Work Life Balance for Today

by Nancy Ramsey for See Magazine
Winter, 2006

In the towering lobby of London's Heathrow Airport, five silver acrobats perch precariously on their slender trapezes in practiced balance, turning gently as the hurrying travelers below stir the air around them. Forever frozen in balance, artist Tamara Capellaro's work reminds us of how out of balance our own lives and systems can become as we twitch to the 24/7 rhythms of today's global, integrated work world.

Historic changes over the last half century have created new realities that challenge us daily, transforming our work and our lives. Things we knew and took for granted as children seem like obsolete antiquities, as everything from technology to communications, manufacturing, transportation, medicine and demography evolves at disconcerting speed.

Most Millennial (according to demographer William Strauss, who coined the term, Millennial are the generation born after 1982) have never heard a telephone actually ring, answering instead the digital sounds they program into their phones. The future guarantees more change, and we will cope with the inevitable speed bumps along the way. Think of our early 21st-century life as an exciting magic carpet ride only we don't know who is driving.  It is an uncomfortable reality for most of us.  We want to know who is driving.  We want some control over our speeding, changing lives.

I call our desire for this control the pursuit of work / life balance. Balance is the steady-state goal we aspire to, a state of mind and being that steadies us in a world of always tilting demands. But a steady state in an ever-changing world is impossible. The real-life trapeze artist is in balance but a moment, long enough to achieve that immediate goal. The moment passes and a new movement begins.

What we really seek is the ability to effectively manage our personal life and work, says Carol Rose, a well-known writer in the work-life field. She has a favorite mantra that makes practical sense. "When work is effective, life benefits. When life works, work benefits." Balance, she says, is "the B word." She prefers "alignment," which allows managers and employees to work toward symmetry between work and life with complementary parts. Mary Catherine Bateson, in Composing a Life, put it this way: "...our lives not only take new directions; they are subject to repeated redirection..." Balance and symmetry are elusive goals.

A burgeoning list of programs from HR departments will not reconcile the demands of both work and life. It takes a genuine corporate recognition of employee importance and a commitment to work with them to "make work work." While a wide range of programs is indeed critical to meet the varied demands of daily life, these are not perks. They are what work-life experts call "strategic business tools to recruit and retain" the best possible workforce. Once considered expendable and replaceable in a manufacturing economy, people are the premier value in the Knowledge Age.

Fortune magazine's 2004 and 2005 special issues on work-life point out that employees have an equal responsibility. Their share of this equation is to build "long and short term plans that suit their changing needs and demands." This may be new in their lives. But in setting these clear goals and priorities, they can work with managers to use the available programs wisely. Help in this serious process is increasingly available through corporate HR offices and off-site courses like those offered at Boston College Carroll School of Management.

A mutual commitment is critical to success. Employees and management need to work together to build opportunities and choices that matter to both. It may mean overcoming the skepticism that some executives, whose lives are very different from those of many employees, have about the value of W-L programs. Early adopters of these programs have quantifiable evidence of their successes. Eager to keep the women who needed flex time to help them deal with the demands of a family with young children, KPMG reports that two-thirds of those valuable employees would have left the company without a flexible work schedule option. Replacing them would have meant an estimated recruitment and training cost averaging $57,000 per middle manager.

Why all this talk of work-life balance? What ever happened to that familiar formula, "You work, I pay you, and you go home. End of story." As long ago as 1989, Bateson claimed that, especially for women, "the materials and skills from which a life is composed are no longer clear. It is no longer possible to follow the paths of previous generations." Unraveling the complex mix of past and current changes only gives us insights into an answer. It gives clues to where we lost balance.

Technology stands first in line as change agent. In Being Digital, Nicholas Negroponte, founder of MIT's Media Lab, describes technology simply as the transition from a world of atoms to a world of digits. That transformation brought us into the Information Age and the Knowledge Economy. Its companion developments in communications and transportation have spawned increased productivity, transforming manufacturing and markets worldwide into a truly globalized world of work.

At work and at home, life is faster and more complex. This cocktail of moving parts brings work home and home to work on the infamous 24/7/365 time line. The days of 9-5 work with a clear separation of work and life roles are over. Only 20 percent of today's workforce is the traditional family of dad at work and mom at home to manage children and family responsibilities. Instead, 80 percent of American families have no one at home full time. This creates what experts call "the dual focus worker," who outnumbers by three to one the "traditional" model. It means a modern day workforce of people both working and managing personal issues every day. The support and company programs that help them with pressing family matters also allows them to focus fully when work dominates their agenda. A person distracted with concerns over a dying parent or sick child is the one most likely to make a bad decision or expensive error.

Technology drives where, how, and by whom work is done. Restructuring of production and companies has changed the formal and informal contractual agreements between employees and employers. Staggering layoffs continue to traumatize families and communities as businesses struggle to make the most of the economic advantages technology allows. Old jobs move off shore and new jobs are created.

Globalization has also brought us face to face in virtual and genuine reality with a mix of customers, co-workers, friends, and relatives; a kaleidoscope of race, ethnic roots, nationality, religion, and age make life a swirl of challenge and opportunity. It is true. Whole new universes are opening before us. Technology makes possible discoveries into the very nature and creation of the universe. Genetic research and the Human Genome Project, only a dream 20 years ago, now yield new treatments and cures for human afflictions. Communication technology puts the horrors of war and the beauty of birth before us in living color every day. We are assaulted and impressed as every technology demands a next step, the next discovery. Every breakthrough provides a new opportunity for entrepreneurs and corporate giants. Technology provides flexibility and demands creativity. And it creates an open-ended playing field that challenges us and our human limits.

Connection and communications have created a world of people who have never met, but who work, play, and invent new products together daily. Linux-based software, Wikipedia, Face Book, and Craig's List have become a part of culture and business.  They create connections across cultural and corporate boarders as individuals co-operate and interact outside of formal structures. Basic staples of business law such as copyright are challenged by technology's expansions in unregulated and illegal pursuits. Change is everywhere at a pace that seems unsustainable. Management systems and managers can barely keep up.

Business schools and business managers are scrambling to deal with the complexity technology introduces to basic operations and business models. Global tracking, on-time delivery, service, and customer satisfaction are but simple names we give to incredibly complex operations. Every business school and non-profit group has established weekly or monthly online publications with the latest "help" tools or theoretical papers with the latest techniques.

Wall Street expectations and other measurements mix to become  "the numbers" that haunt publicly held companies with goals that may or may not make sense for their own strategic plans. The reality of these bottom-line, quarterly pressures puts unsustainable stress on management and employees. "Productivity gains" often mean fewer people working longer and harder.

The Sloan Work and Family Research Network highlights a study by the Families and Work Institute noting that over the past 25 years, the combined weekly work hours of all couples has increased from 70 to 82 hours, while for dual-earner couples with children under 18, hours have increased from 81 to 91.

This pursuit of successful numbers can skew reasonable expectations  and, in some cases, provoke violations of the law, as we've seen in recent corporate showcase prosecutions. Giving people the chance and the means to compose their own work / life balance requires constant advocacy. As one HR executive in a major technology firm put it, "We say the right thing in public, and we win Best Practices Awards, but when the door closes on the CEO's office, I know that my work-life and diversity programs are not among his top 10 considerations."

An over-dependence on "numbers" creates an enormous and incongruous disconnect.  People, not numbers, make the financial difference to companies. Jeanne Di Francisco of ProOrbis puts it this way: "The company's Human Capital is a business asset that is the sum total of the skills, knowledge, talent, and enthusiasm that people invest in the work of an organization."

Former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich uses the term "relational capital, "those relationships employees have with customers and related associates."  Retaining this kind of capital must be at the heart of all corporate measurements.  People and their ingenuity, creativity, skills, and commitment keep a company moving and business profitable. "They have in their minds the oil that lubricates the work processes, but you don't get what is in there unless they want to give it to you," says Dr. Sandra Burud of Claremont College. Those minds and the people that go with them determine success in the Information Age and the Knowledge Economy.

Henry Ford once complained, "I keep hiring workers and I keep getting people." That description of angst from the manufacturing era is a far cry from the definition Dan Phelan at Glaxo-SmithKline uses today to express how important people are to business. Echoing Max De Pree's conclusion in his classic on leadership and management, Leadership Is an Art, Phelan says, "Employees are volunteers and we have to convince them every day that this is the best place for them to work."

Clarity precedes balance.  Being clear about personal priorities and making those priorities clear to teams and managers sets a foundation for successfully managing the demands that life and work create for us each day. Gretchen Addi of IDEO says, "My team knows that I have a 'hard stop' at five o'clock. I'm out the door. It helps us focus but whether we are done or not, I leave."  Making the personal adjustments to refuse to feel guilty about putting your foot down when it comes to time is an acquired skill, she explains. But it is essential in managing the multi-generational, fast-moving demands of family life today.

Corporate leaders who genuinely understand the central part our families play in our lives are not only inspiring, they are successful. Rich Sheridan, a founder of Menlo Innovations, a software firm in Ann Arbor, Michigan, limits employees to a 40-hour work week. "We think having a life outside work actually makes people more creative and productive."

Eileen Fisher, a top-selling fashion designer and CEO, says, "We ask about balance in reviews. It is part of Wellness for us. We ask, 'Are you taking care of yourself?' How? I'm thinking about forbidding work on weekends and nights after 6 p.m. Often you don't do a better job if you are always working or tired. I ask people to keep their leaders informed and have leaders be aware if someone in the group is working too much on a project. Sometimes we have to say, 'O.K. you have to take next Friday off.' People must know that they are supported in having private time. Wellness really is an all-important part of our message. I take personal responsibility for making that balance. A whole person has to feel that they do more than good work."   She goes on to point out that people expect and demand a life—family, friends, and outside interests from sports to the arts.

Here's the balance.  Young workers today expect to enjoy work and look for opportunities to be effective and successful. They expect to be responsible for their future and want rewarding work that uses their talents and skills. If they aren't satisfied with a job or the support that makes maintaining a private/family life possible, they depart quickly.

Even a contented member of these generations changes jobs on the average of every three or four years. They are activists and take initiative. Seventy-one percent of qualified voters in this group voted in the 2000 presidential election, compared to fewer than half among Americans in general.  They have grown up multitasking and are comfortable with technology and travel. They understand the demands of longer hours; they acknowledge that periods of extreme work are sometimes necessary. In return they expect the respect and flexibility that allows them to exercise their judgment in making use of creative work-life programs. Aware of ever increasing demands on what they know, they consider training and career advancement plans and continuing education fair compensation from employers.

Their life cycle advance into family and child-bearing years is creating significant interruptions to what have been successful teams of young achievers who work, travel, and party and live together. Companies that are dependent on their creativity, momentum, and 24/7 participation are seriously reconsidering how to continue demanding operational modes, while acting on their professed respect for employee needs. Interviews at one leading edge design company yielded comments like this: "When we all worked and partied together it was great, but now I want to get home to my husband and baby."  A Millenial newlywed commented, "I just got married. I don't want to hear that she is coming home at 9 p.m. again!"

The ongoing search for equilibrium reigns. The 2003 Spherion Emergent Workforce study found that 86 percent of workers agree that work fulfillment and balance is a top career priority. Looking at it from the down side, the study found that one-third of U.S. workers are not satisfied with their ability to maintain balance between work and personal life. And 42 percent are not satisfied with the work / life balance programs offered by their employees. We need to think deeply about people, how we work and live, how we meet the demands of an ever-expanding, demanding, technology-driven global economy. It is a challenge for each of us.

Many in post Baby Boom generations had working—not hovering—parents, and they, themselves are hard workers. They struggle to meet college and home loans, and increasing numbers of them are working second jobs. Households where both parents work are the norm, not the exception, today. Over 60 percent of women with children younger than six are employed, and mothers with preschool children are the fastest-growing segment of the workforce. As our nation ages, 40 percent of employees are caring for elders and also have the primary responsibility for children in the home.

For all generations the question of balance can be summed up in a few  personal questions:  What do I need to get my work done—including what do I want my life to be like—and how can my team and my manager affirm my choices?  On-site or off, full time or part time—we all need what Carol Rose calls "rigidity about flexibility." Like the acrobats in Heathrow, we need structure and freedom. We need the stability and support of work and family structures, but we desire the freedom to express in infinite ways the meanings we find in life.