CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT STUDENTS’ PERCEPTIONS ON WORK-LIFE BALANCE

Abstract

Today's work-life dynamics have changed tremendously since the 1950s. Increased participation of women in the paid workforce has highly contributed to this prominent change; and since then, work-life balance (WLB) has become an important issue for both employees and organizations. Given that construction is one of the most demanding industries, investigating work-life experiences of employees has been a focal point of researchers. However, there is not much literature on how younger generations, also known as “millennials”, perceive WLB before they get to start working in the industry. The purpose of this study is to investigate construction management students' perceptions on WLB. Additionally, the study will investigate the differences in students’ perceptions and future expectations considering their gender and enrollment years (levels). For this purpose, an online survey instrument was sent to 694 construction management students who were pursuing their undergraduate and graduate degrees at Colorado State University in 2015; and 61 responses were collected. Mann-Whitney U-test and Kruskal Wallis tests were conducted to identify whether there are statistically significant differences in students’ cognizance of WLB issues. Based on the results of the statistical tests, a statistically significant difference was found between the female and male students’ perception of early burnout in the construction industry. The results did not provide enough evidence to identify statistically significant differences between groups of students in different enrollment years.