Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been approached separately via social media by two women who have visited my website and are interested in featuring on my ‘Work-Life Balance Profiles‘ series.
Both women have something in common: they returned to work after maternity leave and found that the rigidity of being an employee constrained their ability to adequately balance work with everything else in their lives. So they quit their jobs and started up their own businesses. In becoming self-employed, they had regained their balance with a renewed sense of freedom and purpose.
I hope to feature their full profiles on the blog in time. And despite their similarities, each one will undoubtedly have their own individual story to tell.
But the reason I’m sharing the headline of their stories in a nutshell like this is because their experiences point to a pattern I’ve seen occurring time and again in my blog interviews: namely, people leaving their employed jobs to seek improved flexibility – and, in turn, balance – by becoming their own boss.
This pattern has shown up in ‘Work-Life Balance Profiles‘ from across a range demographics, which demonstrates the broad diversity of people for whom this arrangement works. Some examples:
- Fathers e.g. John’s Story – “It’s a Dad’s World”: on fatherhood, male primary care-giving & gender equality
- Adults without children e.g. Finding Balance on Her Own Terms: “Single by Choice; Childfree by Choice”. Laurie’s Story – On Doing ‘What Suits You’
When it comes to working mothers, this pattern suggests a worrying trend, which campaigners like Pregnant Then Screwed refer to as a “motherhood penalty”.
But the point I want to focus on is rather a question that has been on my mind for some time:
What impact does being ’employed’ or ‘self-employed’ have on a person’s sense of balance?
And is one or the other more conducive to a balanced lifestyle?
Spoiler alert: I think that there is essentially no ‘one size fits all’ answer. As always, how a person chooses to divide the time they spend on work vis-a-vis other aspects of their life is entirely personal and individual.
But it is interesting to note the disparity between the work and lifestyle choices. Let’s look at them in turn…
I’m in charge
A self-employed person is their own boss: they get to choose their working pattern, the number of hours they work per week, where they do said work, and how and when they wish to fit their other commitments around their work. On the whole, they don’t have to answer to anyone in making decisions around balancing work with everything else in their lives. This points to the sense of freedom that the women I mentioned at the start of this blog value so highly.
Looking back over the people I’ve interviewed for my ‘Work-Life Balance Profiles’ series, those that are self-employed, such as Laurie Macpherson and Ali Miller, described a kind of ‘coming of age’ that came with quitting their jobs and becoming self-employed; a freedom that their time was now their own, to choose how to spend it, and how to carve it up so that multiple life elements could be accommodated according to their will; not according to the will of their boss. They are their own boss, and to them this is a wonderful thing.
What’s more, in becoming self-employed, a person has often chosen to pursue a business based on something they have a passion for, or a proven talent in. So, this is in of itself can be fulfilling and enjoyable.
Self-employed people directly and personally represent their work; they are their business. Consequently, there is inevitably a smaller degree of separation between their work and life. That means that not only is their identity caught up in their business, and their business profile intrinsically linked to their personal one; but also that their business (and hence their income), is reliant on their productivity. Which is why resisting the temptation to “always say yes” is a perennial challenge they have to be mindful and deliberate about managing.
It’s true that self-employed workers get to set their own boundaries; but on the flip-side, they also have to enforce them independently. There is no boss or co-worker there encouraging them to take a break. And often no-one there to hand the reins over to when they do. And they need to be adaptable to the “life” that continues happening around them while they’re working and decide for themselves when they can “switch off”.
Adunola’s example of multitasking the care of her two young children around her business as a sole trader described the realities of this working lifestyle choice: often work and children would be concurrently in the mix, and there was little time left over for her to do anything else. It suits Adunola not to “switch off” from work, which she describes as her passion and hobby. But, I suppose that wouldn’t suit everyone.
Yes, Boss
Conversely, those in employment are not their own bosses; they are answerable to others. If they want time off to tend to something in their personal life, they (generally) need to ask for it. Their boundaries are often set for them and it is incumbent on them to meet their employer’s – as well as their own – expectations.
Tahmid described the pressure he felt as an employee during the early stage of his career. His working pattern exceeded the expected “9-5” as he was driven to prove himself and “rise the ranks” of his organisation. Soli gave a similar depiction of the pressures put on her by her teaching job, due to rigid rules that she was obliged to follow.
Yet, being employed affords a person a degree of security that self-employed workers, whose income is inherently linked to their own output, do not necessarily enjoy. They are contractually bound to be paid for working specific hours, and the responsibility for the organisation’s overall success does not sit solely on their shoulders.
In theory, therefore, it would seem a logical assumption that an employee would experience a less pressured and stressful working life than someone self-employed. In reality, of course, that is not always the case.
It’s notable that four people out of all those I’ve interviewed to date have described feeling burned out at some point in their careers. And all of them were working for organisations, not themselves, at the time that the burnout occurred.
It’s not all bad though. Sam’s story of an employed person flexing his work around his personal life provides a positive example of how it can work.
Interestingly, workaholism is a trait that seems to be indiscriminate as far as a person’s employment status is concerned. The people I’ve interviewed for my blog that describe themselves as “workaholics” do not seem to be driven by whether or not they are working for themselves or an organisation: they are hard-wired to work hard and strive for high standards for multiple reasons, including passion for their vocation and a sense of loyalty to their organisation, as well as fulfilling their own potential, even if it is to their detriment.
You can read Tom’s account of his “workaholic tendencies” as he looks back over his high-pressured career in Finding Balance in Retirement: Tom’s Story – on Empathy, Leadership & Passion for your Vocation as an example. And Jhilmil describes being just as much a workaholic during her time as an employee as when she works on a freelance basis.
A real life example of both
This subject came up during my latest podcast, with Sarah Macmull.
Sarah has recently shifted from working on a self-employed basis, to taking on a contract where she has, for the first time in her career, become someone else’s employee. She described the novelty of working fixed hours, and being able to set work aside at the end of her working day. Whilst she acknowledged the restrictions placed on her by her employer, like not having access to her phone while working, she also recognised that the boundaries imposed on her made it easier for her to switch off from work.
“I don’t know if it’s a good or bad thing, or if it’s just different. And each has their own challenges. You do have the freedom to create your own time balance when you’re a freelancer. However, setting the boundaries is a lot harder because you’re in charge of your own income, and so you want to do as much as you can”.
Sarah Macmull, in Episode 5: ‘A Fine Balance – The Podcast’
Conclusion
Out of the necessity of remote working during the pandemic, new flexible working opportunities have emerged. And technologies have been tired and tested beyond previous boundaries, making flexible working more amenable for employers and employees alike. Some workplaces are changing accordingly, and perhaps so too are working practices.
Yet the differences between whether you work for yourself or an organisation will always remain. And people are people, not robots, so they will always be driven by diverse and multiple motivations and incentives when they weigh up which of those work and lifestyle options best suit them. Of course, sometimes plain old pragmatism makes decisions like those no-brainers.
Either option can evidently be managed so that an individual can feel a sense of balance between their work and other things in their lives depending on their preferences and circumstances. As always, being deliberate about your personal work values when making choices that impact on your work:life ratio, seems to apply.
Perhaps Sarah summed it up best in the podcast when she talked about feeling comfortable in your own skin about the choices you make around how much of your time you devote to your work when opportunities to enjoy yourself are ripe for the picking:
“Own it. Or change it“, she says. Which I think is a good place to park this inconclusive debate.