WELLBEING

WORKING FLEXIBLY HAS OBVIOUS ADVANTAGES, BUT INDISTINCT BOUNDARIES BETWEEN HOME AND WORK MEAN WE NEED TO LAY DOWN SOME GROUND RULES

How to bring back the boundaries between work and play

As those of us who have carved out a flexible work/ home lifestyle for ourselves will know, it’s not all cups of coffee in the garden and five o’clock finishes. “I live in a beautiful rural location and running my own business means I can be here instead of sitting in traffic,” says Helen Campbell. “I feel like it gives me around two hours more each day. But I don’t work a conventional week. I work flexibly across the seven days and use the evenings for networking, meetings and writing.”

Helen is one of the 4.8 million people in this country who works for themselves. And they aren’t just freelancers and business owners; over half of all employees now work flexibly, too. Then there are students, parents of young children, wannabe authors – the list goes on.

In order to become flexible, work and life become enmeshed. It becomes harder to untangle yourself; life gets a bit messy, and boundaries become blurry. “Work can colonise every aspect of your life,” explains Dr Gail Kinman, professor of Occupational Health Psychology at the University of Bedfordshire, “even if you’re not doing your job, you might be spending more time thinking about it.” Few of us walk out of the office or shut our laptops at a certain time and finish work for the day. Our phones sit on the kitchen table pinging away while we’re cooking, eating or catching up with our families, an ever-present distraction that’s hard to ignore.

This can have a huge emotional impact on us. “People feel guilty because they feel they’re not really doing the best job they can in terms of work and also in terms of being a responsive family member,” says Gail.

ROUTINE WORKS

Whether you prefer clear-cut lines between work and life or near-total integration, we all benefit from some kind of boundary. The mechanics of when you work doesn’t matter as much as establishing some semblance of routine. First up is your time. “The best thing to do is try and make a weekly plan on Sunday. When doing this, pay attention to your own diurnal variation; are you a lark or an owl? Respect that. Because it’s very hard to change; it looks like it’s pretty biological,” explains Linda Blair, a clinical psychologist and author of The Key to Calm.

While set hours might sound at odds with flexible working, some semblance of routine will create division between your work and life. “I always stop working at 5.10pm every Friday, an old tradition that harks back to when I was working in London running a small PR agency. We listened to Radio 2 and they always played the ‘Mahna Mahna’ song from The Muppet Show at 5.10pm every Friday, which meant the start of the weekend. Now it’s time to relax with my husband,” says Helen.

HOMEWORK

Working from home obscures the boundaries even further. Home – your sanctuary, a place to retreat from the world – becomes your workplace. “I read about somebody who advised wearing a coloured hat when you’re working and your family are around,” says Gail. “It’s kind of semi-serious because your family need to know when you’re ‘Mum’ and when you’re working.”

Carving out a physical space is a slightly less eccentric way to achieve this. Whether it’s a dedicated office or a designated corner, Linda says it doesn’t matter where, just avoid sofa-bed-desk hopping and stick to the same spot. The cues – the colour of the walls, the location of the clock – will all trigger ‘work’ and you’ll be much more likely to get work done and, crucially, leave it behind.

Once you’ve decided on your boundaries you need to make them clear. The advent of technology means we all want everything now. Lynnette Peck found this when she launched her online shop, Lovely’s Vintage Emporium. “I get messages and queries constantly, regularly at midnight. I hadn’t thought about how to run a business and take a holiday – it’s pretty much impossible and I now mostly go on long weekend breaks instead.”

SWITCHING OFF

Managing other people’s expectations as to when you’re available is crucial, whether you’re employed or working for yourself. “Every time we open our email our blood pressure and heart rate rise in anticipation. It’s a little bit like gambling,” says Gail. The answer? “Work out what

“Make a weekly plan on a Sunday. Pay attention to your diurnal variation; are you a lark or an owl? Respect that, because it’s hard to change”

you want from your smart phone and make it your slave not your master,” she says. “I would turn off the noise that signals when you’ve got a text or email,” says Linda, “It’s been engineered to disrupt your attention.”

And our attention is very limited. “It’s well known that we can only do four hours of focused work a day,” says Linda. This sounds terrifying, but it means you can have realistic expectations of yourself. The think tank New Economics Foundation recommends a 21-hour working week to address low wellbeing, over-consumption, high carbon emissions and the lack of time to live sustainably, care for one another and enjoy life. However many hours you work you need to create a transition between work and life. Something that can help is creating a ‘corridor’ between the two – anything from meditating to walking the dog or changing your clothes.

Boundaries aren’t about staying rigidly work-focused; socialising is important, too. “It’s important to have human contact,” explains Gail. “Email conversations are short and if people are busy they forget social niceties. Arrange to meet face-to-face periodically, it helps working relationships as well as your wellbeing.”

CAFÉ SOCIETY

Many people head to their local café to work in a more social environment but before you do it, consider your personality. “If you’re an introvert it may be distracting to be around other people; if you’re an extrovert it might be the only way to stimulate you,” explains Linda.

Thinking about other people you work with can also help. Jenny Biggam founded The 7 Stars media agency over a decade ago and was a trailblazer for flexibility, offering staff unlimited holidays, no job titles and the ability to set their own hours. She remains as conscious as ever about staff wellbeing: “If I’m working on a Sunday night I’ll save my emails as drafts and send them on Monday morning. That way I don’t pass on work thoughts to someone and interrupt their evening,” she says.

By its very definition, there isn’t a one-size-fits all solution to blended living and working. So experiment. Try new things. Be in control and see what works for you – and if happens to be wearing a wearing a silly hat for work, then who cares!