As seen in an earlier post, workaholism is directly related to burnout, job stress, and decreased health (physical and mental), but also having a conflict between your work and personal life1. Even professions where job satisfaction is high, like in music therapy faculty, work-life balance can still be a problem2. Work-Life balance is the relationship between the time you spend making money and the time you spend engaging in culture3. Enriching your work-life balance (in particular work-family balance) will consequently affect your mood, resources, performance, and well-being3 . For example, getting better quality of sleep is related to having higher job satisfaction4, higher perceived control, lower workload, and lower work-family conflict4. Having a balance between work and family is also related to higher social support, higher job satisfaction, and lower work stress5. Having a conflict between work and family is related to higher job stress4 and lower job satisfaction5,6, life satisfaction, and job performance5, and job-life satisfaction7. It also predicts emotional exhaustion8, but experiencing work-life balance predicts higher compassion satisfaction9. These connections have become stronger and more intertwined over the years, particularly in the hospitality industry10.
So, how can you improve your work-life balance? Here’s a few tips:
1. Clark, Michel, , Zhdanova, Pui,, & Baltes (2016), 2. Gooding (2018), 2. Felstead et al. (2002),
3. Zhang, Xu, Jin, & Ford (2018), 4. Litwiller, Snyder, Taylor, & Steele (2017),
5. Sarfaraz, A., & Khalid, R. (2015), 6. Ahmad, Mudassir and Pervaiz (2012)
7. Kossek & Ozeki (1998), 8.Ellahi and Mushtaq (2012),
9.Bae, Jennings, Hardeman, Kim, Lee, Littleton, & Saasa (2019), 10. Deery, M., & Jago, L. (2015).
11. Bambra, Whitehead, Sowden, Akers, & Petticrew (2008), 12. Dilmaghani (2019).
13. Lee & Sirgy (2018)
So, how can you improve your work-life balance? Here’s a few tips:
- Work a Compressed Work Week (40 hours a week in 4 Days or Fewer): It won’t affect your health but it will improve work-life balance11.
- Organized Religion: Believe it or not, but maintaining a connection with an organized religion, as opposed to private spirituality, is linked to being satisfied with your work-life balance12
- Role Management: Lee and Sirgy (2018)13 detail four ways of achieving work-life balance (see their article for more information):
- Spend equal amounts of time and mental energy in your different roles
- Do not have a conflict between your roles
- Balance the demand on resources that each role requires
- Integrate areas of low satisfaction with areas of high satisfaction. Here are their ways of doing this tip:
- Behaviors:
- Be social in different areas of your life
- Use your work skills in nonworking environments
- If you’re dissatisfied with one area of your life, engage in an area where you are satisfied
- Don’t let one role dominate you
- Mental
- Mentally Combine different sections of your life if you are highly satisfied with them. This high satisfaction will spill over into areas of low satisfaction
- Think about areas of your life that you’re satisfied with more often than areas that you’re dissatisfied with
- See your life from a whole-life perspective: finding satisfaction in multiple areas will increase overall life satisfaction, because all areas are connected
- Behaviors:
1. Clark, Michel, , Zhdanova, Pui,, & Baltes (2016), 2. Gooding (2018), 2. Felstead et al. (2002),
3. Zhang, Xu, Jin, & Ford (2018), 4. Litwiller, Snyder, Taylor, & Steele (2017),
5. Sarfaraz, A., & Khalid, R. (2015), 6. Ahmad, Mudassir and Pervaiz (2012)
7. Kossek & Ozeki (1998), 8.Ellahi and Mushtaq (2012),
9.Bae, Jennings, Hardeman, Kim, Lee, Littleton, & Saasa (2019), 10. Deery, M., & Jago, L. (2015).
11. Bambra, Whitehead, Sowden, Akers, & Petticrew (2008), 12. Dilmaghani (2019).
13. Lee & Sirgy (2018)