Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Good Morning. This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Speaker 1: Today's tip is about how to maintain a good work
Speaker 1: life balance if you travel for work. First, I have
Speaker 1: to say that I'm not a huge fan of the
Speaker 1: phrase work life balance. It implies that work and life
Speaker 1: are on opposite sides of the scale, and for one
Speaker 1: to go up, the other has to go down. But
Speaker 1: this misses the mark when you look at the whole
Speaker 1: of time, work and high quality family or leisure time
Speaker 1: are not the only things that people do. They do housework,
Speaker 1: they watch TV, they surf the web. People could spend
Speaker 1: more time working and more time interacting with their families
Speaker 1: by chopping other things. Indeed, this is what happened on
Speaker 1: a society wide level. Women, for instance, spend more hours
Speaker 1: working for pay now than they did in the nineteen sixties,
Speaker 1: and they also spend more time interacting with their children
Speaker 1: than they did in the nineteen sixties. How is this possible, Well,
Speaker 1: they spend much less time on housework. That's where the
Speaker 1: time opened up. But back to the issue of work
Speaker 1: life balance and travel. Let's say that you do need
Speaker 1: to travel for work. Is it possible to maintain a
Speaker 1: good home life and get some leisure time too, I
Speaker 1: think it is. The first step is keeping your travel
Speaker 1: in context. I find that even people who might say
Speaker 1: they travel all the time seldom truly travel all the time.
Speaker 1: For instance, looking at new consultants who might go to
Speaker 1: client sites Monday to Thursday most weeks, we might find
Speaker 1: that they spend three nights away from home about forty
Speaker 1: weeks a year. That sounds like a lot, but it's
Speaker 1: a hundred twenty nights. There are three hundred sixty nights
Speaker 1: in a year, So these people who might say they're
Speaker 1: constantly traveling our home more than two thirds of the time.
Speaker 1: We've talked in previous episode is about how five pm
Speaker 1: Thursday is the midpoint of the week. So someone who
Speaker 1: leaves at five am Monday morning and his home five
Speaker 1: pm Thursday is only gone for half the time. It's
Speaker 1: important to keep this in perspective, of course, regardless of
Speaker 1: the math, if you are gone three nights a week
Speaker 1: on a regular basis, this can certainly feel like a
Speaker 1: lot of time on the road, both for you and
Speaker 1: for your family, particularly if your partner is in charge
Speaker 1: of dealing with young kids while you're gone, But there
Speaker 1: are a few things you can do to make your
Speaker 1: life feel more balanced and your family's life feel better
Speaker 1: as well. First, when you're on the road, build in
Speaker 1: time for any personal pursuits you'd otherwise need kid coverage for.
Speaker 1: If you're gone during the work week, your partner is
Speaker 1: probably not going to be thrilled about you going to
Speaker 1: the gym for a long session on Saturday, so don't go.
Speaker 1: Then go Monday night, and then Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday
Speaker 1: morning at your hotel. You've taken care of this, so
Speaker 1: you can take over and send your spouse to the
Speaker 1: gym when you get back. Also, when you're on the road,
Speaker 1: work the extra hours you're not around your family, so
Speaker 1: there's less of an opportunity cost. This way, you can
Speaker 1: come home early from work on Friday and maybe Thursday too.
Speaker 1: You can minimize any work on the weekends. You can
Speaker 1: also double up when you're home on family activities you
Speaker 1: might have missed during the week. For instance, if you're traveling,
Speaker 1: you're not doing family dinner, but why not get everyone
Speaker 1: up for a family breakfast on Friday and do a
Speaker 1: family brunch on Saturday, Adding two extra family meals on
Speaker 1: the weekend is the equivalent in meal totals of having
Speaker 1: been there for Tuesday and Wednesday dinner. Finally, you can
Speaker 1: look for little ways to do what I call homing
Speaker 1: from work. Plenty of people work from home, but homing
Speaker 1: from work is the opposite doing little personal tasks during
Speaker 1: breaks or downtime. If you only do these tasks when
Speaker 1: you're home, and you're gone from home half the time,
Speaker 1: you'll have less time to relax and enjoy yourself. And
Speaker 1: while it might not be a great idea to do
Speaker 1: personal tasks during time that's truly work time. When you travel,
Speaker 1: there's lots of gray area. If you've flow into California
Speaker 1: from New York, use those early hours when you're up
Speaker 1: but it's business hours on the East Coast to make
Speaker 1: doctors and dentist appointments for yourself and anyone else you
Speaker 1: need to do this for call an elderly relative during
Speaker 1: a break during meetings, fill out camp forms and kid
Speaker 1: year book orders and the like from your hotel room.
Speaker 1: That way, when you get back, you can focus on
Speaker 1: your family and not on all the little administrative tasks
Speaker 1: of life. You'll feel more balanced, and that's a good thing.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, This is Laura. Thanks for listening and
Speaker 1: here's to making the most of our time. Hey, everybody,
Speaker 1: I'd love to hear from you. You can send me
Speaker 1: your tips, your questions, or anything else. Just connect with
Speaker 1: me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at Before Breakfast Pod.
Speaker 1: That's b E the number four, then breakfast p o D.
Speaker 1: You can also shoot me an email at Before Breakfast
Speaker 1: podcast at i heeart media dot com that Before Breakfast
Speaker 1: is spelled out with all the letters. Thanks so much,
Speaker 1: I look forward to staying in touch. Before Breakfast is
Speaker 1: a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from
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