Balancing a thriving career and every day life can be challenging. Finding time to step away from your work is sometimes too much to bear. But the truth is, if you want a thriving career, knowing when to step away from your desk, or wherever else you may be, can be one of the ways to do it.
Thinking about your job 24/7 isn’t healthy. If you’re always worrying about work, it’s likely that the more you do, the more your productivity will plummet. Here are a few tips we have put together to help you find a better balance at work and home, so that you can maintain a healthy mind and attitude in both areas.
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Set a ‘no email’ zone
Due to the development of smartphones and the desire to be more proactive in a job, many people now have their work emails set up on their smartphones. If you have your notifications switched on, it will be difficult not to see an email every time one comes through. Interruptions like this to your evening can easily pull you away from relaxing with your loved ones.
Set boundaries on when you can check your emails. If you’re finding it hard, physically set your email account to out of office whenever you leave there – especially when you take time off from work. The last thing you need is to be dwelling over a work dilemma while you’re sunning it up in Spain. By simply switching off your notifications, you are freeing up more time to do the things you love without being glued to your phone screen every 5 minutes.
Stop responding during out of office hours
When you reply to your boss or clients during out of office hours, they will assume you are always available. Resist the urge to reply in the evenings and over the weekends – delay your response until you are back at your desk. You must make it clear to your co-workers that you don’t work outside of the office, and politely let your clients know that you were not at your desk.
Failing to do this could see you getting the odd request from your boss over a ‘quick one’ that quickly becomes more frequent…manage their expectations appropriately so that they know when you are able to deal with a request.
Learn to say no
This can be easier for some rather than others, but learning to say no is a massive factor to balancing your work life. During work hours, it’s okay to say no to personal distractions. Removing distractions from your work environment can increase your productivity, so that by the end of the day, you don’t actually feel the need to continue working.
This is also no different to your personal life – you have the right to say no to doing work outside of office hours, especially if you’re not being paid for it. Don’t let your work consume you day and night – you could develop an unhealthy obsession that leaves you feeling down and stressed..
Schedule your private life
It’s very easy to fall back in to working out of hours if you don’t have anything else planned. Plan to meet up with friends and spend time with family, so that you have no other option but to be away from your work. Yes, it can be a challenge to separate yourself from your work, but we guarantee that later on in life, you will regret not having spent as much time doing the things you love,
When your day is full of activities, it is so much easier to not think about work. Build up to separating work from your personal life, like leaving your work phone at home, or turning it off while you’re on a day out.
Don’t be afraid to ask for flexibility
If you have young children, or other personal circumstances that make it difficult for you to be away from home, you might want to check with your boss if you are eligible to work from home. Organise a meeting to discuss the possibilities of how work can be more flexible for your lifestyle. If they do allow you more flexibility, they will more than likely track your work when you are at home to make sure that you are working to the same standard that you do in the office. So provided that you can still be productive at home, this could be a viable option to help you adapt a better work-life balance.
Many of us love our jobs, and in hindsight will forget to switch off from it. But taking precious time away from your work will boost your overall morale, and you’ll have a healthier lifestyle at home. Make time to enjoy yourself – you’ve got one life, and it shouldn’t be spent at your desk (literally and metaphorically).
