Work-life Balance

Resilient organisations encourage a healthy work-life balance among their workforces. There is growing awareness that working long hours can damage health and family relationships and reduce satisfaction with work and life in general. Worrying about work can make it hard to ‘switch off, meaning that people can struggle to replenish their mental and physical energy after the working day.

Health and social care professionals may find it especially hard to balance the demands of their work and personal lives and detach themselves psychologically from work. This can lead to stress, feelings of strain mental health difficulties and relationship difficulties (Kalliath et al., 2012; Kinman & Teoh, 2018; Kinman et al., 2020b). Conflict between work and personal life also has serious implications for workforce retention (Buchan et al., 2019; Cooper, 2019).

It is crucial to make a clear and strong commitment to supporting work-life balance among your workforce and to provide practical strategies at organisational and individual levels. Leaders might consider developing a specific policy for helping practitioners achieve an effective work-life balance. Some issues that could be covered in such a policy are provided below.

Making a commitment to work-life balance

An organisation that is committed to maintaining a healthy work-life balance places this high on its list of priorities. Such an organisation:

• Acknowledges that individuals are healthier, happier and more productive when they have a ‘healthy’ balance between their work and their personal life.

• Is aware that ‘one-size fits all’ strategies are unlikely to be effective and people’s preferences for integrating and separating their work with their personal life will differ. What they consider a ‘healthy’ work-life balance will also vary. 

• Recognises that supporting work-life balance will benefit the organisation (and people who access services) as well as its employees.

• Asks practitioners for their views on how best to support work-life balance.

• Adopts a flexible approach (acknowledges that people’s needs relating to work-life balance will change over time) and offers a range of flexible working strategies and encourages their uptake.

• Has policies to support carers but ensures that work-life balance initiatives are equitable and not only targeted at parents of young children.

• Acknowledges that work-life balance is not just about ensuring people stop work on time; strategies are also needed to help them ‘switch off’ emotionally and cognitively from work.

• Encourages people to work efficiently and productively, and measures performance by output (not hours worked).

• Encourages joint responsibility between individuals and leaders to implement effective work-life balance solutions.

• Regularly reviews workloads to ensure duties are achievable in ‘standard’ working hours.

• Is vigilant for signs of over-commitment and over-involvement to the job among its practitioners and encourages boundary-setting.

• Encourages leaders to lead by example by openly prioritising their own work-life balance.

• Ensures that practitioners who take up flexible working options or who work at home are not disadvantaged in terms of promotion or progression.

• Makes sure practitioners take their full annual leave entitlement.

• Is aware of up-to-date innovations in promoting work-life balance.

• Evaluates the success of any strategies implemented to support work-life balance.

The quick win on achieving work-life balance provides some practical tips.