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Work Life balance

Introduction Work plays an important role in the lives of most people. Work, whether paid or unpaid, also helps us to shape our identity, gives a purpose to our existence, allows us – or forces us – to structure our time, gives us a useful way to spend our days, contributes to our social status, and finally, brings us into contact with others.

Work-Life Balance does not mean an equal balance. Work-life balance is the ability to experience a sense of control and to stay productive and competitive at work while maintaining a happy, healthy home life with sufficient leisure.

The right balance of one today may be different tomorrow. It also differs when an individual is single, married , if there are children and also when one starts a new career as well as when one is nearing retirement.

The Six Components of Work-Life Balance Self-Management Time Management Stress Management Change Management Technology Management Leisure Management

Review of Literature Work-Life Balance Defined, Bird, JimThe Officer; Jun 2004; 80, 5; ProQuest Research Library.

In this article the author is first trying to define what work life balance is not. Work life balance does not mean an equal balance. There is no perfect one-size-fits-all balance you should be striving for. the best work life balance is different for everyone as each of us have different personalities and lives. The article gives two key concepts at the core of an effective work life balance definition. They are Daily Achievement and Enjoyment, ideas almost deceptive in their simplicity.

Impact of work life balance on performance of employees in the organizations, Prakash Vir Khari and Jyothi Bhel

Often organisation culture and the workplace practices control an individual’s work life, and put organization's desires before the individual’s needs. Issues such as work flexibility are approached from the employers’ view, and offer the employee minimal choice in managing their working life (Strachan & Burgess 1998). Pocock (2003) describes the lack of balance between the changing nature of the families and the workplace cultures as a collision between work and families. Institutions have failed to recognise the spill over effect in work places, and deserted to manage the balance with the employees’ expectations that spread beyond their working life (Bond et al 1997; Bardoel et al 2000; Pocock 2003).

HISTORY OF WORK-LIFE BALANCE

The work-leisure dichotomy was invented in the mid-1800s.

Paul Krassner remarked that anthropologists use a definition of happiness that is to have as little separation as possible "between your work and your play”.

The expression "work–life balance" was first used in the United Kingdom in the late 1970s to describe the balance between an individual's work and personal life.

In the United States, this phrase was first used in 1986.

Most recently, there has been a shift in the workplace as a result of advances in technology.

As Bowswell and Olson-Buchanan stated, "increasingly sophisticated and affordable technologies have made it more feasible for employees to keep contact with work".

Employees have many methods, such as emails, computers, and cell phones, which enable them to accomplish their work beyond the physical boundaries of their office. Employees may respond to an email or a voice mail after-hours or during the weekend, typically while not officially "on the job".

Researchers have found that employees who consider their work roles to be an important component of their identities will be more likely to apply these communication technologies to work while in their non-work domain.

Some theorists suggest that this blurred boundary of work and life is a result of technological control.

Technological control "emerges from the physical technology of an organization”. In other words, companies use email and distribute smart phones to enable and encourage their employees to stay connected to the business even when they are not in the office.

This type of control, as Barker argues, replaces the more direct, authoritarian control, or simple control, such as managers and bosses.

As a result, communication technologies in the temporal and structural aspects of work have changed, defining a "new workplace" in which employees are more connected to the jobs beyond the boundaries of the traditional workday and workplace.

 The more this boundary is blurred, the higher work-to-life conflict is self-reported by employees.

Many authors believe that parents being affected by work-life conflict will either reduce the number of hours one works where other authors suggest that a parent may run away from family life or work more hours at a workplace. This implies that each individual views work-life conflict differently.

Employee assistance professionals say there are many causes for this situation ranging from personal ambition and the pressure of family obligations to the accelerating pace of technology.

According to a recent study for the Centre for Work-Life Policy, 1.7 million people consider their jobs and their work hours excessive because of globalization.

Stress and Work Pressure Stress in the workplace can be defined as the

harmful physical and emotional responses that occur when the requirements of the job do not match the capabilities, resources, or needs of the worker. Workplace stress can lead to poor health and even injury.

There are limits to what people are capable of handling, and those limits differ from one person to the other. When employees exceed these limits, they may find themselves facing problems so serious that they are unable to solve them on their own. That is when they are facing a work pressure problem.

When an employee is unable to meet the demands of work a work pressure problem arises that can lead to work stress. Work stress can eventually cause the employee to feel excessively tired, exhausted and depressed, as well as to suffer physical ailments.

According to one school of thought, differences in individual characteristics such as personality and coping style are most important in predicting whether certain job conditions will result in stress - in other words, what is stressful for one person may not be a problem for someone else. This viewpoint leads to prevention strategies that focus on workers and ways to help them cope with demanding job conditions.

Signs and symptoms of stress Mental Emotional Physical Behavioural

Stress and work pressure are main contributors to work life imbalance.

Causes of stress

External causes of stress Major life changes Work Relationship difficulties Financial problems Being too busy Children and family

Internal causes of stress (self-generated) Inability to accept uncertainty Doubt Negative self-talk Unrealistic expectations Perfectionism Lack of assertiveness

IMBALANCE OF WORKAn im-balance is fundamentally a lack of clearly defined and consistently enforced boundaries between work life and personal life. When we fail to have a healthy work life balance, people end up experiencing emotional stress, anxiety and depression. Employees who have the tools to balance their professional and personal lives are happier, healthier, and more productive.

FACTORS OF WORK LIFE IM-BALANCE Social Support Organizational Factor Stress Factor Work Issue Factor Family Issues Factor Individual Factor

Consequences of work life imbalance The consequences of work life imbalance can be affected in many ways:

Health Risks:Obesity: Not taking the time to exercise or eat well can increase obesity, which is connected to heart disease and numerous other health risks.

Exhaustion: Sleeping well can add years to a person’s life. Sacrificing sleep for work will have negative effects on health and increase the chances of getting sick.

Emotional problems: Stress and exhaustion will wreak havoc on emotional wellbeing. This will affect relationships and personal identity.

Absenteeism: Poor health results in employee absenteeism and thus is a costly problem for employers. This can increase the cost to the organization as they have to pay the employees sick pay and it can affect in loss of productivity to the organisation.

Burnout: Overworked employees are mostly burn outs. Burnout is the physical and psychological response to a long term stress. Signs of burn outs are lack of interest, lack of emotion, lack of motivation, and possible depression.

Stress: The effects of stress on heart health are deadly. Stress can lead to Cardiovascular disease, Sexual health problems, Weakened immune system, Migraines and headaches, Stiff muscles, Backaches, depression, Weight gain, Substance addiction, nervousness ,trouble concentrating, Irritability, mental and physical fatigue.

Signs of stress are: Over emotion, Lethargy, Restlessness, Anxiety.

Other causes of work life imbalance are: Less family participation Limited friendships Increased burdens and workload Distance in personal relations Decreased level of refreshment by oneself

Responsibilities of EmployersTo find the right balance for your lifestyle, review ways in which your prospective employers can accommodate these issues:

1. Scheduling

Depending on the job, this may be the easiest way for employers to accommodate employees, since the costs are minimal while the payback – happier, more productive staff – can be immense. The most popular options are:

-Telecommuting: Working all or part of the week from home. (Good for anyone whose job is mainly computer-based)

-Job Sharing: Two or more people working part time to share a full-time role. (Good for people in customer service or administrative roles)

-Compressed Workweeks: Working four 10-hour days, for example, to get an extra weekday off. Some companies even offer amenities such as onsite concierge services, meal preparation, or dry cleaning, to make the employee's home life a bit easier to manage.

2. Health and Wellness

Employer-subsidized health insurance is a widely offered benefit. But since an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, as well as potentially lower premiums, some employers have onsite gyms or discounted gym memberships. Other employers take this issue a step further with onsite wellness programs, some of which include diet workshops. Another benefit that can help keep personal issues under control is an Employee-Assistance Program (EAP). Common areas an EAP covers include: confidential help finding child or elder care; alcohol or substance abuse treatment; or mental health care.3. Child Care

Full-time working parents want to feel comfortable with those who watch their kids during the workday. Having access to onsite or near-site child care can raise that comfort level significantly.

4. Personal Development and Growth

This is a key indicator of how important career growth and employee retention are to a company. Internally, formal mentoring programs and company-paid training by outside experts or at industry conferences can help employees gain needed skills to improve performance in their current roles, or move up to higher-level positions that carry more responsibility and higher salaries. For employees who want to obtain degrees, certifications, or specialized training, some employers offer tuition reimbursement. This is particularly useful for those who never attended college, didn’t complete their degree requirements, or want to attend graduate school while someone else picks up all or part of the tab.

Strategies to Implement Work-Life Balance

PUT THE BEST WORK, FIRSTTo have more time for a personal life, we have to clear out blocks of time in our day to focus on the best (most important) work first. We tend to get wrapped up in time-wasting activities—about 69% of employees confess to wasting time each time, according to Salary.com. Obsessing over unimportant emails or procrastinating on menial tasks is just some examples. Putting the most important tasks first doesn’t mean less work. Furthermore, managers need to get away from the concept that working more means being better than the next person. A better strategy to consider is how to work smarter.

PREVENT BURNOUT

Job burnout is caused by a very real type of physical, mental and emotional stress. We’re humans, not machines—and even those will break eventually. Burnout can come from extremes of a single activity such as staring at spreadsheets and getting tunnel vision. You have to identify when you or your team needs to slow down or when to just stop. Encouraging downtime at work is helpful and teaches employees to budget time to finish the most important work first. This strategy also keeps you plugged in to the wellbeing of your employees. Once you practice what you preach, the team will follow your lead.

GET FURTHER ENGAGEMENT

Being a manager that encourages the best work first and to make your employees pause for rest periods will make you revered among your team. They’ll write songs about you one day. When you walk the walk of work-life balance, you provide your team a great measure of transparency, which will directly engage your employees. They will commit to performing better and are less likely to leave your organization, according to The Corporate Leadership Council. Integrating work-life balance into your culture is not going to kill your company; in fact, it may be the best thing you do for your business. Literally, lives are at stake here! Your team will be more engaged with you as a manager, be better managers of their own time as a whole, and be energized to put out the best possible work.

Conclusion Work/life balance is at best an elusive ideal and at worst a complete myth. But by making deliberate choices about which opportunities to pursue and which to decline, rather than simply reacting to emergencies, leaders can and do engage meaningfully with work, family, and community.

Through work life balance the individual will feel relaxed and organized. Productivity of the person increases which will lead accomplishing task efficiently as well as to attain grater successes. It will improve relationship with families and friends. Better mental and physical health is another benefit. We will be able to make priorities than sacrificing. Leisure time is another added plus of work life balance.

References Work Life Balance Defined: Learn The Meaning of Work

Life Balance. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.worklifebalance.com/work-life-balance-defined.html

What Is Work-life Balance? (n.d.). Retrieved from http://work-lifebalance.com/what-is-work-life-balance/

Aswathappa, K. (2014). a safe and healthy environment. In human resource management(7th ed.). New Delhi: McGraw Hill Education Pvt Ltd.

Employment relations today, Autumn 2006, vol 33, no.3

Stress in the workplace, meeting the challenge, Health Advocate’s recent webinar “Stress in the Workplace: Meeting the Challenge” co-sponsored by the National Women’s Health Resource Center,

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN WORK-LIFE BALANCE AND ORGANIZATIONAL EXCELLENCE: A CONCEPTUAL MODEL, Volume 3, Issue 9 (September, 2014)