Lisa’s top tips for a satifying work-life balance
Many of us find that in the pursuit of a successful career we’re never too far from stress, wavering motivation, and sometimes complete burnout. The term work-life balance is a part of our everyday language, and it’s well established that getting it right will not only benefit your health but allow both these parts of your life flourish and succeed.
With that in mind, it’s not always obvious how to achieve this balance. Through my first business, Raynes Architecture, and later Pride Road, I have carved out a meaningful architectural career that also balances my family and personal life. This is one of the main ethos behind the Pride Road Franchise.
My process is about keeping everything simple, efficient and organised. Back in 2017, I was asked to speak at High Flying Women and share my tips for the optimal work-life balance. Now, I would love to share with you my top tips – my secret to a satisfying work-life balance.
- Don’t work with people who don’t treat you right.
- Don’t worry about asking for professional advice to solve a problem.
- Plan and establish a daily routine and don’t get distracted.
- Know your daily goals, weekly goals, monthly goals, and yearly goals.
- Communicate with the right people i.e. the people whose decisions impact you.
- If someone won’t be flexible to incorporate your life i.e. they want to meet in the evenings or weekends, you don’t have to do it and you don’t have to work with them.
- Work out how best to show your value to your clients in the most efficient way and incorporate that into your process. Don’t worry if no one else does it that way, be free to innovate your processes so that it suits you better.
- Outsource whatever time-consuming processes you can i.e. admin, social media activity etc. and this includes your home chores too i.e. laundry, cleaning, cooking etc.
- Utilise the latest technologies which can save you time e.g. Schedule Once is a booking tool which saves emailing back and forth; Zapier links your apps, online profiles so that emails and newsletter posts, for example, can be automatically triggered when someone new is added to your database
- Measure your time and calculate the return on your time investment – Lisa uses big yearly planners and places coloured dots on the calendar for different activities e.g. yellow for enquiries, green for meetings, red for paid appointments etc. then work out how much money you generated from that effort. From this data, work out what you need to do more of and what you need to do less of.
- Evaluate how you have spent your time monthly using a pie chart (where each segment is a different element of your life which takes up time e.g. work, time with the family, time with friends, gym, hobbies etc. and make a conscious effort to adjust it if you are not happy.
- Don’t schedule time for yourself last… do it first.
By going against the traditional way of running an architecture practice, here at Pride Road have achieved something that many others in the Architecture industry long to – a work-life balance that allows us to use our skills, experience, creativity, and training in a meaningful way that works around our personal lives.
By going against the traditional way of running an architecture practice, here at Pride Road have achieved something that many others in the Architecture industry long to – a work-life balance that allows us to use our skills, experience, creativity, and training in a meaningful way that works around our personal lives.
If you’re interested in finding out more about achieving your work-life balance by running your own architectural practice, get in touch now!
About the Author
Before starting her own practice in 2010, Lisa had worked as an architect for over a decade. In 2009, the recession was well underway and Lisa had been made redundant twice during her career – once while on maternity leave. Although setting up her own practice started as a necessity, it turned out to be the best thing that could have happened.