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Here we are inching towards the end of July and I feel as though the summer is flying by. I did go to Beacon, NY in June with a friend for a long weekend, so I have that experience for which I’m glad. Since I got back, I feel all I do is work, recover, walk my dog Shelby, and work some more. My walks with Shelby during the day are my only breaks. When the neighbors in my building see me without her, they comment that it is like I am missing a limb.
I’ve been at my new job for almost five months and I do love it. I adore my boss and the other social workers with whom I work. My boss is actually located in another state but when she was in New York City last week, she took the whole team out for brunch.
We are 100-percent remote and I don’t have a separate office in my apartment. My desk is pushed up against a window in my living room. I often don’t have time to write up my notes during the workday, so I may finish my own notes in the very early hours — think between 3 am and 4:30 am. I’m more productive at that time of the morning than after 9 at night.
I’ve been working remotely since 2015 and I love it. Until the pandemic, I went out into the field to meet patients in hospitals a couple of times a week for 3-4 hours at a time, but most of the time I was home.
Working from home is admittedly not great for work-life balance but it is extremely convenient. It allows me to walk my dog at regular intervals. You can’t beat the commute. I can always drop in a fast load of laundry, and I have access to my own coffee and food.
How to achieve a semblance of work-life balance when working from home? I try to take time to write, not document, which has and continues to be a passion of mine. I try to hold firm to not seeing clients on the weekends, even though some have requested appointments. I try to make it a point to see family or friends on the weekend, or at least speak with them. I find there are those weekends when I just need to recharge, if it’s been a particularly demanding week. But there are always pesky errands and chores that need to be done, like cleaning and grocery shopping and cleaning my apartment.
A study recently published in Frontiers in Psychology focused on work-life balance in small and medium enterprises, or SMEs, which describes the practice in which I work now. The study formulated several hypotheses about work-life balance, which proved to be true:
- Work-life balance has a positive effect on job performance.
- Work-life balance has a positive effect on job satisfaction.
- Job satisfaction has a positive influence on job performance.
- Job satisfaction significantly mediates the relationship between work-life balance and job performance.
- Family-supportive supervisor behaviors will strengthen the positive effect of work-life balance on job performance.
- Family-supportive supervisor behaviors will strengthen the positive effect of job satisfaction on job performance.
One hypothesis seems to logically follow another, which indicates how important work-life balance is to employees. It’s even more important for supervisors to model work-life balance and instill in their employees that it’s OK to log off when the day is over. As both an employee and a supervisor, I hope to be able to live up to this goal.
Thanks for reading.
Andrea
