Is it still called juggling if the balls hit the ground?

For those of us managing work, home, family, education or sporting past-times, it can seem like there is never enough time in the day to fit it all in. 6am alarms are being re-set for 5am, emails update like the departure screen in an airport and the notion of a relaxing afternoon at the beach seems further and further away each day. 

Eastern philosophy tells us that the first step to living a satisfying life is to combine having the right view or thoughts, and having the right intention. Having the right view is about how we take in and interpret information and how we project our own particular blueprints onto ourselves and the world. It involves seeing the world for what it truly is, away from our cognitive and systemic biases, and then approaching each day with compassion and understanding both for ourselves and others. Much of the latter comes down to motivation, that inner drive and rationale that takes a thought to an idea to an action, creating the habits in our lives. Combining the two means we move in the right direction with purpose. 

In practice, this can be hard, for two main reasons. Firstly, the goals that we set for ourselves and societally on others are almost always in conflict, given the constraints of time, space and the limits of our own bodies. It is impossible to be at work and at the school concert simultaneously, to host an 8.30am meeting while dropping the kids off, or be at the gym while drafting a report. Where one goal involves fixing time or geographical space, it must, by definition, eliminate in part or whole other uses of that time or space. Secondly, we need to let ourselves be flexible, to overcome our own cognitive bias, and to give ourselves a chance. 

Is it ok with you to have conflicting goals?

Goals matter, both in general and in corporate life, not because they give us something to aim towards but because having them changes the way we think, and the way in which we filter and act upon outside information. As we go through our day, millions of pieces of information fly around us and our brains take a more discerning approach to allowing information into our consciousness than we might think. Cognitive psychology tells us that we sort all information into that which is useful for us to achieve our goals (tools), that which stops us from achieving our goals, and that which is irrelevant. If you have specific goals, you eliminate inconsequential information and grasp that which helps you – in doing so, you literally see the world differently from others. 

Having a small number of conflicting goals, however, for example winning a particular promotion at work and being totally present for dinner each evening, introduces constraints to the achievement of individual goals. Our brains need to work harder, as we aim not to succeed in one context but to succeed over a defined suite of activities and to accommodate as best we can the preconditions and conditions of success in each. Where workplace flexibility programs exist, we process them, take advantage of them, and to the extent we allow ourselves, we use them to meet our goals. 

One of the barriers that many flexible workplaces face however, is that people don’t allow themselves to be flexible, partly because we are wired not to play fair with ourselves. We place almost insurmountable pressure on ourselves through our own views of the roles we play; terms like father, mother, husband, wife, senior manager, employee, or counsellor are defined in our minds. We come to them with a blueprint in place, moulded by experience, upbringing, and outside influence, and then we react, placing pressure on ourselves and others. We apply rules to ourselves that we don’t even acknowledge – fathers don’t take days off; grown-ups don’t cry, senior managers don’t make mistakes. These viewpoints, dependent arising as they are, form blueprints from which we, incorrectly and inappropriately, apply negative sanctions of guilt and shame liberally upon others and more importantly ourselves. They stop us from achieving our single and conflicting goals because we stop ourselves from making the changes that we need to in order to succeed. Sometimes we just need to ask in the mirror who has actually imprisoned us.  

Wanted: Flexibility of thought

In many ways, life requires a clear understanding of the constraints placed upon it in order for overcoming those constraints to be meaningful, and in the case of work life balance the constraints are both mentally and physically real. Having a policy of workplace flexibility therefore requires more than corporate initiatives to meet the objectives it has set itself. It needs a culture behind it which not only acknowledges and challenges the conflicts in goals, but more importantly shines a light on the preconditions for failure in the way we see employees and our roles in society and how they are able to solve for those goals. Sometimes mothers miss dinner because they travel. Sometimes fathers don’t see their kids on a weekday. Sometimes senior managers are late for work, miss a client call or have a day they can’t make their way through without asking for help. None of these represent failure, no matter what we have been taught to tell ourselves. Sometimes we have to allow ourselves to do less well on one goal in order to achieve another. Sometimes at least one ball needs to hit the ground.

Embracing corporate flexibility is a two way street – on the one side, corporate empathy that work is just one of many goals people have, and on the other side, the acceptance by individuals that solving multiple equations sometimes needs institutional support. So let’s be a little kind to ourselves. Let’s use and encourage others to use the flexibility on offer and lets allow each other and ourselves a little space to breath while we try to fit it all in. Let’s ask for help if we need it. We might not achieve it all, but we will achieve more of it, and if we fail from time to time, that’s ok too. 

At EY, our people are our assets, and those people support tens of thousands of households, children, religious causes, charities, sporting clubs and schools through their conflicting goals. Those goals make society better and so we support them, we support each other and we support Flextober. 

What are your thoughts?