Rejecting “Work-Life” Balance!

In the past two weeks, I’ve attended the American Society for Training and Development International Conference and Expo in Denver and presented at the Greater Madison Society for Human Resource Management here locally.  Both events provided me with wonderful opportunities to connect with new people, learn about valuable ideas, practices, and trends in a myriad organizational development environments, and reinvigorate my love for this field.

This afternoon, having watched another remarkable keynote address by Paul Wesselmann, a.k.a., The Ripples Guy, I was conversing with a colleague who similarly opted to leave the corporate world in exchange for a consulting lifestyle.  If you’ve never made that leap, trust me when I tell you it can be both unbelievably exhilarating and simultaneously nerve-wracking.  And certainly, it’s not for everyone.

For those of you who know me personally, I made that leap five months ago, trading the security of a corporate salary for the flexibility, and yes, uncertainty of a consultant’s life.  The way I like to think of it, I looked at my work-life balance, and chose life.

I’ve written before about the problems with buying into the “work-life” philosophy.  It creates a tension between one’s personal and professional lives, emphasizing the delicate balance (and sometimes incompatibility) of the two.  It’s an unhealthy perspective that ignores the passion that ought to weave a natural bond between all one’s pursuits (personal and professional).

In the course of my conversations after my session today, this colleague was excitedly (passionately, one might argue) explaining how for years, she deliberately maintained professional and personal silos.  She left her work at the office.  She steadfastly refused to check work email in the evening or on weekends.  She was careful to maintain her “work-life” balance.  But something was missing…..passion.

Since leaping into the consulting world, her life has transformed itself.  To the horror of some, she sends emails in the middle of the night, even on the weekends.  She prepares training sessions when her energy levels are at their maximum (for her, this is in the morning hours), and she opts for others activities (some professional, others not) during her least productive “energy hours” of the day.

“You know,” she confided in me. “It’s been surprising how ‘in-balance’ I feel now….how passionate I am about the work I am doing and the way I’m living my life.”

Trust me, I know the feeling.  She and I, although our paths are quite different and our work focuses on our own areas of consulting, have both rejected the notion of a work-life balance.  Instead, we’ve discovered a work-passion intensifier that interjects excitement, enthusiasm, engagement, and, yes, BALANCE into everything we’re doing.

So, whether you opt to loose the shackles of a corporate life (sorry for the interjected bias here) or not, I urge you to reject the concept of work-life balance.  Stop siloing your lives and sapping yourself of energy and enthusiasm in both aspects.  Instead, seek out those opportunities and career directions that allow your passion for life in general to emerge.  Let that passion illuminate both your career direction and your personal and familial pursuits.  Let passion be your focus….and stop perpetuating the unhealthy tension between your work life and your personal life.  Embrace a passionate life….in every aspect of your life!

Employee Value: Theory X Losers and Theory Y Winners

Relaxing in my leather chair, a glass of Spanish Tempranilla in hand, relaxing music playing, and the company of a good friend, the conversation last evening turned to organizational culture.  (Call me a geek, but I’ve clearly found my work-passion balance!)

You see, she recently transitioned from a Fortune 500 giant to a local non-profit, and after just a few days in the new role, the cultural differences were striking. No longer was her contribution to the company judged by the number of hours her manager observed her chained to her cubicle, the famed “ass-in-seat” measure. Rather, it’s already become clear that her new boss is concerned not with babysitting her, but empowering her to excel. The result, she’s passionately embraced working longer hours (her own choice) and even taking work home.

I know, many of you are thinking, “She’s new. The enthusiasm will fade.” And perhaps it will. But that’s not really the point. What’s important is the sense of freedom and respect that she’s been given in just the first week or two, with the emphasis not on when she arrives in the morning or leaves in the evening, but rather on the thoughtful value she provides.

Others may be thinking it’s odd in this day and age that it’s unusual for a white-collar professional to NOT take work home. Again, this may be true. But there is a significant difference between taking work home because you have to and working extra hours (from home or a coffee shop) because you WANT to. THAT is the definition of engagement — a purposeful eagerness to provide maximum value and contribution to better the goals, services, or direction of an organization.

In reality, the cultural difference between the Fortune 500 company and her non-profit can be summed up by McGregor’s decades old Theory X and Y for motivation and management.

• Theory X (represented by the corporate giant in this example) speaks to an authoritarian style of management. Individuals are viewed as inherently lazy. Workers need directive, quid pro quo punishment-reward systems in order to accomplish the task at hand. In fact, the workers WANT this, according to the theory.

• Theory Y, conversely, sees individuals are self-motivated, hard-working, capable, and participative in their pursuit of their own goals and those of the organization.

As trends continue to stress the growing importance of thinking and learning workforces, organizations that strive to remain competitive (both as employers and within their industries) will need to embrace a Theory Y approach to managing employees. The non-profit “gets it,” and, as a result, it gets an engaged, enthusiastic, intelligent, and innovative thought-leader to help it move forward in an uncertain and ever competitive environment.

The Fortune 500 company? Well, they will continue to lose their best and brightest, those who refuse to continue operating as lemmings and for whom a career of value means being valued.

The Organizational Psychology Daily

For a great compilation of articles related to organizational psychology, organizational culture, leadership, and business…..check out the latest edition of The Organizational Psychology Daily.