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Dear Community,

From North America to South America, but where are we going today? Today's destination is none other than the continent: Europe! 🚀

European countries are known for maintaining a healthy work-life balance. This is also confirmed by OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) data, for example. Looking at the ranking of OECD member states in terms of work-life balance, it is clear that European countries are currently leading the way. Click on "Show content" to see the ranking list:

 

 

Italy, Denmark and Norway are the "top 3" countries with the best work-life balance (from right to left). Let's take a closer look at the countries:
 

🇼đŸ‡č Italy (Ranking: 9.4 out of 10)
In Italy, full-time employees spend an average of 16.5 hours on basic needs such as eating or sleeping and leisure activities.

đŸ‡©đŸ‡° Denmark (Ranking: 8.6 out of 10)
In Denmark, full-time employees spend an average of 15.7 hours on basic needs such as eating or sleeping and leisure activities.

🇳🇮 Norway (Ranking: 8.5 out of 10)
In Norway, full-time employees spend an average of 15.7 hours on basic needs such as eating or sleeping and leisure activities.

 

The OECD average is 15 hours. This means that all countries are well above average.
 

What is a "good" work-life balance?

Essentially, a “good” work-life balance is about finding a way to balance the stresses of work and life with personal joys, triumphs, moments of delight, and happiness. That means having a good balance of work that earns income and provides meaning, with a life outside of work that is positive and joyful overall could be considered a good work-life balance. As a very basic understanding, this is what we might define as a good balance. - HR Lexicon
 

What can HR do to help?

Free time is the most important asset that allows people to spend time on their own well-being, family time or personal interests. Long working hours not only mean less time for these areas of life, but are also associated with increased stress and potential effects on health. The challenge is therefore to find a balance between work and private life.

👉 Given the digital age and the diverse repertoire of tools and techniques/ methods, let's get creative and start a discussion around the following question.

 

HR-Discussion

From your experience, what tools or techniques can contribute to a better work-life balance for employees? Feel free to share from your professional experience. 🙂

 

As always, we'll put €5 in the money pot for each of your comments! 💰

Have a great start to the week,
Melissa and the Personio Voyager Community Team

Depends a lot on the nature of work, but good project planning and project staffing goes a long way so that people don’t need to stretch more than necessary. 

Good morning Community, 👋

Thank you so much for you contribution @Edda van der Ende! 😊

I am also interested in hearing more points of views: @Stefan H. @Julia MT @Bojana @marielle.van.wieringen what do you think about this topic? Let’s continue the discussion. 🚀

Best,
Melissa

 

I like your thought a lot, @Edda van der Ende! 
Helps so much that people aren’t burning out, only like that you can have a great team spirit and retention. 
How is it for you with the fluctuation? - What is the biggest driver why people are leaving the company?
Is work-life balance a point on that list?


Adding up on that, I think it is super important to enable management and ideally teams to make the decisions themselves on what to focus on and sometimes leave out the “nice to haves”. 

One sneak peek from the Community Team: In our Team Standup on Mondays we regularly exchange on the latest Gym Clubs that were added in the Corporate Sports offering or Mountain Treks that we did on the weekend as balance and inspiration for others. Generally, it is so nice to support each other for a great balance and sometimes so easy to give in impulse! 

Excited to hear from some others on their work life experiences and tipps. Or maybe even Fuck-ups, on how not to do it. :) 

Best,
Lena

I agree with Edda- can have wonderful wellbeing resources and great habits but if people’s roles are consistently overwhelming, they will struggle to see past that. 

For me, it’s important to finish up work in the evening and stop. Not thinking that I’ll just pop back online after dinner and finish that email, because then  my mind is on it all the time. Switching off is vital. 

Exactly, @AliceM - all types of benefits don’t cover if the work itself is not supporting your work-life balance. Of course, people are different, but usually it’s important to know when you are expected to be at work and when not. Then it’s your own choice to read your emails in the evening if that’s who you are. :) 

@Edda van der Ende yes. The remote working does allow for a real creep in when you’re working and when not so it can feel more blurred. Pros and cons - it’s great to be able to put a load of washing out while I wait for the kettle to boil for instance but cons if we don’t manage to detach from either work or home successfully. 

This a very simple one.

We flip from Work/Life Balance to Life/Work Balance.

The emphasis on Life first.

As HR transitions to being more people-centric from being ‘Labour’ ‘Capital’ ‘Resource’ then we need to refocus the words we use to reflect that we embrace the whole person not just the job/work part.

Hey everyone, 👋

@JHBEM I really like how you turned the wording around, it fits with the approach of always putting people first - and that's what it's all about.

@Edda van der Ende you mentioned that having a clear expectation with regards to working hours is important, after that, it's a question of personal responsibility. Do you have any suggestions on how to help individuals stick better to the set working hours and avoid creating these “blurred lines” that @AliceM mentioned? I could think that for many individuals it’s also a matter of disconnecting mentally.

Looking forward to your thoughts! Btw. there are plenty of more HR-Discussions that you can participate in. And all for a good cause. Check them out here. 🚀

Best,
Melissa

@JHBEM not heard the life/work balance before actually. I’m definitely stealing that! :) I’m now wondering what other phrases I’m using on a day to day basis purely out of habit that don’t transmit the priorities I really mean


@Melissa I guess there is no “one size fits all” for avoiding the blurred lines. During Covid, I went always (and I really mean every single day) for a 1 hour walk after I shut down my computer. This way I “walked home from work” and there was a clear break. Otherwise it would’ve been very easy to “just open the laptop for one more email” or similar. But as said - I believe every person would have to find out what works for them.

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