Co-author: Michael Sullivan
What is Work-Life Harmony?
The struggle to balance work and home life is a consistent topic of conversation for employees and leaders. The desire to be present, engaged, and fulfilled in both areas is a vision which often seems impossible to achieve. With the global pandemic, increase in virtual work, and constant state of change we have experienced in the last 16 months, this challenge has intensified. The lines between work life and home life have been blurred by teleworking, remote learning, virtual meetings, and the loss of historical boundaries. Balance feels further out of reach than ever before. So how can we move from unachievable balance to work-life harmony?
Work-life harmony changes the focus from splitting our time equally, or meticulously calculating our hourly allocation, between work and home to fluidly alternating between the two. Work-life harmony is centered on purpose, values, and energy. Focusing on why activities within both your professional and personal lives are important to you. Leveraging your energy to spend time where you are engaged and passionate instead of drained and defeated. Your time allocation changes with the needs of the situation, your energy shifts, and your engagement levels. This may result in an uneven distribution of time across the different components of your life and could vary week to week or even day to day. Maybe one week you put in extra hours at work to get a big project completed, but the next week you take time off to spend with your family. Explore this inequality and self-assess how well your current time distribution is serving you. Does it align with this season of life? When do you need make a change? How could you redirect your time and energy to be more fulfilled and present?
Reflecting on Personal Values and Intentionality in Work and Life
Work-life harmony is rooted in intentionality. Many of us find it easier to be intentional about time spent in our professional lives through structure, meetings, and deadlines. On the other hand, being intentional with time in our personal lives can be more difficult. To increase intentionality in your personal life, you can utilize the same tools you do in your professional life – being present, creating an overarching purpose or vision, and reflecting on your time allocation. You can begin by being fully present wherever you are. If you are spending time with family, engage and connect. If you are working, focus your mental energy on the task at hand. When you are not fully present in the moment, you miss the true value of that time, and your energy and focus are divided, resulting in reduced productivity and effectiveness. How can you be more intentional in both your work and personal life? What helps you stay present?
In our professional lives, it is common practice to have a mission or vision statement to guide our actions, but it is much less common for us to think and act that way in our personal lives. Just as our work teams can be galvanized by a common vision or purpose, we can live our whole lives with this level of focus and intentionality. We can have a strategic vision for ourselves, in all of our roles, just as a corporation has a strategic vision that exists over all of the various business areas. Of course, some things in our lives are mentally compartmentalized. For example, taking a child to a doctor appointment is a different type of activity than preparing for a meeting with a corporate board of directors. Although we think of these activities differently, there can be an overarching purpose in how we conduct ourselves. In both situations we can strive to act with kindness, always be curious, and seek to add value. Doing this will allow us to perform in a variety of spaces, wearing a variety of hats, while maintaining a sense of purpose, truth, and authenticity.
To create an overarching purpose or vision, begin by reflecting on your values and determine how they are demonstrated within your life. What are the most important pieces in your life? What are your non-negotiables? Do you prioritize these values and priorities? Then use your values to create a vision that includes all aspects of your life and is based on your broadest priorities and principles, overarching across your career, family, hobbies, etc. This will help you determine how you want to show up and how your overall vision will manifest in your professional and personal lives. What behaviors are universal for you based on your values? How do you aspire to behave across situations? What is your overarching vision?
Being grounded in your values, purpose, and vision will help you be more intentional in your time allocation. Take a moment daily and weekly to reflect on your values, purpose, and energy levels throughout all aspects of your life. Identify tasks and activities that are not aligned with your values and purpose and reduce the time you give to them. In a work context, you may have the ability to delegate tasks that don’t give you energy or move your goals forward to ensure you stay focused on more purposeful initiatives. In a personal context, you may have to decline a dinner with friends, if your goal is to attend night classes for personal development. If your goal is to be more social or to deepen your personal relationships, you may choose the opposite. It is situational and dynamic and different for each person. Are you living your values and making progress on the things that matter most? Give yourself feedback and adjust. If you need more self-care, time with friends, quality moments with your kids, or focus on a personal goal, how can you get there?
Creating Harmonious Workplaces
For those in a formal or informal leadership role, one of the most powerful realizations we can make is that we have the opportunity to create workplaces for our team members to live and work more harmoniously. Given the complexity and challenges we face in this modern era and particularly in these challenging times, we are underserved by rigid systems that were designed for simpler times. People across organizations and industries are struggling with these challenges, and the desire for flexibility and grace is widespread.
Work-life harmony is unique to each person. It is not one size fits all and there is not a magic formula for success. What works best for you may not match your boss, partner or teammates and that is okay. As a leader, your harmony and time allocation are perhaps unlike anyone else on your team. Give kindness and trust as you allow your team members to find what works for them, even if that means working in ways that are divergent from yours, including working an alternative schedule, organizing work differently, answering emails on nights and weekends, or not answering emails on nights and weekends.
While we can’t always predict how others are feeling, we can ask questions to learn more. Give people simple, informal opportunities to share their thoughts and feelings about workplace practices and culture. This can assist in gathering data to confirm programs and benefits or push the organization to consider new ideas and initiatives. Additionally, by creating the space for this dialogue, you will build trust and rapport, which are critical to professional relationships.
The Ripple Effect of Work-Life Harmony
Older notions of work-life balance leave us feeling that our time should be evenly split between our careers and the other areas of our lives. In the unique times we live in, this is an unreasonable expectation. Work-life harmony gives us the flexibility to focus more on the high value areas of life and to readjust as those priorities change. To accomplish this, consider the way you manage your time in all areas of your life, not just during working hours. The key is to be present and intentional with your time by understanding your values and goals and regularly reflecting on your performance as a whole person in pursuit of your own personal vision. Leaders have an opportunity to create more harmony in their own lives as well as create more harmonious workplaces where employees can individually architect their own schedules and work processes. Work-life harmony generates energy and effectiveness which benefits both employees and organizations.
Evaluate your harmony in work life and personal life, given the events of the last 16 months. Do you want something different or something more out of life? You may aspire to express your ideas more at work, to bring more of yourself to work, or to make big changes in your career or in your personal life. By living in work-life harmony, you can more fully engage and contribute. How will you intentionally create your own work-life harmony?
** This article is the sixth in a series of twelve addressing common leadership questions. These questions and challenges touch leaders at all levels and transcend industries. The article series provides valuable information and action steps for leaders to take their skills and teams to the next level. Click here to read the full series.
Author’s Note: Special thanks to Michael Sullivan for his analytical perspective and fresh ideas, and for his generous contribution in co-authoring this article.