by Lisa Pearce

Created on: January 28, 2009

There's an epidemic in the adult world called taking your work home'. Read any self respecting motivational article or self-help book and it will tell you that the inability of adults to separate their work-life from their home-life leads to stress, lack of sleep and stressed-out personal relationships. Most people acknowledge the negative effect of putting work before their own personal interests, but few are able to stop the bad habit.

In many corporations and probably most of the working world, working late' forms part of the unwritten code for success. We believe that the employee, who is seen to deliver more projects and spends extra hours at work, will get noticed and hopefully be promoted. Some managers have lived with this mindset all their working lives and firmly believe that an employee who does not voluntarily work extra hours at home or in the office is a lazy employee.

Leadership Development coaches and consultants teach people to manage their time in a balanced way. They also encourage top-level managers to be strict with their personal time: rather complete your work at the office, or learn the art of effective delegation, and allow yourself the time to spend time on other pursuits which help you to de-stress and build quality relationships.

How often has it actually happened that the guy who spends all his waking hours pouring over work actually gets the promotion? Isn't it true that the employee who willingly spends a lot of if his/her personal time on work, often gets suppressed because his/her efforts make the manager look good? And then the promotion goes to some other newcomer who doesn't know the first thing about the job. Sound like a common scenario? It's a dog-eat-dog world out there.

Yet, why are we surprised?

It started when you were about 8 years old. Your teacher sent you off with a few small assignments, or told you to finish your art project at home. The reasoning behind this is of course that parents will get the opportunity to interact with their children and also participate actively in their education. It is also supposed to provide an opportunity for parents to bond with their young children on more levels. I agree that there is merit if you look at it from that angle. But consider for a moment what happens in high school:

During my high school years we were encouraged to do extra maths sums and additional reading and summaries for extra marks. The more you did at home, the more you were rewarded. It did not matter if you could produce the same volume of work while sitting in the classroom, no. The skill of completing large volumes of good quality work on time was never emphasized. Instead, what was important was how much you did after school. This practice, I believe, fosters a habit of procrastination and is the origin of poor adult work-time management skills.

It is good for children to have work which they need to complete on their own. It teaches them independence and responsibility. It is not good, however, for teachers to give learners too little school work and then burden them with mountains of home work. Children, especially older children, should be encouraged to complete homework assignments while still in class if they are able to finish the regular school assignments early. This can be done by rewarding students for good quality work that is completed, even if it was done during school working hours'.

Young adults who are already able to schedule their work and personal time in a balanced way, and is responsible enough to stick to it, will have a great advantage over those who feel comfortable with leaving work till the last minute.

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