PREM RANJAN (PGDM 3rd sem) WORK LIFE BALANCE

It can be defined as the perfect integration between work and life both not interfering with each other. In the current business world people are working round the clock to meet the every growing demand. A slight delay in meeting the schedules or expectation is considered to be organizational failures. To avoid delays and failures employees are working hard and giving their heart and soul to achieve work life balance. Observing the day to day lives of many employees, two main issues to be addressed to achieve work life balance are time and stress. NEED OF WORK LIFE BALANCE : The outcomes of imperfect work life balance faced in the day to day life are :STRESS : Employees must be ever performing and ever learning to adapt themselves to the dynamic market condition .Adding to this is constant pressure from their superior to meet the targets that keep the employees on their toes. Thus employees have no other choice but to sacrifice most of their personal space. The entire process will create stress on the employees which is the root causes for many other problems.

PHYSICAL PROBLEM :The number of employees suffering from many diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, heart attack has grown considerably in the recent past. Women employees are the worst affected because of long and stressful working hours. RELATIONAL PROBLEM:- Employees are spending more time at the workplace rather then the home .Spouses ,parents ,children and family are no longer given the time they desire. HANGOVER:- Working for long hours in the office increases employees interaction .Employees tend to stay in their professional world (mentally)through they are physically at home .not only this ,the effect of professional anger is also carried on their personal life. For example :- If there is conflict in the organization the irritated behavior of the individual may reflect in the family there by igniting many negative effects in the family. UNETHICAL PRATCISES:- To handle the stress in the organization and the family related issues as well ,employees tend to adopt unethical practices like boozing ,smoking, Drugs ,improper relation etc. Also there is a high probability that employees may resort to unfair means to get their work done ultimately by hook or crook. DISTRIBUTED FAMILY:- The worst hit people in the entire scenario are the families of the employees .fighting with time to achieve the organization target family is often overlooked .The number of broken families has gone up drastically. DEC RASED PERFORMANCE:- Employees in the organization are never at peace .when they are at workplace ,The personal issues are a concern and when they are at home the professional issues are a concern. They try to balance both but in vain if there is no organization support unknowingly the employees get in to a frustrated mode and cannot give their best to their profession.

The role of H.R in achieving work life balance:The H.R department of the organization should assist the employee to maintain a work life balance .organization must include providing work life balance as an H.R policy. Some of the decision which HR can help in are :PLANNING THE WORK :- organization must follow the basic function of management. 1. Planning 2. Organizing. 3. Staffing 4. Directing 5. Leading 6. Controlling So it all start with planning .The H.R department should use modern technique to estimate the manpower required for the amount of work to be done by each employee and very importantly .it must set realistic and feasible target for each employees .manager must help their respective subordinates to plan their work properly. JOB ANALYSIS SPECIFICATION/DESCPRITION :- Job analysis is the process of describing and recording aspect of jobs and specifying the skills and other requirements necessary to perform it,having a job analysis for all the job creates transparency between the management and the employee regarding their contribution towards the organization. PROVIDING A FLEXI APPROACH TOWARDS WORK:- organization which have a rigid work schedule often have a average performing employees. This has been proved by the hawthorens experiments. Many organization these days are

providing the employees with a flexible approach to work. Some of this facilities are work from home, shift system, Target bound not time bound etc. these approaches can help and individual to plan their professional and personal responsibilities. BEING EMPTAHTIC TOWARDS THE EMPLOYEES:- If the organization can provide an environment where the employee can voice their views without any fear and still be understood then they can do justice to both professional and personal lives. A healthy superior, subordinates relation will always boost up performance of both. PROVIDING SPACE FOR PERSONAL LIVES OF THE EMPLOYEES :- Any employees has two faces of life ,the personal and professional .He/she must be respected as a unique individual and their personal responsibility must beackowledge. H.R Department must develop innovative policies which facilitates the employees to fulfill their personal responsibilities not disturbing their professional life. FAMLY GET TOGATHER AT THE WORK PLACE:- This is an innovative technique followed by many organization acknowledge the role of family in the employees performance. In a situation where the employees has to scarifies the personal responsibilities ,the family takes a step ahead in empathizing with the employees. CONTACT FREQUENT TRAINING PROGRAM:- Many times ,employees know the solution to problem but fail to implement .A trigger for such situation is a training program. EFFETIVE COMMUNICATION SYSTEM :- Communication is an integral part of any organization .which ensures smooth transition of information .if the common system in the organization provides an effective platform for employees at all levels to communicate ,there would be transparency in the organization activities that will definitely help in taking out the stress of an employees to a substantial level. ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE :- Culture in a nutshell can be defined as a way of life .the vision ,mission and the organizational objective must encompass the

issues of work life balance .The employees must not be under stress because of infusible and realistic goals .this culture must reflected into work schedule of the employees at all levels as well in their work attitude. WORKER PARTICIPATION IN MANAGEMENT :- work participation is a method of strange the hang the bound between employers and employees .the employs must be encouraged to participate in the management to disclose their concerns and mutual dialog can be setup between both . Steps to achieve work life balance:There are two main issues in work life balance are time and stress. TIME MANAGEMENT +STRESS MANAGEMENT = WORK LIFE BALANCE Time and stress are interrelated in a sense that one is the outcome of mismanagement of other . Techniques for time management :1) SWOT ANALYSIS :- How SWOT is related to time . If one can know that he/she is good at and what not .then planning can be done effectively. Time can be divided among the entire job respectively in a systematic manner. 2) PROPER PLANNING :- The finding of SWOT analysis must be incorporated in the recess of planning .it must be realistic and feasible .the buffer time for each activity is often overlooked but offers a great deal of help in time management. 3) Expert Advice :- A expert advice is like an anchor. A word from those who have already been in the situation is a guide for proper planning. Employees must not feel low about taking advice rather see that as a learning experience. 4) REMINDERS (MOTIVATORS):- Impossible is often read as I m possible by optimistic people .some slogans, sayings short stories ,taking to people can definitely be motivators to follow the time plan consistently.

5) I should do it:- The employees must be shelf motivated as well motivate other to plan ,follow and achieve effective time management. Techniques for stress management :1) Take it easy :- The first step would be to relax and understand the problem .the employees many a time feel the problem is unique to team but astualy is a similar problem faced by many. 2) Try to get soutation instead of brooding over the problem :- once the problem is identified the general tendency of an individual is to go into depression .this will not help in coming out with a solution .so it is important for the employees to start looking for a solution. 3) Accept facts and stops the blame game: - Accepting mistakes is a dare feat on the part of any individual .a solution always start when we accept the reason for stress and stop blaming other for the solution .this helps in creating an optimistic attitude in the employees behavior. 4) Boost yourself: - once the mistakes are identified the next step would be to understand that it is a human nature to commit mistake and not a crime.Falling is not a weakness but failure to get up is a weakness So the attitude of transforming the mistake in to a learning experience must be developed. 5) Enjoy your work :- when we do the work giving our heart and soul to it ,all the stress is washed out when we start enjoying our work ,problem come and go without seriously affecting our job. 7) Gender issues:- The number of women employees in every organization is growing significantly and these days no organization is discriminating men and women with regard to quality and quantity of work. But in the Indian context women still have to play a major role in the family .organization are therefore faced with this challenge of

managing the gender issues while designing the work life balance policies so that the male communities will not feel that they are being treated unfairly.