Life demands on our time are many. lead to an unbalanced life.
ced life. The premise desired state is a set of goals defined
These demands come from a multitude
of directions: home, work, and commu-
nity. Time management has often been
the temporary solution. The better you
are at managing your calendar, the
more you can do. For some that full
calendar is energizing and allows you
to achieve a sense of inner peace,
worth, and/or purpose through accom-
plishments while in others
it induces a sense of panic,
loss of control, and/or
stress. The difference
between the two perspec-
tives is a matter of person-
al work-life balance
(WLB). WLB is a personal
blend of work-life commit-
ments that enables you to
optimize your full poten-
tial. To achieve WLB
requires careful considera-
tion of personal goals and
commitments and what is
derived from those com-
mitments that lead to
achieving your full poten-
tial. In other words, a true
understanding of WLB sur-
passes the simplistic con-
cept of time management.
Based upon consider-
able research of current
literature and interviews The balancing
conducted in 2003 with
more than a dozen of work and life
midlevel managers to
senior executives (male
and female) in govern-
ment and industry, a
model for WLB was devel-
oped to better understand what is
required to achieve and maintain WLB.
The model serves as a guide to “work-
ing to live” not “living to work.”
Many of those we interviewed
shared their desire to achieve a better
balance to feel in control, attain goals,
maintain their sanity, and derive inner
peace. The majority of those inter-
viewed thought of WLB as effective
time management. Yet as good as sev-
eral of them were at managing their
time spent on their many commitments,
they expressed the feeling of something
missing in their lives or a lack of bal-
ance. They described feeling stressed
and not in control of their days and
lives. No matter what we do with our
time, the clock is ticking. A full calen-
dar with back-to-back activities or a
calendar with few activities can both
22
of this WLB model is not achieved by for expenses and savings. This enables
the time you commit to your many an equitable allocation between check-
activities. It is achieved by what you ing, savings, retirement, and education
derive from those activities. accounts that allows for a comfortable
living today and a secure tomorrow.
The WLB model This model is modified and applied
Consider your personal financial to WLB with the establishment of four
management as an analogy to the WLB life accounts that describe the essence of
model. Many accounts are required as who we are: emotional, mental, spiritual,
and physical (see Fig. 1).
Without any one of these
accounts available to us,
we are not a complete per-
son. For example, a family
experiencing a loved one
with Alzheimer’s recog-
nizes the loss of mental
functioning as a primary
dimension missing from
the person they know.
Add to this model a set
of commitments that serve
as sources for deposits
and withdrawals for the
four life accounts. Those
commitments are many
and may vary from one
person to another. For
simplicity, four sources
have been defined in this
model to include commu-
nity, career, relationships,
and self. Other commit-
ments could include fami-
ly, fitness, politics, and
education. It is from these
commitments that we
Debra Haley, Donna Back, derive pleasure and relax-
and Kathy L. Watern ation. These are deposits
to one or more of our life
© 1998 DIGITAL STOCK CORP.
accounts. It is also from
part of your financial portfolio. Four these same commitments that we can
representatives of these are checking, be taxed or stressed. The stress requires
savings, retirement, and education. a withdrawal from our life accounts to
These provide for meeting day-to-day maintain stamina and persevere. These
living as well as meeting longer-term are withdrawals are made from one or
needs. To maintain financial stability, more of our life accounts.
these accounts must be balanced
between deposits and withdrawals. If Deposits and withdrawals
all deposits go to the longer-term What defines a deposit or withdraw-
accounts, i.e., retirement, savings, edu- al is highly dependent on the individ-
cation, not much is left for day-to-day ual. Introspection by each individual is
living. In this scenario, one has to needed at this point to recognize what
scrimp and go without just to cover the is a deposit versus what is a withdrawal
basic necessities. In another scenario, and to/from which accounts. For one
the majority of deposits go to checking person, a five-mile jog in the gym may
with minimal to nothing going into sav- be a large deposit in their physical and
ings, retirement, or education accounts. emotional accounts. For another person
The future is left to chance with minimal a leisurely walk in the woods makes
resources available to cover emergen- that same deposit in the same accounts.
cies. Either scenario is out of balance for These deposits and withdrawals can’t
near- to long-term financial stability. The be quantified as they were in the
0278-6648/05/$20.00 © 2005 IEEE IEEE POTENTIALS
financial analogy. According to Gole- The last commitment is to ourselves. accounts such as not being able to say
man et al., the deposit/withdrawal is This is one that is easy to overlook with “no,” smoking, too little sleep, isolating
measured as a gut feel that each person more vocal and pressing demands com- youself from others, negative attitude,
has to develop along with a sense of ing from the other three categories of and the list goes on. See Fig. 5.
which accounts are in balance and commitments. Deposits to the four As a commitment is fulfilled, a com-
which are not. This may not be easy to accounts are made from taking time to mensurate assessment of what is
do, but as we will see, it is very worth- see the humor and beauty in life, reflect- derived from the commitment is need-
while to spend some time assessing. ing on accomplishments, learning a new ed on a regular basis. If a sense of sat-
We all have a responsibility to our skill, and maintaining a healthy lifestyle. isfaction is derived, a deposit is made
communities, and we fulfill those On the other side of the fence, we can into one or more accounts. If a sense
commitments in a multitude of ways— do ourselves harm with habits and atti- of frustration and stress is derived, a
serving on the board of directors for a tudes that withdraw from our personal withdrawal is made from one or more
nonprofit organization, volunteering at a
women’s shelter, leading a church pro-
gram, and participating in a fundraiser.
By helping others, a deposit into the WLB Model
spiritual, mental, physical, and emotional
accounts is made. On the other hand, — Withdrawals
community participation may result in (Stressed/Challenged)
being a victim of public criticism or
neighborhood crime that would result in
withdrawals from emotional, mental, and
Mental
spiritual accounts. In another example,
you may feel overcommitted, leaving — Deposits
you physically drained. See Fig. 2. (Rewarded/Renewed) Physical
A second commitment is to a career.
The variety of deposits and withdrawals
Emotional
can be many and are dependent on the
job and the person filling it. Deposits
may be derived from a promotion,
Spiritual
mentoring a junior employee, new
assignment, or the integrity of the orga-
nization. Withdrawals may accrue from
excessive overtime, fear of failure, over
qualification for the job, or a compro-
mise of core values. A promotion may
add to the emotional account due to Fig. 1 W-L-B model of life accounts
recognition and to the mental account
due to the financial security the addi-
tional pay made possible. Having to
compromise core values due to unethi-
cal behavior in the organization could Competing Commitments
generate a withdrawal from the spiritual Community
and emotional accounts. See Fig. 3.
Strong relationships in our lives require
a major commitment of our time and Board of
energy, paying huge benefits over the Directors
−

course of our lives. Relationships develop

WITHDRAWALS
+ DEPOSITS +

through marriage and friendships, seeing Turkey Trot/ Mental Overcommitted

one’s children grow into responsible Marathons
adults, joining a team, and many others.
Physical
The resulting benefits are life account
deposits coming from hugs, helping one Neighborhood
Volunteering
another, shared memories, fun times, and
−

Emotional Crime
so much more. Relationships can provide
support in times of crisis, but they can
Spiritual Public Office Loss/
also be the source of crisis and hence
Tree Planting Public Criticism
generate withdrawals from personal
accounts. Divorce, abuse, illness, aging Only on Sunday
Church Support Group
parents, and death of loved ones can all
require withdrawals from any of the four
personal accounts to see one through the
difficult time. See Fig. 4. Fig. 2 Deposits and withdrawals to/from community commitments

DECEMBER 2005 23
accounts. The next step is to look mance. It is not to be expected that
across the accounts and assess whether you can always be absolutely bal-
each one is balanced or not. Accounts anced. Life is up and down, and hence
that are highly positive for long peri- balance will be also. The objective is
ods of time are unhealthy because we to recognize when you’re out of bal-
are not being challenged to optimize ance and take the appropriate action
our full potential. Accounts that have a to strike a better balance.
high negative balance for long periods Another important point to consider
of time are also equally unhealthy due in this model is the number of commit-
to overwhelming challenges and ensu- ments a person takes on. For the exam-
ing stress leading to suboptimal perfor- ple in this model, four commitments
Competing Commitments
Career
Fear of Failure
Promotion
were chosen. The number of commit-
ments can be smaller or larger depend-
ing on how you tailor the model. A word
of caution relative to the number of com-
mitments you have. A person who has a
small number of commitment may find
him/herself in a time of emergency,
change, or challenge to be without the
necessary deposits in the four personal
accounts to see you through the stressful
time. For example, a person’s commit-
ments are to his/her career with no
strong commitments to relationships, self,
or community. In this example, the per-
son’s deposits to his/her personal
accounts comes primarily from his/her
career. If the person loses his/her job in
a down market and finds no other
sources of deposits from relationships,
self, or community commitments, then
there aren’t sufficient deposits/balances

−
Excessive to keep his/her personal life accounts

WITHDRAWALS
+ DEPOSITS +

Mental Overtime healthy. In other words, making any one

Share Gifts
commitment the top priority and not
Physical making time for other commitments is
Challenging ultimately unhealthy.
Work
Emotional Are you balanced?

−
Job Loss The looming question is how to
know if you are balanced. As men-
Reinforce Spiritual tioned previously, it is largely based on
Character/Beliefs
Overqualified gut feel. Ask yourself the following set
Compromise of questions to help you get in touch
Values with those feelings about your life
accounts. It may provide you additional
insight to ask others to also answer
Fig. 3 Deposits and withdrawls to/from career commitments these questions as they know you.
• Do you take vacations each year
to relax/unwind?
• Do you work through lunch three
Competing Commitments or more times a week?
Relationships • Do you laugh at least once a day?
• Do you often feel an overwhelm-
ing loss of control over your life?
• Do you take time for physical fit-
ness at least three times a week?
Death • Do you make time for hobbies
Team Sport
−

and/or reading for pleasure each week?

WITHDRAWALS

Aging Parents
+ DEPOSITS +

Mental • Do you take time for reflection,

Friendships
meditation and/or prayer each day?
Illness • Do you have recurring headaches/
Community Physical
Sharing stomach aches/backaches?
• Are you exhausted every evening
Marriage Divorce
after work that keeps you on the couch?
−

Emotional
• Do you feel you make strong con-
Hugs tributions to your organization/company?
Spiritual Abuse • Do you have guilt feelings each
week about not keeping a commitment?
Practice Gratitude • Do you resent colleagues who
leave work “on time”?
• Do you frequently wake up during
the night thinking/worrying about
Fig. 4 Deposits and withdrawals to/from relationship commitments something?

24 IEEE POTENTIALS
 • Are you regularly involved in ser-
vice activities in the community?
• Does life hold meaning and hope
for you?
• Do you get together with friends for
lunch, dinner, events during the week?
If the answers to these questions
make you uncomfortable, your gut is
telling you that you are out of balance.
Based on that gut reaction, you need
to take action to bring the account
back into balance. For accounts with
negative balances, this may require
declining a future commitment as it
requires too many withdrawals. On the
other hand, an account may have con-
siderably more deposits than with-
drawals and may require you to accept
more commitments.
Bring balance back
into balance. It may not be easy and
will take discipline and commitment to
change. To achieve balance requires
that you recognize the need to change,
followed by identifying the needed
change. With that in hand, an action
plan is necessary. Understand that bal-
ance is a process and it will take time
to implement the action plan and
achieve the desired balance. Lastly,
WLB must be continually reevaluated to
Competing Commitments
Self
Education
ensure one is where one should/wants
to be to reap life’s full potential.
Price Waterhouse-Coopers (PWC),
United States; Work/Life Balance, Inc.,
Australia; Department of Trade and
Industry, Britain; and Ministry of Social
Development, Canada, have investigated
WLB for the past decade through
numerous surveys, studies, and consul-
tations. Their client companies firmly
believe that promoting WLB is a
"Can't" Attitude

−
What follows is a real-life experience

WITHDRAWALS
+ DEPOSITS +

shared with the authors during an inter- Fitness Program Mental Sleep Deprived
view with a midlevel manager. It pro-
vides an example of a father whose Physical
child answered one of the above ques- Humor
tions for him that got his attention and Smoker

−
set him and his wife into motion. Fred Emotional
(not his real name), his wife, and two
Reading
teenage children lived on a working Can't Say "No"
farm that they ran themselves. Fred was Spiritual
also a full-time employee, his wife Retreat/
worked full time, and they owned a Isolation
Meditation/
real estate company. Fred’s two chil- Reflection
dren were active in sports. Needless to
say Fred and his wife managed their
time wisely to be able to do it all. Fred Fig. 5 Deposits and withdrawals to/from self commitments
was at home on a Saturday working on
the budget for his real estate business.
His son came into the room and said, Table 1. Personal WLB inventory.
“Dad all you ever do is work.” It was
Life Emotional Mental Physical Spirtual
like a punch in Fred’s stomach, prompt- Accounts Deposit/ Deposit/ Deposit/ Deposit/
ing him to talk to his wife that night. Commitments Withdrawal Withdrawal Withdrawal Withdrawal
Over the next few weeks the talks con- Self
tinued with both parents agreeing that Fitness Progran
changes needed to be made. They Nutritious Meal
decided to sell the farm, move into Other ______________
town, sell the real estate business, start Other______________
exercising routinely, and become Relationships
involved with church activities. Fred Care of Aging Parents
and his family have their lives in better Team Sports
balance after nine months of significant Other ______________
changes. They now have time to spend Other______________
together enjoying each other’s company Career
as well as family activities. Fred regular- Excessive Overtime
ly assesses the balance in his life. He Challenging Assignments
Other ______________
summarized what he had learned from
Other ______________
this experience, “balance is a process
that is never fully achieved . . . it is Community
Volunteer Work
something that you must continually
Church Attendance
manage in your life.”
Other ______________
As Fred’s experience showed, an Other ______________
out-of-balance life can be brought back

DECEMBER 2005 25
business-critical issue and not simply
the right thing to do. Their research
documented the following benefits for
those companies who had implemented
WLB programs in the workplace:
• improved recruitment and retention
• higher levels of customer service
• improved workforce productivity
• increased employee satisfaction
• reduced employee absenteeism
due to stress-related absences.
These benefits have been quantified
and measured as to their positive impact
on the companies’ bottom line. As a
result, more companies/organizations are
training their managers, implementing
WLB programs, and encouraging
employees to take advantage of these
programs. The WLB programs include
job sharing, telecommuting, paid parental
leave, elder care, part time work, flex-
time, career breaks, work from home on
an ad hoc and others. The WLB pro-
grams range in cost for employers from
management literally leading by example
to establishing the WLB policies, provid-
ing classroom training, and distributing
WLB DVDs, all relatively low cost when
compared to the employer benefits.
A close look at the approach many
companies, such as Johnson & Johnson,
SAP, Whirlpool, and others large and
small, are taking in the recruitment of
new employees is to promote WLB as a
benefit of employment. In a PWC1999
International Student Survey, 57% of the
students surveyed stated WLB is a prima-
ry goal and did not think this competed
with long-term career development and
personal growth goals. A November
2004 Salary.com online poll resulted in
39% of workers indicating that if given
the choice, they would choose time off
over an equivalent increase in salary.
This preference for time off is up 20%
from three years ago. Certainly the
workers recognize their priorities for
time off and flexibility come with sacri-
fices. The sacrifices may be in job
opportunities, promotions, and project
assignments lost to those still willing to
invest the long hours on the job. On the
other hand, those individuals, willing to
make long hours on the job a priority,
will have to sacrifice other aspects of
their lives and potentially WLB.
A wide range of companies to
include Allianz Group (international
financial services company), Schneider
National Inc (truckload and intermodal
services company), and Century 21 Folks
26
Realty (real estate broker) are recogniz-
ing the importance of WLB to their
employees. A company that supports
WLB benefits the employees in several
ways. Employees enjoy better working
relationships, improved self-esteem,
health, concentration, and confidence.
They have the time to focus on what is
really important and have greater control
over their personal and professional life.
Companies are realizing the work
culture of the past described by bodies
in the seat, face time, and hours worked
in the office are no longer a strategic
advantage adding to the bottom line. As
more companies recognize the benefits
of embracing WLB and adjusting the
organizational culture accordingly,
employees must take more responsibility
for their own WLB and optimize the
flexible work arrangements available
from their employer. WLB lets us live life
to our fullest potential be it at work,
home, or wherever we may be. In the
past, our desire for WLB was a personal
challenge. As this research has shown, it
is now growing into a partnership
between the individual and employer.
Read more about it
• J. Loehr and T. Schwartz, The
Power of Full Engagement. New York:
Free Press, 2003.
• D. Goleman, R. Boyatzis, and A.
McKee, Primal Leadership. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard Business School Press, 2002.
• “1999 international student survey,”
[Online]. Available: www.pwc.com
• K. Delaney, “The future of pharma
HR: Part 2” [Online]. Available:
www.pwc.com
• “2003 global annual review: Reten-
tion” [Online]. Available: www.pwc.com/
extweb/aboutus.nsf/docid/
142c4d9d99e99faf85256f490062fd15
• L.Y.Y. Lim, “Singapore” [Online].
Available: www.pwc.com
• “Case study: The retail operation of
a global energy company” [Online].
Available: www.pwc.com/extweb/new-
c o a t w o r k . n s f / d o c i d /
71051DE4AF1C2D6A85256D91006
• Managing Work/Life Balance Inter-
national, “Work life initiatives—the way
ahead report on the year 2004 survey”
[Online]. Available: www.worklifebal-
ance.com.au/
• United Kingdom Department of
Trade and Industry, “The strategy—
Properity for all,” [Online]. Available:
www.dti.gov.uk
• Social Development Canada,
www.sdc.gc.ca/asp/gateway.asp?hr=en/l
p/spila/wlb/01home.shtml&hs=wnc
• T. Driver, “Time off from work gains
in importance,” Salary.com, Jan. 2004.
About the authors
Debra Haley is executive director
of Develop and Field Systems Group
at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base,
Dayton, Ohio. She leads a workforce
of 1,000 people and executes a bud-
get of over US$400 million annually.
Her organization is responsible for
acquiring and deploying software
applications to execute the business
processes of the Air Force. She has a
B.S. in aeronautical engineering from
Purdue University, an M.S. in logistics
management from the Air Force Insti-
tute of Technology, and an M.S. in
management from Massachusetts Insti-
tute of Technology. She has complet-
ed numerous programs in professional
military education and executive
development.
Donna Back is the president of
Executive Edge, a company committed
to providing executives the “edge”
needed to excel in today’s fast-paced,
ever-changing organizational environ-
ment by delivering developmental
seminars, executive coaching, and
innovative problem resolution. She
was chief financial officer, USAF, for a
workforce of 700 people with exper-
tise in cost estimating, budgeting,
earned value management, scheduling,
and accounting to execute an US$18
billion annual weapon system acquisi-
tion budget. She has a B.S. in account-
ing and marketing from Miami Univer-
sity, an M.B.A. from Wright State Uni-
versity, and has completed numerous
executive development programs.
Kathy L. Watern is chief financial
officer, F/A-22 System Program Office,
Wright-Patterson Air Force Base,
Ohio. The F/A-22 System Program
Office is directed to manage all acqui-
sition aspects of the USAF’s highest
priority tactical program—the F/A-22
Raptor. The organization manages
multiple contractors developing the
21st century’s first Air Dominance
Fighter. She has a B.S. in accounting
from Wright State University, an
M.B.A. from the University of Dayton,
and an M.S. in national resource strat-
egy from the Industrial College of the
Armed Forces.
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