According to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center, most Americans consider spending time with family as a top priority in their lives, surpassing all other personal commitments. Approximately 73% of U.S. adults believe that spending time with family is the most important thing to them personally.
In addition, as we continue in our careers and age, the weight of importance we put on family grows. No matter the uniqueness of our family structures or any quirk we might have, we all yearn for trust, connections, and deep relationships. We crave investment from those “upstream” from us, our parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles. We want companionship and camaraderie with those we keep pace with – our siblings, spouse, partner, and cousins. And we get great joy from spending time with and investing in those who came after us within our family, such as our children, nieces, nephews, and grandchildren.
For decades, the imbalance of work hours and personal time has put intense pressure and stress on families. Then with the advent of smartphones and incessant notifications, social media, and the demand to always be on quality family time has been eroded. You can be in the same room physically with your loved one and still feel lonely and lack connection.
Lack of family connection or feeling that you are not as connected and supportive as you should be is the most significant driver of stress in the workforce. In fact, up to 90% of Physician office visits are due to stress-related issues, and the six leading causes of death are linked to stress.
The path forward is clear; we must own our time and create an intentional action plan unique to our goals to foster family connections. The more stability we have at home and within family relationships, the more we tend to have a consistent and longer-term approach to work and career. Having stability at home and work allows the safety to learn new things and take on new responsibilities, leading to better performance, lower turnover, lower rate of absenteeism, and lateness. Your commitment to improving your family connections will also yield dividends in the joy and freedom you experience in your career.
The CareerTruth solution set of steps and exercises prepares you to take a holistic view of your career plan that sets you up to make clear action plans to meet your goal. Determining what success means for your time with your family is critical. Be specific about who you want to impact with your time and how you will increase your time with them.
You may select your spouse to have a weekly date to discuss a specific topic. You may schedule three planned family events in the next 90 days. Maybe you will create new kitchen table discussion games to create fresh rapport and build relationships. Or you may decide to deepen your relationship and trust with someone in particular, and this will take going out of your way to remain available to their needs.
In addition, you will need to determine how you define success in this season of growing your commitment to family. You don’t have to reduce your impact. It is fantastic to focus in, and you might find that you perform with more impact in your job, too. You should speak to your colleagues or leaders to shift your work schedule or create more attainable fixed goals at work. You can also reclaim some time by doing a time audit that may eliminate other time sucks, such as screen time or commuting.
Fostering an enduring connection with others is no small task. You must take a holistic view of your life and develop a real plan to allocate the time, determine action steps, properly communicate to key stakeholders at work and home, and be accountable to meet your goal.
There may be seasons when you need to spend more energy and resources on work than you or your family would prefer, but making sure that you’ve invested in connection proactively will help for when those times arise. If you plan and communicate well, you will gain support and credibility, not stress. Continuously check your energy and journal what is going well (we call those Roses) and what is not going well (known as Thorns) so you are in tune when the stress is manageable or you need to adjust.
Most often, we work to benefit our families. Therefore, our work cannot cause our family problems. This is a CareerTruth.