOLOGY

This research explores the characteristics of these men who dare to reveal their gender deviance and openly ask for more work-life balance. In order to achieve this, we have conducted 41 semistructured interviews of working men in France and Spain. We included in our sample all types of working men (in different hierarchical positions in different departments of a variety of organizations (e.g. schools, chemical firms and the automotive industry) in order to compare and understand why some men remain in the hegemonic schema while some dare to break the norms.

WFRN 6th