How to Avoid Becoming a Workaholic - Angela Hooper-Menifield

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Introduction

Many entrepreneurs and business owners have found that as their business grows, they are mired in the small details.  None of these things are taxing, difficult to accomplish or overwhelming.  Yet, they nip, nip, nip at our time.  Before we know it, we have spent hours checking off these small things and the day has gotten away from us.  Are these some areas or needs that someone else could do to free us up for the ‘big rocks’?  Would these things allow us to transition from working in our business to working on our business?  What are some other key questions that need to be considered in this thinking?

Today’s episode of “The People Side of Business” with host Angela Hooper-Menifield will provide awareness, insight and accountability for business owners as they operate in their PASSION and PURPOSE and while keeping HARMONY in their lives (many use the term of balance) and not allow the work to overtake our time, energy and lives.  As such today’s episode (S4_E7) is titled “How to Avoid Becoming a Workaholic?”. 

Angela is a proven HR Professional, leadership coach, trainer, and former leader / manager of thousands of employees.  In this show and this season, she will bring her vast experience and credentials to our listening audience as she speaks into how entrepreneurs can grow their businesses by growing their teams.

Show Objectives
Today's show will discuss how having HARMONY in our lives can help us to AVOID BECOMING A WORKAHOLIC.

What You Need to Know

1. What is the definition of a ‘workaholic’? (Per Wikipedia)
   1. A workaholic is a person who works compulsively. The term originates from alcoholism. The person works at the cost of their sleep, and social functions such as meeting friends or family. While the term generally implies that the person enjoys their work, it can also alternately imply that they simply feel compelled to do it. Hustle culture is a neologism for workaholism, related to excessive devotion towards one's work to the exclusion of every other aspect of one's life, creating an unhealthy work–life balance.
2. Questions that could indicate the difference between being passionate about what you do and signs of becoming a workaholic.
   1. Does my job make me happy?
   2. Does work invade my personal life?
   3. Am I hoarding work and not delegating?
   4. Am I showing signs of burnout?
   5. Is my job or business my identity?
3. Reasons why it can be bad to be a workaholic.
   1. Harvard Business Review shared that workaholics, whether or not they worked long hours, reported more health complaints and had increased risk for metabolic syndrome; they also reported a higher need for recovery, more sleep problems, more cynicism, more emotional exhaustion, and more depressive feelings than employees who merely worked long hours but did not have workaholic tendencies. (March 2018)
   2. Motivational: Workaholics are different from people who are simply highly engaged in their jobs. They don’t enjoy their work; they feel compelled to work because of internal pressures. In other words, they work because they feel like they should or ought to be working.
   3. Cognitive: Workaholics have persistent thoughts about work when they’re not working, and they find it difficult to mentally disengage from work.
   4. Emotional: Workaholics experience negative emotions like anxiety and guilt when they aren’t working.
   5. Behavioral: Workaholics tend to work beyond what is reasonably expected of them by their organization.

What You Need to Do

1. Change your values so that work is no longer the most important thing in your life. 

Unless you are truly convinced in your heart that there are some other things more valuable than work, it is unlikely the other steps will be effective. You won't be able to say “No” to overtime unless you are sincerely saying “Yes” to something you truly desire. Ask yourself if you value any of the following enough to give them higher priority than your work:

• Your family. Is your work so important that you would rather risk a divorce and wreck your relationship with your children rather than cut back on your work?
• Your health. Are you willing to get a stress-related disease and possibly die before retirement because your work is so important?
• Enjoyment and peace of mind. Workaholics often claim they work so much because they enjoy their work. But if you focus on only one type of enjoyment, you are likely to miss out on the happiness and peace of mind that come with a more balanced lifestyle, with time to nurture meaningful relationships and savor simple pleasures.
• Money. What's the point of having so much wealth if you don't have time to enjoy it? If you are doing it for the sake of those you love, remember that the gift of time is worth more than the gift of money.
• Once you have a firm determination to tackle your work addiction, the following steps can help:

1. Evaluate the impact of the various types of work you do.
2. Cut back on work which gives relatively little benefit for the time invested. For any item of work you take on, ask yourself: “How many people will get a significant benefit from this? How many people are eagerly waiting for me to finish this?” If the answer is, “Hardly anyone” think twice or three times about whether you should really do it, or continue with it.
3. Limit the number of work assignments you accept.
4. Finish one item of work before starting another one. Don't feel that you have to finish every item of work that you have started. Just because you've already wasted a lot of time on a piece of work, it doesn't mean you have to waste more. Don't throw good time after bad.
5. Limit the amount of time you spend working. 
6. Set aside one day of the week, such as Sunday, as a day of rest. Be strict with yourself in not working on that day. If the computer is your main work tool, try not to use the computer at all on your rest day. Set office hours for yourself, outside of which you don't allow yourself to work. For example, no work before 8 a.m. or after 7 p.m.
7. Be flexible about when you aim to finish a piece of work. 
8. If other people set deadlines for you, so be it. But try not to set deadlines for yourself. Don't do today what you can reasonably put off until tomorrow.
9. When appropriate, limit the quality of work you aim to achieve. 
10. Don't always aim for super high quality work when it isn't necessary to achieve the purpose of the work. As Chesterton said, “If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.” Especially if that frees up time to do something else even more worthwhile. Also, remember the 80% rule.
11. Be efficient in the work you do. 
12. If you can be highly productive in a relatively short time, you can use your achievement to calm your workaholic conscience and allow yourself to relax outside your set work time. If you stop being a workaholic, it doesn't mean you can't work hard, work efficiently, and aim for excellent quality. But you set sensible limits on your work so that it doesn't eat up the rest of your life. 
13. Meditate on this: How many people say on their deathbed, “I wish I'd spent more time in the office.” 
14. Make it a habit to periodically ask yourself, throughout the day, "If I died in my sleep tonight, would I be happy with the way I spent my day?" As somber as it may sound, looking at your life from the perspective of your deathbed can jolt your priorities into place.
15. Delegate or Outsource: 
16. Is it possible that the reason you work as much as you do is because some of the tasks you are completing are not in your strength zone so it requires more time for you than a person that has this expertise.  Consider where delegation or ‘hiring out’ can be of value to you.
17. Track how you use, allocate or spend your time.
18. Routinely discovering where your time is spent (or not) is a great way to gauge for improvements.  There is a saying that says you can tell what is important to you based on your wallet and calendar (the places you spend two of your most valuable resources - time and money).  They don’t lie!

Tips:

• Pay serious attention to your spouse/partner/parent/child/close friend when they urge you not to work so hard.
• Develop a daily or weekly routine of non-work activities, so you learn to enjoy things other than work. These could include regular exercise, prayer or meditation, reading relaxing or uplifting books, listening to or playing music, or watching films. It's helpful to have a regular commitment to doing something involving other people, such as going for a walk together, playing games, meeting for coffee, calling or visiting family members or close friends, or having a night out. But beware of trying to pack in too many extra activities, with the result that your non-work time ends up as busy as your work time.
• If you wake up too early in the morning, don't get up and do something useful. Just lie quietly resting on your bed. After an hour, you may go back to sleep again. If not, you have still allowed your body to get needed rest.
• Train yourself to respond positively to interruptions. If the purpose of work is to benefit other people, then each time someone comes and interrupts, you can regard it as a golden opportunity to fulfill that purpose there and then.
• Get to the source of the issue. Could anxiety or a lack of confidence be driving you to work long hours in order to prove something to yourself or others? 
• Set boundaries. To stop being a workaholic, you’re going to have to change your work behaviors. This means setting boundaries, such as not checking work emails when you’re off the clock.
• Get the support you need. Connecting with like-minded people through support groups or professional communities (www.ibgr.community) can help you gain perspective and learn skills that will enable you to unplug from work.

Previous Show: Season 4_Episode 6: Creating an Atmosphere of Mentorship
Next Show: Season 4_Episode 8:  Dealing With Difficult Clients or Employees

Written by Angela Hooper-Menifield
“The People Side of Business”
Podcast - https://pod.co/the-people-side-of-business-with-angela-hooper-menifield
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