Work-life balance
I hate these words. Separately, they’re fine. But this phrase has become oversaturated in our conversations and created a tangled-necklace-knot that will never get figured out as it stands.
The other day, I was having a conversation over happy hour with friends about work-life balance. At its meta level, I actually love talking about and working with clients about getting to a great place where they feel they have work-life balance. But this recent conversation led to my own personal light-bulb moment about why this is one of those topics that just creates and recycles frustration instead of ever getting resolved:
Because we have no agreement on a common definition of what exactly work-life balance is or how it feels. It is subjective to each person, which means we’re always walking around trying to have it but we don’t have a shared agreement about what that actually is.
NO WONDER NO ONE FEELS THEY HAVE WORK-LIFE BALANCE.
And through this conversation I realized that what this elusive topic truly comes down to, in my opinion, and how I work with clients around it, is all about how comfortable they are setting and holding boundaries (which is all about articulating expectations and making agreements) with the people at work in order to make space for their full life.
So it plays out like this: someone who feels they have great work-life balance very likely feels comfortable telling their boss “I need to leave at 3pm on Wednesdays to make my kid’s soccer game, so on those days, I’ll get back online at 9pm after the kids are asleep and catch up before the next day.” That person then discusses with their boss what might need to be covered or what expectations might need to be set with other colleagues in order to minimize negative impact of this need.
Someone who does not feel like they have work-life balance may be in that exact same situation but feel that they can’t have that discussion, so they miss their kid’s game and feel like work is taking over their life and therefore they have no balance.
When it comes down to the nitty gritty, I believe it has nothing to do with the actual logistics (leaving at 3p, maybe starting later, or working out in the middle of the day – whatever it might be), but entirely about whether a person feels comfortable having the conversation that articulates and negotiates for what they need, at work and outside of work.
So the real question becomes – are you willing to engage in the conversations that will allow you to reasonably design your work so that you have the space you want or need in the rest of your life too?
Writing my blog (on a Sunday, of course!) while unpictured football is on and friends are nearby. And I’m right where I want to be, because this is how I designed my life and my work. So while working during football Sunday would be radically unappealing to someone else, it’s great to me!
