How to make worklife balance work Nigel Marsh

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what I thought I would do is I would

start with a simple request I’d like all

of you to to pause for a moment you

wretched weaklings and take stock of

your miserable existence now that was

the advice that Sint Benedict gave his

rather startled followers in the fifth

century it was the advice that I decided

to follow myself when I turned 40 up

until that moment I had been that

classic corporate warrior I was eating

too much I was drinking too much I was

working too hard and I was neglecting my

family and I decided that I would try

and turn my life around in particular I

decided I would try to address the

thorny issue of work-life balance so I

stepped back from the workforce and I

spent a year at home with my wife and

four young children but all I learned

about work-life balance from that year

was that I found it quite easy to

balance work and life when I didn’t have

any work

not a very useful skill especially when

the when the money runs out so I went

back to work and I’ve spent the seven

years since struggling with studying and

writing about work-life balance I have

four observations I’d like to share with

you today the first is if society’s to

make any progress on this issue we need

an honest debate but the trouble is so

many people talk so much rubbish about

work-life balance all the discussions

about flexi time or dress-down Fridays

or paternity leave only serve to mask

the core issue which is that certain job

and career choices are fundamentally

incompatible with being meaningfully

engaged on a day to day basis with a

young family now the first step in

solving any problem is acknowledging the

reality of the situation you’re in and

the reality of the society that we’re in

is there are thousands and thousands of

people out there leading lives of quiet

screaming desperation when they work

long hard hours at jobs they hate to

enable them to buy things they don’t

need to impress people they don’t like

it’s my contention that going to work on

a Friday in jeans and t-shirt isn’t

really getting to the nub of the issue

the second observation I’d like to make

is we need to face the truth that

governments and corporations aren’t

going to solve this issue for us we

should stop looking outside it’s up to

us as individuals to take control and

responsibility for the type of lives

that we want to lead if you don’t design

your life someone else will design it

for you and you may just not like their

idea of balance it’s particularly

important this isn’t on the World Wide

Web is it I’m about to get fired it’s

particularly important that you never

put the quality of your life in the

hands of a commercial corporation now

I’m not talking here just about the bad

companies the the abbatoirs of the human

soul as I call them

I’m talking about all companies because

commercial companies are inherently

designed to get as much out of you as

they can get away with it’s in their

nature it’s in their DNA it’s what they

do even the good well-intentioned

companies on the one hand putting

childcare facilities in the workplace is

wonderful and enlightened on the other

hand it’s a nightmare that just means

you spend more time at the bloody office

we have to be responsible for setting

and enforcing the boundaries that we

want in our life the third observation

is we have to be careful with the time

frame that we choose upon which to judge

our balance before I went back to work

after my year at home I sat down and I

wrote out a detailed step-by-step

description of the ideal balance day

that I aspired to and it went like this

wake up well rested after a good night’s

sleep have sex

walk the dog have breakfast with my wife

and children have sex again

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drive the kids to school on the way to

the office do three hours work play

sport with a friend at lunchtime do

another three hours work meet some mates

in the pub for an early evening drink

drive home for dinner with my wife and

kids meditate to the half an hour have

sex walk the dog

have sex again go to bed how often do

you think I had that day we need to be

realistic you can’t do it all in one day

we need to elongate the time frame upon

which we judge the balance in our life

but we need to elongate it without

falling into the trap of the other have

a life when I retire when my kids have

left home meant work my wife has

divorced me my health is failing

I’ve got no mates or interests left a

day is too short after I retire is too

long has got to be a middle way a fourth

observation we need to approach balance

in a balanced way a friend came to see

me last year she doesn’t mind me telling

the story a friend came to see me last

year and said Nigel I read your book and

I realized that my life is completely

out of balance it’s totally dominated by

work I worked 10 hours a day I commute

two hours a day all my relationships

have failed there’s nothing in my life

apart from my work so I’ve decided to

get a grip and sort it out

so I’ve joined a gym

now I don’t mean to mock but being a

thick ten hour a day office rat isn’t

more balanced it’s more fit lovely

though physical exercise maybe there are

other parts to life there’s the

intellectual side there’s the emotional

side there’s the spiritual side and to

be balanced I believe we have to attend

to all of those areas not just do 50

stomach crunches now that can be

daunting because people say bloody hell

mate I haven’t got time to get fit he

want me to get a church and call my

mother and I understand

I truly understand how that can be

daunting but an incident that happened a

couple of years ago gave me a new

perspective my wife who is somewhere in

the audience today he called me up at

the office and say no I don’t you need

to pick our youngest Harry from school

she had to be somewhere else we’ve got

other three children for that evening so

I left work an hour early that afternoon

and picked Harry up at the school gates

we walk down to the local park messed

around on the swings play some silly

games I then walked him up the hill to

the local cafe and we shared a pizza for

tea then walk down the hill to our home

and I gave him his bath and put him in

his Batman pajamas I then read him a

chapter of Roald Dahl’s James and the

Giant Peach I didn’t put him to bed

tucked him in gave him a kiss on his

forehead and said good night night and

walked out of his bedroom as I was

walking out of his bedroom he said dad

yes mate he went down this has been the

best day of my life ever I haven’t done

anything hadn’t taken to Disney World I

bought him a Playstation now my point is

the small things matter being more

balanced doesn’t mean dramatic upheaval

in your life with the small

investment in the right places you can

radically transform the quality of your

relationships and the quality of your

life moreover I think it can transform

society because if enough people do it

we can change society’s definition of

success away from the moronically

simplistic notion that the person with

the most money when he dies wins to a

more thoughtful and balanced definition

of what a life well-lived looks like and

that I think is an idea worth spreading

[Applause]