Strategies for Work-Life Balance

Perspective
February 19, 2019, 5 years ago
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Work-life imbalance affects both the organization and the employees negatively. In the previous post, the various personal and professional problems arising due to work-life imbalance were listed.

As much as the employees suffer, the organizations too, suffer the aftermaths of work-life imbalance. Therefore, this necessitates a collective action from both the organization and the workforce for enhancing work-life balance.

Work-life balance is all about creating a productive work culture; a culture in which tensions between work and family life is reduced (New Zealand State Services Commission, 2005)

Few strategies that the organizations and employees can follow for enhancing work-life balance are shared in this post.

Strategies by Organizations

Employee Engagement Programs
Employee counseling & mentoring
Job Autonomy
Flexi-timings
Team-Building programs
Transparent culture
‘Idea-Box’ and ‘Inno-thoughts’ Implementation
Open communication patterns
Employee Benefit policies
Family-life enhancement programs
Quality of work-life strategies
Training & Development programs
Self-development training

Strategies by Employees

Emotional maturity
Creative & adaptive work patterns
Self-discipline
Job sharing & learning
Effective time-management
Blue-sky thinking
Recreation & Sports
Multi-dimensional skills development
Developing novel hobbies
Stress management
Mindfulness

There is no one simple procedure for achieving Work-life balance. Needless to say, employees’ needs and priorities vary from person to person. Every individual has different challenges and life pressures. Similarly, the environment under which the individual operates varies. Hence, a strategy that will help one person will not necessarily help another. In fact, the strategies may not be relevant to the same employee over time.

Therefore, organizations and employees will have to periodically evaluate individual needs, anticipated personal and professional outcome and thereby design strategies for enhancing work-life balance. A focused process for each of the above strategy, relative to requirements, resources, aptitudes and deliverables will help in enhancing work-life balance. However, it needs to be remembered that personal drive, positive mindset and commitment are the key factors that will help in maintaining work-life balance.