But More Important During Covid

Why Managing Your Work-Life Is Harder By Dan Schawbel But More Important During Covid New York Times Bestselling Author & Managing Partner of ‘ Workplace Intelligence ‘

I recently had a Zoom conversation with a colleague who told me that since he no longer had to commute to work, he blocked off an hour to read a book or listen to a podcast. Before Covid, many of us would take a train, drive a car, or even fly to get to work, using that time to prepare for the day, relax or entertain ourselves. I always thought my hour drive to work was "the calm before the storm". It was a time to reflect and prepare mentally for the day ahead. It turns out that having a "fake commute" is more common than I thought and is especially popular in Germany, where leisure time is cherished because periods of resting leads to higher levels of productivity.

Our work-lives are no longer nine-to-five leading to more unpredictable schedules, an always-on culture, and a labour free-for-all that has been perpetuated by Covid and made possible by mobile technologies.

Since March, the time we spent commuting has been reallocated to more time working, which has resulted in higher levels of productivity at the cost of our mental health. In a global study by my firm and Oracle, we found that being remote has increasingly blurred our personal and professional lives. Half of the respondents are spending at least five more hours each week working and over a third are spending ten more.

All of this additional working time has led to stress, anxiety, and depression that directly impacts our home life. It feels almost inescapable because only a door separates our work from our personal lives, and that door is often opened by spouses, children, and breaks to eat and sleep. As a result of our worklife blend, our research shows that we are more sleep deprived, have poor physical health, lower levels of happiness, our family lives suffer and we feel isolated from our friends. While technology has powered and made remote working possible, we are now always available regardless of what room we're in at home. And, when we're always on, we're never present with ourselves, our family and friends.

The importance of work-life management during Covid

We have to make work-life management a priority during these times because when we're suffering at home, the quality of our work declines, and when we aren't performing at work, we bring negative feelings into our home. I realized during the early part of my career the connection between work-life and have said many times that if we improve our workplace, our entire lives improve as a result because we spend much of our lives working and it couldn't be more true today. But, don't get me wrong, remote work has been a blessing for me and so many others, who feel a better sense of control over our time now that we aren't mandated to commute to an office. One study found that 73 percent of workers have a better worklife balance when remote, giving them more time with their spouse, children, and pets. Regardless of age group, we all desire to prioritize time with family and want freedom in our lives. But, there needs to be more harmony between how we work and how we live because each relies on the other to achieve it. And, there are benefits to being face-to-face in an office together compared to at home on Zoom.

In a letter in the Financial Times, PwC UK Chairman Kevin Ellis wrote, "If the pandemic has proved to others that office workers can work effectively from home, it has proved to me the importance of offices to the work/life balance equation. The virtual world is no substitute for human contact for a people business like ours. Teams need to come together, people need to coach others and ideas need to be developed with clients in a face to face environment." Ellis is right in that being in-person can be extremely beneficial to the exchange of ideas, which leads to new innovations and deeper relationships. And he validates my belief that there's no one-size-fits-all approach to managing our work lives or to how organizations should orchestrate a flexibility program.

But, even though we can all agree that flexibility is part of the foundation of working in today's world, there's no real instruction manual for how to do so. Since we each have a different set of life circumstances, preferences, and needs, these flexibility programs and policies need some degree of customization to appeal to and support all workers. The U.S. culture promotes burnout as a right of passage and work is deeply entrenched in our identities that it sometimes feels like we've created a prison without a key. That's why we should look to other countries for inspiration.

What we can learn from other countries about managing worklife

Every year the World Happiness Report ranks countries based on how happy their citizens are. Over the past eight years, the Nordic countries have always been at the top of the list, while the U.S. lags behind in 18th or 19th place. In Denmark, employees are guaranteed five weeks of paid vacation with a 37- hour work week. In Sweden, only 1.1 percent of employees work long hours and they are given the flexibility to work whenever as long as the job gets accomplished. In Finland, employees have flexible hours so they can start or end the day earlier if they so choose, and as of this year, they have the right to decide when and where they work at least half of the time.

Unlike the Nordic countries, the U.S. doesn't mandate paid family or sick leave, or offer universal childcare support, or even paid vacation or holidays. We live to work, while people in the Nordic countries work to live. And, this has led to a lot of mental health issues that we are all responsible for. While we shouldn't patiently wait for U.S. work culture to magically change, we can start managing our worklife in a better way so they can be in harmony instead of imbalance.

How to manage your work-life in this new work paradigm

In order to maximize your ability to produce, but not at the cost of your family life and health, we need to be more thoughtful about how, when, and where we work and live. If we say, "if it's not on my calendar it doesn't exist" and "I live and die by my calendar", then we should be much more thoughtful and intentional about how we construct our calendar, ensuring that we have enough breaks and time for personal activities and people. For instance, instead of that old one-hour commute to work, add in time for a socially-distanced walk with a friend or breakfast with your spouse. Instead of isolating yourself in your home office, eat at the kitchen table. Put 30minute breaks into your calendar at least three or four times a day to break up the day and force yourself to disconnect.

We need a better relationship with technology in order to effectively manage our work-lives too. Keep all your technology in your home office and out of the kitchen or bedroom. Just like you set boundaries with technology, you should set them with your colleagues so you aren't always on-call. Have a set time every day when the team knows you're done working so they don't keep emailing and texting you. Try to keep a routine so you create habits you can commit to that make you feel healthier and happier. And, most importantly, have work-life conversations with the people you work with because the behaviour of others can either help or harm your work-life.

By making work-life a priority, we can all live better lives and not at the cost of our productivity because a healthier and happier employee will work harder and produce better quality work. When you are suffering from stress, burnout, and are unhappy, it's hard to focus and reach your full potential at work. Starting today, let's put more of an emphasis on managing our work-lives because our lives and our jobs both depend on it.