Anne Fisher writes a great column for CNN money news and one she wrote a while back is a great one. It’s one dealing with work/life balance called “How Can I Do it All?. She describes a number of strategies that were written by Kurt Sandholtz in Beyond Juggling: Rebalancing Your Busy Life, the book describes five ways to find more time for the people and things you love, including yourself:

1. Alternating. This technique involves immersing yourself completely in work for a specified period, and then not working at all for a while–rather like a freelance writer who works feverishly on a book project for a year and then takes three months off. If arranging a sabbatical isn’t realistic, at least be sure to go on regular vacations. Too many people neglect to take these vital breaks, and ultimately become less productive.

An interesting article is this one by Jim Bird. He has a list of four simple time-management techniques that are to me controversial. He suggests throwing away your “to-do” list.While the first one is to use a day planner, the second is to throw away your to-do list and instead use the technique of deciding “when” you will do a task, which is the key of this article.I can see that by choosing “when” you have more of a concrete point in time that might see your task done instead of the more amorphous “to-do” list. For me, I do have a to-do list, but it’s more of a way I can not lose the various threads of things. Instead, my email is more of my to do list. I continuously review it as most of my “to-do’s” are project related.

Interesting article in the Vancouver Sun today called “Some people just can’t unwind” which speaks to the Type-A person on holiday that can’t relax. It’s interesting from the work/life balance point of view because obviously holidays are key parts of having a busy work life.

In my own life, holidays are really important and as aa Type-A myself, I tend to plan them far in advance. I don’t think I’ve ever had to cancel a holiday because of work, but I know that people have. I wonder what the circumstances would be to make you cancel a holiday. I guess I could imagine!  There are probably differences between going up to a cabin vs. a plane trip to Mexico, but still, it would take a lot to force me to cancel a holiday.

This was a great Time Value calculator that a friend Lori Bamber passed on to me that I think really provides some insight.

First, it tells you have many hours you have to work to get an hour of leisure time. For me, it is about 2.5 hours of work for 1 hour of kicking back. Yikes! Give you pause when you think about what you are focussing on when you are relaxing. I’m not sure it will make me relax more if I am thinking that I have paid 2.5 hours to do it!

Second, it calculates at what $ an hour threshold it makes sense to pay someone to do something for you instead of you doing it yourself. For example, according to the calc, my net pay is $15/hr after expenses. So for me, if someone costs less than that, it might make sense to pay them to do it . In their example, in deciding whether to paint your house yourself, you might figure that the job would take 200 hours of your weekend time, and each hour is worth $20. You could pay a painter up to $4,000 to do the job instead, in effect buying time from the painter.

This article by Gloria Tom Wing Staudt has some great “commitments” to getting your life on track:

• Feeling perfectly balanced means you will be at your best to make the best of each day. You will be more energized, more confident, make better decisions, capitalize on opportunities, accomplish more and be inspiring to others.
• Taking time off does not have to be the same way as others take time off. Maybe frequent short or full days regularly work better for you.
• Scheduling time to have more fun will mean you are more productive when working. Fun may mean making sure you have time set aside for yourself as well as with family and friends.
• Having a clear knowledge of what drains or energizes you, will make it easier to be proactive about what action to take.

This is a quote from today’s Vancouver Sun:

“According to an RBC Royal Bank poll released Monday in time for Small Business Week, only 39 per cent of small business owners in B.C. feel they are able to balance their time between work and home well, while 57 per cent said, if given an extra hour a day, they’d spend it with family, relax or get caught up with personal matters.

The poll, conducted by Ipsos- Reid, showed that 36 per cent of the 363 B.C. business owners who were surveyed said they work more than five days a week.”

This is very true for me. I run my own business and probably work 60+ hours at it. In today’s market, I am the cheif and the janitor. Yet this isn’t so bad, but at times I think I forget that the reason I got into this was because I was supposed to be “my own boss” and “master of my own time”. Yet the reality is that I am subject to client pressure and deadlines, even if I make them. I think my key is to try and make time for family, as my work will fill any time I give it.

Here’s an interesting aspect of work/life balance in that this author, Eric from smashLAB: www.ideasonideas.com/2006/10/9-to-5 says that you can’t be great if you work 9-5 because true greatness requires commitment and sacrifice.

But by all accounts Shakespeare was a 9-5 journeyman and no one doubts his greatness. Some of the comments on Eric’s post talk about the other factors that create greatness – like environment, compensation, values etc – and so it depends on which of these you consider important.

One aspect relevant to the life/work balance is that to be truly great at work you need to be refreshed, relaxed and creative. To be creative is not easy when you are burning the midnight oil for the 2^nd week in a row. If you don’t have the balance in your life, and even if work is your passion, you will quickly burn out. We all know (and might be ourselves) the people that burn out from simply too much.

The provincial government in BC Canada is now giving out awards that celebrate work life balance. It’s called WorkLife BC.

Concept is pretty good and as LInda Reid says, who is the Minister of State of Childcare, “It’s spawning great interest and great enthusiasm.”

Employers, she said, are sitting down with their employees and asking what they can do to help balance work with life.

“The ideas they get back often cost them no money whatsoever. They’re finding different ways of reframing their business. I think it’s going to bring a lot of people into the workforce.”

I thought the best tip was that when one of the employees of Crowe Chizek (an accounting firm in the US), Greg Stump when he is with his kids he asks any caller whether it is an emergency or he’ll call them back. For me I just don’t answer it, but hey, whatever works.

Plus I’ve changed my cell phone message to say, “I only check the voice mail once a day, so the best way to reach me is via email.” That way people will hopefully contact me another way in the future or just through email, which is a way better way for me. I actually find it really hard to remember to call people back once I answer the phone.

The Knowledge Green is an open space where we can learn how to keep our minds, our work, and our organizations healthy and sustainable.

Foster knowledge sharing. Air common concerns. Make your Knowledge Green.

We all know it is incredibly rewarding working for socially progressive organizations. Yet everyday we feel the effects of limited resources. Issues, budgets, time — in the not-for-profit sector, we all deal with these common concerns. And it takes a toll, on our personal and professional lives.
So how do we keep our personal and our professional lives healthy?