Springer Work and Quality of Life: Ethical Practices in Organizations (International Handbooks of Quality-of-Life)

Balancing the requirements of our working and home lives is an increasingly complex task. This volume assesses a range of existing quality-of-life programs implemented by employers that recognize the conflicts between our professional and family commitments. Review From the reviews: “Contributing to the literature on quality of work life, this volume examines ethical dilemmas resulting from conflicts at work. … Although a wide variety of topics is covered in this volume, readers can explore each in depth because chapters often provide strong literature reviews based on relatively recent scholarly research as well as suggestions for future research, long lists of references, and concluding comments. … Summing Up: Recommended. Business practitioners and academic researchers, upper-division undergraduates and up.” (G. E. Kaupins, Choice, Vol. 50 (5), January, 2013) From the Back Cover Employees have personal responsibilities as well as responsibilities to their employers. They also have rights. In order to maintain their well-being, employees need opportunities to resolve conflicting obligations. Employees are often torn between the ethical obligations to fulfill both their work and non-work roles, to respect and be respected by their employers and coworkers, to be responsible to the organization while the organization is reciprocally responsible to them, to be afforded some degree of autonomy at work while attending to collaborative goals, to work within a climate of mutual employee-management trust, and to voice opinions about work policies, processes and conditions without fear of retribution. Humanistic organizations can recognize conflicts created by the work environment and provide opportunities to resolve or minimize them. This handbook empirically documents the dilemmas that result from responsibility-based conflicts. The book is organized by sources of dilemmas that fall into three major categories: individual, organizational (internal policies and procedures), and cultural (social forces external to the organization), including an introduction and a final integration of the many ways in which organizations can contribute to positive employee health and well-being. This book is aimed at both academicians and practitioners who are interested in how interventions that stem from industrial and organizational psychology may address ethical dilemmas commonly faced by employees.                 About the Author NORA P. REILLY is an organizational social psychologist (Ph.D., Dartmouth, 1985), Professor of Psychology, and Associate Dean of the College of Graduate and Professional Studies at Radford University in Virginia, US. She has published in the areas of quality of work life, the behavioral expression of commitment, perceptions of/reactions to stigmatizing conditions in the workplace and the self-regulation of affect in such outlets as The Journal of Vocational Behavior, Motivation and Emotion, Journal of Business and Psychology, Applied Research in Quality of Life, and The Academy of Management Journal, as well as serving on several editorial boards.   Her teaching interests range from organizational psychology, applied social psychology, psychometrics, methodology, statistics and organization development.  She has served as the coordinator of the master’s program in industrial and organizational psychology at Radford as well as in numerous internal governance positions, including president of the faculty senate.  She is currently responsible for graduate academic course and program reviews as well as the administration of graduate assistantships at Radford.  She is a member of several professional organizations, including the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, where she served on the Education and Training Committee.  Finally, she is an active OD consultant, primarily in the area of healthcare.  She may be reached at nreilly@radford.