Work-life balance: What Americans can learn from the British

Work-life balance: What Americans can learn from the British

So many of us can afford to work less, and yet we choose not to. As we prepare to return to work, we look at why work-life balance remains so elusive

Tim Armstrong, the 43-year-old CEO of AOL, gets up at 5 a.m. He tries to hold off on sending emails until 7am. He can then be reached by email “in the morning, while driving and late in the evening”. He enjoys a break for part of the weekend, but then starts work on Sunday at 7 p.m., making calls and writing emails.

Karen Blackett, CEO of MediaCom UK, receives around 500 emails a day. She comes home promptly at 6:30 p.m. to spend time with her son, but then returns to work at 8 p.m. for calls and emails.

These accounts of the lives of CEOs, as featured in the Guardian in 2013, make depressing reading. The authors of the article sum it up well when they ask, “What’s the point of being rich and successful if you have to get up before sunrise every day to answer 500 emails?”

Some will argue that work is just as worthwhile as the alternative; that lounging on the beach all day is an endless pleasure, and that productivity - the feeling of accomplishment - makes people happy.

Everyone is different, but I think it's fair to say that the sweet spot is far from 500 emails a day, but not quite as far as constantly lounging on the beach.

alt="Work-Life Balance Scale">

I'm reminded of this tension by a recent study that claims British workers take more vacation days than their counterparts around the world. In the UK, 75% of workers surveyed said they expect to take all of their holiday this year (on average 27 days per year).

In dramatic contrast, only 44% of American workers expected to do the same, despite their median being a paltry 12 days - just one more than in China. In fact, America is one of the few countries in the world that does not have a legal minimum vacation requirement.

alt="Work-life balance: country table">

Why such inequality? Professor of psychology and author of Wellbeing: Productivity and Happiness at Work Cary L. Cooper offers two explanations. First, that Americans are workaholics by nature: “Getting ahead at work is fundamental to their self-image and to the image they want to project to their employer and the outside world—America is open for business 24 hours a day!”

The second explanation is that American workers are more insecure in their jobs because of weaker laws regarding layoffs, sick leave, and work hours. Cooper writes: "Because employees are more vulnerable to immediate job loss if they fail to deliver, I suspect that many workers are afraid to use their vacation entitlement, however meager it is, because they fear it will send the message 'I will not be perceived as fully committed or giving 100%.'"

This approach to work is thoroughly depressing, whether it's an endorsement of the Great American Dream or a severe case of "presenteeism." Too much work can be harmful to your health and reduce productivity. Also (and I don't think it's anti-capitalist to say this) surely there are better things we as humans can do with our time?

This question has been asked many times, perhaps most famously by economist John Maynard Keynes, who predicted that by around 2030, citizens of developed countries would be working 15-hour weeks and using the time freed up by technology for nobler pursuits: travel, music, art, literature.

Unfortunately, Keynes was wrong. Technology has not been a liberator but a teacher, used by corporate giants to “help” us work from anywhere.

alt=“Work-Life-Balance”>Microsoft’s marketing campaign for Office 365

Many of us are already questioning the pointlessness of long working hours. Perhaps in the distant future people will view us with the pitying amusement we reserve for witch hunters and fortune tellers. They have spent their lives working like hamsters in a wheel! They thought they were accomplishing something!

Not everyone can afford to work less, but we can and should at least take our vacation. For some, this may mean taking a less powerful job, but trust me, it's worth it. The alternative is to climb further up the greasy pole of career success and realize that even at the peak, there is simply no respite - just more of the same.

Traveling, spending time with family and friends, learning a new language, reading good books, going jogging are much more important than answering 500 emails a day. If we put aside the “choose life” rhetoric and evaluate our lives from a practical, objective standpoint, so many of us will realize that we can and should work less. Life is so much more fun.

For more on working less, see How Much Is Enough?: Money and the Good Life by Edward and Robert Skidelsky.

Mission statement: Dreamstime

      .