Balancing Work, Another Job and a Life

July 8, 2008 · Filed Under Learning and Living 

As many of you know, I am big into work/life balance. I have also been lucky enough to work for employers that have valued that as well. Now though, it seems that I am running into a little conundrum because that work/life balance has turned into work/work/life balance and I didn’t even take on a second job! At least not deliberately. Let’s list the issues:

  • I have a day job. It runs 8-5pm with little (if any) overtime. Some travel involved but not enough to really get excited over. No the job isn’t super sexy. But yes, lucky me: I have a life.
  • I am now essentially moonlighting as a blogger. Two independent sites going (this one and HRM Today), a blog on Vault.com, as well as exclusive sponsorship of a social network (HR Bloggers). My monthly income from blogging is roughly half that of my day job. It could be more if I worked harder at it (sponsorships, advertising, etc) but again, work/life balance.
  • Then life. My routine has been to come home and spend the first couple of hours focused on my wife, have dinner and talk about what is going on. Then she wants to watch a little TV or read and I get online and do my blogging. Until when? Sometimes 1am. Then to bed and up again at 6:30. The good? Weekends are intact. I rarely touch the computer on the weekend and if I do, it isn’t usually more than an hour.

How do I resist the urge to check my blog stats every five minutes or stay on my cell phone? How does my wife not want to kill me every night (she still may want to on occasion)? I think I do it by following some easy steps:

  1. Set your computer boundaries - I want to be either on the computer being productive or off it doing something else. No computer games, not much in the way of personal blogging, no chat, no twitter.
  2. Set your phone boundaries - I check my emails on my phone in the morning before work and after work on the way home. I can worry less about email when I want to spend time with my wife.
  3. Set your hours - I don’t want to be blogging at 1am but sometimes I am. I do very well on the weekends but I need to do a better job on work days.
  4. Set up an end game - Is there a breaking point with having essentially two jobs? I know there is because I’ve worked with employees who have dealt with it. It is critical to understand where your break point is and to have a plan to go one way or the other.

This post started out as a gripe post but I realized that it would seem silly to gripe about the opportunities I have and to complain about coping with it. I am grateful that I have abundant opportunities and I do get tired of people saying “Agh, I am so busy and life isn’t fair.” So turn it into a positive: being busy is either a function of having lots of opportunites (yay!) or inefficiency (something that can be easily fixed!).

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Comments

7 Responses to “Balancing Work, Another Job and a Life”

  1. Rosie Sherry on July 9th, 2008 2:11 am

    Sounds alot like my life…though my personal life somewhat integrates with my work life, sometimes it’s hard to know where the line is drawn, or perhaps if there is a line?

    I think should just call it balancing life :)

    [Reply]

  2. chi_42gems on July 11th, 2008 6:29 pm

    hm… sounds like you’re not very big into sleeping… but good to hear that you’ve managed to balance everything out.

    [Reply]

  3. Luke on July 13th, 2008 8:38 am

    Do not forget to make some fun in your life, it should not be just about priorities, goals and time slots.

    When your wife wants you to be with her, you should enjoy her presence, even when it is your “blog time slot”.

    And having fun and to have some surprise is also very important.

    [Reply]

  4. James Taylor on July 14th, 2008 2:57 pm

    Just act like a smoker and take a “smoke break” through out the day. I don’t recommend actually smoking though!

    [Reply]

  5. Toshiko on July 15th, 2008 4:29 pm

    Ahh. I look forward to balancing it all! I’m working on cutting back on the time I spend on the computer but it seems everywhere I go… there is a computer staring at me. :)

    [Reply]

  6. Ron Ulrici on July 21st, 2008 10:48 am

    It sounds like you have a reasonable plan.

    I have a question - is your blogging considered “work” or is it a hobby? If it is the latter, it sounds like the balance isn’t around work/life; it’s about “personal time/family time” balance.

    Years ago in Silicon Valley, we spent 10 hours on the job and 4 hours after hours at the local watering hole. We also worked most weekends. Our companies prospered and our careers did too, but our homelife suffered.

    The moral of this story is - you get what you focus on.

    [Reply]

  7. Lance Haun on July 22nd, 2008 8:59 am

    It is “work” as far as I get paid to do it. That means that sometimes I don’t feel like writing when I really should. I think that if you do end up forcing yourself to get with it and write when you don’t want to, that constitutes a job in a sense.

    [Reply]

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