This week I’ve had quite a few coaching conversations about work-life boundaries. This is such a critical conversation for so many of my coaching clients - and one where I often push their boundaries!
The most successful people I’ve coached have strong boundaries and are successful in all senses of the word. People who do amazing work but also leave time for recovery, relationships, and a great life.
What do poor boundaries look like? A little different for everyone to be honest. But they’re often signalled by some resentment or a lack of self-care. I think they look like regularly checking work emails when you're on holiday. Or responding to an email at 9.30pm. They look like getting a head start on your work week on a Sunday afternoon. Or working when you're on sick leave.
I can absolutely get some pushback from clients on this one.
Especially if they’ve become conditioned to working long hours over many years. Sometimes they don’t think it’s even possible to do their job in “normal hours”. Or if they have a strong identity as a “hard worker”. Maybe their parents had to work long hours and they’ve never really reflected on that expectation in their own life. Or they have imposter syndrome and secretly believe “I have to work hard to make up for the fact I’m not really good enough”.
And I get that your leader may have poor boundaries and expect that you’ll respond to that email or text after dinner. Don’t even get me started on how important it is if you are a leader to role model strong boundaries – the damage you do to your team with your behaviour can be far reaching and impactful.
But here’s the thing. Your organisation will probably not set the boundaries. Neither will your leader.
It’s your responsibility to set your boundaries. You draw the line in the sand. You make it clear to others what you will accept. They may not like it - and that’s okay because it’s not up to you to make everyone happy.
Your job is to demonstrate that you can do your role well AND maintain your boundaries. If your organisation (or leader) has no respect for that, there is most certainly a problem.
And always remember – in both your professional and personal life – that the people most upset when you enforce your boundaries are the ones that benefitted from you having none.
What do you think?
