Farewell to the 9-5 Workday: Create a Work Intergration Plan

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The concept of work-life balance implies that you will divide your time between your business [or wage job] and your family/friends. You allocate a certain amount of time to work, then allocate time to family, most often doing work during the day and family in the evening.

 

And while that sounds good in theory, if you are an entrepreneur, CEO, or other business professional who is passionate about what you do, the business will always require unlimited time from you. In other words, you will never be able to tell yourself that your work is "done" at one point or another.

 

Thus, if you always have something to do at work, the idea of work-life balance makes no sense unless you decide to build a business around your hobby. If you want to create something meaningful that will affect many people and the world around us, work-life integration is a much better approach.

 

How Does Work-Life Integration Differ from Work-Life Balance?

 

Work-life integration is an approach that creates synergy between different areas of life: work, home and family, community, health, and an overall sense of well-being.

 

A person who practices this approach can have breakfast with the family and take the kids to school, work from 9 a.m. to 12 a.m., then have lunch and go to the gym, attend a work meeting in the afternoon, pick up the kids from school and do their homework with them, and answer work emails a couple of hours before bed in the evening.

 

The idea that work and life are separate is an archaic approach. It made sense when everyone worked a traditional 9-5 schedule. But in the digital age, different aspects of life can overlap. Integrating work into life would be more convenient than keeping it separate if you can shape your work schedule.

 

However, work-life integration has its pitfalls. When your to-do list seems endless, it can be tempting to fill each day with work tasks without paying attention to family, friends, health care, and other essential things. You'll just end up thinking about work all the time.

 

Creating a work integration plan

 

The main thing in any CEO, leader, or entrepreneur's life is not the balance of work and life but their integration. How to create a work integration plan? Here are a few things that will help you tremendously:

  • Put important family events on your calendar as recurring events that happen every week, month, and so on.
  • Treat these personal events like meetings with a client or employer. You can't just cancel them. You have to make time for them. They need to be non-negotiable.
  • Fill your day with a combination of work and personal activities - meetings, time for reflection, planning, creative work, going to the gym, and spending time with your family or friends.
  • Don't train yourself to rigid notions of "work" and "personal" time. For example, start each day at 7 a.m. and end at 10 p.m., but, as mentioned above, alternate personal and work activities.
  • Explain the idea of work-life integration to the people closest to you and ask them to respect your time while you work. Since you are doing your part to give them enough time, they should not feel abandoned or unwanted.
  • If possible, take your children, spouse, or friends with you on work-related activities - you spend time with them, they see what you're doing, plus you can teach them valuable things about your work.
  • Keep this up for 30 days, then stop and analyze what works for you and doesn't. Tweak these rules to suit you.

HRs often write work integration plans for CEOs, team leaders, executives, etc. And when writing, it is essential to remember about clarity of the work integration plan. HRs with poor writing skills usually turn to Essay Writer PRO for help. A work integration plan is also suitable for entrepreneurs and freelancers who manage their jobs. 

 

Conclusion

 

We all want a life filled with meaningful work and relationships. The work-life balance and work-life integration approaches help balance work, family, hobbies, and other vital areas of life. But the secret to prioritizing is execution. You may not be able to stay on schedule ideally, but trying to get even close to that will already improve your quality of life.

 

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About the Author

Eliza Medley

Eliza Medley is an experienced writer and psychologist. She is actively interested in management, new technologies, and writing motivational articles. She also loves catching up on modern trends. Her work inspires people to learn new things and reach new heights. You can reach out to her at GuestPostingNinja@gmail.com.

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