The MIT Workplace Center was founded in July 2001 with a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. We are the first Sloan Foundation center to focus on the workplace, following a number of successful centers focused on the study of working families. All of these centers deal with issues facing dual-career middle class families, and ours is the first to combine research on work and family with experimental models for change in selected workplaces. The approach taken by the MIT Workplace Center is based on the research report of the Sloan Work-Family Policy Network, "Integrating Work and Family Life: A Holistic Approach." After synthesizing research, private sector work/life programs, and public policies on the local, state, and federal level, the report concludes:

"Integrating work and family life today requires a well-informed collaborative effort on the part of all the key actors that share interests and responsibilities in these issues."

The MIT Workplace Center is applying this stakeholder approach to all aspects of its work in an effort to move away from piecemeal solutions and toward models that will be shaped by multiple voices and meet multiple needs.

The Center is building a body of new research, and a growing archive of materials and resources, that address work-family issues:
We analyze the structure of the greater Boston regional economy and its labor force and gather data on trends in key industries. These data form an empirical base for possible interventions in the area of work-family conflict.
We collect information on the firm level about work processes, technological and work performance innovations, and work-family policies.
In particular workplaces, we document the gap between work structures and policies on the one hand, and the realities of family life on the other. We map responses to this new reality by showing how employers are reacting, how families and children are coping, and how other sectors are affected by the lack of a coordinated response to family caregiving.
We assess workplace-based experiments designed to benefit both the performance of firms and the quality of life for families and communities. We record the process of designing and implementing systemic workplace change, and we evaluate the outcomes for affected individuals and institutions.

A key element of the Center’s work is to engage all stakeholders in the examination of work-family problems and the design of solutions by identifying the needs and perspectives of each. To do so in a given industry, we engage in an interactive educational process. We share the Center’s research with key players—employers, employees, unions, trade and professional associations, government agencies at all levels, community institutions and organizations representing families themselves. We organize dialogues among these groups with the aim of reaching broadened mutual understanding, reframing work-family issues, and building institutional relationships necessary for change. We support continued dialogue in specific workplaces to develop concepts of work redesign both as solutions to immediate problems and as contributions to the larger realignment of work, family, and community.

The Center’s workplace interventions address the problem of the "one size fits all" workplace which no longer meets the needs of a varied workforce. These interventions are always the culmination of a long-term process of collaboration and dialogue among those who work inside a firm and others who are affected by the firm’s practices. We engage with all interested parties in the redesign of work systems and employment practices. Such experimentation could result in new approaches to the time and timing of work, such as opportunities for reduced hours and alternative career paths. It could also institute new models for accomplishing work, such as restructuring tasks, decision making, and performance evaluations. Other areas for innovation focus on building new relationships between firms and community institutions, such as child care centers, schools, nursing homes, and other service providers. The goal in all such interventions is to build sustainable and mutually beneficial relationships among firms, their employees and families, and diverse community institutions.

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The Center develops and pilots educational programs and outreach activities, both regionally and nationally. We contribute to the ongoing public debate about work-family issues through our web site, journal articles, and other publications. We communicate with multiple audiences—utilizing the popular press and the academic press—about our research findings, the results of cross-sector dialogue events, and our workplace experiments. We provide institutions of higher education with course materials based on the work of the Center for use at the undergraduate or graduate school level. Finally, we provide MIT doctoral students with opportunities to participate directly in the Center’s work and make the results of their research available to the public. Through multiple venues, the Center seeks both to shape public opinion and provide a training ground for the next generation of work-family scholars and practitioners.