Boldly Creating Work/Life Balance
December 13, 2022
It’s that time of year when holidays, friends and family obligations, friends and family angst, grief and wistfulness, end-of-year deadlines, and disappearing daylight all collide together into . . . well . . . exhaustion. That makes it the perfect time of year to intentionally think about work-life balance – what it means for you as a leader and what it means for your team(s) – and, then, instead of lamenting its loss, will it into being.
I’ve spent enough time here in Washington, D.C. to know well the pull of attaching oneself to the next rising political star, assessing one’s importance by the amount of time you spend outside of the office checking and answering work messages, and measuring self-worth by how far you’ve climbed up the influence ladder (at work, of course). As dizzyingly exhausting as it sounds, it’s a powerful pull – because, have you really lived up to your potential otherwise?
The whole city reverberates with the echoes of all of that pulling and pushing and striving to the point where it can easily feel like it’s just the way it is – there is no other way to be. And then that leads to everything being “urgent” or an “emergency”. Have I had times in my work when there were actual urgent emergencies that needed my undivided and rapid attention? Yes. But the vast majority of all of the “urgent” requests, the vast majority of the issues that would spin up the whole team, have really just been symptoms of that often unconscious need to race to the top. Top of what? Well, that’s not the point – everyone just remembers that they need to be racing, always racing, or their project, and by extension, they themselves, don’t matter.
But the vast majority of all of the “urgent” requests . . . have really just been symptoms of that often unconscious need to race to the top. Top of what? Well, that’s not the point – everyone just remembers that they need to be racing, always racing, or their project, and by extension, they themselves, don’t matter.
There are ways to deflate some of that anxiety-riddled energy without leaving the rat race behind and becoming a lifestyle influencer with your yoga retreat on your organic farm in the remote mountains of Idaho. And there are ways to find and create work-life balance without your organization or your professional reputation falling apart. There is life outside The Competition Echo Chamber.
I’m not going to pretend that there’s a magic formula that can be canned nicely into a listicle. But I will give you food for thought, some of it learned the hard way and all of it ideas I wish my leaders had embraced when I was earlier in my career.
Most important – remember that work-life balance means different things to different people.
Define for yourself what it means and start carving it out, leading by example. You can start right away, within the policies you already have in place. But don’t assume that others on your team have the same definition. Consider a staff survey to figure out what others value in the way of work-life balance so that you can start thinking about how to create and implement some new policies (or modify existing ones) next year that value and honor the way your team chooses to find balance.
Try some small changes in these last few weeks of the year.
Some possible ideas:
Are there some projects that maybe don’t need a last minute push just to finish this year? It’s easy to fall into the trap of wanting to tie everything off with a bow before year’s end – how often have you found yourself in a rush in the middle two weeks of December? But really, is it a manufactured rush? And, if this time of year is always a frenzied dash to the end, consider re-thinking your project management and pacing for next year.
Consider giving your team extra paid volunteer leave – many folks do a lot of volunteer work during Q4 in their communities, their kids’ schools, etc. Trying to cram that into already full holiday-prep weekends isn’t always practical or possible.
Does everyone need to work the whole last week of December? Do you run a team that truly needs to be present or on-call that entire week, or are you keeping everyone there out of habit and because otherwise everyone would just have “too much vacation”? (Some people like working this week because it's quieter, while for others it comes at the end of an exhausting quarter/year and ends up not being very productive, even if quiet).
Corollary: give fundraising, accounting, and other staff that may indeed need to be working or on call at the end of December some extra time off at the beginning of January or whenever their project cycle is slower. And make sure you're accounting for non-Christian religious or other cultural holidays in your leave policies.
Perhaps the first week of January could be declared “Refresh Week”. Let folks use that week to re-set for the year. Encourage folks to clean out and organize their workspaces and computers, update their calendars with work-life balance carve-outs, make medical appointments they’ve been putting off, etc. Declare the week meeting-free, at least of internal meetings. Make your next staff meeting (the 2nd week in January of course) one of looking ahead to what everyone is excited about accomplishing in 2023. Start the year with refreshed energy and a 30,000 ft view, rather than an immediate dive into detailed to-dos and deadlines.
Carving out and honoring individual work-life balance for yourself and your team is critically necessary to your team’s success. Especially as we are all recovering from several years of pandemic, political turmoil, and a rise in overt racism (and all the other “isms”).
Be courageous – don’t be afraid to make bold changes to old habits in 2023.
I know you’ve heard it many times before, but, truly, people work better when they’re treated as whole people – and that includes us as leaders. Wringing folks dry by squeezing every last bit of productivity out of them might push your organization ahead in some temporary ways, but, ultimately, it leads to burn-out; turn-over that’s costly in terms of expenses, time, and staff morale; a lack of passion for the mission; and staff alumni that aren’t going to want to drive new talent to you.
Making it personal for a minute . . . . early on, I had a job where I was expected to work 6-7 days a week with little to no vacation and to be on call 24/7/365. Did I technically produce more than some of my colleagues whose bosses had a more balanced approach? Perhaps (quantitatively, but not necessarily higher quality). But I discovered something life-changing when I moved to Europe for a few years. There, my colleagues were horrified when I tried to take my lunch to my desk. I was told, in no uncertain terms, that lunch was a 1 hour affair, outside of the office, with colleagues and friends, followed by coming back to the office for a 30 minute coffee and chat with the admin staff. And they’d better not see me at work past my work hours or catch me trying to email anyone outside of those hours. In summers, stretch that lunch to 2 hours because of course we needed a mid-day swim in the river. Oh, and generous vacation leave. Per year, I produced quantitatively and qualitatively far more than I ever had in that greuling, “disciplined” previous work environment. (Thank you International Space Science Institute(ISSI) – y’all are the best).Obviously, every company or organization and its needs are different, and every leader has a different amount of control over creating or modifying workplace policies.
But, even in tight budgets and competitive atmospheres, you or your organization can make bold changes that allow the people on your team to be their full selves AND still produce possibly (or even probably) better work results.
Here are a few potential examples that might work for your team (in addition to those above):
Redefine “urgent”. Come to a team understanding around what types of issues require dropping everything to address immediately (set the bar very high here), what type require attention outside of normal work hours (again, high bar), what require attention in the next few days, etc. And then create a contact tree for each type of truly urgent issue – who needs to be contacted when (and at what stage of the issue) and how do they want to be contacted?
Set work hours boundaries and keep them. You’ve heard this before, but it bears repeating. As the leader, pay attention to and honor your team’s calendars, personal holds, and work hours. Aim to set the bar incredibly high for allowing folks to be contacted while on vacation – including for yourself. Try to avoid sending an email to anyone on your team outside of their work hours unless it clearly states in the subject line – “Not for attention until tomorrow/when you’re back from vacation” (it’s understandable that sometimes you need to send something when you remember it). Likewise, try to avoid the temptation of answering emails outside of work hours – that sets the expectation that others must do the same, no matter how many times you might say that it only applies to you.
Corollary: For your own mental health, try to set firm boundaries for yourself on when you check your work email (even if you’re The Big Boss) – e.g., I can almost 100% guarantee you that you’ll have a better solution to that new fire that cropped up if you find out about it after bus stop drop off in the morning than if you find out about it right before you’re closing your eyes to (at this point supposedly) go to sleep.
Be generous with work-from-home time allowances. Working from home can alleviate a huge amount of stress for certain people with neurodivergences or mental illnesses, for caregivers needing to run a load of laundry between meetings or run to the grocery over lunch, etc. There are myriad ways to build team cohesiveness in a remote environment (more on that in a coming article). Is there really a need to force people into a certain number of days of the week in the office? Can more positions be completely remote with only being in person a few times a year? (Think of the wider candidate pools!). Are you stuck in old ways of doing things just because it was supposedly better pre-covid when everyone had to be in the office? But was it better, on the balance? Maybe the new normal isn’t a downgrade.
Let go of monitoring people’s calendars or work hours too closely (if they’re meeting their deadlines with quality work).
Don't be afraid to let your organization set the example for a healthy, human-centered culture in your field.
Allow for flexible, multi-purpose breaks during the day to eat, go for a walk, workout, run an errand, etc. without being specific with folks about how they can use their breaks and without people feeling like they have to sneak it in. And model that yourself – put personal holds on your calendar. Build-in flexibility – e.g., maybe someone needs to carve out different hours for their race training or outdoor photo project at different times of the year.
Encourage the whole-self by celebrating it. For example, create congratulatory kudo-boards for folks’ external successes (like completing a fun-run or having a role in a local theater production).
If you have influence over the policies in the Employee Handbook, take time in January to give it another look-over. Where can you be ahead of the pack in caring for your team? Where can you be more forward-leaning, more generous than peer organizations? There are a number of possibilities here (to be covered in a future article). Don't be afraid to let your organization set the example for a healthy, human-centered culture in your field.
Carving out and honoring individual work-life balance for yourself and your team is critically necessary to your team’s success. Especially as we are all recovering from several years of pandemic, political turmoil, and a rise in overt racism (and all the other “isms”). We’re all trying to find a new, hopefully healthier, normal, and the old dog-eat-dog ways aren’t going to fly anymore. Relatedly, in future articles, I’ll discuss building team cohesion in a remote work environment and stemming burnout (in yourself as a leader and, separately, in your team).
If you have other ideas or have seen other stellar examples (or examples to avoid!) in creating a strong work-life balance culture, please do share.
For myself, I’ll be holding off on any new articles of this newsletter until the new year. Have a great rest of December, and I’ll see you here in the New Year!
