How can employers support their employees’ work-life balance?

A checklist for employers

Nine out of ten docters surveyed agree that work-life balance is more good than not work-life balance for employees having.*

*Okay, I made that one up.

Well, there are studies that actually show that people with lives outside of work are healthier, more productive, happier in their jobs and stay longer.

All of this came to mind after reading an essay in the Atlantic by Anne-Marie Slaughter, arguing that women still can’t have it all. She walked away from a senior position in the State Department, went back to teaching International Affairs and politics at Princeton, for more time with her teenage sons. Her conclusion: today’s American workplace makes “having it all” impossible.

I don’t agree with everything in the essay, but it is thoughtful and well-done, and I admire her for choosing her kids above anything else.

I’m also finding the idea that she didn’t “have it all” tough to take. She spent two years at State with Hillary Clinton (this isn’t an endorsement) and had a professorship at Princeton to fall back on. I’d think having a fallback position like that made her more likely to have it all than most of the rest of us. It’s not like she was working the fry station or cleaning restrooms after closing. And her husband is also a professor, so he handled the home and family front while she commuted to and from Princeton and Washington.

Anne-Marie Slaughter is the one percent. I’m interested in the other 99 percent, who don’t have an illustrious job at Princeton waiting for them on a platter. I’m interested in the work-life balance that can be had by working people. The non-professors, the people with fry-station jobs, the toilet cleaners? Do they have it all? Or can they? Hard to say, but I reckon the odds aren’t good.

Not that anybody in the workplace is short on advice about balance. Every publication and everybody at the office tells you the same few things. You know the drill. Set aside time every day that you can’t touch. Turn your phone off. Get a hobby. Exercise. Eat right. Make time for real life.

None of these tips are bad. Not one. But I bet that employees won’t follow them until their bosses back them up. Otherwise, they’ll stay overworked… (workaholics**)… or, like Slaughter, conclude, “You can’t have it all.” That’s where employers come in: making room for those tips and not punishing people who use them.

**Yeah, yeah, some people truly love their long hours. Some people do. Good for them. I’m talking about the workaholics, the reluctant ones, aware of it or not.

It’s also difficult to hand out one set of tips to employers, because if you have non-exempt workers, their hours need to be tracked with precision, which can make flexibility difficult. A manufacturing plant and a retail operation are different from an office. (The office work can often be done any time, anywhere, with a laptop and a smart phone.) You can’t send a factory worker home to build the widget. That flexibility is not there. Yet, to some degree, a worker in a cubicle can do some of the job from home.

Okay, so here’s a short checklist for employers.

Have managers been told that work-life balance is a priority, and when was the last time? You want managers who have a life outside of work, not burn-outs. Explain it, and say it more than once. Managers copy what they see. A head manager who never takes a day off ends up with a team that never does either.

Do you have managers who require everyone to be in the building 8 to 6, and don’t trust anyone who isn’t? That model is dead. People don’t have to be in the office in order to work. And a person in the office is not necessarily working. Figure out who they are and bend their ears. You need them.

Have you cut back on useless meetings and busywork? Nothing wastes time and kills the soul like a bad meeting or a workfare project.

If you have shift workers, keep overtime low, and emergency last-minute overtime as rare as possible. Allow shifts to be swapped or traded if you get notice. And try to keep people on one shift. Their bodies will adjust, and they’ll relax and sleep better.

Is your technology up to date enough that employees can work from anywhere? Good.

Now tell them they don’t have to answer your texts at midnight. A genuine emergency is the only exception.

Do what you can to support their physical health. Stock a cabinet with healthy snacks, but don’t be Mr. Bloomberg. Let them pick what they eat; you’re not their dad. And offer or subsidize gym memberships if you can. Encourage them to take a run or walk and get outside in daylight once a day. A little vitamin D does a body good.

Does your company offer help with smoking, weight loss, substance abuse, or mental health? But only for those who volunteer.

Let employees know that good parenting matters to you. Their kids may be your workers someday.

Do you make room for employees who care for needy relatives? (Say, elderly parents or a sibling with special needs?) Bend a little.

Does your company encourage employees’ charity work, civic involvement, church activities? You want to help them be good members of the community. Don’t press them to give to your favorite charity, though. That can get tacky.

Do you ever ask the employees what else they’re into? Biking? Running? Whatever. Ask enough that they know it’s okay to have a life outside of the office.

Will employees be able to “have it all”? Probably not. But giving them room to have a life outside of work pays off for you as well as for them.