More Pay and Benefits or Better Work-life Balance? Post Pandemic Perspectives on Employee Centricity among University Frontline Staff

The COVID-19 pandemic forced organisations across diverse industries to redraw their business models globally. Businesses crumbled, downsized, lay off workers, streamlined and digitalized their workflow, maintaining skeletal staff to support integral business functions. Remote working and flexible schedules were institutionalized to manage service employees globally. The study conducted a comparative analysis on the effects of work-life balance and employee remuneration on employee job satisfaction and loyalty intentions. The study targeted frontline staff at three public universities in Zimbabwe and 327 valid responses were obtained. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) revealed that employee remuneration, remote working and flexible scheduling had positive and significant influence on employee job satisfaction. Further, analysis indicated employee preference of remote working and flexible work scheduling and over more pay and benefits. The positive impact of job satisfaction on employee loyalty intentions was also confirmed. This study flags the significant contribution of work-life balance by bringing new empirical evidence on the relative significance of remote working, flexible working arrangements and employee remuneration on employee job satisfaction and loyalty intentions in the post pandemic normal. The study recommends that universities should harness digital technologies to promote sustainable remote working and enhanced employee autonomy.