Work Options
Perhaps, on other days when things are quiet and slow, you can ask your boss to let you leave early and/or get compensatory time to reward you for the crazy hours you are expected to work during an emergency.
Don’t despair if you are a trauma nurse, or you work in the operating room or in other jobs where you have to work really tough shifts. Many hospitals, fire departments and other such companies are now using a 4- day on, 3-day off schedule or other schedules that let these critical workers
spend more time with their families.
These flexible schedules also allow employees to schedule daytime appointments, and to decompress from the sometimes-stressful experiences and events that occur while they are on the job.
If your employer does not participate in these schedules, perhaps you want to take your skills elsewhere.
Seasonal jobs may give you the opportunity to negotiate hours, as well. Put your nose to the grindstone during Christmas hours in a retail store, or summer hours in a surf shop, and ask for extra time off to reward your dedication during the off season.
Look carefully at your position and determine if you have a ‘job’ or a ‘career’. If you are in it for the long haul and hope to continue the climb to upper management, you can expect to work much longer hours and endure a lot more stress.
Can you take another job in a lower stress environment, perhaps a company that prides itself on being ‘family friendly’ and still get into management? If you want to stay in the company you are in, and continue to climb, and if your company is not dedicated to a balanced life for their employees, you may find it very difficult, if not impossible, to balance your life.
If you are in a position to do so, and your company does not recognize the need for and value of a balanced work and family approach, consider going to your human resource department or to your manager and starting a grass roots movement to look at this issue.
Of course, management may immediately think you simply want to do less work than they want you to accomplish. To counter this, you’ll need to arm yourself with information.
There are all kinds of studies on increased productivity, employee retention and performance that support the decision to create a balanced work and family environment.
Companies like DuPont, Motorola, Hewlett-Packard, Marriott International and many others have instituted these programs and your employer may look to these leaders to get some ideas.
There are resources available online for you and for your company. These resources include seminars for company employees, and documents that teach managers and employees how to better manage time and workload so that the employee can accomplish more work, and produce excellent output – all in less time.
Look at sites like these:
http://www.bc.edu/centers/cwf/
http://cwfr.la.psu.edu/research.htm
http://www.familiesandwork.org/
http://www.workandfamily.org/
http://www.workfamily.com/
http://hrweb.mit.edu/worklife/index.html
You’ll notice that many of these sites are sponsored by universities and these universities often participate with companies to help them execute a work/life balance strategy.
In exchange, the university gains valuable insight and knowledge that they use to
advance their studies. You will also notice that many of these sites have online courses, or self-paced courses to walk management and/or employees through the process of planning
for and executing a balanced work/life program.
If the reason you are working really long hours, under tremendous stress is that
your boss is a lunatic, then you need to change jobs. Before you do that, you
have to honest with yourself.
