3 Chapter 3: Work/Life Balance

Learning Objectives

*Understand the importance of promoting work/life balance in a busy working environment

*Recognize the work/life issues and how they affect the workplace

*Build a case of work/life balance programs for employers

*Practical tips for carrying out a work/life balance lifestyle

Introduction

According to a report in Time Magazine (2017), the Japanese government was forced to confront the issue of numerous employees’ death by overworking. Although salary and job security are commonly perceived as the most important concerns among all employees, the demand of a work/life balance is just as important as (if not more important than) those two concerns in today’s workplace settings (Nelson, 2013). Work-life balance has been a much debated conversation in today’s business world. As people become more connected to each other through the use of technology, social media and mobile devices, it is increasingly difficult for many people to separate work from their personal lives (Scotto, 2016). An individual’s work/life balance are most commonly disrupted by working long hours, working on the weekends, and bringing work home (Leger-Hornby & Bleed, 2006). Studies show that information technology (IT) workers have more difficulty with work/life balance than their non-IT counterparts do (CIO Online Magazine, 2001). For individuals who work in the sports industries, excessive long hours of work would seem to be the commonality. When people enjoy holidays or leisure time to attend the events/games, the sports industry employees are working hard to serve their customers. Nevertheless, sports administrators or personnel still work to prepare for the upcoming events during the weekdays. So, they can easily work as much as 50-60 hours weekly. This unhealthy pattern also applies to the unpaid interns as well.

Since 1941, employers in America have learned to value their employees as individuals rather than just as workers. The attitude of seeing man as a “working machine” has gradually changed. Readers can refer to Table 1 to see how Corporate America supports their employees with different emphasis on the types of employee programs throughout the last few decades.

Table 1. Focus of Work/Life Balance in Various Decades

Numerous alarming facts and statistics have highlighted the importance of balancing one’s work life and impact on one’s family issues. Research in early 2000s clearly indicated family life problems affected employees’ work output and attitude (Biddle, 2000). In 1992, the United States and South Africa were the last two remaining industrialized countries without a policy of paid leave for infant and childcare (Shellenbarger, 2000). According to the data of National Association of Female Executives from 1969-1998 (a survey of 800 respondents), women who are married with children under the age of three were the fastest growing segment of the workforce. These working mothers certainly need a lot of support to be able to juggle their role as a worker and a mother. Since 1999, family issues have edged personal illness as the No. 1 reason for absence at work (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 1999). It may be beneficial for small business employers to introduce job sharing or flexible schedules to combat unscheduled absenteeism caused by last minute call-ins due to family issues.

The belief that one is not successful unless keeping oneself busy has created an unhealthy workforce. Heavy workload and job responsibility lead to high levels of psychological stress (Queensland Government, 2013). In addition to the potential risk of overwork death, the ratio of population with depression and anxiety from 1998 to 2009 increased from to 1.3% vs. 5.3%, respectively. About 33% of 20-year-old and above population show symptoms such as lack of patience, agitation, short temper and concentration, and inadequate sleep. Excessive work and pressure caused individuals to lose sleep or become addicted to checking cell phones and other electronic devices regarding work. Young professionals often struggle with the dilemma of whether “unplugging” or “ignoring the boss’ call” is the right thing to do (Scotto, 2016). It was estimated that 55% of Americans didn’t use all their paid vacation time (Wallman, 2020). For this reason, the French government has attempted to force employees to power down after certain hours (Levit, 2017). A study at the University of Michigan of 20 countries found 37% of British and 31% of American adults expressed that they don’t get enough sleep (Time, 2016). According to the authors’ own data, the average American adult workers will likely have one half hour less resting time less than college students per day.

Photo 1 Work Life Balance [1]

It was noted that Information Technology (IT) workers have more difficulty with work/life balance than their non-IT counterparts (Leger-Hornby & Bleed, 2006). People may not realize that in the medical profession full of brilliant and talented doctors, there is an extremely stressful working and abusive environment. The data showed 46% of interns (medical doctors) meet depression criteria at some point in their first year of residency. About 45% of physicians have symptoms of burnout. There are serious issues, such as shortage of workers (doctors), sleep deprivation, and bullying culture associated with the developing process of a good doctor.

On average, both male and female Americans go to bed around 10:50 pm or later (Time, 2016). From 2013 to 2016, the average working American had increased their weekly average work time about 1.8 hours (Time, 2013 & 2016). In general, workers in the Middle East and Far East countries are more likely to work longer hours more than the Americans do. However, the United States is one of the leaders among the Western countries having long weekly average work hours (see Table 2).

Table 2. Average Work Hours per Week (from Time 2013)

The quality of life and living patterns are important elements that impact the psychosocial wellbeing of an individual. In this day and age, people tend to be controlled by their mobile devices and technological gadgets. Many individuals cling to these devices due to their work needs.  According to a report from Time Magazine (Edwards, 2018), a person spends about an average of five hours on his/her phones every day. Another report shows that a typical American adult would spend around 3.5 hours on their cell phone device each day to keep up with emails, texts, social media updates, and news (Wallman, 2020). Nearly 89% of people check their phones within an hour of waking up. Forty-five percent of children in the U.S. between the ages of 10-12 have their own smartphone with a service plan. We check our phones about 47 times a day or about once every 19 minutes. Although the concept of “Time Well Spent” movement has risen to alert people about using our limited time wisely, this teaching alone does not make people avoid the feeling of being time-poor easily (Wallman, 2020)

The Need for Work/Life Programs

Business leaders must recognize the importance of implementing work/life programs to increase the employees’ satisfaction and sense of security and overall competitiveness of their companies. Corporate America has made a commitment to work/life balance. To build quality work/life programs, it is vital to obtain employees’ expectations and feedback and tie these programs back to the organizations’ strategic direction and goals. Based on past surveys from many business employees and engineers, several important services or benefits are considered as top priorities to satisfy employees from a work/life perspective. These important benefits are: offering dependent care spending accounts, offering flexible work time or compressed work schedules, offering opportunities for professional growth (education as well), offering various types of insurances, offering technical and mobile device support, and offering dependent care (Nelson, 2013). Additional needs may cover onsite personal services or employee assistance programs and maintaining an ethical organizational working environment (Nelson, 2013).

Ways to Achieve Work/Life Programs

Believe it or not!! If one can figure out the meaning of life, it isn’t difficult to achieve work/life balance at all (Liu, 2022). Sawyer (2001) suggested the necessary key steps to build a successful case for work/life programs. These steps include composing added values, describing program costs, reviewing program savings, and measuring different types of values. Ultimately, these aforementioned steps are prepared to communicate to the top management team about the argument for Return on Investment (ROI). It is not merely enough for the advocates to express the needs and wants of the employees. They need to show the actual benefits that they may bring in by the implementation of work/life programs. And finally, the presentation for selling to the top management and strategies for carrying out the programs are concluded. The authors will highlight these steps with summative descriptions in the following paragraphs.

(1) Added values: An inclusive list of positive added values of work/life programs may include: reduced turnover, reduced employee training costs, improvement in recruitment and retention, improved productivity, and lower recruiting costs.

(2) Describing program costs: It is important to calculate both the start-up and ongoing costs to maintain the work/life programs. Categories of those costs may include staffing costs, research costs for establishing benchmarks, consultant fees, equipment purchases, employee reimbursement, promotional (marketing) costs, and seminar attendance (training costs).

(3) Review program savings: This could be the most difficult part among all of the steps, because many of the benefits of work/life programs are intangible and difficult to estimate. A good suggestion to accomplish this step is to examine and review many available benchmarking studies. Particularly focus on statistics about improvement in workers’ attitudes, employee satisfaction, turnover and retention rate, and decrease of absenteeism.

(4) Measuring values: This step encourages the organization to collect information on existing popular practices and programs established by other influential organizations or competitors. In addition, there are some alternative figures and data available to show the harmful effect of not having the work/life programs. For example, in 2013 alone, employees in the United State didn’t utilize nearly 169 million days of paid time off (totaling $52.4 billion in benefits saved for the employers). However, the employers eventually lost up to $300 billion annually due to employee stress from their work pressure (Scotto, 2016).

(5) Demonstration of ROI calculation: Table 3 lists a simple example illustrating how to win an argument based on Return on Investment. The purpose of the ROI calculation is to prove that the savings (or benefits) outweighs the costs. In real industrial settings, obtaining a rate of ROI within 12-20% will be extremely optimal and unusual. (This example is just a demonstration.)

Table 3. An Example of ROI Calculation within a 5-year Period

If the benefits of the work/life program can be as promising as the example has shown, then the challenge is how to sell the program to senior managers. Here are a few guidelines that will work well to sell the strengths of the program. First of all, try to include information such as case studies and recent statistics, survey results, pros and cons of the program, and policies and advertising methods in the presentation. Presenters must thoroughly understand both the information and the audience well. This means presenters must choose the most appropriate and influential candidates to address the presentation. They also need to know what type of information that top management would prefer to listen to or are capable of understanding it. Choose the appropriate format with both visual and audio aids to sell the pitch. Presenters should clearly focus on the message and be anxious and excited, but ready on the day of the presentation.

When the organization is getting ready to implement the work/life programs, there are a few foci that must be carefully examined by the planning team. The team has the responsibility to assess the current corporate culture, promote creativity and education, and inform others about the programs. They also need to identify the available resources to execute the programs. Top management teams must allow a committee to be formed. This committee should be served by individuals with enthusiasm and knowledge about the work/life program. The committee members will develop a long-term plan and network with other organizations or individuals to carry out the campaigns and programs. The creation and benefits of the program should be advertised daily to inspire the enrollment of individuals. And finally, strategies and methods must be developed for evaluating, and modifying the programs. The work/life program should be introduced as part of the employee service programs in the hiring process and orientation. In addition, promoting programs should not only be advertised to the employees, but also to the community in order to attract public support and build a good organizational image.

Video Clip: Work-Life Balance: The Role of Managers (Video courtesy of Katie Rice)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uw71TzlNeWA

 Tips for Maintaining Good Personal Work-Life Balance

Balancing the demands of a busy lifestyle is not an easy task to do. However, scholars have offered many good tips to help workers manage their lifestyle. Here are a few ideas to help you strike a good work-life balance (Queensland Government, 2013).

• Regularly review and assess the priorities;
• Set goals around things that are valued highly;
• Manage your time effectively;
• Create a boundary between work time and personal/family time;
• Maintain a healthy lifestyle and have a positive attitude;
• Avoid stress, mental exhaustion and burnout; and
• Foster a good support system and enjoy the work.

Helping employees create and enjoy great experiences are more likely than material goods to deliver happiness. It is important to sell the idea, “it is time for happiness” to the employees.

Individuals who describe themselves workaholics often experience high level of the stress, anxiety, and demands from their job. In athletic coaching, many coaches suffer burnout during their career. Burnout is a complex physical, mental, and emotional response that expresses emotional exhaustion and an increasingly negative attitude toward work (and perhaps life) (Hutman et al., n.d.). A burnout individual is not only ineffective in his/her job, but has a very negative effect on colleagues. This is a serious risk that may trigger depression and threaten one’s social relationships and health. It is vital for coaches who experience job burnout to seek help and resources from the college and university health centers or counseling centers (Leger-Hornby & Bleed, 2006). The following link contains great information for understanding and preventing burnout http://coping.us/toolsforpersonalgrowth/preventingburnout.html.

Conclusions

With strong evidence to show the benefits of work/life programs, leaders and employers will be more convinced to integrate work/life goals into the recruitment and retention process. The authors sincerely hope the implementation of work/life programs will become a corporate culture. Leaders and top management can have great influence in establishing a corporate culture that fosters work/life balance. Individuals in leadership roles must carefully manage the job expectations and requirements, so those requirements are realistic, and expectations can be met without overburdening the workers. More importantly, leaders must be a good role model by maintaining a balanced life style. They cannot be a negative influence by being a workaholic and constantly harassing employees with mobile devices. Helping employees achieve work/life balance is in the best interests of the organization and employees. Finally, the authors would like to remind the employees that they are in control of the balance of when, how and where they work. They must carefully evaluate what are the important things in their life and manage to live a healthy and happy life.

Brainstorming Activities

(1) Does social media really control your life?? Please consider the problems and issues that are addressed in the readings and record the pattern of use of your cellphone devices. How often and how long do you use them?

Answer: Here is an useful article: Hollingshead, G. (2018). Social media: The positives outweigh the negatives.  https://116.web.csit.jccc.edu/2018/11/29/social-media-the-positives-outweigh-the-negatives/

(2) What can Athletic Directors do to promote work/life balance among intercollegiate athletic coaches?

Suggested Answers:

Belzer, J. (2016, January 26). How do athletic directors and university presidents manage to get along? https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonbelzer/2016/01/26/how-do-athletic-directors-and-university-presidents-manage-to-get-along/?sh=4dd1523b3fbb

• – Increase staff numbers: administrative asst.
• – Sport psychologists
• – Plan ahead accordingly
• – Phone plan for families
• – Limited coaching hours
• – Limited their public appearances

Learn about how health and family issues impacted the life of a successful collegiate football coach: The story of Urban Meyer.

Thamel, P. (2009, December 26). Meyer says he’s quitting as coach of Florida. New York Times.  https://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/27/sports/ncaafootball/27florida.html

Quiz Questions

Q1. Emphasis on employee health and well-being was the focus of the:

1. 1950s

1. 1. 1990s
   2. 1960s
   3. 1970s

Q2. Since 1999, family issues have edged out personal illness as the leading reason why employees call in sick. True/False

Q3. The value-added benefits of a work/life program may include:

1. 1. improved productivity
   2. improved morale
   3. increase of the number of sick leave
   4. All of the above
   5. A and B

Q4. Estimating program savings created by life/work programs is easy, because most of the benefits are intangible. True/False

Q5. Presentation for selling a work/life program should include:

1. 1. Case studies and recent statistics
   2. Pros and cons of the programs
   3. Advertising methods
   4. All of the above

Image Citation

[1] Image courtesy by Creative Commons 3 – CC BY-SA 3.0, under public domain.

References

Abend, L. (2021, April, 12-19). T.G.I. Thursday? Span’s trial of a four-day workweek could make the idea go mainstream. Time, 197(13-4), 78-81.

CIO Online Magazine (2001, September, 17). IT careers and work life balance.  http://www2.cio.com/research/surveyreport.cfm?id=18  [archive link: https://web.archive.org/web/20070303211009/http://www2.cio.com/research/surveyreport.cfm?id=18]

Eadicicco, L. (2018). Technology: Savage questions? The HQ trivia app is a massive success.        Time, 191(11), 50-53.

Editors (2014). What can the interscholastic athletic directors do to promote work-life balance      among sport coaches? JOPERD, 85(1), 52-53.

Edwards, H.S. (2018). The masters of mind control. Time, 191(15), 30-37.

Ginzler, A. (2022, January/February). I tried working 7.6 hours a day. It wasn’t easy. Outside Magazine, 44.

Hutman, S. et al. (n.d.). Burnout: Signs, symptoms, and prevention. http://www.helpguide.org/mental/burnout_signs_symptoms.htm#what

Kluger, J. (2020. August 17-24). How the pandemic is changing the way we sleep. Time, 196(7-8), 87.

Leger-Hornby, T., & Bleed, R. (2006). Chapter 7: Work and life: Achieving a reasonable balance.  https://www.educause.edu/research-and-publications/books/cultivating-careers-professional-development-campus-it/chapter-7-work-and-life-achieving-reasonab

Levit, A. (2017). France is forcing its employees to power down. Will it work? https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/france-forcing-its-employees-power-down-work-alexandra-levit?midToken=AQFvzeMLA3mrwg&fromEmail=fromEmail

Lipman, J. (2021, June 7). The great reopening. Time, 197(21-2), 56-59.

Nelson, R. (2013). Work/Life balance key to job satisfaction. Evaluation Engineering. https://www.evaluationengineering.com/work-life-balance-key-to-job-      satisfaction.php

Liu, G. (2022, January/February). It’s easy to find balance. Outside Magazine, 40-42.

Oaklander, M. (2015). Life/Support. Time 186, (9, 10), 42-51.

Petersen, A. H. (2021, August 2 & 9). The empathy trap. Time, 198(5-6), 42-46.

Queensland Government (2013). Work/Life balance and stress management.   www.qld.gov.au/health/mental-health/balance/lifestyle

Rellosa, J. (2022, January/February). Lived like a Finn. Outside Magazine, 44.

Responsible Sports (2012). When sport and family collide. http://www.responsiblesports.com/youth_sports_advice/subscribe_to_fundamentals/fundamentals_feature_volume_iv_november_2012.aspx?utm_source=h5m&utm_medium=e&utm_campaign=fund

Sawyer, T. H. (2001). Employee services management: A key component of human resource            management. Champaign, IL: Sagamore.

Scotto, K. (2016). The importance of work-Life balance and health.              http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kristine-scotto/the-importance-of-            worklif_b_10128144.html

Semuels, A. (2020, April 6-13). Does remote work actually work? Time, 195(12-13), 42-47.

Wallman, J. (2020, February 10). The view: Do you have enough time? Time, 195(5), 13-14.