Work-Life Balance Strategies- Setting Boundaries for a Healthier Life

Welcome to Building Better Developers, the Developer podcast, where we work on getting better step by step professionally and personally. Let's get started. Well, hello and welcome back. We are continuing our season of Building Better Businesses. We are Building Better Developers. This is the Developer podcast. This episode, we're going to talk about boundaries. We're going to put some gates and some fortresses and stuff like that and shoot pigs back and forth across them. Or that's a whole different thing. I am Rob Brodhead. I'm one of the founders of Develop-a-Nor, Building Better Developers. I'm also a founder of RB Consulting, where we are one of those firms that go out there. Actually, we're probably about the only firm. Not the only. There are a few out there, but what we do is we specialize in you. We sit down, we learn your business, we work with you to understand what are the ins and the outs, the value proposition that you bring, what is it that you have currently that is your technology stack, your footprint, dare I say, your sprawl. And then we help you organize that through integration, implementation or integration, simplification, automation, innovation, all these other-ations. And that's just the problem. There's a lot of ways to skin this cat. No offense to the cat lovers out there. There are a lot of ways to leverage technology. It's out there. It's going to be part of business. I don't care if you're like got a lemonade stand. There is the technology is involved these days. And so what we do is we take our vast experience with technology across a lot of different lines of business and we help you do technology better. We help you take that big investment and use it to make your business better, to make your customers happier. And everybody wins. Good thing and bad thing. Thanks. Talking about everybody wins. Bad thing. I had to take my car in this week. And it was basically because we're sitting there the other day and Dada looks down and her feet are roughly in water in the bottom of the car in the passenger seat. There's a leak of some sort. So that's never fun having to take it in. And actually what was even worse is it turns out that the guys we took it into, they're more like a body in shop and stuff like that. It was actually windshield related. So now we're going to have to go back and find a windshield place and it's probably going to take forever to get that stuff actually fixed. I guess the good part about that is not a huge leak. It's not all the time. It's just one of those things that's a pain. Hence the bad thing. Good thing is when you're like me and you've been doing work for many, many years, you actually will end up going through we'll say like seasons and stuff like that with customers. There will be people sometimes you work with for a long time. And then in some cases, if you're like me, they go away for a while because project dies, they move on or whatever. Good thing is I've recently recently connected back with a customer that I had not worked with in many years. I don't know how many, but more than one. So we'll just call it many. And I had worked with them for probably three or four or five years, something like that beforehand before this break and wasn't sure if we were ever going to like cross paths again. Things have changed. Businesses have changed, stuff like that. But now I get to come back and work with them again, which is a really good thing because they were great people, loved working with them. And so it's one of those things I look forward to. You all get to look forward to listening to Michael introduce himself. So go for it. Hey, everyone. My name is Michael Moulache. I'm one of the founders of developer NURB building better developers. I'm also the founder of Envision QA, where we help businesses through assessments, through requirements gathering. Maybe we help you figure out what you need for from your business through software. It's either through custom building, custom software, helping you identify the software tools that you need to buy or even using the tools you have. Sometimes it's just simply walking through what you have, figuring out, oh, you already have this. How do you use it? Or maybe how does this work with your business? Some businesses buy things, they forget about them, or they just never really figured out how to fully implement it into their business. So Envision QA can come in there and we can help you make your software work better for you instead of you working for your software. So I sort of, I guess, tease it. I said, right, right. We're going to talk about boundaries in our world, in our business. The boundaries I'm talking about is our life and our business. And these are, this is very much a challenge because the whole concept, I guess, of side hustle is starting to blur your work into more of your regular life. Side hustle is basically sacrificing some of your non-work life so you can do more work to some extent. Now, ideally, the side hustle we're enjoying and so it is part of our fun time. It's our free time. It's the time that we get to control our schedules a little bit more and do what we want to do. However, as that grows, a lot of times we can become a slave to that as well and now we no longer are doing what we do necessarily all that. Maybe we're doing what we would like to do but not necessarily when we would like to do it. And that is the crux of this one. Is it saying, how do we put the guardrails in place to protect ourselves from ourselves of all people? And those are the hardest ones. It's very easy for us to move those guardrails when we feel like it. If you've got a deadline, you've got a day that's like, I just need to get across this thing. I need to get this thing done. I need to finish this project for this customer. I need to reach out to one more customer. Whatever it happens to be, there's always more that can be done. That's sort of the nature of work. Your job is going to be there tomorrow as well. It's not something that's just here today and gone tomorrow. I hope not because if it is, it's not really a job. It's more of like a gig or something like that. What we need to do though is I think one of the things that's key is have a workplace. Have somewhere that you work that is your work environment. There's really something very vital about being able to go to work. Even if it's going to work is walking down the hall or going into the next room in your house, it needs to at least be leaving the room you're in. Many years ago, I don't even know, I probably have told this story before, there was a point where my desk was literally right next to where I slept in my bed. I literally could roll out of bed and actually I think I literally couldn't roll out of bed because my desk chair was right there and I was at work and that was life. I did a lot of work then but I also got very frustrated at times because I had a computer right there and it would notify me if somebody would email me or something like that which would sometimes happen at two in the morning. It's too much. You need to be able to separate that. I would also suggest, although a lot of us don't do this and I think it's going to be a bigger problem for some of us than others, particularly if you're a gamer or something like that, is also separate your recreation area from your work area. So a lot of us, because we have computers and we have TVs and we have all this stuff, it's very easy for our workplace to also be our, it could be our man cave or something like that where we've got computers and we've got television, we've got sports going on and things like that. Now I like to use the analogy or I guess the thought of if you go to work, if you actually and your office space there has, we always customize it. Some of the pictures of our loved ones and stuff like that. But if it also has a big 60 inch screen TV, widescreen TV and you're blaring your latest sports team all the time or you've got music cranked out all the time or you've got a PlayStation that's there running all the time that you like swapping back and forth, your boss is probably not going to be a fan. Just saying it's probably not what they're going to be looking for because they want you to come to work and be in a work mode. Same thing is when you go to work, you should be in your work mode and then you should be able to leave your workplace and get out of your work mode. Now I know that is a challenge, but that is going to be one of the things that we're going to talk about, speaking of challenges, when we get to the later, second part of that. But first I want to let Michael throw his two or more cents in. Thanks Rob. Yeah. So what I like about this one is because we're talking about that work life balance, you know, setting up those barriers. And I think I even alluded to this a couple of podcasts ago in my bad where I had spent so much time working that I had only had a couple hours to spend with my wife for the entire week. So it's like I was such, I did not have good boundaries that week. I did not have separated my time well. One of the things as you're trying to figure this out, as you're building your business, you are your business. So you are always on. The biggest problem I have is turning that off. I do kind of have my space separated a little bit like Rob mentioned, but due to my downsizing, I don't have as much space. So I don't have two places to go anymore. So it is kind of shared a little bit. With that being said though, I do try to keep my workspace clean. So I have a dedicated section. However, there are still times where I go to an office space. Like I will go to a shared office space so I can separate my boundaries. So I can kind of separate the two places. Be careful if you're one of those that go to like a coffee shop or a restaurant. Those can be distracting. That could still be your place, but that's still not a perfect place. Like maybe go to a library or like a WeWork or something like that. That's a little more separate. Now if you're meeting clients in that, coffee shops are good. But like Rob said, have a dedicated place to go work. That is when you're there, you are plugged in, you are working. Make sure that when you leave, you're not plugged in. However, again, if we are our business, the telephone is going to ring. It's going to come to us. So you're going to need to set up office hours for your customers. If you're 24 hour support, hopefully you've hired someone to be a 24 hour support person. It's not just you. You can kind of balance that. Other things I would recommend, like Rob mentioned, having the machine beep at them all night, kind of wake them up. Our phones do that now. You know, we have so many devices in our house that make noises to alert us of things. It can be overwhelming. It can set off anxiety. You know, smartwatches are great, but they can be bad. They can be distracting. They can kind of set you up to always just make you distracted. I've talked about this before, but look at using your, look at using technology to help separate the two. When you're in work, set up your machines or your apps for work to be available during work hours. When you are out of work or off work hours, all those apps need to be muted, silenced or otherwise put in the background. So they're not bothering you after hours when you're on your personal time. The other thing is, and like Rob mentioned, you know, we have computers. If you're a gamer, you might play games on your computer. Try to have two different machines. It's not always easy cost wise, but try to separate your gaming rig from your work rig. And if you are on your gaming rig, block your work sites, block your work email. Don't install anything business related on your gaming rig at all. Because again, you're going to get those alerts in that while you're playing. Oh, I need to go to you. Don't want to get that squirrel momentum going all the time. You want to kind of be pick a lane, be in that lane. And when your time is up, be in your other role, go back to your personal space, your personal time or your work time, you know, kind of set up those barriers. And you will find that that is very helpful because a lot of times we don't do that. And we're constantly looking in front. Okay. I get that email or, oh, I'm waiting. Email, send and forget. Send it. They'll get it when they get it comes back to you. If you need it a little more pressing, send them like a Slack message teams. You should get it hopefully a little bit faster response. But if it is an emergency, pick up the darn phone, call someone, get it taken care of and then put it away. So just set up a schedule or set up a routine so that you can step out of your work or step out of personal time back into work. So you can kind of have that work life balance again and be able to play your games, get your work done or spend time with family. I think that's the best thing is that notifications are our life now through your phone, through your laptop or tablet or whatever it is. And I think one thing is, yes, definitely do not don't put games on your work machine and don't put work on a game machine. If you're like me, that is why I've got so I like the little handheld consoles better. Your switches and your the other guy that I have the what? What? Steam Deck. There you go. Sorry, words are tough sometimes. The Steam Deck, things like that, because then it's just very difficult for me, although I have at times been like, I could probably put work on. Don't don't put work on it. And then separately, try to keep your games off your work stuff because it allows you to split those. But more importantly is use, which has now become very much a part of all these devices. Well, use your like quiet times and stuff like that where you can do not disturb and those kinds of things where it's like, all right, I like, for example, turn off on the weekend, turn off all your stuff, turn off your email notification on your phone or your email notifications, Slack, whatever you use teams, all that stuff, turn that crap off. It is amazing how easy it is, especially like turn them off completely. Don't even do the little bubbly thing that says you got notifications, because when you go to jump on your whatever it is, you're going to bounce into that. You're going to say, oh, wait, I got I got I got little red dot. I got 50,000 messages. I got to start working on them. If you're like me, I do that at mail sometimes like and it's not always my fault because if somebody says, hey, go look at that, you know, hey, I sent you an email. I need you to take a look at that. If I go to do that. And now I've got because I don't check my mail all the time. I've got a whole bunch that are unchecked. Usually I'm going to walk through all of those first. So this goes back to some other automations where you may want to just like get that crap already moved out so that you are more easily going to go directly to what you're supposed to do. Do not pass go, do not collect $200 and get the heck out of that. And that is it's going to be a habit and it's going to be a hard one to learn. But I think that's going to be your your start is to shut off notifications as much as possible, particularly like outside of work hours, sets of work hours, shut those notifications off. And then even if you are working beyond those hours, you get the bonus that normal workers get when they work out of normal hours. They actually get more productive because they don't have people bugging them because everybody else is at home. If you're going to spend that extra time working, then work. And it really is it goes back to all of this comes back to when you're working, work. Don't try to mix it with other stuff when you're not working. Don't work. Don't try to mix work back into it. Now, we talk all the time about being able to like, you know, when you're sitting on the road, you've got dead time and stuff like that. You can find ways to get time back. But that's where you've got to be very careful is to make sure that you actually have dead time and schedule if you can't. If you if you can't just naturally do it, it's like schedule some time where it is going to be pure dead time. It's like, yes, I could. I'm sitting in a car and I'm driving along and I could be doing something else. But maybe it's better that you don't. Maybe that's the time to just sit there and think for a while or something like that. So life, the work loves to encroach on our life. And it's just you're going to have to be strong. But I think that's the thing is find some boundaries, find some stuff and be accountable. Tell other people I'm not working at this time. I get that on a regular basis. And sometimes I get annoyed by it. But my wife will be like, hey, it's three a.m. Are you still working? You know, stuff like that. Like, no, well, I'm clacking away on a keyboard or something like that. It's like let other people know so that they can remind you as well and hold you accountable and say, hey, you're not supposed to be working right now. If you have kids, trust me, they will love to remind you and be like, hey, I didn't think you're supposed to be working right now. Why do you have that laptop out? Because I'm taking pictures and editing video. I don't know. But whatever it is, watch out for that stuff. Closing thoughts. Yeah, I like how you mentioned, you know, let other people, you know, work with other people to and blocking out your calendar. The only other thing I would even mention is use like the social media apps and things like that. You can actually set timers or block time to turn off applications. Certain things like FaceTime and that with Apple, you can actually block like FaceTime. Sorry, Facebook, LinkedIn. You can block certain applications so that you don't even go into that. Like you. It's like, oh, OK. Oh, but can't do that. I think Google did what years ago, the Google goggles to where if you're going out, you can enable that and then you can't send people email or chat if you've been drinking. Do you think of that? They even like that. If I am going to touch something or if I touch something when I'm not supposed to, I should get a denied or you're not allowed. You know, you can set it up for yourself so you don't have to rely on other people. Yeah, I think that's the thing is, like I said, is use the. Use the tools that are out there because they have they are now self-aware enough in a sense that they will allow you to block them or to set certain hours. And that's where the challenge is, is pick a dead time this week, maybe on the weekend, maybe after six o'clock or before six a.m. or something like that. If you can do it every day, if you can schedule on a week of like, say, from midnight five a.m. every day and then from Friday at six until Sunday at midnight or whatever, block that stuff out, set something up, play around with your device for a little bit, you have permission to play around on your magical devices just a little bit to go schedule that stuff and shut off all notifications as much as you possibly can, even like down to like the things you mean, the only thing should be able to get to you should be emergencies and then shut off all the notifications about them, all the little the tags, the badges, all that crap. It will help. It will be a good start. And that's why I'm going to put that challenge on you, because I think we do need to like regain our sanity just a little bit. That being said, I'm not even going to ask you to send us stuff. You know where to go. You know how to leave us responses. And infodevelopment.com. Oh, I did say it. If you want to send us email. But go ahead and just let us know where you have. Leave us feedback. We would love it. But for now, we love it better if you just go out there and enjoy the day. It's a nice one. Go out there and have yourself a great day, a great week. And we'll talk to you next time. Thank you for listening to Building Better Developers, the Develop-a-Nor podcast. You can subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Amazon, anywhere that you can find podcasts. We are there. And remember, just a little bit of effort every day ends up adding into great momentum and great success.