“For the vast majority of the world’s population
‘work/life balance’ is an irrelevant concern and we
should be very careful to remember this when we
are inclined to complain.“
W
hen I started work and was deemed
important enough to have my own
workspace it came equipped with a phone
(landline of course – no mobiles in those days), an
in-tray (to which an internal mail person delivered
my pitifully small amount of incoming mail each
day) and an out-tray into which I would place hand-
written work for processing by the typing pool within
(if you were lucky) 24 hours prior to receiving it back
for posting.
If I wasn’t at my desk, on my phone, or in a meeting,
then nothing that looked much like work was getting
done. Once I left the building in the evening my
private life started and when I entered the building
in the morning my work life started. Despite these
many handicaps the business managed to struggle
on and things got done (and the business survives
to this day).
These days I look at my email on a handheld
device pretty soon after waking and am occasionally
berated by my wife for doing the same while we
are (theoretically) watching the TV together in the
evening. Occasionally something will demand that
I deal with it there and then and I go into my ‘home
office’ (didn’t have one of them 30 years ago either)
to do so.
This has also spread to holidays – where I prefer
to spend 20 minutes a day clearing down emails
to coming back to an inbox full of hundreds of
communications. I have found myself in client
telephone conferences on the beach and conducting
an interview in a coffee shop whilst on holiday in
New Zealand.
And it’s not just me, or people at my level in
business or stage of life. There are many youngsters
these days who are regularly putting in twelve hour
days or longer at their work, having just finished
full-time education and who consider
themselves lucky just to have a job.
So where does work/life balance come
in? I’m afraid I don’t have a magic answer,
but I do have a few thoughts which might
be helpful to reflect upon.
Those of us living in the West are
incredibly privileged and lead a lifestyle
which, in material terms, is beyond the imagination
of the 80% of the world’s population that lives on
€10 per day or less*. For the vast majority of the
world’s population ‘work/life balance’ is an irrelevant
concern and we should be very careful to remember
this when we are inclined to complain.
Eroded boundaries
The development of modern communications
technology has eroded the boundary between
private time and work time in the West. However, it
has made us more productive (I think) and means
that we are, at least, able to afford leisure time to
be disturbed in! If we had our cost base and lifestyle
aspirations, combined with the developing world’s
technology, then our economies would collapse
instantly.
If we look for ultimate happiness and fulfilment
in either work or leisure then we are looking in the
wrong place. I have seen people make just as much
of an obsession of their particular leisure ‘idol’
(following a football team, competing in triathlons,
playing golf, collecting coins etc.) as other people
make of their work. Both work and leisure are
equally capable of robbing time and commitment
from human relationships and from pondering on
higher things (let’s call it faith) where I suspect true
happiness and fulfilment might lie.
We all get it wrong. The people who seem most
content to me are those who don’t spend ages
agonising over whether there is a more meaningful
life to be lived (if you’re agonising about that, go
to church - seriously), but just get on with enjoying
what’s in front of them and, as the saying goes,
‘doing things seriously, without ever taking them too
seriously’.
Dear readers, very few of us will be remembered
in twenty years’ time and one in a hundred years’
time. The book of Ecclesiastes is very practical and
straightforward on the matter “there is nothing
better for a man than to enjoy his work [note – not
‘find work he enjoys’] for that is his lot”. Most of us
have to work to eat. That’s our lot. Let’s get on with it
and make of it the very best we can.
IRN
*
World Bank development indicators 2008
KEVIN APPLETON is a former divisional chairman of Travis Perkins and was for many
years CEO of Lavendon Group. He is currently a non-executive director of Ramirent.
To comment on Kevin’s article please e-mail:
Get on with it!
Kevin Appleton says those of us worrying about work/life balance are missing the point.
We have to work, so just make the best of it and remember how lucky you are.
11
THE APPLETON COLUMN
IRN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2013
