Work-life balance in organisations: Analysing work-life balance in Germany and presenting BMW as a family-friendly German company

Scientific Essay from the year 2010 in the subject Business economics - Operations Research, grade: 1,7, Griffith University, language: English, abstract: 1. Introduction
The following paper describes the work-life balance movement in Germany and the work-life balance policies of the German car and motorcycle producer BMW. First, work-life balance (WLB) will be defined and the importance of leisure for WLB will be briefly explained. Next, the paper will provide information about leisure in Germany and explain some reasons for the German WLB movement. By describing the WLB policies of BMW, the paper will examine the influence organisations can have on their employees' WLB and the reasons organisations have to introduce WLB programmes. The paper will argue that WLB policies provided by organisations need to be managed professionally to result in a win-win situation.