Work Life Balance of Women Employees

Introduction:

Times have changed. From the time the husband earned, and the wife stayed at home. To the time now when the husband earns and the wife earns too. But the wife still cooks and washes and runs the house. So, how does she balance her work with life at home?

Although, over the years women in India have struggled to establish an identity & create a mark in the social as well as in the organizational platforms, but with educational institutions training more and more women to enter professional careers, have drastically changed the scenario.

Infact, between 1991 and 2001 female employment in India on the whole, have increased by 3.6% per annum. Within the professional world, which reflects India's small but growing middle class more than the country as a whole, the phenomenon of Indian women "breaking through the glass ceiling" is perhaps more muted. Even, despite legal provisions made by acts like those of the Equal Remuneration Act of 1976 (which promulgates equal payment for equal work, regardless of gender & prohibits gender discrimination in hiring practices), the so-called "glass ceiling" is perhaps still very prevalent within organizations.

This article would highlight the various values, attitudes & beliefs of women regarding job anxiety in their formal work organizations & particularly balancing their work & personal life. Work Life Balance (WLB) is not a new concept.

Let's first define what work-life balance is not. Work-Life Balance does not mean an equal balance. Trying to schedule an equal number of hours for each of your various work and personal activities is usually unrewarding and unrealistic. Life is and should be more fluid than that. Your best individual work-life balance will vary over time, often on a daily basis. The right balance for you today will probably be different for you tomorrow. The right balances for you when you are single will be different when you marry, or if you have children; when you start a new career versus when you are nearing retirement. There is no perfect, one-size fits all, balance you should be striving for. The best work- life balance is different for each of us because we all have different priorities and different lives. However, at the core of an effective work-life balance definition are two key everyday concepts that are relevant to each of us. They are daily Achievement and Enjoyment, ideas almost deceptive in their simplicity. Engraining a fuller meaning of these two concepts takes us most of the way to defining a positive Work-Life Balance.

The change in the pattern of work and the concept of the workplace after the industrial revolution in the second half of the 18th century gave a new dimension to the concept of WLB. As time progressed, nuclear families increased. A later change was the fading away of the "ideal home" in which the earning member's spouse took care of the home.

With improved education and employment opportunities today, most homes are ones in which both parents work, because of necessity and the desire to augment incomes.

The need to create congenial conditions in which employees can balance work with their personal needs and desires became a factor that companies had to take note of both to retain them as well as to improve productivity. It was a compulsion that they couldn't afford to ignore. Having realized that, companies started introducing schemes to attract and retain employees and improve their productivity.

Why Work Life Balance is Important to Women? Today's career women are continually challenged by the demands of full-time work and when the day is done at the office, they carry more of the responsibilities and commitments to home. The majority of women are working 40-45 hours per week and 53% are struggling to achieve work/life balance. Women reported that their lives were a juggling act that included multiple responsibilities at work, heavy meeting schedules, business trips, on top of managing the daily routine responsibilities of life and home. "Successfully achieving work/life balance will ultimately create a more satisfied workforce that contributes to productivity and success in the workplace." Employers can facilitate WLB with many schemes that can attract women employees and satisfy their needs.

Some of these are

* Facilities for child care * Financial planning services for employees who need them* Flexi-timings * Work sharing

* Part time employment * Leave plans - both paid and unpaid - to suit employee's needs* Subsidized food plans* Insurance plans * Counseling services for problems like managing work and the home* Rest rooms, food preparation services* Jobs with autonomy and flexibility * Realistic work loads * Review of work processes to see if the burden on employees can be lightened Maintaining dialogue with the employees and considering their suggestions on a continuous basis

Work-life balance

Can women be both sharers and careers Often, working women drop out of the work force when they are doing well, simply because they wanted to stay at home with their children, or care for an ageing parent. Or for both reasons. And then there are women who have children later in life because they want to work for reasons of personal satisfaction or for the money. So, can a woman have it all? The working woman should refuse to take on too much. She should adopt a sense of priorities.

If she has children, she should teach them to share responsibilities. But what about the husband? Has he changed at all anywhere in the world?

Surprisingly, a survey in the UK revealed that a majority of men want a 50/50 partnership with their wives both at work and home. They no longer see themselves as macho men. They want to spend more time with their children. Has the Indian man kept pace with the times? Can women achieve a work-life balance? The changing Equations of New Era The Changing Equations The Machine Age The Industrial Age The Networked Age Stress High Higher Highest Work- Life balance You went to work-life started only when you go home Not only are people working at work, but also at home 24-hour workdays split into compartments dedicated for 'life' Women and Work The men worked and women tended the house Both men and women worked, and women still tended the house Both men and women work and tend to the house.

Framework for successful Work-Life Balance in organizations

* Identify the key need or reason for introducing Work-Life Balance policies * Build the commitment to Work-Life Balance Policies into the organization ' s vision or value statement * Set up a Work-Life Balance Task Force Examine current practices in the organization

* Hold joint discussions with employees to evolve policies, while also identifying possible barriers * Communicate policies through handbooks, newsletters, Intranet and other forms of communication * Hold workshops to help Managers implement and manage policies * Begin with a few "quick win" policies

Monitor implementation and put feedback systems into place In India, there is a starting point in that organizations have recognized the need for and value of Work-Life Balance policies. An integral part of our lives is our profession. Just as there is responsibility and opportunity in life, our careers are also guided by opportunities and responsibilities. We must ensure that these two factors don't work at cross purposes. Quality of life is something we all covet, every profession affects life in general and every profession has a duty towards life.

Top 5 Strategies to Strike a Balance

* Budget your time both in and out of the office - Schedule your time efficiently at work. Put yourself on your calendar and take some time for you and your family / friends. Leave work on time at least three days per week - There are times when working late just can't be helped, but schedule your time to leave on time three days per week. * Control interruptions and distractions - Stay focused while in the office, and budget your time effectively. Try to schedule a block of time during the day without meetings when you can focus on your tasks with minimal interruptions. * Explore the availability of flex-time - Research flex-time options within your organization. If available, it may be a helpful solution.* Seize the weekend - Plan your time off as you plan your work week. * Schedule activities with family and friends, a weekend trip, or just something fun. Make your time away from work count!

Conclusion for working women, getting caught in the work/life balance trap will continue to be an ongoing challenge. Careful planning and personal effort is the advice from those who have found balance in both career and home life. As one respondent summarized, "Plan, prioritize and schedule as efficiently as possible... and don't be afraid of hard work!" Work-life balance is a person's control over the conditions in their workplace. It is accomplished when an individual feels dually satisfied about their personal life and their paid occupation. It mutually benefits the individual, business and society when a person ' s personal life is balanced with his or her own job. The work-life balance strategy offers a variety of means to reduce stress levels and increase job satisfaction in the employee while enhancing business benefits for the employer. In our increasingly hectic world, the work-life strategy seeks to find a balance between work and play. A sentence that brings the idea of work life balance to the point is: "Work to live. Don't live to work."

Strategies for Work Life Balance

Essential Tips for Busy Working Mothers

For many working mothers, the work life balance is one of life’s greatest challenges. While men often feel conflicted between workplace and fatherhood demands as well, women usually suffer from more than their fair share of the burden of balancing family and work life

Why? For one thing, society puts unrealistic expectations on women to be “perfect” mothers. In addition, there’s a huge double standard. Men don’t lose credibility among coworkers when they have children, but women do. Many women feel they have to work harder in the workplace to demonstrate their commitment. The result is that women feel the need to buckle down at their jobs at the same time as they are raising a young child.

So how does a woman balance work with family? There’s no easy answer to this question that impacts countless women, but here are some suggestions

Lose the guilt. It’s not like you’re going to a resort every day. You’re at work. As a career woman, you’re serving as a breadwinner for your family, and that’s an essential role.

Divide the workload fairly. Unless you are a single mom, take the time to negotiate responsibilities with your partner. Avoid conflict as much as possible by communicating with your partner about how to distribute the work fairly. Sit down when you’re not angry and negotiate a fair work distribution. Who’s going to do the grocery shopping and the laundry?. Who’s going to pick up your child at daycare?

Be in the moment at work or with family. This can be a difficult goal, especially if you work at home or are expected to bring work home from the office. But when you’re at home, do the best you can at just being a mom. At work, do the best you can at being committed to your job.

Communicate with your boss and your coworkers. Open a good line of communication with your boss to make sure you are fully aware of your job expectations and of any concerns about your work. At the same time, don’t be afraid to insist on reasonable accommodations. You may need to take sick days off for your child, and if your employers do not accept this without penalizing you, they are asking for a lawsuit. Communicate with them about things they may not know you need, like a private place to pump.

Look for smart ways to readjust your schedule. Can you telecommute a few days per week? Is a flex schedule or part time work possible?

Document anything “fishy” at work. Unfortunately, some workplaces treat women unfairly after they have children. This is sex discrimination. If anything like this happens to you, keep good records.

Put housework lower on your list of priorities. Your child could care less if your kitchen floor doesn’t sparkle. Besides, trying to keep your home spotless with a toddler running around will make you insane.

Find a good child care situation. This can be a challenge. However, you’ll feel much better at work if you know your child is in good hands.

Schedule in down time with your partner. You need to be more than parents once in a while. Treat yourself to a night out, or have a “date night” with take out food and a DVD.

Schedule in time for yourself. Busy working women need to recharge, so don’t feel the least bit guilty about taking time for yourself. Get out of the house with your girlfriends once in awhile. Indulge in a manicure, a hot fudge sundae, a margarita, or whatever makes you feel just a little bit naughty.

Working mothers and Stress

How the Modern Woman Juggles Work and Child-Rearing

An increasing number of women nowadays are faced with the task of juggling the roles of mother and employee. Whilst some studies report that working mothers experience high levels of stress as compared to unemployed mothers (Hochshild & Machung, 1989), others conclude that mothers who partake in paid employment benefit greatly for a number of different reasons (Barnett, Marshall & Sayer, 1992).

Research has focused on two competing theories. The first is the role enhancement theory, arguing that paid employment benefits women psychologically and socially through increased social interaction with fellow adults and increased self esteem that comes with financial independence and increased status. Other research has focused on the role overload theory, which argues that working mothers are faced with the demands and pressures of juggling multiple roles, leading to physical and emotional exhaustion and adversely affecting women’s health.

Hochschild (1989) found that women who work outside the home are faced with a second shift or additional working month of 24 hours per annum compared to working men with children. In a study by Baxter and Westin (1998), it was found that married women performed around 64% of the total amount of household work and that their contribution as compared to married men was particularly high when it came to work indoors (78%) and childcare (67%). Whilst on average men reported spending around 23 hours per week on childcare and 9 hours per week on housework, women reported 58 hours and 24 hours per week respectively.

Incompatibility between work and family life arises due to a number of factors. For instance, a mother who would like to progress in her career and obtain a promotion may feel she has to spend longer hours at work like her colleagues, but this isn’t possible as she has to leave work at a specific time to pick up the child from childcare or school/nursery. Performing multiple roles results in what may be termed ‘family-work spillover’. This occurs when the demands from family and home life impinge upon one’s ability to perform effectively in the workplace.

‘Work-family spillover’ may also occur due to having to juggle multiple roles, and may result when the pressures from work have an effect on one’s attitude and behaviour within the family. A study by Hoffman (1963) showed that work stress has an influence on the quality of the parent-child interaction in such a way that women who were not happy in their jobs used harsher methods of discipline and showed less affection with their children than those mothers who were

happy at work. On the contrary, the work-family spillover may be a positive one. A study by Reynolds,Callender and Edwards (2003) found that many mothers saw their work identity, work skills and their feelings about work as affecting their family relationships and home life in a positive way.

Research suggests that there are a number of factors which may interact, having a buffering effect or, alternatively, intensifying the stress felt by working mothers. For instance, whilst having a supportive partner and a well-paid job may act as a buffer to the effects of stress, being a single mother whilst also having a low-paid job can exacerbate the stress felt.

The decision to work or not to work outside the home whilst bringing up children is not an easy one. Many women, due to financial constraints, do not feel that they have a choice. However, regardless of which situation one is in, the modern family needs support from those closest to them, one’s place of work and the government, in terms of legislation. Such support would not only reduce the stress felt by mothers but benefit the family unit as a whole.

Challenges to Work-Life Balance

The uncertain economic environment has placed tremendous personal and workplace pressure on employees. Corporate Executive Board (CEB) analysis has shown a drastic decline in employee engagement since the start of the economic downturn, with the number of disengaged employees having risen dramatically from 1 in 10 in 2006 to 1 in 3 in the first quarter of 2009.

With financial instability fueling growing demands in many areas of employees' lives, it comes as no surprise that leveraging work-life balance practices provides employees with much needed flexibility and can greatly improve employee engagement overall. In this volatile economic climate, with downsizing and restructuring efforts having left employee morale low and workloads heavy, creating opportunities that can improve employee work-life balance can also have a tangible bottom-line impact for the business. Implementing effective work-life balance initiatives, however, can be challenging, and is directly linked to how well today's workforce development executives can identify and provide the right mix of benefits that are highly valued by the workforce.

The Business Case for Work-Life Balance

CEB research of more than 160,000 employees across industries and geographies has identified an interesting correlation between work-life balance and today's economic environment. While work-life balance has risen on employees' priority lists, their overall satisfaction with achieving it has fallen. CEB has been surveying employees throughout the downturn, and as of the second quarter of 2009, employees now rank work-life balance third only behind compensation and future career opportunities in terms of employer attributes that are of importance to them,

compared to a ranking of sixth in 2006. Yet, today, the study shows that only 30 percent of employees are satisfied with their work-life balance, as compared to 53 percent prior to the downturn.

These trends directly affect companies' bottom lines in the form of decreased employee productivity. CEB's research also shows that more than 30 percent of employees miss time from work in order to meet their work-life needs. CEB's study has shown that effective work-life balance offerings can bolster lagging employee effort levels. Specifically, surveys show that employees who feel they have a better work-life balance work 21 percent harder than those who don't, which can dramatically improve the performance of organizations in the current economic environment. In addition, employees who are satisfied with their work-life balance are 33 percent less likely to leave their current organization than their peers who are not satisfied. While turnover might not be at the top of the agenda for most organizations right now, improving work-life balance can also result in better retention when the economy rebounds.

The Common Challenges for Organizations

While it is clear that improving employee work-life balance has real value to organizations, defining and improving the work-life balance of employees can be challenging. To better understand how organizations can most effectively deliver and maximize ROI in this area, CEB analyzed the most essential elements of employee work-life balance and determined the key lies in creating the right work-life proposition (WLP). The WLP is a set of work-life practices that employees perceive as the value they gain through employment in the organization. This includes six categories: work time, work location, family, development, services and health.

 The challenge for employers, however, is that while an effective WLP demonstrates compelling benefits, most organizations struggle to successfully design and deliver a valuable one. The three most common root causes of why organizations fail are:

1. Few employees are aware of the work-life practices offered by their employer.2. Most work-life practices are not targeted at the most important drivers of work-life

balance.3. Even fewer employees actually participate in the work-life practices offered by their

employer.

While these challenges seem difficult to overcome, there is a series of cost-effective strategies that the most innovative organizations are using to effectively improve the work-life balance of their employees.

Solution 1: Give the Gift of Time

To better achieve a work-life balance for their employees, organizations have continuously modified the work-life practices they offer — yet few organizations have effectively prioritized the work-life practices that matter most to employees. According to CEB's 2008 report "Building and Managing a Global Work Life Balance," of the employees who are informed of their organization's work-life portfolio, less than 25 percent report that their organization offers the

work-life practices that align with their preferences. Companies must ensure that their initiatives target the activities that most improve the work-life balance of their employees. After examining more than 32 different strategies, CEB found that work-life balance practices related to time management, including flexible work schedules, appropriate workloads and predictable working hours, are much more important to improving employees' work-life balance than providing services such as telecommuting, gyms or on-site medical facilities.

It's important to keep in mind as well that the similarities in terms of work-life balance preferences for various employee segments are much greater than the differences. While a great deal of speculation has been made concerning generational differences in the workplace, CEB research has found that there is surprisingly little difference in work-life balance preferences when looking at employees by function, age, industry, parental status or even gender. There is, however, one notable segment for which work-life preferences do vary: high-potential employees (HIPOs), or those who companies have designated for future leadership positions. HIPOs place dramatically more value on telecommuting technology to stay connected with the work they do and crave the always-on access that this connectivity allows. Interestingly, they are willing to give up predictability within their day and lower the barriers between their professional life and work-life balance to get this connectivity.

Solution 2: It's Not What They Use, It's What They Know About

Even when employers offer work-life practices to employees that align with their preferences, many organizations find it difficult to raise awareness about available programs and therefore fail to realize returns on their work-life investments.

According to CEB's aforementioned 2008 report, less than one-third of employees are actually aware of the work-life practices offered by their organizations. Therefore, another key mandate for employers is to focus on effectively communicating their work-life offerings to employees. In fact, awareness of work-life balance practices is more important than the actual consumption of the practices themselves for improving employee engagement. Increased employee awareness of the WLPs offered by a company increases employees' perceptions of whether or not they have a good work-life balance by 35 percent.

CEB tested a variety of strategies that organizations use to improve the awareness of the work-life balance practices they offer. Surprisingly, the most important factor is not the communication from human resources or senior leadership, but when employees actually see their peers take advantage of the work-life practices being offered by the organization. Organizations can therefore drive higher awareness of the WLP by simply ensuring that the information about work-life practices is accessible and frequently communicated and uses real examples of employees using the services offered.

Solution 3: Use Peers to Drive Program Participation

When employees participate in the work-life balance programs offered by their organization, their perception of whether or not they have a good work-life balance can increase by 29 percent. However, less than 50 percent of employees report ever having used any of the work-life

practices offered by their organization. While building awareness of work-life balance practices is certainly critical, the lack of participation in programs creates a challenge for HR executives when CFOs start to question the logic of offering expensive perks and benefits to their employees. Much like building awareness, the most effective way to get employees participating in the work-life balance programs offered by their organization is for them to see their peers using the services.

While employers should certainly employ strategies to drive awareness and increase consumption in order to maximize returns on their work-life programs, they should know that efforts to drive awareness of practices also drive consumption. Although this will help organizations increase their overall effectiveness in delivering the WLP, executives should be aware that increased consumption will also raise the cost of work-life practices for the organization.

WLP: Not to Be Ignored

Most CFOs were quick to cut work-life balance programs at the start of the economic downturn because of a perceived lack of impact on the outcomes that inflect business performance. In reality, these programs can drive real business value when designed correctly. To effectively enhance employee work-life balance, the best organizations will build work-life practices around programs that create time flexibility for their employees, invest in building awareness of their programs and leverage their employee base to drive participation in programs, rather than trying to drive participation through HR.

Stress And Work Life Balance

This article should be helpful to all managers and professionals, but is aimed particularly at those whose work-life balance has been changed by the additional workload, and potential stress, of studying management development courses or professional qualifications, by distance learning or in the classroom, in order to develop their careers.

Technically stress is the adverse reaction an individual has to excessive pressure or other types of demand placed on them. In the workplace, the negative, damaging, effects of stress can arise at times when pressures are extreme, such as peak busy periods, but equally can be caused by continuous exposure to stressful conditions, such as being in an unsuitable job or being treated unfairly. Outside work, negative stress can be caused by major change events, such as a death in the family, but equally by continuous pressure of having a life constrained or dominated by the work situation.

Stress is personal in that stress affects individuals in different ways. In similar situations or conditions some people cope, even thrive, on the pressure, whilst others find it difficult to cope and suffer negative stress as a result. It is also personal in the sense that the amount of control that the individual has, over their workplace conditions, events, and work-life balance, will influence the amount of negative stress that they suffer from. Those individuals with greater control will tolerate and manage stress levels, or avoid them altogether, more successfully.

Work-life balance is, literally, balancing the demands, the amount of time and effort, given to work and the workplace, and that given to the individual’s domestic, personal, family, and social life. A vital factor in achieving an appropriate work-life balance is ensuring that the work element does not dominate, and-or that it is not causing damage to the individual through the effects of negative stress. It is most unusual to find people with a work-life balance that is dominated negatively by their life outside the workplace. It is almost always the workplace activity that dominates and often negatively. For professionals undertaking personal and career development activities, the positive activity of personal development must be actively managed in order to ensure that it does not have a negative effect on stress levels and cause damage to the individual’s work-life balance.

The increased awareness of the importance of managing stress and work-life balance effectively has given rise to approaches such as time management, managing stress, achieving work-life balance, managing personal development, and related approaches such as coaching and mentoring. The tools and techniques within these approaches are valuable in helping individuals to manage stress and work-life balance more successfully. All of these are worth exploring in more depth. However, here we will focus on simple, well established actions that any individual can take themselves.

There are some well established, simple to implement, approaches that will help to reduce the effects of negative stress and help to maintain an appropriate work-life balance. These include: Recognizing the symptoms that will alert you to the fact that you may be under stress. Commonly experienced symptoms are: Poor health - headaches, upset stomach, sleep problems, change in appetite, tense muscles, indigestion, exhaustion, stomach, intestinal and skin problems, and heart attacks (extreme but not uncommon in severe cases); Personal behavior - constantly worrying, irritated, feeling depressed, unable to cope and make decisions, being less creative, excessive smoking, excessive use of alcohol, not sleeping; Unsatisfactory work situation - low job satisfaction, poor relationships with colleagues, focusing on unproductive tasks, deadlines missed, performance level falling, opportunities missed, poor appraisal outcomes, feeling de-motivated; Personal life –stopping social activities, being irritated and argumentative with family and friends, personal relationships deteriorating.

Many of these symptoms can be experienced in normal life, but become symptoms of stress when several are experienced at the same time, or when there is no obvious cause, or when one or more symptom becomes overwhelming. We need to remember, however, that whilst the symptoms often are more visible, and potentially damaging, in the workplace, they are not necessarily caused by workplace pressures. Many are, but not all and not always.

Identifying the sources in the workplace: As individuals working in a business world that is continuously changing at an ever-increasing pace, we need to be adaptable and flexible. In order to avoid negative stress we need to be aware of, prepared for, and able to manage, the impact of: time pressures; demanding deadlines; increasing complex relationships with others; peaks and troughs of too much or too little work; multiple, overlapping business or work changes; threats of redundancy or unwanted job change; pressure from senior managers; unfair or discriminatory actions of management; travel pressures; increases in performance expectations; more visible

scrutiny through technology and surveillance; requirements to undertake continuous personal professional development activities.

Identifying the sources in life outside work: Outside the workplace there are regularly occurring events and pressures that are a normal part of our lives, but which can be either a source of stress, or satisfaction, or both. These include: death of friend or family member; a relationship breakdown leading to separation or divorce; personal or family member injury; moving house; taking on large financial commitments such as for a mortgage; holiday periods where personal relationships are refreshed and renewed, or put under intense pressure; giving up a habit such as smoking; the birth of a child; getting married; and so on.

Knowing what your natural response will be: Individuals adapt and adjust to external pressures in different ways, depending on their personality type. The range of types is very wide, but two broad bands of personality type have been identified. Type "A" people are described as competitive, aggressive or hasty, whilst Type "B" people behave in a passive, non-competitive, slow to react way. Type "A" people tend to pass on stress to others, Type "B" tend to internalise the effects of stress. Whilst these are established, proven categories that most people fall into, other factors, such as age, gender, health, financial situation and access to support will strongly influence the response to causes of stress, regardless of personality traits. Knowing your personality type can be helpful, but can only play a small part in managing stress successfully.

Identifying strategies and actions that will help you to cope: As we have seen, individuals react differently to stress, so each of us will need to adopt different coping strategies. The following are well established, proven actions and strategies for managing stress and achieving work-life balance: be aware of your own weakness and strengths; understanding and accepting that certain things cannot be avoided or changed; taking action to reduce or remove the pressure; breaking down problems into smaller parts and setting targets to tackle each part in sequence; implementing personal time management techniques; replacing negative relationships with positive, supportive relationships; adopting a healthy living style; develop outside work interests, such as hobby, educational, social or sporting activity; undertaking positive professional career development activity; seeking advice and support from others, including professionals if appropriate; accepting that managing stress and work-life balance is a permanent continuous activity.

Corporate support mechanisms: Some organizations have recognized that stress and work-life balance are issues that need to be supported by corporate action. Individuals in these organizations should, where appropriate, take advantage of support mechanisms such as: Flexible working hours – allowing employees to organise working hours to accommodate important aspects of their home lives; Self managed teams – where teams work out their own hours, responding to each others’ needs; Using a buddy system – pairing with a colleague to provide cover for each other, enabling each to take time off when necessary, knowing that their buddy will take over their duties and responsibilities; Flexible locations – working from different locations, or from home, either regularly or occasionally, to help with family responsibilities and reduce or eliminate commuting time; Special leave availability – such as paid or unpaid leave, to give time to cope with personal crises and emergencies, without using formal holiday allowance; Career breaks –for study or research sabbaticals, travel, family commitments, or voluntary work;

Health programmes - offer counsellings and advice, for a range of issues; Private health insurance; Fitness programmes and gymnasium membership subsidies; Childcare/eldercare facilities or subsidies –workplace nursery or subsidized places in local nurseries or nursing homes. All of these are highly valuable support opportunities, which, if available, should be taken when needed.

For most managers and specialists, in all sectors of business today it is an essential requirement, that professionals undertake courses in management development, or in specialist disciplines such as quality management, project management, accountancy, human resources, or marketing. The objective of this activity, from the individual’s point of view, is usually to obtain higher financial rewards, higher status, increased job security, and-or to increased opportunities and career choice. From the organisation’s point of view it is rightly aimed at improving the knowledge, understanding, skills, and ultimately the performance of the individual and the workforce collectively. The impact on the individual, regardless of these contrasting objectives, is that work-life balance is affected, pressure will rise and will need to be managed to avoid this resulting in negative stress. For any individual undertaking professional development activity, especially those studying at home, in part or in full, it is essential that this is recognised as a potential source of negative stress, and that the individual builds the monitoring and control of this pressure into their development plans.

In order to manage stress and to achieve a satisfactory work-life balance, it is necessary to avoid the most common pitfalls that professionals encounter. These include: Believing that suffering from stress is a weakness – it is not, but positive, corrective action is needed to redress the situation. Allowing yourself to suffer from stress and an out of balance work-life equilibrium, when simple, easy to apply solutions are at hand, is a weakness; Keeping stress to yourself is the best approach – it is not. All the evidence shows that seeking advice and support is the key to reducing and eliminating negative stress and restoring an appropriate work-life balance; Assuming that others are to blame for your stress and the imbalance between your work and your outside work life – they may be the causes, but you are responsible for allowing the negative situation to continue; Cutting back or eliminating social, sporting, or personal interests activity is the answer to restoring a work-life balance – it is not, because these are essential positive elements necessary to achieve a healthy work-life balance and a relatively stress free life; Ignoring the warning signs – these are easy to identify, if not by you then others will see them; Not identifying the sources of stress and reasons for imbalance – a simple analysis of your situation, perhaps with some help from a professional advisor, colleague, partner, or friend, will identify the main causes of your problems; Not looking after yourself in terms of health and happiness – if you are unhealthy, unfit, or in an unhappy relationship, or not in any relationship and are lonely and isolated, you will find it difficult to manage stress and your work-life balance effectively; Believing that there is a single solution to your negative stress and work-life imbalance problems – there is not. You need to take a holistic approach to managing your life, at work, at home, and socially. This encompasses your work, your aspirations, your personal development, your fitness, your lifestyle, your health, your relationships, your general attitude to life – everything that makes you an individual, a unique person.

This has been a first look at the links between workplace stress and work-life balance, and has

been specifically aimed at those professionals who are adding to the pressures of workplace and home life by taking on professional development activities. Continuous personal professional development, for managers, professionals, and specialists, in all sectors is essential. Even entrepreneurs and those leaving organisations to be self-employed risk being overwhelmed by workload and pressures from work-related activities. The solution to avoiding the negative effects of stress, and maintaining an appropriate work-life balance, when taking on additional personal development workload, are the same for those in organisations. You will need to be aware of the dangers, be alert to the symptoms, put in place defensive mechanisms, and then pro-actively manage your work life and personal life in a way that protects you from the dangers of negative stress and enables you to maintain a healthy and satisfying work-life balance.