The New Approach to Work-Life Balance
What is work-life balance?
According to Business Directory, work-life balance is a comfortable state of equilibrium achieved between an employee's primary priorities of their employment position and their private lifestyle. Most psychologists would agree that the demands of an employee's career should not overwhelm the individual's ability to enjoy a satisfying personal life outside of the business environment.
We have struggled with the idea of work-life balance for a while. For most of us, we have made changes to create what is likely a reasonable balance, but continue to struggle to ensure our work does not bleed into our personal lives. I’ve read a lot of studies and watched several videos about the importance of work-life balance and took something for each to help me with accomplishing work-life balance. However, the advent of social media and access to the internet plays a pivotal role in how much restraint we can muster to maintain a reasonable work-life balance.
Deanna DeBara, Contributor at Hourly provided another perspective regarding a new approach to Work-Life-Balance. “Employee engagement is one of the best indicators for organizational success. Engaged organizations are more productive, more innovative, and more financially successful than their less engaged counterparts—and if you want to take your business to the next level, focusing on employee engagement is one of the best ways to drive results”.
Career Builder found that nearly half of American workers check email after they leave work, and 45% say they do work during non-business hours.
Additionally, this phenomenon crosses global borders, prompting new laws in France and a campaign in Japan to limit working hours.
The Work-Life Balance Matrix
Creating a matrix regarding categories that impact personal and professional goals is a good option to stay focus on what’s important, and where to focus your attention. Check out the 5 easy steps to get you started here
Here are 7 Work-Smart Strategies to consider
Just say no to low impact work
Stop multitasking
Break work down into achievable tasks
Make your meetings matter
Create checklists
Evaluate your daily schedule
Make time for self-care
I’m certain that you have heard of many of these strategies and very likely have used them with a degree of success. The multitasking strategy is one that often creates a great deal of consternation - it simply does not work. It portends to provide a false sense of being able to get a lot done, but at what cost.
