Finding work/life balance is as important for many men as it is for working women
In my interviews conducted for my book ‘Work/Life Balance for Dummies’, I came across a lot of inspiring stories from real blokes. That’s right — if you’re a bloke Down Under, it no longer means that you can open a bottle of beer with your eye-socket whilst keeping your eyes on the cricket on TV. These days, young guys straight out of university, fathers and childless blokes are doing much more to get their full share of work/life balance.
Radiation scientist Kent ran into the brick wall of an existing workplace culture when he started a new position in the health industry. “Officially, we had access to flexible starting and finishing times and days off as time in lieu, but when I asked a colleague about arranging a flex day off, he nearly fell off his chair. He told me that ‘No-one actually takes a day off here.’ My eight-hour day sounded fine in theory, but in practice I was required to be at work by 8am and rarely left before 7pm.”
After several months of long workdays, unwieldy workloads and very little time spent seeing his children awake on week-nights, Kent decided to take a stand. “My stand was really just to ask for what was already my right, an existing workplace condition. I started keeping a timesheet and asked for a day off every now and then.”
His workmates now do the same. “We’ve still got a long way to go in terms of the work-hours expectations, but at least the hours are now being recorded. Having a day off — even if I feel as though I do three extra days’ work for that one day — is a step in the right direction.”
Paul, the small-business owner
Paul, groans when he lists the reasons for making the ‘convenience’ of interstate travel anything but. “You find more delayed flights than a couple of years ago, and much more hassle with security, parking, over-booking and being expected to walk straight off the plane and into the office after waking up at 4 am on one side of the world and eventually arriving at 4 pm somewhere else.”
Paul reduced the need for travel with technology: “What’s the Internet, video conferencing, telephone and email for if not to save time and money on travel?” he asks. “If it’s crucial to meet up with an important client face-to-face, I can. But if it’s a regular briefing then I’ll do it via teleconference. I think it’s quicker, easier and the other party is relieved to not have to travel to me as well.”
IT professional Mick
After moving to Australia with his partner and young baby, Mick found the long hours expected in his Australian workplace difficult. “The 40 hour-plus week was a bit of a shock,” he recalls. “If I left my desk at five o’clock, I ended up doing what felt like ‘The Walk of Shame’, because everyone was working such long hours.” This was a puzzle to him. In a beautiful country with the ocean, hills, vineyards and beautiful weather, why did people feel compelled to work until it was way past dark?
Gardening had always been an interest and he became involved with the local permaculture club. He quit his IT job and started helping a friend with his gardening business, but soon ended up with enough gardening clients of his own. “I’m on less than half of what I could have earned in IT, but I’m much happier — no contest,” he says His wife, Jo, works as an occupational therapist three days a week, and they have enough to pay their mortgage, raise their two daughters and enjoy a considerable amount of life outside of their work commitments.
Mick has no regrets: “You have to ask yourself this question: how much money do you want? What else do you want out of life? We have a simple lifestyle and have already done our years of extensive (and childless!) travel and aren’t really into fancy cars or eating out.” Tim explains further that his flexibility in working hours has meant that he has greater involvement in the girls’ school activities. “Because Jo is on set hours, it’s easier for me to drop them off and pick them up for school, which is great. There’s no way I would have been able to do this if I’d stuck with my old IT job.”
Robert, the service station manager
After working in the family-owned service station for eleven years, Robert’s life changed when the business was bought out by a nationwide chain owned by one of the country’s largest retailers. He felt increasingly frustrated with the impersonal aspect of the business and the sudden inflexibility in work hours and conditions. “Head office just wasn’t interested in us or our community. None of us felt as though we were appreciated and I didn’t like their ‘do it for the shareholders’ approach,” he says.
The situation became too much to bear, and he’d heard from a friend (who had infamously tried 20 jobs in a four year period) who had bought a garden maintenance franchise. “I thought he’d quit within six months, but sure enough, four years later he was still in it and making a success out of it.” His friend was separated, and valued the flexibility that running his own business could provide. He was able to pick up his daughter after school and arrange to have school holidays off in order to be an active parent. Intrigued, Robert started looking into buying a similar franchise of his own.
Robert and his wife Edwina bought a well-recognized and respected gardening franchise. Several years on, Robert is still enthusiastic about the decision to run his own business. “I really enjoy it. It’s great to work hard and know that the majority of the money I earn comes straight back to me. The harder I work, the more I earn, and I now have a really good list of regular customers. I have some bad days occasionally when the weather’s against me, but then I think about how I hated having to sit behind a desk and be told what to do and how I now get to make my own decisions about my workload and what clients I take on.”
Quotes from other real blokes
Richard, IT professional: “I think we all have to make an effort to just switch off our computers and go home empty handed. Those of us on salaries are the real losers as we effectively get paid less for every extra hour we work. If you keep on working longer, it eventually becomes expected of you forever. Tradespeople and hourly-wage earners are at least rewarded for their extra hours. Just say no. I know that I can work more effectively within 8 solid hours instead of 12 where I’m just hanging around looking as though I’m working harder.”
Dave, Town Planner: “I get sick of having to attend evening meetings that go on for hours without anyone thinking of those of us with lives outside of work who been in the office since 8am. I am getting contacted now by agencies because my skills are becoming ‘known’, and I intend on following these up. Make no mistake about it; I will negotiate a much better work arrangement in my next job. There’s no reason why I shouldn’t be able to work from home for part of the time, or have earlier start and finish times so that I can pick up the boys and go for a surf before work sometimes.”
Michael, Public Servant: “E-mail used to eat into so much of my day and I’d still log-on and check them at night when I got home. Now, every Wednesday I have an email free day. I don’t read e-mails, respond to them or write them. Instead, I focus on whatever the most urgent task is that I’ve got on my plate. If I need to contact anyone I get on the phone or walk over to their desk and talk to them.”
Philip, Functions Manager: “My job is less high-powered than the role I was doing in Melbourne, but I have less than an hour’s total commute time each day and we’re a proudly one-car family. We let the answering machine answer the phone between 6 and 7:30pm so that we avoid cutting into our evening meal together wasting our time with telemarketers. People who know us know that we’re available to talk after 8pm, when we’ve finished dinner and our son is in bed.”
What would your story be?
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