Work-life balance and employee performance: A comprehensive bibliometric analysis

Abstract

This research paper aims to analyze the work-life balance and employee performance through a bibliometric analysis reflecting the research trends, direction, and future path of the themes. The analysis employed 235 datasets from the OpenAlex data source, which covers the study period from 2014 to 2025. The data comprises manuscripts published in English only relating to the theme of research. The accumulated data were analyzed using the R Biblioshiny software. The analysis of the study included descriptive statistics, annual publication trends, average citations, prolific authors, countries, key terms, thematic maps, affiliations, sources, and word clouds. The findings of the study revealed an increasing trend of scientific publications in the theme areas. The result depicted a rising trend in the areas of research during the study period. The leading terms found were “psychology,” “work-life balance,” “work,” “balance,” and “social psychology,” which were revealed as vibrating and mostly utilized key terms. The contributing countries include a variety of nations. However, the Asian countries are mostly involved in the scientific production of papers comprising Indonesia. The findings of this study establish a benchmark for the industrial practitioner, academician, and policymaker to manage the work-life balance approach for better performance. Additionally, this result illustrates the current state of research, providing guidelines for future studies, and further contributes to the existing literature by revealing and exploring new evidence. This paper recommends that practitioners need to embrace a balanced strategic approach for work-life balance among the employees that could contribute to fostering employee performance.