These two things shouldn’t happen at the same time.
And yet it happens all the time.
A study from the Cornell School of Industrial and Labor Relations found that employees in demanding roles still fail to take advantage of paid time-off and other options for flexible working even when it would improve their work-life balance.
In a year when team burnout is at the forefront of everyone’s minds, we thought we’d highlight what they found.
The authors interviewed 50 management consultants about their careers and personal lives and the challenges of balancing the two. Whilst the findings are particularly relevant to consultants, they also seem analogous to other intensive knowledge work.
The authors identified three reasons why this group of consultants failed to take advantage of flexible work programs, even though it would help alleviate stresses in their personal lives:
In a Harvard Business Review article, the paper’s authors identified three potential ways to change team dynamics so high-performers were encouraged to take advantage of these options:
If you find your team also aren’t fully considering these options, maybe the answer lies in some of the above.
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