Most people’s work/life balance is seriously out of whack. Hectic work schedules, increased responsibility, new technology, and the need to read and respond to growing quantities of email, voicemail, and text are just some of the things that place huge demands on your work life. This pressure may make you feel as if your work is a prison that you can never escape from as more and more keeps coming at you.
Many of us work in environments like this. Work comes from a lot of different sources, and you might be supporting many different people. You’re pulled in various directions without understanding how to cope with expectations from multiple leaders. It’s a lot to handle, and it may seem impossible to bring your work and life into balance. Just know that you are not alone. Many other executives and leaders face similar challenges.
Lack of work/life balance is becoming an increasingly common problem in today’s hyper-competitive world. A survey conducted by Strategy One, a global research and consulting firm, found that 89% of 1,043 Americans surveyed say that work/life balance is a problem for them.
Chris, a client in the biotechnology field, kept moving up through the ranks over a five-year span, from manager to senior manager to VP. The number of responsibilities and decisions he made, and their significance, drastically increased. He had a lot of demands coming at him and needed to make decisions quickly, but it became more and more difficult to make the best choices under all that pressure. He had to learn what was most important, get comfortable trusting his own instincts, and determine when to say yes and when to say no. He needed to develop new skills for dealing with a never-ending stream of demands.
You may not be able to control all the demands coming your way, but you can control your own strategies for managing them. The place to start is with yourself and the way you think about the demands on your time.
Below are five ideas to help you bring your work and life into balance by changing your attitudes about what you can, and should, accomplish at work.
1 – Do not please everyone.
Many leaders get caught in the trap of trying to please everyone in an effort to be perceived as doing a good job. This desire makes it impossible to achieve work/life balance and manage their time effectively. People who are really good at pleasing everyone don’t say no to anything given to them. They don’t want to be critical or to challenge a paradigm that is presented by either a boss or superior. By saying yes to everything, they fail to consider what is most important or what is the best use of their time. They fail to prioritize, which leads them away from their goals rather than toward them. If you try to please everyone, the one person who doesn’t get pleased is you! You can’t place yourself second while always placing someone else at work first. Instead, take care of yourself first and foremost. Learn to say “No” when requests go beyond your boundaries or don’t fit with your goals and priorities.
2 – Be true to yourself.
Many executives think the respect they get from others stems from how much they do and how well they do it. However, a very important determiner of respect is integrity, and integrity requires being true to yourself. Yes, you must often do what the company wants you to do, but not to such a degree that YOU get lost within that paradigm. Know your vision for your career and live by it. Question assignments that don’t jive with the personal mission you’ve laid out. Set goals and priorities for both your personal and professional life. This will help you decide how to dedicate your time and energy. When you know your truth and take a stand to live by it, others will have deeper respect for you.
3 – Set high boundaries.
Setting high boundaries will give you the time and space you need to work at your best and recharge fully. For example, you can affirm that you will never work through lunch, work past a certain time, get to the office before a certain time, or work through lunch. Be clear with yourself about your boundaries so that when you get a huge project, you won’t allow your boundaries to evaporate because of the demands on your time. You can then structure the project schedule and completion date according to what your personal schedule allows.
Setting boundaries will allow for greater enjoyment, peace, and fulfillment in all aspects of life. When you feel a great amount of stress from the demands of your work, it’s almost impossible to make time for what you most need or want in your life. This is why having and setting boundaries is so vitally important. If you keep your boundaries strong, they will protect your time no matter how difficult, troubling, or challenging your work may become.
4 – Set realistic expectations.
Don’t try to be a hero or a superstar. Set realistic expectations for projects, underpromising on how quickly you can complete them. What is underpromising? It’s setting deadlines further out than you actually think you need them to be. If you think it will take 1.5 hours to do something, give yourself two. Be realistic about your time, giving yourself a larger timeframe than you think you need to get things done. At worst, you’ll finish on time, and at best, you’ll deliver results earlier than expected. Either way, it’s a win!
Most people tend to do exactly the opposite by giving themselves very high expectations. They tend to overpromise rather than underpromise. For example, if they think they have an hour to get something done, they give themselves 40 minutes. This puts extra pressure on them. In fact, 80% of the executives I work with create such high expectations that they rarely accomplish what needs to get done.
5 – Exercise good time management.
Determine what situations at work or at home you can and cannot control. You can choose to stop procrastinating, for instance. You can figure out which types of tasks you do best in the morning and in the afternoon. You can set aside focused time for in-depth work on projects and strategic thinking when you don’t take phone calls or drop-in office visits, eliminating distractions. And you can avoid checking email continuously throughout the day. Taking steps like these will help you use your working hours more effectively.
6 – Simplify your life.
Examine what you want from your life and what is standing in your way. Look at all of the things that you tolerate that only serve to limit you and drain your energy. Make a goal to systematically eliminate them all from your life. Do you need to pay off credit cards? Do you need to simplify your living situation? Can you incorporate a more flexible schedule so you’ll have more time for fulfillment? Can you take time management training so that you’ll use your time more effectively? Brainstorm and see what comes to mind. Make a plan with concrete action steps complete with deadlines, and follow through.
7 – Make an appointment with yourself.
This week, make an appointment with yourself on your calendar. Keep the appointment with yourself as you would an appointment with your most important client. During your appointment, consider how to implement each point on this list, determining where you need to say no, simplify life, and exercise good time management.
8 – Get support.
Talk to friends and colleagues to see if they are going through the same situation, and help each other brainstorm solutions. Enlist the support of an executive coach to help you set and achieve practical goals and regain balance.
9 – Celebrate even the small triumphs.
We often become so absorbed in accomplishing tasks or to-do lists that we overlook opportunities to experience joy and satisfaction. Celebrate the small victories in both your work and personal life.
Obviously you have a challenging career. That makes it almost inevitable that you’ll find yourself consumed in work at times. But practice these five suggestions and you’ll soon see a decrease in your stress level and an increase in the quality of your work.
When you feel like your work/life balance is getting out of control, also talk to your boss and discuss ways you can regain balance. Most companies realize that a happy employee is a more productive employee. They don’t want you to experience burnout; they want you to remain loyal and fulfilled by your work.
Recently a client, Jillian, confessed to me, “I find myself working 60 or more hours each week. I have no time or energy for anything other than work. I don’t see my family, I don’t have time for friends or hobbies, and I feel completely overwhelmed. I want more time and fulfillment in my life. I would rather divide my time between work, the people in my life, nature, and travel instead of barely having any time outside of work responsibilities.”
But Jillian began making appointments with herself every Friday to examine what she could do differently the following week, using the tips on this list. In a month’s time, Jillian felt she finally had some breathing room. She’d whittled her schedule down to 45 hours a week—mostly by saying no more often, setting realistic expectations, and using solid time-management skills. She’d occasionally have a 50-hour week, but she now felt like she was the one in the driver’s seat. She was the one who would decide to work overtime now and then on a special project. It wasn’t just something that happened to her, day in and day out. She made it to a family picnic and her niece’s soccer game, and she went hiking with a close friend. “It’s like night and day,” she said. “I’m finally able to leave work at work—and have time for everything that’s most important to me!
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