work-life balance

The Future of Work is Flexible. Let’s Ensure it’s Equitable, Too

In December 2020, Mercer released their final survey in a series designed to measure the impact of COVID-19 on the workplace. It asked the question, “How are companies addressing flexibility, inclusivity, and the continued impact of the pandemic?”

The data on flexible working is clear, but while it shows that employers are more focused on inclusion than ever before, culture changes aren’t happening. We have the opportunity to form flexible work practices focused on being inclusive from this point forward.

Women + Burnout: A Conversation with Dr. Casen of Drugless Doctors

We’ve been talking a lot about burnout recently—from our review of the 2020 Women in the Workplace report, a deep dive on what organizations can do to retain their female talent, and our new workshop topics on Navigating and Managing Burnout.

Last week I had the opportunity to speak with Dr. Casen DeMaria of Drugless Doctors on this topic. As a chiropractor, Dr. Casen works with many women and helps them to identify the gaps and challenges they may be facing, finding the right place to begin and helping her patients get their gusto back.

A Roundup of Expert Career Advice for Navigating COVID-19

No matter where you live – or if your local COVID-19 cases are rising or falling – it clear that as a country we are going to be navigating this pandemic for months to come (if not longer). For many of us, that means that our employers are choosing to continue remote work, or some hybrid form of it, for the foreseeable future. For some, this is great news – we have thrived working in a remote environment. For others, this reality feels professionally paralyzing.

Case Study: UC Emergency Medicine Women's Initiative

We continued our work with the Emergency Medicine Department at the University of Cincinnati with a session for the department’s women’s initiative. Our workshop topic was Developing Solutions for Gender Issues and during the session we worked through the topics that rose to the top for participants in a pre-sessions survey. The topics we covered were on work / life balance or integration, advocating for others, and building confidence.

Case Study: Barnes Dennig "The Power of No" Workshop

“No.” is a full sentence.

That was the inspiration for this workshop, focused around recognizing the importance of each participants’ goals and working to give self-permission to prioritize those things. We took it one step further to dig into communication techniques that make it more comfortable to do something that feels so unnatural for many—saying no.

Creating a Healthy Balance While Working From Home

Through clever scheduling, a few ground rules and some hard core flexible thinking, I have figured out how to share my workspace with the (not-so)-little ones. When you exclusively work from home, physical boundaries between work and personal life can feel virtually nonexistent. Even the most organized can still find difficulty successfully managing a career and a household in the same space.

The following are a few key strategies I implement throughout the day to be successful, bring my whole self to work, and be present in my life. Over the years these have changed a bit, but the idea of creating a healthy balance for me to feel successful remains the same.

How to Bring Your Whole Self to Work and Life

Work-life balance. That ever-elusive goal we are all working towards achieving. We hear all the time at our women’s initiatives workshops how this obsessive pursuit can be exhausting, frustrating and alienating. What we at Gild have come to realize is this: We are not alone. Successful women in workplaces everywhere struggle to find the right balance. We have to ask ourselves, does it even exist?

The Many Hats We Wear

Working in the field of productivity and organization, I encounter and counsel women every week who are overwhelmed, stretched thin, and desperately seeking the elusive “work-life balance.” In all my conversations with friends, colleagues, mentors and professional women over the past 10 years, I have yet to find anyone who feels they have achieved the perfect balance.

Many women no longer work traditional hours in traditional office settings. Therefore, setting the expectation to fully take off your professional hat at the end of the day, and put on your personal hat, and to spend equal time in both areas, is not realistic. In fact, I no longer talk about work-life balance; instead, I encourage women to seek work-life integration.