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Family-friendly policies and workplace supports: A meta-analysis of their effects on career, job, and work-family outcomes

Rutger Blom et al.

Journal of Vocational Behavior2025https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2025.104091article
AJG 4ABDC A*
Weight
0.61

Abstract

Today, many individuals face the challenge of combining work and family responsibilities. To help employees tackle the issues they face when juggling work and family, organizations often provide formal family-friendly policies. In addition, other people in the workplace, such as supervisors and coworkers, can support employees in an informal way in work and family reconciliation. In this study, we provide the most comprehensive meta-analytic review to date that examines the effects of family-friendly policies and workplace supports on career, job, and work-family outcomes. Based on 1680 effect sizes from 229 samples, our findings indicate that, overall, small to moderate positive effects exist across a wide range of outcomes. Supports tend to have an overall stronger effect than policies, although the differences between individual policies and supports are more nuanced. Moderator analyses indicate that people with greater family demands, such as parents, seem to benefit less. In addition, family-friendly policies and supports appear more valuable in national and organizational contexts that are disadvantageous for people that need to combine work and family responsibilities. • Meta-analysis of the impact of family-friendly policies and workplace supports on employee outcomes. • Potential positive effects, with greater potential for supports than policies. • People with greater family demands seem to benefit less from policies and supports. • Potential of policies and supports seems higher in more disadvantageous national and sectoral contexts.

15 citations

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https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2025.104091

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@article{rutger2025,
  title        = {{Family-friendly policies and workplace supports: A meta-analysis of their effects on career, job, and work-family outcomes}},
  author       = {Rutger Blom et al.},
  journal      = {Journal of Vocational Behavior},
  year         = {2025},
  doi          = {https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2025.104091},
}

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Evidence weight

0.61

Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40

F · citation impact0.63 × 0.4 = 0.25
M · momentum0.88 × 0.15 = 0.13
V · venue signal0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03
R · text relevance †0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20

† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.