National reports widely publicized that the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic’s disruption of work–nonwork boundaries impacted women’s careers negatively, as many exited their jobs to manage non-work demands. We know less about the adaptations made by highly career-invested women to remain in the workforce in occupations where they are significantly under-represented. Based on qualitative data from 763 academic Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics (STEM) women at 202 universities, we examined adaptation to disrupted work–nonwork boundaries and identified workplace contextual features associated with these adaptations. Results show that STEM women varied in their adaptation. Many women adapted their professional image management approaches: From concealing nonwork roles—particularly when in less supportive contexts, to revealing them—often to challenge existing ideal worker norms and advocate for change. Also, women adapted through varying forms of role sacrifice; trading off one role’s execution for another, mental detachment through psychological role withdrawal, or abandoning role duties through behavioral role exit. Notably, some sacrificed their non-work roles, although the dominant media narrative highlights women sacrificing work roles. Work contextual features associated with boundary management adaptation include structural support (e.g., flexibility) and social support (e.g., empathy). Results illuminate the complex decisions faced by STEM women when they lose the scaffolding supporting their work–nonwork interface. Moreover, the results have practical and theoretical implications for advancing workforce gender equity, and for supporting all employees’ work–nonwork boundary management.
Ellen Ernst Kossek is Basil S. Turner University Distinguished Professor at Purdue University’s Krannert School of Management in the USA. She holds a Ph.D. in organizational behavior from Yale University, an MBA for the University of Michigan and a Bachelors’ degree with honors in psychology from Mount Holyoke College. Her research has won national and international awards and examines leadership and strategic initiatives to advance gender equality, work-life equality, flexibility policies and remote work to foster diversity and inclusion. Ellen is the first elected President of the Work-Family Researchers Network and elected a Fellow of the Academy of Management, American Psychological Association, and Society of Industrial Organizational Psychology. Previous appointments include: University Distinguished Professor at Michigan State University, a visiting scholar at the University of Bologna; UNISA in Australia, and an upcoming U.S. Fulbright Fellowship at Cranfield University in the UK. She also serves on IESE’s work-family and women’s leadership advisory board in Barcelona, Spain and led in writing a report for the U.S. National Academy of Science on the effects of COVID-19 on the work-life boundaries of Women in STEMM Scientists. She has served at Chair of the Gender and Diversity Division of the National Academy of Management, on the Board of Governors. Her research has been funded by U.S. NIH, NSF, Russell Sage, Alfred P. Sloan and Gerber Foundations. Her research has appeared in many leading academic journals, and in the popular press. Prior to becoming a professor she worked in industry at for companies such as Hitachi, GTE, IBM and Deere and Company in Japan, Switzerland or the U.S.
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