Here are several excerpts from an article by Mary K Pratt, a Computerworld contributing writer, 10 Tips for Achieving a Better Work/Life Balance:
As president of Encompass, a 16,000-member user group for business customers of Hewlett-Packard, Buik comes in contact with a wide variety of technology professionals who all seem to log a lot more than the traditional 40-hour workweek. “I rarely talk to anyone putting less than 60 hours a week into their jobs,” says Buik, who is also senior vice president of MindIQ Corp., a Norcross, Ga., designer of technology-based training materials.
As companies increasingly look to technology to help them do more while spending less, technologists like Buik, and the IT workers she manages, are clearly feeling the squeeze.
It’s pressure that hits at all levels. Some IT positions, such as help desk jobs, still tend to follow a traditional eight-hour shift, but such employees are often scheduled for evening and weekend work as well as the usual 9 to 5. Meanwhile, higher-level managers are racking up the hours at work as they try to meet tight deadlines and respond to those they serve.
Now, at all levels, IT professionals are beginning to give voice to their desire to have some time for personal pursuits. In other words, they want at least some semblance of what’s known as work/life balance.
Pie in the sky?
Given the nature of IT work and the economic realities of the marketplace, achieving that kind of balance can be a tall order.
How can you find ways to better balance your professional and personal time — even if you’re at a company that’s less progressive on the issue? Work/life coaches, IT executives and experienced tech professionals share their strategies for finding the right balance, with these 10 tips…
1. Establish and enforce your own priorities – Whether your goal is to be active in your community or nurture personal relationships, it’s likely you’ll need to make time for those priorities by limiting your hours at work — even if that means saying no to overtime or extra projects, or to a promotion.2. Communicate – You’ve set your priorities. Now let your co-workers know about them.
3. Build a business case for your better life – Savvy professionals are increasingly willing to asking for flexible schedules as part of their compensation packages when offered new jobs, says Lily Mok, who analyzes work/life balance in IT for Gartner.
4. Take advantage of corporate policies and programs – A survey conducted last year by OfficeTeam, a Menlo Park, Calif., staffing service, found that 53% of workers and 45% of executives said their employers were “very supportive” of efforts to achieve work/life balance. Another 37% of workers and 50% of executives said their employers were “somewhat supportive.”
But work/life benefits, whether they’re on-site child care, flextime or job sharing, can’t help you if you don’t take advantage of them. Learn what programs your company offers and consider when and how they can benefit you, Mok says.
5. Seek out a mentor – “Look to people who you feel who have a good work/life balance and ask them, ‘How did you accomplish this?’ ” advises Katherine Spencer Lee, executive director of Robert Half Technology.
6. Work more efficiently - Seasoned tech workers know when they need to rush back to the office and when they can dial in and troubleshoot remotely, says Natalie Gahrmann, a work/life expert at N-R-G Coaching Associates in Hillsborough, N.J.
7. Share your knowledge – It’s often fulfilling to be an expert on a specialized program, but Keefe warns against being the only one in the know.
“In the cases when you’re a de facto expert, you want to pull teammates in and train them,” even if you have to take the initiative to make that training happen, he explains. “You want to share that knowledge, because if you have an on-call structure, then you won’t have to always be the only one on call.”
8. Use your gadgets – “IT professionals have invented everything that lets people work from wherever, [so] no one in IT should be enslaved to a particular place,”
9. Use your gadgets wisely – When Steve Davidek, a systems administrator for the city of Sparks, Nev., got a BlackBerry about a year ago, he quickly found himself dealing with e-mails at all sorts of times and places. He reassessed his situation and decided to stop checking e-mails during off-hours. Instead, colleagues know to reach him via phone to relay news of problems that truly needed his immediate attention. “I need a cell phone; I don’t need a leash,” he explains.
10. Maintain perspective – instead of focusing on how tough you have it at any particular moment — or, worse yet, making decisions based on short-term problems — you should take a long-term perspective and consider how you’re working to achieve your work and life goals.
For much more, check out the complete source article.
