Working towards leisure

Expanded individual availability and flexibility is necessary in order to progress in a management career to senior level. If managers owe all their time to the organisation and their work as managers they are left with no time to invest in the management of their private lives. Therefore, it remains unspoken in their management work how they are able to create time and space to enjoy free time during their non-working hours. Managers female partners prepare all the domestic work in the private sphere in order for the manager to enjoy their free time in any leisure activity. The empirical evidence for this argument derives from 64 in-depth interviews with male managers from three European countries (Germany, Portugal, the United Kingdom) working for one large multinational company. These interviews cover the views of a variety of male managers with an age range between 30 and 65 years and, thus, different management positions and life stages. This article explores three different layers of time in male managers work careers: non-working time, free-time and leisure time. It includes the concept of leisure work which enables managers to devote themselves absolutely to whatever they want to do in their non-working time. Therefore combining a professional career and family life for male managers is only a question of balancing their work as male managers and leisure time and not an issue of tension between employment and domestic obligations.

Adolescent’s subjective perceptions of chronic disease and related psychosocial factors: Highlights from an outpatient context study

Background: Adolescents with chronic disease (CD) can be more vulnerable to adverse psychosocial outcomes. This study aims: 1) to identify differences in psychosocial variables (health-related quality of life, psychosomatic complaints, resilience, self-regulation and social support) among adolescents who feel that CD affects or does not affect school/peers connectedness (measured by self-reported participation in school and social activities); and 2) to assess the extent to which psychosocial variables are associated with connectedness in school and peer domains. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted in 135 adolescents with CD (51.9% boys), average age of 14 ± 1. 5 years old (SD = 1.5). Socio-demographic, clinical, and psychosocial variables were assessed, using a self-reported questionnaire, which included the Chronic Conditions Short Questionnaire, KIDSCREEN-10 Index, Symptoms Check-List, Healthy Kids Resilience Assessment Module Scale, Adolescent Self-Regulatory Inventory, and Satisfaction with Social Support Scale. Descriptive statistics, GLM-Univariate ANCOVA and Logistic Regression were performed using the IBM Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS), version 22.0. The significance level was set at p < 0.05. Results: Thirteen to eighteen percent of the adolescents felt that CD affected participation at school (PSCH) and participation in leisure time with friends (PLTF). These adolescents presented lower results for all psychosocial study variables, when compared with adolescents who did not feel affected in both areas of participation. From the studied psychosocial variables, the most important ones associated with PSCH (after controlling for age, gender, diagnosis, and education level of father/mother) were self-regulation and psychosomatic health. Concerning the PLTF, social support was the sole variable explaining such association. Conclusions: The present study pointed out the association between psychosocial variables; and living with a CD and school/peers connectedness. The need to focus on the assessment of the effects of a CD on adolescents’ lives and contexts is suggested, as well as on the identification of vulnerable adolescents. Such identification could help to facilitate the maximization of social participation of adolescents with CD, and to plan interventions centered on providing support and opportunities for a healthy youth development. For that purpose, a complex and multifactorial approach that includes clinicians, schools, family, and peers may be proposed.