NOVEMBER 19, 2014

THE ENGINEER AND THE FAMILY

FPEN 411 PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT SEMINAR

BENJAMIN ADAMTEY
10381550
FOOD PROCESS ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT
FACULTY OF ENGINEERING SCIENCES

Abstract
Work and family have always been interdependent, enriching and complementing each
other. When work takes precedence, our relationships suffer; when family takes
precedence, our careers suffer. But when theres an established balance and no friction
between the two, we are better at our jobs, and we are better with our family. And we
are at peace with ourselves as effective, happy, and productive persons.

Table of Contents

Abstract ............................................................................................................................... 1
Background.......................................................................................................................... 3
The Engineer and the Family .............................................................................................. 5
Work and Family Conflict ................................................................................................ 5
Time Based Conflicts ..................................................................................................... 7
Strain Based Conflicts ................................................................................................... 7
Behavior Based Conflicts .............................................................................................. 8
Work and Family Balance ................................................................................................ 8
Work-family Facilitation ................................................................................................ 11
Budding Engineers: Choosing between Career and Family ............................................. 12
Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 13

Background
A family (from Latin: familia) is a group of people affiliated by consanguinity (by
recognized birth), affinity (by marriage), or co-residence/shared consumption. Members
of the immediate family may include a spouse, parent, brother and sister, and son and
daughter. Alternatively, may include members of the extended family such as a
grandparent, nephew and niece, aunt, uncle, cousin, or sibling-in-law.
The family is the natural and basic unit of society.
It is hard to think of a human social institution that has undergone more change
in less time than has the family in the last several decades. Due to globalization,
modernization and other dynamic social forces, the family has been transformed a great
deal. These dynamic social forces have provoked an assortment of responses; in its
structure (smaller-sized households, late marriage and childbearing, and single
parenting due to increased divorce rates), the role of members (breadwinning,
childcare, etc.) and in its capacity to perform its functions (socialization, caregiving for
their young and older members).
Family and employment are socially constructed and interrelated phenomena
via which the division of labour between men and women is organised, to achieve social
production and reproduction (Crompton, 2006). However the dynamic cline of the

modern world and its social forces risk the interrelation and interdependence of these
institutions/phenomena work family conflict. Demanding careers and dual earning
parents (or single parenting) makes balancing and interrelation of the two challenging.
The once traditional and majority family pattern of breadwinner father,
homemaker mother and children is now in the minority form in much of the modern
world. The majority two-parent with children households, have both parents in
employment. The challenges of integrating work and family life are part of everyday
reality for the majority (two-parent household). The particulars of these challenges may
vary depending on their occupation, income, or stage in life regardless their gender.
Most workers today, regardless of gender, have family responsibilities, and most
married workers, regardless of gender, have an employed spouse. But jobs are still
designed as if workers have no family responsibilities. The culture and organization of
paid work, domestic care work, and community organizations remain mired in the past,
modelled on the breadwinner father-homemaker mother. Thus, jobs, schools, and many
other aspects of modern life operate on the assumption that someone (a wife) is
available during the typical workday to care for family responsibilities such as
housekeeping and caring for children. (Cary L. Cooper and Susan Lewis, 1998).

The Engineer and the Family

Who is an engineer? An engineer is a professional practitioner of engineering,

concerned with applying scientific knowledge, mathematics, and ingenuity to develop
solutions for technical, societal and commercial problems. Engineers design materials,
structures, and systems while considering the limitations imposed by practicality,
regulation, safety, and cost.
Work and family have always been interdependent, enriching and complementing each
other. However, with the constant travels, relocation, projects, meetings, irregular and
long work hours of an engineering career and the demands of having a family (provision,
spouses, childcare, bonding etc.); being an engineer and a parent/family person can be
demanding, challenging, stressful and conflicting.

Work and Family Conflict

Many job and organizational factors found to impact negatively on family and
non-work life are pertinent to engineers; these include long and irregular work hours,
schedule inflexibility, high job demands, job insecurities and frequent relocations or

travels. These demands of an engineering career risk the harmonious and

complementing interdependence of families and employment.
Work-family conflict has been defined a form of inter-role conflict in which the
role pressures from the work and family domains are mutually incompatible in some
respect. That is, participation in the work (family) role is made more difficult by virtue of
participation in the family (work) role. (Greenhaus & Beutell, 1985). This definition
implies a bidirectional relation. Work-family conflict occurs when work related demands
interfere with home responsibilities and Family-work conflict arises when family
responsibilities impede work activities (Frone, Yardley, & Markel, 1997).
Family work conflicts affect the engineers employer or employee effectiveness in
carrying out his job duties, thus affecting production.
An examination of the literature on conflict between work and family roles
relates its occurrence to the stage of a persons career or his level of career success. It
also suggests that work-family conflict exists when:
(a) time devoted to the requirements of one role makes it difficult to fulfill
requirements of another Time based conflict
(b) strain from participation in one role makes it difficult to fulfill
requirements of another Strain based conflict and
(c) specific behaviors required by one role make it difficult to fulfill the
requirements of another Behavior based conflict.

Time Based Conflicts

Engineers often do not have enough time for their families due to unmanageable
workloads. Engineers often travel the world and nationwide undertaking and
supervising projects, and its norm to work overtime and on weekends as an engineer
thus constantly interfering with the home and personal life. Process engineers can be
held at the plant for long hours after work, installing new equipment or reconfiguring
equipment layout, forcing them to miss family events such as a childs birthday. The
presence of shift work makes it impossible for the engineer to be present during family
emergency at night times.
As the definition implies a bidirectional relation, an example of time-based family-towork conflict is the irregular punctuality of the engineer to work since he has to drop his
kids at school every day.

Strain Based Conflicts

Engineering job stressors such as machine noise, intense heat, overwhelming tasks, long
work hours and uncomfortable work positions during installation and maintenance
causes stress and health implication. They become exhausted, ill tempered, and find it
hard to rest. These stressors and their physical and mental implications may make it
difficult to perform family roles required of a spouse or parent such as spending quality

time or cooking.
Some of these stressors may also be family-to-work. An engineer may be too tired to
work in early as he/she was up all night attending to a sick spouse or child.

Behavior Based Conflicts

The continual need for safety, meeting deadlines, accountability, and strict sense of
organization, supervision and some behavioral characteristics of the field of engineering
could be exhibited at home. Family members, on the other hand, may expect the
engineer to be warm, nurturing, emotional, and vulnerable in his interactions with
them. They may suffer being treated as subordinates and co-workers. In the engineers
defense, the overall security and good upbringing especially for the children is the goal.

Work and Family Balance

Work- family balance is a term that refers to an individuals perceptions of the degree
to which he/she is experiencing good relationships between work and family roles,
where the relationships are viewed as compatible and at equilibrium with each other
(Greenhaus & Beutell, 1985).

For a better interrelation of work/employment and families, it is important to

establish a successful balance between work and family domains so that several
demands in both domains could be met efficiently.
When work takes precedence, our relationships suffer; when family takes precedence,
our careers suffer. The point of balance is to prevent either work or family from taking
precedence, so that neither suffers at the hands of the other. When career and family
both get their proper parts in our lives, we have achieved balance.
Below are some of the countervailing measures that contribute to a rewarding
interrelation of the two work and family investigated from literature.
Work and family balance is a conscious decision. Work and family do not
balance automatically. Achieving balance is an ongoing process. One does not
achieve balance by accident but rather by pursuing a process, that includes
setting priorities, gaining perspective, and establishing boundaries between work
and family.
Write down family goals. Family needs change over time. Opportunities to
participate in a new family pastime do not last forever. Decide what is important
and write it down. Assign a date, and make these goals absolutely-willhappens.

 Prioritize and stick to it. Sometimes it can be tough to make a choice between a
family and a work activity. Knowing where you stand on your values can decrease
second-guessing and tough choices easier.
One must recognize that imbalance is sometimes inevitable. It is important to
recognize that jobs and responsibilities are important and that sometimes one
may take top priority. For example, when one family member is sick, the engineer
may need to skip work; or when an important deadline must be met, he/she
might need to miss dinner at home and stay working in the office late.
Revisit schedule. When your work schedule changes, new opportunities may
become available to participate in family activities.
Shared responsibilities. When one family member is taking on too many
responsibilities at home, resentments can build. Spouses can take up the role of
the other in housekeeping and childcare.
Organization and time management. Improving your delegation and timemanagement skills can buy you time needed for family life.
Learn to say No. Learning how to put work down, say no, and let go of
workplace worries are skills that are learned through practice. For many, its
easier to say no to family than to the work. They rationalize giving priority to
work by believing that, when they are working, they do so to support their
families.

The impact of letting work slide is generally more immediate and visible than
neglecting our family responsibilities, it may take years for the damage done to a
family through neglect to be evident.

Work-family Facilitation

Recent research suggests that work-family facilitation (also referred to as workfamily enhancement and positive work-family spillover) may be a second component of
work-family balance (Grzywacz & Marks, 2000; Kirchmeyer, 1992). Work-family
facilitation represents the extent to which participation at work (or home) is made
easier by virtue of the experiences, skills, and opportunities gained or developed at
home (or work). As with work-family conflict, work-family facilitation has a bidirectional
dimension, where work can facilitate family life (work-to-family facilitation) and where
family can facilitate work life (family-to-work facilitation).
From the Definition, the engineering profession is most rewarding when it comes to
work-family facilitation as the technical knowhow and expertise of the engineer can be
very useful around the home. From the purchase to the maintenance of household
appliance, a proper building layout and the guarantee of safety of family members. In
the case of a food process engineer, extra concern will be given to food safety.

Budding Engineers: Choosing between Career and Family

There comes a point in life where one will be faced with the age-old conundrum: which
comes first; Family or career?
Most undergrad students want to fully engage in life and have it all after school
a career and a family. The contemporary young adult hopes to escape their parents
fate by getting more education; a career; find interesting and better paid jobs than
their parents did. However, spoken in between the lines is their desire to replicate their
parents lives to place family before career and to spend large amounts of time at
home with their young children and significant someone.
Many choose to pursue a career and delay starting a family, as they feel/believe career
and family do not mix viz women. Most undergrads believe having a family is a liability
to their career success, but still want to combine both.
It is possible however, to have both a successful career and a meaningful family
life. This can be achieved through committing to wanting both a career and family, and
balancing the two.
One can have both career and family in the same period, and avoid the illusion that, we
can make up later in life for what we have put aside earlier. If we focus on our careers at
the expense of our families, we will miss our children growing up, and we will never get
that back. Conversely, if we drop off the career track to raise families, it is almost

impossible to get back on, and we will miss the opportunity to achieve our career goals.
Do postpone one past its rightful time for the other.

Conclusion
A balanced life can provide multiple sources of satisfaction; contribute towards
the quality of life and well-being of engineers and of those for whom they care, whereas
they make optimum contribution at work and help increase productivity.

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