Work-life balance ranks high on our lists of deciding factors when looking for companies to work for.
What should you look for in a company when Work-Life Balance is at or near the top of your list?
Determine if work-life balance is supported by attitudes and corporate culture at all levels of the organization or is simply a Human Resources department directive.
Working Mother magazine has published its list of 100 Best Companies – The Family-Friendliest Companies in America. The list measured 7 areas of the companies’ work-life programs:
I came across an interesting report written recently by Lori Herz and Arnie Herz over at Legal Sanity titled “BEYOND BALANCE: How to Cultivate Work-Life Synergy in the Law.”
The report is written about the legal profession, but please feel free to insert your chosen profession where you read the words ‘law’, lawyer’, and/or ‘legal.’ I believe their observations ring true for many of us.
The Work-Life discussion rages hot-and-heavy. From National associations to corporate HR departments to non-profit organizations to think tanks to university work-life centers and foundations – everyone is getting involved in advancing the work-life debate.
But are all interested in achieving the true goal of work-life balance? That is,are all parties dedicated to, as the Third Path Institute rightly defines it, “assisting individuals, families, and organizations in finding new ways to redesign work to create more time for family, community and other life passions?”
According to a survey of office professionals by Yahoo! Hotjobs, the line between our personal time and professional time is being all but erased as more of us use laptops, mobile phones, and smart phones to stay connected.
This observation comes as no surprise to us.
The survey’s data reveal that “75 percent of respondents say that they use their wireless device equally for both work and personal purposes. In fact, only 8 percent report that they are completely offline when away from the office and 27 percent admit to being so attached to their wireless device, they only leave it alone when they’re sleeping.”
While we can all agree that technology is a wonderful thing, our never-ending tightrope walk is to make use of this technology without becoming a slave to it.
Separation of work life from our home and personal lives is becoming harder and harder. We are constantly being interrupted by ringing cell phones and PDAs beeping with new email messages waiting for our attention.
When we think we’ve escaped the microscope of our working lives, the lights are tuned up brightly and the wonders of technology pull us back – they often divert our attention from achieving what’s most important to us.
Leslie Morgan Steiner’s Washingtonpost.com On Balance blog post of March 29Th asks the following:
“So what is balance, anyway? Do you have to have children in order to struggle with balance issues? How do you find your own balancing point in life? What makes you think you are balanced — and others are not — or vice versa? What happens when you tip over — how do you right yourself and your life?”
Good questions!
Some of you have noticed that I have posted a book on My Reading List on my Squidoo page Who is David B. Bohl? titled “I Don’t Want To Talk About It: Overcoming the Secret Legacy of Male Depression” by Terrence Real. When I say “noticed”, I mean you’ve wondered to me what that’s all about.
It is true – Dr. Real’s book is about men and depression. But it is so much more. I think the book jacket does a great job when it states: “I Don’t Want To Talk About It offers great wisdom, hope, and practical guidance to men and their families. This is one of the most important and straightforward books ever written about men.”
What I get most from Terrence Real’s book is a person who understands me. If you’ll indulge me for a moment, I’ll explain.
Dr. Stephen R. Covey, author of The 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People and co-founder of the FranklinCovey Company, had this to say in his recent column Work-Life Balance: A Different Cut in Forbes.com: “The challenge of work-life balance is without question one of the most significant struggles faced by modern man. I’ve surveyed thousands of audiences about their greatest personal and professional challenges. Life balance is always at or near the top.”
Evan Carmichael wrote in a recent Youngentrepreneur blog post titled “How To Find Your Calling” and posed the following question: “So how do you find your calling and get into something you stick with?”
Evan referenced a Fast Company article that suggested three steps:
The Center for Work and Family at Boston College has recently updated its report: “Women at Midlife and Beyond: A Glimpse into THE FUTURE.”
Notable findings of the study are:
David Zinczenko, Editor in Chief of Men’s Health magazine, has some interesting thoughts on this very question in an article titled “Why Do Men Spend So Much Time At Their Jobs”.
In a nutshell, Mr. Zinczenko explains in a different and more lighthearted way what I’ve written about in my article: Work-Life Balance for Men.
Here’s an excerpt from my article:
According to the same study mentioned in yesterday’s post, fathers have just about tripled the hours that they spend being attentive to their children in the last 40 years (from 2.5 hours per week in 1965 to 7 hours today).
William Doherty, professor of family studies at the University of Minnesota, commented in the washingtonpost.com that “It’s not the case that men are slugs.”
A recently released University of Maryland study conducted by Suzanne M. Bianchi, Chairwoman of the Department of Sociology, today’s mothers spend more hours focused on their children than mothers of40 years ago did.
What is especially interesting about this is that mothers of today don’t perceive things that way: Approximately one-half of those interviewed in the study felt that they did not have enough time to spend with their children.
I had the opportunity this past weekend to participate in an event that showcased 150 of the local community’s businesses. I met many wonderful people at the show, and for the first time had the occasion to meet husbands and wives attending the venue together.
There was a common theme that seemed to resonate throughout: These partners weren’t satisfied with the balance they were experiencing in their lives. Moreover, there appeared to be a general breakdown in communication between the couples. In fact, legitimate distractions had caused them in many cases to avoid communicating.
Would you like to make use of technology to help you in your business rather than becoming a slave to being instantly and constantly available?
One of the things I learned some time ago was that to achieve balance, I need to take action.
Toward that end, I set up a simple system of daily conventions: some simple habits and routines to practice every day to help me achieve the goals that I had prioritized.
One thing that I do every day is to phone a friend.
Every once in a while, I need a reminder. Today, it came in the form of a great piece from Margaret Heffernan at FastCompany.com that I had read some time ago and resurrected today.
Margaret had placed a half-hour time block on her calendar every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday that was permanent- it couldn’t be moved or rescheduled. Ms. Heffernan would walk out her office door and take time for herself. She called it “my thinking time.”
What she found is that we’ve gotten so accustomed to multitasking that we have forgotten how to
single task: to give our full attention and presence to just one thing – ourselves, a partner, a child, a family member, a friend, a colleague.
