Achieving work-life balance in the National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I setting, part I: the role of the head athletic trainer.

CONTEXT: Supervisor support has been identified as key to the fulfillment of work-life balance for the athletic trainer (AT), yet limited literature exists on the perspectives of supervisors.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate how the head AT facilitates work-life balance among staff members within the National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I setting.

DESIGN: Qualitative study.

SETTING: Web-based management system.

PATIENTS OR OTHER PARTICIPANTS: A total of 18 head ATs (13 men, 5 women; age = 44 ± 8 years, athletic training experience = 22 ± 7 years) volunteered for an asynchronous, Web-based interview.

DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: Participants responded to a series of questions by journaling their thoughts and experiences. We included multiple-analyst triangulation, stakeholder checks, and peer review to establish data credibility. We analyzed the data via a general inductive approach.

RESULTS: Four prevailing themes emerged from the data: modeling work-life balance, encouraging disengagement from the AT role, cooperation and community workplace, and administrative support and understanding.

CONCLUSIONS: Head ATs at the Division I level recognized the need to promote work-life balance among their staffs. They not only were supportive of policies that promote work-life balance, including spending time away from the role of the AT and teamwork among staff members, but also modeled and practiced the strategies that they promoted.