Shelley MacDermid

This research is a joint effort with Mary Dean Lee of McGill University in Montreal, Canada. It is a large qualitative study of managers and professionals who voluntarily work part time. These groups are very interesting because, as very high-level workers, they test the idea that part-time work arrangements can only be successful for workers with minor responsibilities. More than 400 interviews have been conducted and data currently are being analyzed for publication in scientific journals. Analyses focus on the policies and cultures in the organizations we studied. Analyses also focus on aspects of family life, including the marriage relationships between the part-time workers and their spouses, and the ways that the families think about and manage time.

Funding: Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Canada.

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