Hybrid Work: Mental Well-being of Working Parents

Abstract

Hybrid work is the new way of working and is here to stay, despite having some benefits, it also affects the mental well-being of parents who need to find the right balance between work and family.

This research aims to find out how hybrid work influences mental well-being, specifically how it affects working parents' mental well-being and what challenges they encounter with this new way of working.

This thesis is written in a research format, with theory, research, and analysis of the results. It is divided into three topics: Hybrid work, mental well-being, and finally, organizations and hybrid work. The first topic examines hybrid work, its advantages, disadvantages, challenges, and parents in hybrid work. The second topic focuses on well-being with an emphasis on mental well-being. The third topic explores organizations and hybrid work.

This thesis is not commissioned by any party and the topic was selected for two main reasons. Primarily because it is a current topic that since the outbreak of the Covid19 has changed the world, and secondly because as a parent, student, and future worker the case seemed relevant and exciting to the author’s situation, and the status of many other working parents.

To collect data the author conducted quantitative research by surveying different groups of parents about the advantages, disadvantages, challenges, and effects of hybrid work.

Based on quantitative and qualitative research results from the survey, the results of this thesis indicated that hybrid work does affect positively the mental well-being of most people in the survey and that despite facing some challenges in this way of working, they are overall happy to have this flexibility.

Due to the limited number of respondents, this is only indicative. Therefore, the author of this thesis proposes further research on the topic with development in the sample.