Family matters: The impact of family functioning on co-worker outcomes

Abstract

Does family really matter when it comes to work? To answer this question, we tested the relationships between a job incumbent’s family life and a co-worker’s work life and found that one person’s family may impact another person’s work. We hypothesized that job incumbent family functioning influences workplace outcomes through work–family balance (WFB) to shape a co-worker’s job attitudes and experiences. Further, we proposed that task interdependence moderates the mediated effects of WFB on the relationship between family functioning and these outcomes. Our sample was 226 married job incumbents living in the United States who work full time, along with responses from both their spouses and co-workers. We found that WFB mediates family functioning’s relationship with the co-worker’s job satisfaction, job incumbent’s incivility, and job incumbent’s task-focused organizational citizenship behaviors. Task interdependence moderated family functioning’s indirect effect on co-worker job satisfaction and the incumbent’s incivility through WFB. There were no significant effects of job incumbent family functioning on co-worker organizational commitment. Thus, family does matter as positive family functioning not only allows the employee to reap the benefit of WFB, but also co-workers benefit through increased job satisfaction and the job incumbent performing more helpful and collegial behavior toward the co-worker.