Work-Life Balance in the New Normal Situation
By Evar Louie H Magamay
Before the pandemic, achieving work-life balance for the majority is being away from the
office to have extra time for family and other personal agendas. However, with the new normal
situation, separating work from our concerns became complicated. With the advent of working
remotely or working outside the office, our home also became our workstation. This new normal
situation gives us a thin line difference between work and our personal lives. With this situation,
we are disoriented with our daily routines, and working remotely became a significant challenge
for us to separate it from our personal lives.
As a Human Resource practitioner, we need to address our personnel’s wellness and worklife balance, mostly during these challenging times of the pandemic. Maintaining this aspect is
very important since it dramatically affects our personnel’s morale, which eventually leads to
greater productivity. Our personnel’s physical fitness is also essential for our body to withstand
our vulnerabilities with the current pandemic. So in this article, we will be discussing the ways on
how we can achieve work-life balance for both working remotely and working at the office setup.
The current COVID-19 situation causes stress to most of us having a similar environment
for work and personal lives. However, this is not the story of working remotely before the
pandemic. Based on the study of Owl Labs about the State of Remote Work in 2019 with 1,200
U.S. workers between the ages of 22 and 65, it was found out that employees who regularly work
remotely are happier and stay with their companies longer than on-site employees. It was also
revealed that the full-time remote workers said that they are satisfied with their job 22% more than
that personnel who are working at the office. Work-life balance increased productivity, better
focus, less stress, and avoiding commuting in public transportation are the primary reasons these
persons work remotely (Morse, 2019). The salient information of the said research, as stated by
Owl Labs based on their State of Remote Work 2019 Report, are the following:
1.
At least some of the time, workers who work remotely are happier, feel more
trusted, less stressed, are more inclined to recommend their employer to a friend, and are less likely
to leave than their office-bound colleagues.
2.
People choose to work remotely to achieve a better work-life balance, increase their
productivity and focus, and avoid commuting.
3.
Remote workers are 29% happier in their jobs than on-site workers.
4.
Working remotely makes employees happier, feel more trusted, better able to
achieve work-life balance, and more inclined to take a pay cut to benefit from added flexibility.
With this new normal situation, the story of work-life balance became different. The
pandemic has triggered stressors in careers, personal finances, and family life, with almost 70% of
workers saying that this pandemic causes the most stressful moment of their job, and they said that
it is even more stressful than other major events like 9/11 and the Great Recession of the late 2000s
(Farzan, 2020). Before, achieving work-life balance is merely being away from the office to attend
to your personal schedule. Even if most of the employees are working remotely, there is a trend of
unhappy personnel based on different surveys worldwide. Despite working remotely, personnel
tend to spend more time in an online meeting and lose track of working hours to prove their
productivity for being away from the office. It resulted in no clear boundaries of working time for
the office or for the family (Kang, 2020).
Being in the field of Human Resource, the following are my suggestions based on my
learning and experience for our personnel to attain work-life balance to remain effective and
productive as an employee and a responsible member of the family on the other end. These
suggestions can be applicable for personnel working at the office or working remotely.
1.
Employee Engagement – Engaged employees can still be useful, whether working
at the office or working outside the office. As long as our personnel is committed to the attainment
of the organization’s desired objectives in any set-up, that person can still deliver excellent outputs
on time.
2.
Family responsibility – Being good at work does not necessarily mean that one is
also doing well for the family. Work and personal life are the two most important aspects of any
person who is working, and balancing these two is very challenging. These two are in both ends
(Figure 1) that need to have the so-called “work-life equilibrium.” The majority are excellent in
only one end, but only very few can balance work and life. Some are willing to sacrifice the other
end to achieve the peak of the other. To be specific, giving up a career may result in longer family
time but may also result in lesser career opportunities and lesser income. On the contrary,
sacrificing the family for a job may result in better career opportunities, but family relationships
may be affected. Thus, work-life equilibrium is essential to achieve greater satisfaction because
sacrificing one over the other may result to better satisfaction to only one side but less satisfaction
on the other.
Source: http://mindframes.co.in
3.
Self-discipline – Right now, there are various distractions for personnel to have a
focus on work. Any personnel can browse the internet using their smartphones or personal
computers/laptops or any other gadget on the tip of a finger. Despite several organizational
restrictions on this aspect, if our employees don’t have self-discipline, it will most likely result in
unproductivity.
4.
Set and follow your schedule – To attain work-life balance, one should set a
schedule separately for work and personal agenda. This is a must for those working remotely since
having mixed schedules may feel like working most of the time. By having a detailed plan for
work and personal concerns, attaining a work-life balance is very doable. Further, following your
schedule will undoubtedly result in efficiency for both work or personal activities. This practice
will avoid procrastination of forcing to get the deliverables done within the given timeline.
5.
Physical Wellness – Despite the necessity to boost our immune system by having
an excellent physical and mental condition, many of us are still tempted to skip exercises.
Undoubtedly, physical conditioning is essential to preserve our health both physically and mentally
by working remotely or staying at home. Nuvance Health mentioned the following benefits why
exercise is necessary mostly during this time of COVID-19 pandemic:
a.
Prevent weight gain – This is known information that exercise can
help you burn extra calories. However, due to some restrictions and fear of having contact
with Covid-19 people, some will opt to stay at home than to go outside.
b.
Reduces stress and anxiety – Another benefit of exercise is that it
reduces stress levels and develops our emotional stability.
c.
Improves sleep – Exercise can give us better sleep at night, and having
a well-rested night can truly boost our immune system.
d.
Beneficial for older adults and people with chronic health conditions
such as diabetes, arthritis, or heart disease - Regular exercise can help us to improve
balance, flexibility, strength, mobility, and cardiovascular health. Plus, it can boost energy
and overall well-being.
This new normal situation also brought physical exercise limitations despite Inter-Agency
Task Force (IATF) Guidelines that non-contact sports and other outdoor activities like walking,
running, jogging, and biking are allowed (IATF Guidelines 2020). Due to the fear of contacting
someone with Covid-19, the majority opted to stay inside their homes and forego the necessity to
have physical exercises despite knowing its benefits to our health. However, staying indoors is still
not a valid excuse to skip from having great physical activities. Stein, 2020 suggest the following
indoor exercises to avoid outdoor activities:
a.
workout.
Treadmill, elliptical, or stationary bike, you are good to go with your cardio
b.
Aerobics or dancing on your own or with workout videos.
c.
Circuits with push-ups, squats, front and side lunges, calf raises, squats,
jumping jacks, crunches, planks, and any other exercise you can think of to get moving. It helps to
go from one activity to another without resting, and you can alternate more intense ones with less
intense ones to get a break while still moving.
d.
Setting up your computer at a standing desk, or making a makeshift standing
desk by merely putting the laptop on a countertop for a while to work, can allow you to engage a
few more muscles and move around a bit.
e.
You could walk around the house while talking on the phone to colleagues
or before heading to the kitchen for a drink of water.
6.
Personal reflection/evaluation – Having a daily meditation or quiet time can also
inspire us to achieve work-life balance. The best practice to have this is early in the morning before
being overwhelmed with our workloads and responsibilities at home. Through this practice, we
can reflect our desires with other factors around us. Most importantly, we can remember our heart’s
desire with the will of our Creator. I believe that only our Creator can perfectly maintain our worklife equilibrium. Due to our nature as humans, we tend to be selfish and prioritize our aspirations
that will usually result to work-life imbalance.
7.
Accountability – Personal evaluation may not be enough in attaining the work-life
equilibrium. Accountability is also essential in having a work-life balance. Having someone to
regularly and openly tell-us on how we are balancing the challenges of our lives and work at the
same time is very crucial.
Conclusion
To have consistency for our employees’ productivity, our personnel should be engaged
with their respective units or organizations. It is also essential that our personnel should have the
self-discipline to follow their work schedule and remain productive wherever they may be
working. To have work-life equilibrium, each personnel should value both work and personal
aspirations; sacrificing one aspect would result in an imbalance of work and personal lives. Thus,
it is necessary to have a work-life balance, and there are suggested actions to attain such ideal
conditions even during this challenging time of the pandemic.
Another significant factor in attaining work-life balance is physical wellness. There are
several limitations in achieving such desired conditions; however, even at home, various exercises
are applicable to attain a healthy and active lifestyle. Having a good physical condition
dramatically affects the motivation and productivity of our personnel. Most importantly, having a
work-life balance is the best motivator for our personnel to be more productive even during these
challenging times.
References
Farzan, Sunshine. 2020, June 23. Switch Off Covid-19 Stress: 5 Ways to Achieve Work-life
Balance in the New Normal. Entrepreneur Asia Pacific. Retrieved from
https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/352278
Kang, Mint. (2020, June 29). COVID-19 Has Been Both Good And Bad For Work-Life Balance.
People Matters. Retrieved from https://www.peoplemattersglobal.com/article/employeerelations/covid-19-has-been-both-good-and-bad-for-work-life-balance-26159
IATF
Guidelines.
(2020,
July
16).
Resolution
No
56.
Retrieved
from
https://www.officialgazette.gov.ph/downloads/2020/07jul/20200716-IATF-RESOLUTION-NO56.pdf
Morse, Brit. (2019, September 18). Study: Remote Workers Are Happier, Stay in Their Jobs Longer,
and Work More Hours Than Onsite Employees. Company Culture. Retrieved from
https://www.inc.com/brit-morse/remote-work-survey-owl-labs.html
Mindframes.2020.
Work-life
equilibrium
focus.
Retrieved
http://mindframes.co.in/adults/adult-group-sessions/work-life-equilibrium/
from
Stein, Natalie. (2020, March 24). COVID-19 and Exercise: Staying Active while Socially
Distancing. Retrieved from https://www.lark.com/blog/covid-19-and-exercise/
Nuvance Health. (2020). Exercise is Essential for Well-Being During COVID-19 Pandemic
Retrieved from https://www.nuvancehealth.org/coronavirus/exercise-is-essential-for-well-beingduring-covid-19-pandemic