Caring LO18615

Bill Harris (billh@lsid.hp.com)
Tue, 14 Jul 1998 09:27:49 -0800 (PDT)

Replying to LO18603 --

Doc,

> Remember that we (all of us) have personal lives and significant others to
> attend to.

You wrote lots of good stuff in your list of guidelines, but the last one
sticks out for me. I once was at a company that prided itself (or so it
seemed) in everyone's ability to work all-out for the company. I peaked
at 110 hours in a week, as I recall; 80-90 hour weeks were not that
uncommon.

That was a costly experience, one that I let last far too long (in a
misguided attempt to show them that I could contribute well with fewer
hours --- while I did contribute well, I "lost" on the hours part).

With the misguided pride in being able to do anything that may come with
youth, I let personal development, relationships, and balance slide.

When I came to this company, I found a company that works hard but does
deal with the "work-life" balance issue. As such, I had no problem
becoming a manager here, because I wouldn't be forced to ignore the rest
of people's lives to be a good manager.

So, how do others deal with this balance stuff? How do people new in
their careers who feel they have much to prove deal with it?

BTW, I have found that I need some amount of involvement (i.e., time) with
the problems at work to immerse myself in them. I also need some amount
of re-creation time away from work to be refreshed and able to contribute
(ignoring, for a minute, the value of that re-creation on its own). That
is, I can be more productive at work (or so I seem to observe) with a
hard-worked reasonable work week that also has time for other things than
by working many more hours and having no time for other things. When I
work a reasonable week, I take time at nights to make notes for my work,
when inspiration strikes. When I worked 80 and more hours in a week, I
wouldn't take _any_ time at home to make notes of any inspiration which
struck, even if making those notes woould save me time the next day; I
_needed_ those few hours to myself or for my family and me.

Bill

-- 
Bill Harris                             Hewlett-Packard Co. 
R&D Engineering Processes               Lake Stevens Division 
domain: billh@lsid.hp.com               M/S 330
phone: (425) 335-2200                   8600 Soper Hill Road
fax: (425) 335-2828                     Everett, WA 98205-1298 


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