Autonomy

“There’s almost a weird masochistic pride that some people take, and being like—'I work WAY more than 40 hours. That’s the bare minimum.' And what is that? Why do we have that kind of culture?” – Ciannat Howett, environmental lawyer, Georgia

For knowledge workers, it’s difficult to know how much work is enough, when it’s good enough, and when it’s done. Many work environments still rely on face time and hours worked to judge performance, and overtly or unconsciously signal that more is always better. Some workers even pretend to work long hours, just to fit in.¹ By design, organizations reward work, not making time for life, caregiving, or work-life balance.

• Perceived social norms: Humans are driven to conform to what they see others doing, often without realizing it.² Many workers who struggle with work-life conflict—yet have a measure of autonomy—see the problem as one of time management or a lack of willpower. But it’s hard not to overwork and overdo if that’s all you see everyone else doing. We don’t see people on vacation. We do see late night e-mails. And in many workplaces, intensive work, not time off, is what workers talk about to show status.
• Self-image: Humans are motivated to maintain a positive self- image.³ Many workers are driven not just to be good, but excellent, which in many performance evaluations is described as going “above and beyond.” Workers will strive intensely to meet that ambiguous goal.
• Identity as a worker: We each have dozens of different social identities—worker, parent, caregiver, child, friend, community member. Because we spend much of our time working, our identity as a worker may become dominant.⁴ That can lead workers to, for instance, divert attention to the pull of checking work e-mails in the evening rather than devoting full time and attention to time with family or friends.

Promising New Ideas

• Create urgency around scheduling paid time off. Use technology and reminders to get workers to actively choose to schedule vacation, facilitate planning for it, creating contingency plans to handle workload, and providing slack to smoothly transition back to work.⁵
• Offer incentives aligned with values to disconnect. Offering to donate to a favorite charity for every day a worker disconnects, for example, encourages real rest by signaling rest is valued, and uses loss aversion, or the discomfort from not having money sent to an important charity, to reinforce rest behavior.⁶
• Rethink promotions and evaluations to reward work-life balance. By taking a clear stand that work-life balance is a value, that the “rock stars” are not just those who go “above and beyond” at work, the organization signals that overwork is not the expectation.
• Make non-work time visible. “Uncover” and be transparent about working flexibly, as Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg did when she said she left the office at 5:30 for family dinner time. Put life events on your calendar and be honest about how that time is important.
• Put your “To Do” list on your calendar. Scheduling when tasks will get done helps reduce decision fatigue and allows workers and managers to intervene before workloads get too heavy.

Best Practice

• To counter burnout and the loss of women in science and academic medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine sought to redesign a work culture that equated excellence with long hours, devising a “time bank” of work and life supports for hours spent volunteering, mentoring, and other “invisible” but expected work. Preliminary results of a pilot found improved work-life balance, greater job satisfaction and loyalty and higher rates of successful grant approvals.⁷

“When I work hours that are outside my normal boundaries, I’m very ineffective. Most of the stuff needs to be redone. I need time away to clear my head. I’ll come back the next day with better ideas. Our CEO is the same. He’s an avid mountain climber. He says he’s able to do his best thinking when he doesn’t have any other worries than where the pickaxe goes next.” – Michelle Hickox, executive vice president and CFO, Independent Bank, Texas