AbstractThis paper discusses how male managers perceive the relationship between their careers and family lives. The authors suggest that a typology of perceptions is necessary to describe this relationship. The way individuals perceive the relationship is influenced by the emotional outcomes of work and the relative importance of work in the life of the person. While the former is mostly the consequence of the job‐person fit, the latter is closely linked to the individual's life stage. Thus, work appears to be the more significant environment in an individual's early adult stages, while family and private life become the more salient environment later in lif