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There is no one-size-fits-all
set of policies to
enable staff to experience
better work-life
balance and boundaries.
Email gives one example of
work-life balance policy changes
that can be swiftly
implemented and
the outcome of better
work-life balance policies
can promote well-being
and also increase
staff loyalty without
impacting productivity.
In a previous lecture,
I used a case study
where a media company
started off with
meeting free Friday
and over time
this gave the staff the option
of moving to a
four-day work week.
But sometimes specific policies
such as the email charter
or the four-day work week
are not suitable
for all scenarios.
Sometimes the culture
of understanding and
flexibility needs to be created
and this takes time to do.
Another client, a global
finance company with
sites across
different continents
and countries work with me.
They reached out due to my
research on digital nomads.
They wanted to understand
how people could self-manage
their work-life boundaries as
effectively as digital nomads.
The solution was to avoid a
top-down list of policies
and instead, develop a set
of cultural rules that
supported both work-life balance
and company performance.
This work is still ongoing,
but the key cultural values
that came out of our work
included a company-wide
mentoring program whereby
work-life balance and
performance were developed
holistically and three
basic principles that
drove the organizations and
the staff's activities.
Number one, permission to
define your own commitments
and be accountable.
Two, freedom to encourage
colleagues to develop skills,
and three fairness in all
communications and interactions.
Staff and line managers
were trained in the
specifics of what these can
mean, and it was understood that
different countries and markets
might interpret
these differently.
In practice, this meant that
the email charter was used
companywide but the
four-day work week
was only adopted in some
parts of the company.
