An Investigation into Work-Family Balance and Employee Resilience among Female Bankers: The Mediating role of Organizational Support

Purpose-Work-family balance has increasingly become the epitome of scholarly investigation. This study was motivated to contribute to the growing debate from the Ugandan setting and particularly with a female sample by studying employee resilience. Methods-This study adopted data triangulation conducted among 397 female bankers; where a sample size of 196 was determined. Data was collected using a structured five-point Likert-type scale questionnaire. The instrument was tested for validity using expert opinion and content validity. We also used exploratory factor analysis. For reliability, we used the Cronbach alpha coefficients. The data were collected with the approval and consent of the Research Committee of MUBS, and the supervisors in the banks, and respondents were assured of confidentiality. Findings-Indeed, some organizations have mainstreamed gender into their operations in the footsteps of national gender policy. But work-life balance is beyond gender frameworks. This study found that organizational support has a partial mediation effect between work-family balance and employee resilience. This means that both factors are important in influencing the employee resilience of female workers in the banking sector. Originality-This study is grounded in the practical insights of female bankers in Uganda. While there may be similar studies none has taken a rigorous scholarly approach like this in conceptualization and methodology. This study was original in the context in which it was executed and the methodologies used. We contend that this study has made a significant contribution to further delineating the life-balance debate for policy, practice, and academic advancements in the African context.


Introduction
As many organizations in Africa are tied to increase competition, one factor that is pertinent to management is the resilience of employees to their work. Studies from Management research in Africa reaffirm employee resilience despite the convolutions at the workplace (Masson, 2019;Meintjes & Hofmeyr, 2018). According to Bruneau et al. (2003), resilience is the ability of one to reduce the probability of an adverse event, to absorb the shock if the adverse event occurs, and quickly re-establish normal. Resilience has also been defined as the capacity to adapt existing resources and skills to new situations and operating conditions (Comfort, 1999).
One underlying reason for the growing importance of these dimensions is that workers today operate in very turbulent and uncertain environments, unsure of what tomorrow may bring, making it essential that they are prepared to combat adversity (Britt, Shen, Sinclair, Grossman, & Klieger, 2016;Pęciłło, 2016). While the scholarly debate on work-family in African settings is still in nascent stages, work and family intersections have recently become an interest among African scholars. These have been studied widely in developed countries with varying conclusions (Wolf & Frese, 2018). There is a wide array of volatility in work-life events, several of them springing into family life.
We selected the banking sector as it is known for tight work schedules, quality checks, and long working hours with likely fewer rest periods (Granleese, 2004;Kodz, 1998). In this environment, female workers face more challenging situations than their male counterparts. (Yadav & Dabhade, 2014), revealed that women are subjected to relatively the same recruitment conditions and the same working conditions in the banking sector. Many banks subject female employees to transfers regardless of their family commitments like breastfeeding, pregnancy, and infant care. The local press partly explained that some career women are emotionally depressed and try to drift between home and the workplace. This affects not only their overall well-being but their career progress as well (Doble & Supriya, 2010). Consequently, many women have bowed to the challenges of the banking job and quit (Ehsan & Ali, 2019) and yet if offered the necessary organizational support, they could be resilient. There were calls by civil society actors for positive legislation on maternity leave days to be extended beyond the current 60 days (Employment Act 2006), organizations to provide facilities for lactating mothers, open up baby care centers, and to adopt gender-responsive policies and practices in all work systems.
In regions like Sub-Saharan Africa where institutions are still weak (Wolf & Frese, 2018), it is not surprising that female employees are still at a great disadvantage in their quest for work-family balance. In the Ugandan case across various sectors, resilience is in various ways according to anecdotal evidence. These include working longer hours, supporting each other in informal teams, standing in for one another to accomplish tasks, selfsponsor on training, use of personal means for official work among others. This raises scholarly questions about their resilience and the role of organizational support.
The rest of the paper proceeds as follows. The next section gives a theoretical underpinning for this study followed by a conceptual overview of the relationships for hypothesis development. We then give the methodology, followed by the results in which we interpret and conclude on the hypotheses. The discussion of the results is done after which the conclusions and implications are drawn. 1980). The spillover effect results from the inter-role conflict faced by the employee. In their study, Wayne, Lemmon, Hoobler, Cheung, and Wilson (2017), indicate that when employees experience mental work-family conflict, they become emotionally exhausted with a reduced psychological capacity to devote to their work as a result of the spillover. A complex system is where the causal categories/agents become intertwined in such a way that no dualistic language of state plus dynamic laws can completely describe it (Rosen, 1987). Indeed, in a recent study, Gabriel, Volpone, MacGowan, Butts, and Moran (2020) assert that several work-family theories describe the unpredictability of work and family alignment. There are therefore undoubtable multifaceted situations associated with fulfilling work and family roles. Complexity has been used to study the non-linearity of the different roles(agents) that create an imbalance which is the embedment of family conflicts and other domestic relationships as observed by some studies in the African setting (Hoobler, 2016).

Work-Family Balance
There is a long string of literature on work-family in the developed world contexts and increasingly on Africa (Amah, 2021;Asiedu-Appiah & Zoogah, 2019). Work-life balance is the degree to which individuals pursue work and non-work responsibilities while with contentment in both spheres (Hirschi, Shockley, & Zacher, 2019). Work-Life balance has gained more prominence as a result of the multiple roles that employees, especially career women have to juggle. Work-family balance lies within the domain of Work-life balance where by the individual pursues to balance family and work facets. Notwithstanding their engrossment in the work domain, the demand for a traditional family structure where women are exclusively responsible for unpaid family responsibilities remains constant in the African setting (Ajala, 2017). As a working woman, the responsibility of nurturing and providing primary care while also meeting or exceeding set work standards remains (Slaughter, 2015). This makes it more challenging for women in their pursuit of "the balance" between these various roles. Jacelon (1997), defines resilience as a personality characteristic that moderates the negative effects of stress and promotes adaptation. An employee is said to be resilient if he or she can push through difficulties in work life and effectively succeeds on the job. Employees work with optimism that life will be better, lending desired selfdriven incentives at work. Employees then exhibit a sort of latent commitment to their work. In this regard, resilience will enable the organization to achieve its targets but the leadership should count on individual employee needs (Woolley, Caza, & Levy, 2011).

Employee Resilience
Organizational support encompasses the management's expression and aid in helping the employees attain the desired targets and concurrently live a wholesome life (Gaëtane Caesens, Marique, Hanin, & Stinglhamber, 2016). The provision of specific offers by an organization can be in terms of favorable policies, practices, and physical workplace settings. Organizational support may be undertaken as a targeted activity to impress on employees for certain desired outputs or as a routine embedded in operations at various levels (Gaëtane Caesens et al., 2016). Organizational support could be in the form of financial support; some organizations will give bonuses, staff transport, and daycare centers; others are advance payments and study opportunities. As suggested by Jones and Taylor (2013) organizational support could be in intangible forms mentorship and supervisory guidance.

Work-Family Balance and Employee Resilience
Empirical evidence has recognized the importance of work-family balance in building and sustaining resilience (Kim & Windsor, 2015). According to (Jones & Taylor, 2013), it is quite easy to realize that there is a need for female employees to develop a reasonable degree of resilience if the employee is to function effectively and then be satisfied especially in an environment where there is a great workload to accomplish (Greenhaus, Allen, & Foley, 2006). It has been noted that for those female employees who have a reasonably low level of resilience, it becomes more frustrating as they attempt to attain the work-related goals within their organization because an employee will find it challenging to excel because of their stretched competencies even when the employee is quite proficient (Bell, Rajendran, & Theiler, 2012), and this will need for one to be resilient to persevere. In this study, we, therefore, hypothesize that; H1. There shall be a positive and significant relationship between Work-family balance and employee resilience.

Organisational Support and Employee Resilience
Employees feel that the organisation is obligated to offer support, which will conversely then render the employee feel obligated to work towards the achievement of the organizational goal (Kurtessis et al., 2017). Additionally, (Rockstuhl et al., 2020) postulate that when employees are supported by the organization, they are more likely to endure challenging situations at the workplace with a determination to achieve results. Also, in such cases employees are more likely to manifest all the perspectives of resilience (Lynch, 2015), for instance, working with optimism that life will be better. Organisational support to employees comes in differing packages. Dawley, Andrews, and Bucklew (2008), suggest that support to employees in the form of mentorship or supervisory guidance, will not only equip them with new knowledge and competencies, it will also help them acquire better experiences. This helps in building sustainable levels of resilience as employees are empowered to manage unusual situations on the job however discouraging they might be. They are then in better shape to even learn given their supportive managers and are more resilient (Franken, Plimmer, & Malinen, 2020).
The organizational support elements such as financial support, bonuses, staff transport, daycare centers, and advance payments among others, shall not yield positive outcomes if employees fail to manage the work-life balance perspectives (Idrovo & Bosch, 2019). On the other hand, female workers who use their skills to attain reasonable productivity levels at work are more likely to realize the desired organizational support that may come in different ways (Fox, Fonseca, & Bao, 2011). Scholars provide debate on various patterns of support that organizations may give to meet the different needs of workers (Lu, Barriball, Zhang, & While, 2012;Poulose, 2014), including building resilience. In this study, therefore, we hypothesize that; H2. Organizational support will have a positive and significant relationship with employee resilience.

Work-family Balance and Organizational Support
Organizations that value their employees' well-being have a sincere desire to address it through provision for their work-family balance. (Laschinger, 2012) supports that employees' capacity to attain a reasonable work-life balance can be attributed to support in the workplace. Gaetane Caesens and Stinglhamber (2014), reveal that this support can in turn cause the employees to be more versatile and resilient since they are determined and willing to keep their job. This was further investigated by Baral and Bhargava (2010), who assert that there is often an undeniable link between work-life balance and organizational support. Employees that have a combination of these will develop better and positive thinking about the workplace, suggest solutions to overcome the challenges at the workplace, and also display more resilience than any other group of employees (Kuntz, Malinen, & Näswall, 2017). We thus hypothesize that: H3. Work-family balance will be positively associated with organizational support.

Organisational Support as a Mediator between Work-family Balance and Employee Resilience
Providing support to employees to improve the work-life interface and build employee resilience is not widely studied. Some scholars however report that resilience in the workplace is built from a combination of efforts of both the employee and the organisation. Sok, Blomme, and Tromp (2014) their findings suggest that a supportive culture, expressed in flexible work−life balance arrangements, can enhance positive spillover from the work domain to the home domain and diminish negative spillover. Additionally, Wolf and Freeze (2015) point out that as much as female employees may be committed to their work; they are deeply embedded in the family. Soleimanof, Rutherford, and Webb (2018), theorized that high family embeddedness is prevalent in environments where formal institutions are weak. This is generally typical of most African countries. Both perceived supervisor support and workplace support relate to work-life balance by mitigating conflict and stress caused by work and life responsibilities thus improving employee well-being (Jang, 2009;Li, Tang, Ma, Zhang, & Zhang, 2021). From the foregoing review, we therefore hypothesize that: H4. Work-family balance and Organizational support are jointly significant predictors of employee resilience H5. Organizational support will have a full mediation effect on the relationship between work-family balance and employee resilience.

Methodology
This study adopted data triangulation to enable an accurate representation of the work-life variables under study. Noble and Heale (2019) argued that triangulation not only facilitates the credibility of the study but also enables the complementarity of different methods. The research used a cross-sectional survey design. The study was conducted among 397 female bank employees in Uganda. The banking sector was chosen for its greater responsiveness to policies of easing work-life conflict. The banks have very tight work schedules and a strict focus on efficiency and professionalism, escalated by increased competition from microfinance institutions in both the regulated (tier 1, 2, 3) according to the Financial Institutions (Amended) Act 2016. But the banks have been quite responsive to introduce policies that ease the work-life of their employees.
From the population of 397 female employees in selected banks, a sample size of 196 was determined from Krejcie and Morgan's (1970) sampling table. In comparison, this sample size was not different from Bartlet, Kotrlik and Higgins's (2001) table of sample size determination. Random sampling was used to select the respondents in each of the participating banks. This was aimed at reducing sample biases as well as provide independent chance to all respondents to be included in the study. Data was collected using a structured fivepoint Likert-type scale questionnaire. The anchors were 1=strongly disagree; 2=disagree; 3=not sure; 4=agree and 5=strongly agree. Initially, we had 37 items that were reduced to 21 in our final analysis. The questionnaire items were adopted from literature; for Work-Life balance (Hayman, 2005), Organisational support (Eisenberger, Huntington, Hutchison, & Sowa, 1986) and Employee resilience (Näswall, Malinen, Kuntz, & Hodliffe, 2019). The instrument was tested for validity using expert opinion and content validity. We also used exploratory factor analysis to extract indices for maximum fit. This test and re-test enabled us to check for items that affected the strength of our instrument. We further subjected the instrument to for reliability test using the Cronbach Alpha coefficients. We obtained .70 for all variables consistent with (Amin, 2005). After the test and retest at different levels of pilot responses, the final instrument had 21 items. We distributed up to 200 questionnaires with the hope of increasing sample response by drop-and-pick approach. To reduce bias as a result of the self-rating, the independent variable items were stated in the negative as against those of the dependent variable. At analysis, the items and scale for the independent variable were re-coded. The data was collected with the approval and consent of the Research Committee of Makerere University Business School, the supervisors in the banks and the respondents were assured of confidentiality.
The cofound factors were age, position, and work experience. Work-family balance was the independent variable and we used attitude measures of family responsibilities, personality and societal demands, adopted from the study by Banu (2014). The dependent variable was Employee resilience operationalized by modifying items previously used such as positive thinking, flexibility, and task orientation (Bruneau et al., 2003;Comfort, 1999) which is a context-specific issue given the pressure that the bank employees faced regarding the job and resilience. Organizational support was the mediator in this study and measured in terms of those specific offers that target easing the pressure of work that is upon the employees (Dawley et al., 2008).
Data were processed using SPSS version 20. We first tested for the Pearson correlation to assess the association between pairs of variables. We used Hayes Process Macro Model 4 (Hayes, 2016) to analyze the predictive power of the independent variables on the dependent variable as well as to test for the mediation effect of organizational support on the relationship between Work-family Balance and Employee Resilience.

Results and Descriptive statistics
The findings are based on responses from 138 usable questionnaires of the 196-target sample. This translates into 70.4% response rate, considered high enough in a survey of this nature. The respondents in the study were specifically female bankers, 2.2% of whom were in top management; the majority were operational level banking officers at 63.8% and the rest were middle managers. This was consistent with national statistics where women in top management are less than 5% and those in middle management are gradually increasing in number.
In the table below, we summarize the rest of the demographic indicators of the sample. The parameters reaffirm that the respondents had adequate exposure to the demands of family and work. The years spent working in the bank, the level of education were all suitable for us to determine the model fit for our study.

Correlation and Regression Analysis Results
We used correlation analysis to determine the association among the variables in our model, Work-family balance (WFB), organizational support (OS) and employee resilience (ER). We also included the Cofounding factors namely position in the bank, age group and work experience. The correlation results show the magnitude and direction of associations among the variables. The results provide support of connotations among them for the interpretation of some of the study objectives. The regression results on the other hand, give the predictive power of the independent variables to the variations in the dependent variable. We used the regression results to further support the hypotheses.
The correlation results show that the mean scores on the demographic factors were around 2.6 which were towards the mid-point. The coefficients showed significant and positive associations among the study variables.
The standard deviations were all below 1.0. This implied that on matters of WFB, OS and ER, employees are generally uncertain of the trending. For the main variables, there were positive and significant associations as we hypothesized. All the confounding factors had negative coefficients with WFB and OS, save for position in the bank with OS. For education level, the confounding factors were non-significant with employee resilience. Similarly, work-life balance was found to be significantly associated with organizational support thus supporting H3, which stated, H3. Work-family balance will be positively associated with organizational support.

Mediation Analysis Results
We used Hayes Process model to test for the mediation effect of Organizational support between Work-life balance and Employee resilience. The results are presented in the table below.

Table 5: Hayes Process Macro Mediation results
The study suggests that work-life balance remains a key factor to female bankers for them to maintain their work resilience. Indeed, individuals who focus on their family, community and well-being will continue being resilient even in the face of work-related challenges. But the support provided by the organization is needed to enable work-life balance endeavors to enhance employee resilience. In general, female employees who experience high resilience combine their work-life balance initiatives and the support extended by the organization. This is possible in the essence that organizational support eases the pressures the employee has to go through to have a personal fit at the workplace and to be generally resilient.
Using results from the Hayes Process model, we were able to conclude on our remaining hypotheses. The results supported hypothesis H4, which stated that:

H4. Work-family balance and Organizational support are jointly significant predictors of employee resilience;
The result of the direct effect confirmed that work-life balance predicts employee resilience and the partial mediation outcome implied that organizational support alongside work-life balance predicts our outcome variable. Thus, H4 was supported.
On the other hand, H5 stated that: H5. Organizational support will have a full mediation effect on the relationship between work-family balance and employee resilience. The coefficients in the model were, Direct effect of WFB on ER was .2077; the Indirect effect was .6085. This meant that OS reduces the effect of WFB on ER, this implies a partial mediation. This implies that work-life balance on its own remains a significant predictor of employee resilience. Thus, H5 was not supported.

Discussion
As the Human Resources function becomes a central focus in many organizations, the factors that affect employees' productivity are being given attention in various contexts. Organizations have to come to terms with demands for employee welfare. Our results have shown that there is an interplay between family and work. Early studies recognized the dichotomy of home and work as separate entities as do recent research (Parsons & Bales, 1955, In Asiedu-Appiah & Zoogah, 2019; Asiedu-Appiah & Zoogah, 2019). Our study conforms with these prior findings. Results showed that banks are undertaking activities that balance the work and family demands of their employees.. The zero-order coefficient results showed employee resilience with significant but negative associations with personal demographics namely position in the hierarchy, age and experience. This finding may be a worry to managers in the banks that older employees will be less resilient based on items in our model; the same for more experienced staff and those rising in rank. These findings implied that there was no clear pattern of how employees focus on work-life balance perspectives and in resonance with their resilience. This is indeed true in Uganda and possibly elsewhere in Africa where personal factors are not put in the fore in management decisions. For instance, a breastfeeding mother may be proposed for a transfer to an upcountry branch of a bank without regard to the effect on her family. The result also implied that work-family balance, organizational support and employee resilience were not structured.
The results also confirmed work-family balance retains its strength to influence employee resilience even when tested through organizational support. By the description of Asiedu-Appiah and Zoogah (2019), the work-life balance process involves organizations partnering with employees to manage their work and non-work boundaries, there are mutual benefits. This is done in such a way that it reduces inter-role conflict to achieve the best functional outcomes. The support of both work-family balance and organizational support enhancing employee resilience dissents Greenhaus and Powell (2012) whose definition denotes conflicting strands. We find support from Ten Brummdhuis (2013, In Asiedu-Appiah &Zoogah, 2019) in their broader work-home resources model.
There have been demands by gender activists for organizations to set up baby care centers within the premises, and provide for flexible working hours for expecting or lactating mothers. This has drawn banks to set up systems of organizational support in financial and non-financial measures. They have adopted task-based support systems; flexibility in reporting time and for female employees posting female employees recognize their family plasticity. Indeed, as observed by Li et al. (2021) flexibility can reduce work-to-family conflict. Our findings as well recognize the arguments advanced by (Hoobler, Wayne, & Lemmon, 2009), on the consequence of imbalance on the organization and employees.
By our results, we advocate for a 3-loop archetype: the employee outside the workplace, the organization and the employee-in-the organization. We tested for organizational support mediating the other two elements in our 3-loop archetype. We thus took a precarious position within extant literature to separate work-family balance and employee resilience and place organizational support between them. The failure to get a full mediation meant that work-life balance stands on its own as a predictor of employee resilience. But this could have been possible for our use of measures that were personal elements as against adding those which are organizationally driven.
Extant literature reaffirms that work-life balance lends various organizational outcomes (Aryee, Chu, Kim, & Ryu, 2013). This also found support in Jiang and Men (2017) conclusion that work-life balance policies lead to feelings of dedication at work -thus resilience. In an interesting study, Bolino, Flores, Kelemen, and Bisel (2022) observe that employee involvement in organizational citizenship behavior that could render them stay longer at work and volunteering for extra assignments, require special communication with partners to contain family conflicts. The study also tested partner satisfaction when provided with adequate information on the job extra tasks one is involved in. This debate extends the current hypotheses of organizational support and theorization of employee self-determined engagement in extra tasks. Another theoretical implication from (Bolino et al., 2022) is the multidimensionality of family life and when factored to work spheres becomes a little more complicated.
We agree with studies that indeed work-family balance is entwined with complexities (Gabriel et al., 2020) Our focus on resilience was to identify one domain that could enhance further investigations into this growing area of interest. We note that work-life balance elements such as family responsibilities are very instrumental if we desire to have a very resilient employee. This finds support in the spillover theory that emphasizes work and non-work facets continuously slicking into each other. Overall, the work-life balance, organizational support and employee resilience are statistically neighboring in line with our findings and similar to those of previous scholars (Carvalho & Areal, 2016;Eisenberger & Stinglhamber, 2011;Kurtessis et al., 2017) There is evidence that employees who manage work-life balance are resilient. Resilient employees are in a position to recover from stressful and disappointing family events, to go on and excel at the workplace (Cooke, Cooper, Bartram, Wang, & Mei, 2019). Even in challenging work-family situations, employees are more likely to gain resilience when the organization provides basic support. They will keep time, exhibit less absenteeism from the workplace and acquire a better appraisal (Fleming, 2012). The need for resilience, therefore, seems to be at an all-time high in today's workplace, especially for female employees.
However, we take cognizance of the studies on the backlash that not all work-life balance policies find favor with employees (Perrigino, Dunford, & Wilson, 2018). In Uganda and the rest of Africa certainly, societal demands on women affect their ability to balance family and work. From the synthesized literature, (Bernuzzi, Sommovigo, & Setti, 2022) it can be argued that employees' own pleasure of positive engagement in organizational life smoothens their resilience.

Conclusion
Work-life balance studies are still inconclusive on employee resilience. In this study, we attempted to mediate these two with organizational support. The results are supported by the spillover and complexity theories. The results also provide the basis for the theoretical implications of using two theories against the single theory model. Our motivation was to question further the perspectives of work-family balance as it has become increasingly an area of concern with gender activism. Our study sheds some light on the African setting. Particularly to Ugandan managers, dimensions of work-life balance should be given more attention. While the study noted organizational support perspectives, the magnitude is still low. There are increasing pressure groups, especially from women gender activists on paying attention to female-friendly policies and facilities. Managers in banks, as well as other public institutions, should cause a debate on what is feasible in the short run and strategies for the future. Work-life balance being a multi-dimensional variable will call for layered studies from different disciplines. We contend that our will attract more research studies on the phenomena. We agree with Major et al's (2013, In Asiedu-Apiah & Zoogah, 2019) call for a multi-level approach to Work-life balance. This study points to the need for practical support that is needed such as counseling, empowerment and consultation with employees. This will make the employees productive-focused at the workplace. The contextual reality is that female employees in Uganda attach much to family and community presence. The benefits of resilience at work are good for organizations. Management should begin with simple systems like flexible reporting time, work and exit hours, offs for a day or so if requested without affecting the annual leave days, employee counseling, financial assistance and appropriate work-based facilities that comfort female workers.
Academically, more studies should be extended to other industries. A focus on sociological dimensions such as the influence of family upbringing, personality, outlook on life, marital status, and attendance to children at home could shade more light to the perception of job security and resilience. We propose a canonical analysis of work-life balance -employee resilience as a strategic resource and the reverse causation between work-life balance and employee resilience. We also think that multiple studies across Africa will reveal various regional contexts.
The results of this study should be interpreted in light of methodological limitations in the scope where we focused on females and in the banking sector; use of a cross-sectional approach against longitudinal observations; sampling by focusing on a smaller portion of banking staff; We also had a gap with literature that the review could not ground much in the African context on the same variables, notably the continuous interchange between work-family and work-life. We could not also access literature for substantial debate on the mediation effect hypothesized in the paper. We, therefore, relied on the contexts of the developed countries to fit the African reality. There is a conceptual dilemma of the reversal causation between work-family balance and employee resilience; what comes first is questionable. For this study, we considered work-life balance as the predictor of employee resilience, and results should be interpreted in light of that choice. We, however, contend that this study has contributed to the extant literature on life balance perspectives for policy, practice, and research.
Funding: This research received no external funding.

Conflicts of Interest:
The authors declared that there is no conflict of interest.