Email invades our homes. We have it on our work computer,
our ipads/tablets, our phones and our home computers. We are tremendously
connected, or tethered, or chained or imprisoned – but only if we allow ourselves
to be treated this way.
Email may not be
the problem. The real issue is boundaries. We need to be able to say no I won’t
do this or that. This is my time. Sometimes you have to force other people to
respect your time, and your standards of work excellence, and you have to
respect yourself.
In a time when
so many people are worried about keeping their jobs or having enough money to
cover bills, there is a new paradigm that seems to be emerging that demands
that our work day never end.
This new paradigm
that has slipped into our very bedrooms is making us sick, physically sick. The
tension is never turned off. Our bodies never get a day off, to have fun, to
laugh out loud, take a hike, sit and veg in front of a good movie or football
game.
Our busyness
from work has taken over our lives like some creeping mold that is beginning to
cover us, overtaking us in our waking and sleeping moments. It’s so subtle,
most of us have no idea when or how this even happened, but it did, it’s there.
Perhaps the
issue is that we feel that we have all of these timesaving, instant tools that
propel us into faster and faster communications scenarios and the expectation
is that we will get it done faster and faster until, really, what’s the point?
If everything is a fire drill, why care?
The truth is
that people cannot be on the professional firing line 24/7 and expect to work
at peak efficiency. It’s like never letting a race horse leave the track and
then when he does get an hour or two, you only feed him the bare minimum and
then you send the poor beast out to run again until he can’t run anymore.
There’s an old
Navy saying that there will be no leave until morale improves. The irony is
that you need leave, vacation time, days off to be able to come back to work fresh,
ready for the week ahead, especially if the work you do doesn’t demand that you
are constantly making life and death decisions.
So, let’s return to our three scenarios.
Scenario One
The woman who
was expected to read her email on Sunday afternoon and show up to an 8am
meeting Monday morning may want to take her boss aside and ask for a
clarification of working hours. The executive has no need to apologize for
missing the email. Work parameters should be clearly defined. She can also tell
her boss that she does not work seven days a week and that she does not read
email seven days a week, especially on weekends. If there is an emergency, she
can ask her boss to please call her. She can also ask that if this is required,
will she receive overtime for working over the normal working hours.
This sounds
gutsy, but at some point, you have to establish boundaries for yourself, your
job, your family and your sanity. Actually, the executive in Scenario One did
just that and does not read work email to this day at home. There are also no
more ‘flash meetings’ Monday morning. Everyone benefited from one person
putting the brakes on insanity, and the constant obsessive control of her boss.
Boundaries have to be set and enforced. Also, she didn’t lose her job. She’s
still there and now she fully enjoys her weekends.
Scenario Two
You decide to
handle the email from this demanding group by keeping it professional. You
kindly explain to the boss who hosted the group, on Monday morning, that you have a deep and profound respect
for the work-life balance of your entire staff and that none of you read email
on Sundays or weekends. You thank him for understanding and promise to get him
the edited power point by close of business on Monday. Actually you get it to
him by 11am.
The outcome of
this true-life situation is that the host of this group was not professional.
He never responded to a single email, not the first one, nor the second one
where the power point presentation was provided. This man was rude. Perhaps he
was miffed that someone stood up to him. Ultimately, it is his loss.
Organizations
work with, for and among other organizations, including other companies who may
have extremely abusive policies. Each CEO, Manager, Supervisor and Executive
has a moral duty to their staff to make sure that no one else abuses their
people. People are your most critical resource. It is important that management
stand up for them.
Scenario Three
Lets go back to
our demanding boss who never takes a moment off and is chronically ill. This is
another scenario where it is critical to set your personal boundaries. While it
is easy to suggest to all who read this that you have to stand up for yourself
and set your boundaries, it is quite another to decide to do this if you are worried
about your job. However the bottom line is that you simply cannot keep up the
pace of work if you never rest your body.
Ultimately, you
won’t be able to keep your job if you are constantly out sick. Remember, if
your subconscious thinks that you need time off and you are not taking it, your
subconscious will make you sick to ensure you can finally have ‘legally
sanctioned’ down time, meaning you get to take a sick day.
It is
interesting to note that France has passed a new law that prohibits after-hours
emails. Check out this link:
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