Balancing Australia is an online directory that offers comprehensive information on the work life balance initiatives offered by companies. It’s packed full of useful information for women who are looking for a more supportive employer, or considering a position at another company. Read More

If you’ve ever been responsible for establishing employee development programs, conferences or leadership offsites, you’ll know just difficult it can be to find fantastic, out of this world, leading-edge service providers.  In a sea of social media and spin, my vast network send me calls for help every day – by email, LinkedIn, twitter and the sphinxx website - all looking for advice about who they should hire for their own professional development needs, or to supplement their in-house women's programs. Read More

Doesn’t that sound fantastic? I think we all often feel like we have so many emails to respond to, meetings to attend, speeches to give, people to see, chores to do that we struggle to feel excellent at anything. Excellence at one thing I’d be stoked with! This article explores the 6 step approach to being excellent at everything is a great reminder about how to get the best out of ourselves. Read More

Work-life balance is not an issue that is unique to women – but it is one that women tend to be especially vigilant about given that we still shoulder the brunt of household management tasks, as well as child care so there is a whole lot more to fit in around the job!  The 2010 National Work-life balance winners have been announced, and the clear message from the winners – employer commitment to work life balance is worth it. Read More

I have accepted an invitation to speak at the 2010 Women's Summit being held by the Ministry of Women, Family and Community Development, Malaysia on 8-9 December this year. This conference offers a platform for women to discuss workplace issues and my job will be to bring new ideas to participants on what women can do to improve their career prospects and position themselves for success - including dealing with the perennial issues of work-life balance and networking effectively.  Read More

Work life balance is talked about a lot these days. Whether its study leave to flexible working hours, or shorter days for new dads to job sharing there are lots of innovative ideas floating around that can benefit employees and the businesses they work for. I got a sneak peek at some brand new findings at the Women Management and Work conference. But it seems all this discussion is not enough, with the Australian Work Life Index (AWALI) and the University of South Australia publishing the results of a four year comparative study from a large sample of working Australians finding that our work life interference is getting worse.
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MEDIA RELEASE: Work-life balance not priority for advancement of women - 
new sphinxx survey reveals: sphinxx (www.sphinxx.com.au), the network for senior women in business recently polled 264 women in mid to senior positions who attended the sphinxx Ascend events for women in leadership in order to determine the development needs and experiences of women in senior positions.   Of the top ten skills and obstacles women felt they needed to address to improve their prospects for career advancement, work-life balance didn’t rate a mention. Read More

And no surprise, women spend almost triple the time parenting, and a little less taking care of ourselves. This graph represents the average hours per week. Does this fit with your week? I know I work a great deal more then 27.3 hours, but the comparison seems about right to how many of my male peers seem to spend their time.

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The Work-Life Institute has a report called the Reality Check. And it’s packed full of findings that explain the factors leading to poor work-life balance, and the issues it can cause. 

It’s an interesting report to read, because it gives you some data on a much talked about issue. And interestingly, they include a graph on how the different genders experience work-life balance. It’s pretty equally shared until you get to substantial and extreme work-life conflict, when women leap ahead.



In their survey, they found that key risk factors for work-life conflicts included: being female, having young or many children, being well-educated, working long, unsocial or un-preferred hours, having multiple responsibilities, long commuting times, unsupportive work culture or inflexible work practices, tight finances/debt, health problems, unadequare support at home in domestic work of parenting, study deadlines, being from a culturally and linguistically diverse background and geographic factors such as traffic congestion.

If you found yourself ticking a couple of boxes in your head, it’s probably time to consider how you’re doing with balancing your work and your life. The study is very clear it’s not just you - your work environment, your responsibilities, your partner, family, home all play a role in making us stressed, and keeping us sane.

For the full Work Life Reality Check report click here, we will be covering other sections of the report in other blogs also.

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“Too often women short change themselves in their choices. They choose based on what others will think, or expect, or what they have time for. Join me and learn how to make clear choices for yourself. I believe a happier energized you, is beneficial to all.” – Shar Henderson, Clear Choices  Read More