Underpinning Rural Bumiputera Mompreneurs' Work-Life Balance Framework Towards Sustainable Entrepreneurship

This paper aims to underpin the Bumiputera women entrepreneurs' (BWEs) sustainable worklife balance framework based on business-family relationships. Aiming to propel holistic success among BWEs in rural society, the study focuses on marital and parenthood balances. The Conversion of Resource Theory (COR) has been adopted to identify the factors contributing to the level of women’s entrepreneurship activities in the context of family relationships from the past empirical studies. This study provides a basis for the starting point in filling the existing gap by discovering BWEs and their families' views on factors that can cause work-life imbalances within a business family relationship. The study's baseline should be directed towards meeting the inclusive socio-economics agenda for an equitable share of the economic resources of disadvantaged minority women and families. The life balances and support needed to be addressed by policymakers so that the economic potential of this group can be fully utilised especially when entrepreneurship is considered a reliable economic weapon to combat poverty for the rural society.


Introduction
Existing government policies may not capture all of the impediments to women's business growth, suggesting that role, growth, and space issues are vital (Selamat et al., 2015). Narrowing the problem on the role of women -family work life balance may not be achieved without acknowledging challenges and demands on Bumiputera Women Entrepreneurs (BWEs) self-family relationships, thus shattering the BWEs entrepreneurial sustainability and growth prospect. Many perennial issues and challenges grounded women entrepreneurs from dominating entrepreneurial activities (Filzah et al., 2019). The stresses and ability to contain strain shall positively and negatively affect the well-being of family members, relationships, and happiness. As families begin to understand the work demands of BWEs, family business lifestyles will be built (Abdullahi and Zainol, 2016).
Women entrepreneurs in rural areas have reportedly had long-standing problems due to a lack of institutional support, economic and social resources, which are evidence of insufficient protective factors in dealing with vulnerable events (Roberts et al., 2017). Apart from being homemakers, women in Malaysia have a vital role in Malaysia's economy, yet many women entrepreneurs are still reviving their businesses, and some are still suffering due to the pandemic (Adib, 2020). Women-owned businesses in rural society, especially Federal Land Development Authority (FELDA) for domestic eco-sustainability is significant to support the family income. FELDA BWEs create many homogenous problems that demand attention. Not only FELDA participants are ranked poor, FELDA venture has been at loss since 2013 led by an unsustainable agriculturally based economy (Ooi, 2019) where agriculturally based products may suffer price fluctuation tremendously.
European boycott on palm oil exaggerates the problems (Klepper, 2018) along with agricultural mismanagement and income lobbying (Che Wan, 2017) have driven BWEs to route their resources to business for life sustenance, driven by presently low returns earned in agriculturally based income, and a high number of loaners in FELDA co-operation scheme with low pay-ability prospect among FELDA settlers force BWEs to act. Prominent poverty and unruly income seeking behaviour may accelerate social issues involving FELDA families, especially children. This chain of reaction is prosperously affecting the government on a larger scale (Selamat et al., 2015).
The lack of a reliable picture in understanding women entrepreneurial phenomena in family relationships and family well-being results in a wastage of attention given by policymakers, NGOs, and government bodies on this important topic. This makes crucial interventions difficult to assist the BWEs successfully. The women entrepreneurship sector is highly valued in the country as continuous big spending from national budget allocation clearly shows the significant role women entrepreneurs play in the economy, especially in tackling issues of poverty and life-work balance for women and families.
There are several questions concerning BWEs, such as (1) how would BWEs describe the factors that cause work-life imbalances in business-family relationships? (2) How do their family describe the factors that cause work-life imbalances in business-family relationships? And (3) what are the elements of BWEs' sustainable work-life balance model based on business-family relationships? Therefore, this study aims to explore BWEs' and BWEs family members' views on factors that can cause work-life imbalances within the context of business family relationships. In addition, this study also aims to develop BWEs' sustainable work-life balance model based on business-family relationships.

Women and Entrepreneurship
Women are a basic unit in society. They traditionally prioritise greatly on preserving family-relationship above any other endeavours. Women are capable of producing a great family, turning the great family into a good society, and subsequently contributing to a great nation. Nonetheless, women are still behind and considered an underdeveloped source of economics since their population is equal to men (Kanapathipillai and Azam, 2019). The rampant policy executions towards harnessing women in entrepreneurial activities are evident for their strong presence needed in the economic development plan throughout the world. Empowering women in the economy through entrepreneurship is a way up to tighten gender gaps and is key to achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals.
Despite their undeniable roles in helping society generate employment and domestic income, women entrepreneurs struggle a lot in juggling the work-life balance between family and businesses. Consequently, equal opportunity between men and women to excel from the perspective of entrepreneurship is still rhetoric rather than a reality. Worsen, cultural bias discriminating against women's possibility to become successful entrepreneurs if not properly managed may lead to business market failure. Likewise, if they do not function according to their expected traditional roles, the price for such sacrifice to succeed in business could only be culturally shameful. Policy makers need to address these market and cultural biases so that the economic potentially induced of this group can be fully utilised, especially when entrepreneurship is considered a reliable economic weapon to combat poverty for rural society.
The COVID-19 pandemic is particularly hard-hit on all yet, even more, the already marginalised women entrepreneurs. The pandemic caused the jobs and livelihoods of many sections of society at risk, a lower average of women's incomes, and potential over-exposure to job losses (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), 2020). Despite a tendency to pursue more risk-averse business strategies, women-owned businesses may be at greater risk of closure over extended periods with substantially reduced or no revenues. Social distancing measures, lockdowns and distorted supply chains and markets have exacerbated structural inequities and challenges that typically hinder the performance and growth of women-owned enterprises and have resulted in many temporary or permanent closures of operations (International Labour Organization, 2020).
More than 190,000 women entrepreneurs, mostly small and medium-sized enterprises, expose themselves to economic and social risk (Alzahrin, 2020). The negative consequence of the Covid-19 pandemic not only hurt BWEs businesses, but concurrently it spills over to a family relationship, livelihood, and well-being. In this case, severe domestic vulnerabilities such as domestic violence, depression, divorce filing, income deficits, savings depletion and even bankruptcy forces could not be controlled (OECD, 2020). Thus, allinclusive policy planning that advocates BWEs may narrow the poverty gap between urban and rural society.
The president of the Bumiputera Women's Association in Business and Profession Malaysia (Peniagawati) said that helping women entrepreneurs also means helping families because women are known to contribute around 70% of their income to family well-being (Alzahrin, 2020). As women entrepreneurs are generally less resilient to the impact of adverse economic shocks, ensuring their access to critical support services will be essential to ensure their post-COVID-19 stabilisation and recovery (International Labour Organization, 2020). In Malaysia, small and medium-sized enterprises are one of the sectors most directly affected by the movement of control orders. This severely inhibits the income earned by small traders, particularly in rural areas (Abdul Rashid et al., 2020).
Intending to improve the settlers' quality of life and socio-economic status, FELDA, as one of Malaysia's government agencies, is taking the initiative to transform the FELDA community into an entrepreneurial community (Selamat et al., 2015). Deo et al (2016) found a positive and robust relationship between women entrepreneurs and family socio-economic development. Therefore, the present study is worthy and holds merit. It may suggest measures for the sustainability of family income and better understand the well-being of family members involved and society.

Development of Rural Bumiputera Mompreneurs' Work-Life Balance Framework Underpinning Theory
As women entrepreneurs have relatively fixed and limited amounts of time and energy, they have the motive and motivation to acquire, foster and assimilate more resources from their environment according to the Conservation of Resource Theory (COR) (Hobfoll, 1989;1998;2002;2012). This theory is well known in ecology literature but interestingly, only a handful of prior studies have identified its impacts on entrepreneurship. Therefore, based on the COR theory, we posit that women entrepreneurs can receive, maintain, and then expand resources from their family members, the current nuclear family. Therefore, it is theoretically consequential to investigate entrepreneurship from the familial perspective and to understand the underlying influences better.
The COR theory defines resources as matters that individuals' value and need, such as objects, states, and conditions, which can help them to reduce stress and pursue life and business activities. In contrast, the loss of resources will cause them to feel stress.
A career as an entrepreneur consumes an individual's resources significantly, even severely if one is a mother and wife. Thus, it is of critical value for individuals to seek, acquire, and spend the resources available from their families. To summarise, a harmonious family encourages entrepreneurial support, serving as critical resources to facilitate entrepreneurial activities. This study makes an important contribution to the literature on entrepreneurship. By drawing basis on the COR theory (Hobfoll, 1989), we examine the relationships between supports from immediate family members and entrepreneurship activities, thus casting light on how support from the family spheres can help women entrepreneurs to manage entrepreneurial activities, which contributes to the development of entrepreneurship theory within family-relationship context.
Secondly, this study further contributes to the development of entrepreneurship theory in identifying the factors that mediate the effect of immediate family members on women's likelihood of success in managing entrepreneurial activities. Specifically, we postulate that family support expedites the effects of immediate family relationships on entrepreneurship activities but reduces conflicts that facilitate the current family's effect on entrepreneurship.
Thirdly, from a broader perspective, this study contributes to the COR theory in that we identified that the supports from current family serve as important resources that individuals can resort to and apply into such life ventures and expeditions, such as business entrepreneurship, expanding the meaning and nature of the concept of resource and thus contributing to developing the COR theory. Figure 1 illustrates the conceptual model of this study. Specifically, we hypothesise that a positive relationship with one's spouse and a positive relationship with one's children within the immediate family members will lead to reduced conflicts, which, in turn, can help women entrepreneurs to facilitate entrepreneurial activities.

Family Relationship and Entrepreneurial Activities
Family relationships represent an important source of resources in social and human capital (Granovetter 1985;Matzek et al., 2010;Michel et al., 2011). Abdullahi and Zainol (2016) agrees as families begin to understand the work demands of BWEs, family business lifestyles will be built. This creates a path for BWEs entrepreneurial success.
Family is generally recognised as one crucial resource reservoir that fuels an individual's passion, whereas work-family conflicts negatively impact or even destroy their performance (Michel et al., 2011). This kind of family relationship has the potential to induce either competitive advantages or disadvantages (Chrisman et al., 2005). Entrepreneurship requires individuals with much more physical, emotional, and psychological resources to deal with relevant stresses and challenges. The regional learning literature argues that family relationships may stimulate learning processes due to the level of trust and commitment embedded in the relationship (Maskell & Malmberg, 1999). Rimsha et al (2020) raised Stigma, Time, Growth, Family Balance (STGFB) as challenges for Pakistani Mompreneurs. They found there is a positive relation between Stigma and Mumpreneurship. Domestic and global economic stability will be increased due to the empowerment in gender as all political, legal, and social factors ultimately affect Pakistan's entrepreneurial activities. Similar information must unfold for the more remarkable achievement of Malaysian BWEs.
Family relationships are also highly beneficial because they lower agency and transaction costs by offering bundles of inimitable, rare, and valuable resources via the interactions between individual family members and the business (Habbershon and Williams, 1999). For instance, women may experience work-life conflict and such conflicts undermine business success. However, the effects of conflicts on entrepreneurial activities and the role of family conflict/support as an important contextual contingency in initiating entrepreneurial activities have been under-discussed (Zhu et al., 2020). Thus, we believe that it is necessary better to integrate the literature in these two seemingly separate spheres to better understand the family environment factor.
Additionally, because women entrepreneurs need to assume multiple roles, their time, resources, and energy will be shared and expanded to different spheres. Therefore, resource depletion will eventually influence entrepreneurs' well-being and venture success. In this view, the family relationship is a vital source of support to women entrepreneurs (Zachary, 2011). Therefore, it is of theoretical value and necessary to consider one's family environment as a predictor of their entrepreneurial abilities to cope with work-life balance. Thus, this study puts the following propositions: Proposition 1: There is a Positive Relationship between Family Relationships and BWEs Entrepreneurship Activities.

Marital Relationships and Entrepreneurship Activities
The marital relationship has a considerable influence on women entrepreneurial activities because it can facilitate direct and indirect spouse involvement in any aspects of the family business (Kurniawan and Sanjaya, 2016). Many research in consensus on the prominent role of husband plays in women entrepreneurship and serve as a critical enabling factor to positive venture performance (Matzek et al., 2010;Van Auken and Werbel, 2006). Furthermore, as married women typically had cultural barriers limiting their business growth prospect (Khan et al., 2021), having a good relationship with their spouse offers a form of emotional and instrumental advantage, which is very helpful to encounter business challenges (Chay, 1993). The way that emotional comfort influences women entrepreneurs is pretty apparent in stimulating positive behaviours such as self-confidence and self-efficacy (Van Auken and Werbel, 2006). In fact, women entrepreneurs will get even more inspired to excel in business to gratify their spouse by sharing responsibility and burden to increase domestic income in a way it shows how they appreciate the husband from that heart-winning relationship (Roy and Manna, 2014). The role of the husband in helping women entrepreneurs prosper in their entrepreneurial activities were not only for emotional reasons, but they provide instant access to internal funding and business mentoring which critical to survival for small size business (Maden, 2015;Wolf and Frese, 2018). It is notable that a supportive husband in a marital relationship is far more important than other types of social support as Brüderl and Preisendörfer (1998) emphasise that this marital bonding is regarded as strong ties than weak ties, which is undoubtedly a pivotal resource to sustain the work-life balance of women entrepreneurs. Therefore, in view of the above points, this study puts the following propositions: Proposition 2: There is a positive relationship between marital relationships and BWEs entrepreneurship activities.

Marital Relationship Mediates the Relationship between Family Relationship and Entrepreneurship Activities
In most developing countries, women are still bounded by culture and tradition, and in such cases, men obviously dominate most of the family state of affairs. In marital context, it was found that even family relationship can be a strong predictor to positive entrepreneurial activities, including growth and success destiny of an enterprise, it is contingence to how supportive the husband is in maintaining work-life balance relationships (Wolf and Frese, 2018). With house chores and parenting responsibilities where women are expecting to be good at them, it is very challenging to juggle multitasking roles without husband support, even with the presence of help from other family members. As previously discussed, the wife-husband relationship is capable of achieving a state of mental comfort or feeling that "being supported", which often works primarily during the critical period compared to other tangible family supports (Carels and Baucom, 1999).
To some extent, where family resources are available, spouses' commitment to the business can facilitate synergy alignment between business objectives and family goals (Van Auken and Werbel, 2006). Eddleston and Powell (2012) provides this justification, suggesting that a husband can act as invisible leader in directing the right business path through his supportive behaviours (for example sharing domestic responsibilities to enable their partners to spend more time on business development). On the other hand, potential conflict among family members who get involved in the business can also be mitigated effectively by the functional role of the husband-wife relationship in reducing business-related conflicts (Owen et al., 2013).
The vital notion in literature has made it clear that spouse involvements are able to create a positive influence towards women entrepreneurs' success, which makes their life partners ranked highest among social ties, including the other family members (Jianakoplos and Bernasek, 2008;Garcia et al., 2007). Therefore, strengthening the outcome of women entrepreneurship need full support from their partners, and thus this study puts the following propositions: Proposition 3: Marital relationship mediates the relationship between family relationship and BWEs entrepreneurship activities. This study identifies the factors of work-life balance in business-family relationships among BWEs. The conceptual model proposed by this paper is presented below as Figure 1.  Figure 1 illustrates, the arrangement of the model suggests that the role of the marital relationship and family relationships towards entrepreneurship activities of BWEs. These factors are underpinned by the conservation of resource theory. This framework emphasises marital relationships as an intermediary between family relationships and BWEs entrepreneurship activities.

Conclusion
Issues and challenges pertaining to the quality of life and well-being within domestics or family context during this pandemic Covid-19 challenges are inevitable. The work-life balance between family and entrepreneurial commitment became extreme; thus, positive interventions demanded its urgency. The chances of women entrepreneurs to succeed in business are in determinant on their family's relationships, happiness, and well-being. Thus, it is vital to underpin the impact of this challenging time on the women entrepreneurs, families, and communities so that assistance and support can be aggressively offered to the most in need relationships.
The findings of this research shall proclaim supportive networks, resources and policy undertaken needed to be undertaken to remedy the hindrances faced by BWEs and their families in developing a holistic work-life self-family relationship thus, ensuring sustainable entrepreneurial ventures among BWEs. This study can be replicated by other prominent bodies like Federal Land Consolidation and Rehabilitation Authority (FELCRA) and Rubber Industry Smallholders Development Authority (RISDA). This shall benefit their participants as the research findings offer a set of modelling to rectify any similar issues.
Women entrepreneurs in rural society mainly are known to be emotionally fragile. They need tangible and intangible support especially following the negative consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic. The research aims to collectively assemble the life experiences of the Mompreneurs in managing the challenging situation to continue business for the sake of earning sufficient income to pay basic expenses. Their views matter most to be heard through a research initiative. The research findings can be communicated effectively and directly from a trusted research entity, the university, to responsible agencies. Movement Control Order (MCO) had witnessed massive temporary job discontinuance and job termination, which drastically impact family economic well-being where many of them are men-beheaded breadwinners. Therefore, empowerment of women entrepreneurship is considered