Work-Life Balance is Dead. Go for Work-Life Integration Instead

Work-life balance sounds great: work stays in the office, and your personal life happens beyond. Hours are divided cleanly between them, the scale never tipping too much to one side, so it never gets overwhelming.

But it’s inaccurate–impossible, even.

The wrong assumption of work-life balance

While it’s necessary to leave a lot of time for recharging (death from overwork would be nasty), work-life balance makes the wrong assumption that we can compartmentalize ourselves so absolutely, as if work and life were two separate worlds that would never intersect.

How we act might be different, sure, but at the end of the day, they still blur into each other. We treat our friends out because we got a promotion; we’re distracted during a meeting because of a breakup the night before.

On top of that, technology ensures that we’re accessible all the time. Social media platforms, online chats, emails, video calls, and other means of instant communication have changed the very landscape of work.

People can collaborate regardless of distance, and this has given rise to freelancing and telecommuting–and, in turn, more flexible working arrangements. Locally, Senate Bill No. 1363, which allows telecommuting, was approved this year in support of work-from-home programs.

A mindset shift to work-life integration

Instead of work-life balance, it’d be more timely to go for work-life integration. This means bringing your entire self to work and acknowledging that your work is part of who you are. Your hobbies and passions, your strengths, ultimately inform what you do.

Steve Jobs, for example, was extremely interested in calligraphy, and this allowed him to craft the Apple products that we know now.

This also extends to coworkers. Since we’re around them a lot–at least 40 hours, in a traditional job–work-life integration implies that we’re allowed to get to know them better rather than keeping it merely transactional.

More than a higher salary, more than extra free time, human beings value relationships. For one, 40% of startups have founders that were friends even before. Consider the statistics that having a friend that you see regularly might give you the same happiness as getting a significant increase (around $100,000 more) in your yearly salary.

Apply this to your workplace, and you get happier, more productive employees–research even says that people with a best friend at work are seven times more engaged than those without.

Happier employees: good news for your company

Overall, work-life integration benefits both employees and the company itself. Clinical psychologist Maria Sirois adds that it results in more fulfilled employees.

It’s also important to remember, though, that there’s no hard and fast way of implementing work-life integration, as it varies from person to person. What’s consistent is a respect for autonomy and each individual’s natural working style.

With the rapid advances of technology showing no signs of stopping and millennials flooding into the workplace–plus Filipinos’ desire to spend quality time with family and loved ones–work-life integration is here to stay.  

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source https://sprout.ph/blog/work-life-balance-is-dead-go-for-work-life-integration-instead/