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Business and Professional Communication, 3rd edition
Kelly M. Quintanilla, Shawn T. Wahl
Chapter 14: Work-Life Balance
Lecture Notes
Learning Objec'ves:
14-1 Discuss the impact of work-life balance on professional excellence
14-2 Define work-life balance
14-3 Identify the triggers to imbalance
14-4 Develop strategies for achieving work-life balance
Outline:
I. Introduction
A. Maintaining work-life balance can be difficult to achieve
i. Step away from the e-mail.
ii. Leave work at work.
II. The Importance of Work-Life Balance
A. Important Because:
i. Imbalance between your work life and personal life can negatively influence the
way you communicate.
ii. Work-life balance fosters meaningful and successful relationships at home and at
work.
iii. Work-life balance is necessary to sustain professional excellence.
B. Work-Life Balance Defined
i. Boundary is the line or division between work and life.
a. Assumption is that if there is a boundary between work and life, then
iii. Definition of work is an instrument of activity intended to provide goods and
services to support life.
iv. Definition of community is a group of people identified as interdependent and
who discuss actions and share practices and have a concern for the common
good.
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C. Individual Benefits
i. Burnout can be prevented with work-life balance.
a. Burnout is defined as chronic exhaustion from persistent workload,
decreased motivation, and apathy toward work.
b. Burnout caused by:
1. Same work with li3le variation
2. Giving a lot and ge5ng li3le thanks back
3. No sense of accomplishment or meaning in work
4. Under constant pressure to produce, perform, and meet
unrealistic deadlines
5. Working with difficult people
6. conflict and tension among workers and abundance of criticism
ii. Benefits Include:
a. Have greater control over working life
b. Have the time to focus more on life outside of work
c. Don't bring problems from home to work and vice versa
D. Organizational Benefits
i. Organizational problems
a. Employee reten'on—ge5ng employees to continue working for the
same company.
b. Employee a8ri'on—the loss or turnover of employees to other jobs
and industries perceived as having healthier workplace cultures.
ii. Benefits Include:
a. Maximized available labor
b. Reduced costs
c. Retaining valued employees
III. Triggers to Imbalance
A. Imbalance triggers are experiences (conflict, aggressions, overload, negativity) that
cause professionals to feel drained, used, abused, and unhappy.
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B. Personality Types
i. Personality Type A
a. Highly competitive, driven, focused on time and deadlines, aggressive,
find it difficult to relax.
ii. Personality Type B
a. Laid back, easygoing, don't find it difficult to relax.
b. Trait lends itself to procrastination, last-minute pushing to finish.
iii. Personality Type AB—combination of both types.
C. The Impact of difficult People on Work-Life Balance
i. Angry Customers and Clients
a. We o?en focus on how employee communication skills can optimize
customer satisfaction.
b. The emotional and psychological demands of dealing with angry
customers can serve as an imbalance trigger.
ii. Workplace Bullying
a. Bullying at work can have a direct and indirect influence on
organizational production and a direct impact on an individual’s
work-life balance.
b. Workplace bullying is defined as repeated acts and practices that are
directed intentionally or unconsciously and that cause embarrassment,
humiliation, and stress.
c. Bullying negatively influences job performances, causes an unhealthy
work environment, and leads employees to spend their time away from
work trying to figure out how to survive or cope.
d. What does workplace bullying look like?
1. Calling out people who are di@erent
2. Using people as scapegoats
e. The impact of workplace bullying
1. Employee motivation, a5tude, focus on tasks are destroyed by
the bully.
2. Productive, commi3ed, and positive employees will tend to not
go the extra mile.
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3. Organizational change is difficult since the bully is fighting o@ all
the positive agents for change in the organization.
4. Workplace bullies act as organizational cancer, eventually killing
the entire business.
iii. Workplace Mobbing
a. Workplace mobbing—the nonsexual harassment of a coworker by a
group of other workers or other members of an organization designed to
secure the removal from the organization of the one targeted.
b. Victims are typically accomplished professionals who exemplify
commitment, honesty, integrity, intelligence, innovation, and
competence.
c. Mobbing is a group a3ack on a worker as opposed to an a3ack by a
single individual.
d. What does workplace mobbing look like?
1. Phase 1: The triggering event. An event occurs that leads an
employee to stand out as di@erent due to high performance or
disagreement with status quo.
2. Phase 2: Aggressive acts and psychological assaults against the
vic'm. A mob forms and begins to punish the target, cu5ng the
person out of professional decisions. Gossip and rumors are
spread.
D. Life Demands
i. Household and Family Responsibilities
a. Regardless of our home situation, we all have responsibilities at home
that must be dealt with.
b. Many workers have children or older parents who need care.
ii. Health Responsibilities
IV. Strategies for Balance
A. Knowing Yourself
i. Determine the priorities in your life and assess how much time you devote to
each priority.
ii. Know your personality type.
iii. Learn to say no.
B. Developing Emotional Intelligence
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i. Emo'onal intelligence is your ability to monitor your own and others' feelings
and emotions, to discriminate among them, and to use this information to guide
your thinking and actions.
ii. Understanding Anger
a. Not every professional experiences anger because of imbalance triggers.
b. Anger is an emotional state that varies in intensity from mild irritation to
intense fury and rage, a feeling of keen displeasure for what we regard
as a wrong toward others or ourselves.
c. People become angry when they encounter real or perceived threats.
d. External triggers to anger are things going on in the environment at
work or at home.
iii. Releasing Anger in Healthy Ways
a. Admit you are angry
b. Identify the anger
c. Ask what you want to accomplish with your anger
d. Talk it out
C. Developing Time-Management Skills
i. Achieving balance in your life means taking control of how you manage your
time.
ii. Identify external 'me wasters—things you don't feel you have control over.
iii. Identify internal 'me wasters—things brought on by mind-set, motivation, and
bad habits.
D. Using Information Technologies to Maintain Balance
i. Information technologies like iPhones, Blackberries, and other similar
communication and organization tools can help manage and maintain work-life
balance.
E. Taking a Vacation
i. Many workers in the United States do not take all of their vacation days.
ii. Reasons include:
a. The need to schedule vacation time in advance
iii. Organizations and leaders must encourage vacations and tell other workers to
not disturb the person while on vacation.
V. KEYS to Excellence to Work-Life Balance
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A. Know yourself—know what makes you happy in relation to time both at and away from
your job.
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