Work-Life Balance is a Sticky Floor

by Pamela Weinsaft (New York City)

In Rebecca Shambaugh’s book, It’s Not A Glass Ceiling, It’s a Sticky Floor, she identifies seven key areas where women get “stuck”. Chief among them—and no surprise—is striking the balance between our work and personal lives.

She says if our lives are out of control, and checking to make sure that we’re working for a purpose or just for the sake of working. “Living a balanced life,” she says, “fosters the resilience we need to be successful leaders,” yet “83 percent of women with jobs [agree] that they have a hard time balancing work and family.”

Certainly, the problem isn’t restricted to the C-suite, or to those outside it. When we interviewed Omgeo CEO Marianne Brown, she talked about the often-difficult choices that one makes when allotting time to work versus personal and family matters. She shared a story of a time when work won out, when she chose to make a presentation at a corporate board meeting rather than attend her son’s class performance with her husband. She talked about regretting the decision to this day, because there are always more board meetings but there is only one of every “first” for your child. She said she feels guilty, even now (and that her son, now a teenager, still gets some mileage out of that guilt).

Ms. Shambaugh suggests that women often unknowingly bring this on themselves, and offers some helpful symptoms of work-life imbalance, including, but not limited to: feeling like you’ve lost your creative spark, feeling angry when someone asks for favors or feeling caught in a cycle of a seemingly endless projects/demands. Once you’ve identified the symptoms, you can examine the four “syndromes” that are at the core of the problem:

• Taking on too much, then multitasking to the extreme (“Multitasking Syndrome”)
• Going the extra mile to make things better for others, often out of guilt, then resenting their lack of free time (“Martyr Syndrome”)
• Obsessing over personal flaws and overworking to compensate (“Self-Critic Syndrome”), and
• Being too attached to making everything perfect, down to the smallest detail, which keeps them from delegating and/or asking for help (“Perfectionist Syndrome”).

To recover, Ms. Shambaugh writes, you need to make a life plan to determine what areas are most important. She reassures women that “at the end of the day, they really are in control of their work-life balance.” When we have a map to navigate by, we can detour as necessary with less concern that the diversion will keep us from getting where we want to go; therefore, she advocates not only spending the time creating a map to your ideal destination (i.e. “Work-Life Balanceville”), but checking it and taking stock as your priorities change over time.

Ms. Shambaugh suggests looking at your life as a big pie (or, as she dubs it, the “Wheel of Life”) with slices representing the various facets of life: relationships, health, money, spiritual, career, recreation, service, and personal growth. Looking at it this way reminds us that we do have lives separate and apart from work. It also reminds us that although we can do anything we want to do, we cannot do everything. The pie (the time we are alive) is limited; we can only divide it up in the best we can each day. (For those of you want some high tech help in calculating the time you spend on each facet of life, you can check out CNN’s helpful work-life balance calculator.)

Once those priorities are set, the crucial thing is to learn to say no to those requests that fall outside of the priorities. Ms. Shambaugh advises getting a coach to develop your “no muscle.” She writes, “For some of us, ‘no’ is very difficult. We want to see ourselves and be seen as a can-do person, or we want to help out and save the day, or we don’t like to disappoint.”

Saying no can be the key to attaining the elusive balance, but it must be said both politely and directly according to Michael Watkins, founder of Genesis Advisers. “Don’t worry about seeming nice,” he said in a 2007 article in Forbes magazine. He suggests taking the time to consider a request before uttering the knee-jerk “yes” so many of us do. Tell the person you need to check your calendar and get back to them, or that, if they must know right away, the answer is certainly “no.”

Although it would be nice to realize the achievement of one’s dreams in every area—climbing Mount Kilamanjaro (recreation), becoming CEO of a Fortune 500 (career) and earning millions (money)—it’s more likely that at least some of your goals will need to be smaller to co-exist with the big goals. To get to the C-suite, you have to be prepared to trade in your goal of studying for a year in India with your guru (spiritual) for your goal of being able to take the time to watch your pride-and-joy compete in and win the school spelling bee.

Shambaugh recommends asking for what you want, whether it’s flexibility, more help, or more responsibility. Know what your company offers and what’s been done in the past before you approach your boss for flextime or other balance-boosting assistance. Be prepared to explain how your proposal will benefit the company. Think about how long you want to work the program before it’s re-evaluated. Then continue to be the same dedicated employee in fewer, more efficient hours, so you can be the well-rounded adult participant in your own life as well.