Profiles of boundary tactics when working from home and their relationship with recovery

Employees in hybrid work arrangements face blurred work-home boundaries when working from home, which can hinder recovery from work-related stress. To manage this challenge, employees use boundary tactics (temporal, physical, communicative, technological). Previous quantitative studies have primarily examined these tactics in isolation. Using a person-centred approach, we examined combinations of boundary tactics and explored their associations with antecedents (colleagues’ and supervisors’ segmentation norms, segmentation preference) and recovery indicators as outcomes (psychological detachment, mastery, control, relaxation, exhaustion). We conducted a two-wave study with measurement points four weeks apart. Latent profile analysis revealed four quantitatively and qualitatively distinct boundary tactic profiles at Time 1 (nT1 = 413). Two profiles (Uniform Moderate and Uniform Strong Boundary Managers) used all boundary tactics to the same extent, whereas two other profiles (Selective Moderate and Selective Strong Boundary Managers) showed reduced use of communicative and technological tactics. Segmentation preference and segmentation norms differentially predicted profile membership. Furthermore, we found distinct associations between boundary tactic profiles and recovery indicators at Time 2 (nT2 = 270). In summary, Uniform Strong Boundary Managers demonstrated the most favourable recovery experiences.