Why
Achieving Work-Life Harmony Is More Valuable than Striving for Work-Life
Balance
Do
you ever feel as if you’re living multiple lives? And that your various
incarnations—executive, spouse, parent, friend, volunteer, artist,
athlete—conflict with, rather than complement, each other? Many of us hold on
tight to the hard-wired belief that life is something to be lived once work
hours are over. It’s a sad thought. Somewhere out there, a senior finance
executive can’t wait to retire so that he can start using his time to pursue a
career as a musician. A young woman may be volunteering in an unpaid internship
in a school in India, which fulfills her passion to help others, while applying
for a job back home that serves only to pay the bills.
Most
of us agree that the concept of work-life balance is a myth —and that it only
reinforces the zero-sum thinking that work is work and life is life. The
delayed gratification inherent in the learn-earn-return model of career
stages
doesn’t resonate with our innate desire to live each day to the fullest.
The
concept of work-life balance is a myth.
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That’s
why Leading the Life You Want: Skills for
Integrating Work and Life captured my attention. After reading the
book, I interviewed the author, Dr. Stewart D. Friedman, a professor at the
Wharton School and the founding director of the Wharton Work/Life Integration Project. In 1987, motivated by the
birth of his son, Friedman, a psychologist by training, started challenging his
business school students to articulate how they were going to make the world
better for their employees and families. Since then, Friedman says, he’s felt
“spurred on” to research how others have indeed improved the world. And over
the course of almost 30 years, examining the lives of thousands of individuals,
he has discovered something simple, but profound: Those who lead satisfying,
successful lives do so by, “taking their unique gifts and passions and making
them useful to other people.”
Friedman
believes that life is “the intersection and interaction of the four domains”:
work/school, home/family, community/society, and the private realm of mind,
body, and spirit. And while he agrees that it’s impossible to have it all—all
of the time, anyway—it is possible “to be conscious of what and who matter
most” and to identify four-way wins, “actions that result in life’s being
better in all four domains.” By focusing on work-life integration, not balance,
we can create harmony, rather than conflict.
The
book includes a survey readers can take to assess
their own work-life integration skills. The assessment is followed up with
profiles of six well-known individuals who illustrate that it is indeed
possible to achieve “four-way wins.” And while the narratives are inspiring, it
becomes apparent in reading them that we all already know—and admire—people who
are living more integrated lives: the family who volunteers together; the
married couple who makes it a priority to “date” during work week lunches; or
professionals, like Lori Patterson (who founded a technology consulting firm)
and Art Langer (whose company helps young people gain
access to education and work), who started businesses to express their passions
and leverage their gifts.
The
book also provides a curated set of 36 tools to help you conceive and implement
a more integrated life. I have to admit, upon my first quick read, the sheer
number left me dazed and confused. Friedman suggests using the results of the
self-assessment to select a few tools from the list, those that can help
readers to develop the skills they most lack, or hone their strengths. That
being said, 36 is a lot to process, so I asked him to pick the three that he
prioritizes:
1.
Align actions with values by finding the larger meaning. Think about
what you do every day and how it contributes to others’ well-being. Doing so,
Friedman says, will help you “better appreciate the ways your actions are
evidence of living your values,” and help identify “activities that are not
aligned with your core values” so you reduce or eliminate them. Case in point:
When an academic researcher reframed her role as helping advance the careers of
women, it renewed her passion for her job.
2.
Clarify expectations with the people who mean the most to you and your
future. Try to predict how they will answer the question, “What are the
main things you want or need from me?” and then reach out to clarify mutual
expectations. Considering all of these people as parts of a social system can
help you see how they interact. If you follow up on these insights with
conversations, it will become easier to meet their needs as well as yours. Case
in point: A father who felt disconnected from his three children started
meeting with them every weekend for 20 minutes, asking, “What is important to
you this week and how can I help?” Over time, he found that his relationships
have “profoundly changed.”
3.
Challenge the status quo in the lab. Keep a journal for a few days on
“new ways of getting things done” and refine the ideas so that they “benefit
different parts of your life,” Friedman says. Then select one idea to implement
and talk with others to refine it and gain encouragement and support. Use the
“theory of small wins” to make incremental progress. Case in point: A retail
executive negotiated a delayed start time with his colleagues so that he could
invest an additional hour each morning to take care of his health and spend
time with his kids. Rather than being sidelined, he was promoted and recognized
for his ability to inspire others.
Friedman
cautions that the tools require a lot of heavy lifting and that, only through
careful consideration and persistence, will they bear fruit. He encourages
partnering in twos or even threes, to get as many new perspectives as possible.
Although I did not have Friedman’s book to use as a guide at the time, I can
personally attest to the power of the first tool. More than 20 years ago, as a
CIO, I decided that the most important contribution I could make to my company
involved developing people, not technology. As a result, I treated the work
that needed to be accomplished as the means to helping others discover their
gifts and passions, and not an end in itself. Since then, I have pursued my
love for developing people in all that I do, in every aspect of my life—as a
wife, parent, leadership coach, author, and volunteer.
Woody
Allen once said, “Eighty percent of success is showing up.” While I have found
this to be true, it’s only possible if we show up with our whole self in our
whole life. Failure to do leads to exhaustion and dissatisfaction. If you want
to have a gratifying and successful life making this world a better place, be
sure to honor your passions, leverage your unique gifts, and serve others—with
the goal of doing it all of the time, in everything you do.
http://www.strategy-business.com/blog/Why-Achieving-Work-Life-Harmony-Is-More-Valuable-than-Striving-for-Work-Life-Balance?gko=7e73c
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