Our work-life balance programs recharge minds, bodies, and motivation as they reduce pressure points with proven tools to manage stress, time, and distractions and put a more rewarding life on the agenda.
With a lively combination of stress management, time management, device management, and attention and mind management, our work-life programs give your team skills to increase performance, engagement, and wellness. Whether the challenge is overwhelm, remote work, change, or burnout, work-life leader Joe Robinson, seen on CNN and Today and author of Work Smarter, Live Better, supports your talent with strategies that increase satisfaction on the job and off.
The programs at Optimal Performance Strategies are fun, interactive and based on the latest neuroscience, so they get great sign-on from clients. "Joe Robinson was the best choice we could have made," said Nestle's Linda Sellan.
Increase work-life survey scores and retention with the dividend of great morale.
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“The more you check email, the more you have to check email, because you lose ability to regulate your impulse control," says Joe Robinson. “Interruptions erode impulse control and make anything you do seem more difficult than it is. Humans are allowed to set the rules on the devices.” - Fast Company
“We searched long and hard to find the right trainer. We didn't want airy-fairy but something practical to help us with the uncertainties ahead. Joe Robinson was the best choice we could have made."
"We were searching for a keynote speaker to deliver an engaging session at our company’s annual Leadership Meeting. We wanted a speaker who could tailor their subject matter to fit our company culture and group dynamics and Joe’s presentation did just that. He hit a home run with our team, and I would highly recommend him for others seeking a down-to-earth, creative speaking professional that will leave you with tactics and strategies that can be implemented immediately."
“Thank you so much for this life-changing session. It was great! I took away so much, and it left me wanting more. Employees are asking for more sessions."
“First and foremost, it was a pleasure working with Joe. Joe is one of those speakers who shows a deep understanding for his content. He is engaging with a unique presentation format. We were pleasantly surprised that we had more than half of our Associates show up for this early morning (voluntary) seminar. Not only did Joe keep the energy high, but he also provided real life examples and tools leaving the attendees motivated and recharged!"
“THANK YOU for your time and expertise! The team has raved about the sessions and, as a Business Management Team, we are actively working on adjustments to our business practices to try and operationalize some of the learnings! We REALLY enjoyed the time together and would highly recommend the sessions to other companies. Thank you for making the program available to companies of our size! It’s a difference-maker!"
“Joe presented at our annual conference, speaking to board members, senior leadership, and clinicians. Members are still talking about his presentation on work-life balance. Talk about speaking the truth. It was like being in church with all the 'Amen's' and 'YESes.' Joe is an inspiration, and we have all committed to making personal changes after his show!"
“Joe Robinson's work-life balance training was extremely valuable to our supervisory staff. I'd recommend the training for any organization trying to find the right balance between high performance and employee engagement.”
“Joe was an inspiration! The sessions with Joe were fun and interactive. He gave us valuable tools to carry forward."
"Joe presented to our top sales group and our executive team on a recent awards trip. The work-life balance presentation provided takeaways that the group put right to work. We had great feedback from the team. They thoroughly enjoyed his presentation. Do yourself a favor and check Joe out! It is well worth it!"
“I received great feedback, and I have heard multiple team members reference the techniques and “tricks of the trade” you provided to us this week.
Again, thank you for everything and rest assured you will come highly recommended as a training leader to other departments and organizations from the Elior Service Operations team."
"Joe’s productivity and work-life balance training for our leadership team
“As we are almost a year into the pandemic, we felt a seminar on work-life balance was the perfect fit for our Ocean Spray Innovation virtual offsite event. Joe did a great job engaging the audience, even in the virtual world, through different exercises and breakout groups. It was a great session, and our group learned a lot of useful tactics to bring to the company! Thank you Joe!"
"Joe's training was ideal—and perfectly timed for our needs and workforce. The feedback from managers was universally positive!"
“Your talk included useful and important information presented clearly and cleverly, along with a nice touch of audience engagement. The audience learned something and enjoyed the experience. After almost 40 years of teaching and speaking at professional conferences I know very few people can do this effectively. You can and did!"
“Our staff really enjoyed Joe's presentation—lots of positive feedback. You have a great message and tips that can benefit all of us. I thought multitasking was a good thing. Not anymore!"
“Thank you for spending the week with us and making an impact for our people and our company. I've heard nothing but very positive comments and feel that your message will make a difference in all our lives."
“Joe Robinson is a true inspiration."
"I personally took away a lot from your program that I can apply to my day-to-day and work-life, so I am so happy to have found you to present for Xenon Pharmaceuticals. Even with the presentation being held virtually due to Covid, everyone was engaged and truly interested, which showcases how excellent the presentation and material was. Our team now has tools to manage stress and bring balance to our lives."
“This session came at a great time for our employees with so many feeling the burden of stress. Joe was engaging and gave great tips on reducing stress and taking control of the day."
“Our team loved the Work Smarter Live Better workshop led by Joe Robinson. Helping team members achieve optimal balance between work and life has never been more critical, and Joe’s content was right on the mark. We all left with tools and tactics we could utilize immediately to live a more fulfilling life personally and professionally."
“As co-chair of the Fall Conference, I was very nervous regarding how my peers would receive the information from the training. We all work in fast-paced stressful work settings. Everyone kept commenting on how wonderful the training was and how interactive it was. Some told me about which tips they were going to use right away. I felt the same and, on my drive home after the conference I was speaking to my daughter and shared a few tools she could use in her everyday life as a college student. I highly recommend this training for everyone."
“Joe Robinson provided a well-rounded and engaging workshop for our leadership team. Every participant walked away with new tools to improve mental balance at work and at home and a new motivation to work smarter and live better."
"We contracted with Joe Robinson to enhance our employee wellness program. The initial agreement was for one year. He provided half-day workshops on Work-Life Balance, followed by post-workshop webinars and activities. The staff responded very positively, and this led to a second year-long agreement. Joe Robinson provided monthly trainings on employee wellness topics from Boundaries to Burnout to Positive Emotions. Staff feedback has been very positive about the trainings and appreciative of Cummins’ investment in the mental health and wellness of staff."
We often hear from clients when low work-life balance scores on employee surveys show strain, which impacts performance in a host of ways. Studies show that work-life conflict reduces effort and increases absenteeism and turnover (Anderson, Coffey, Byerly). It also drives poor health and energy (Frone, Rusee, Barnes) and stress (Anderson et al).
When people have a hard time managing work and home responsibilities, fatigue drains the chief productivity tool, attention, and with it work engagement. The more fatigue, the more effort it takes to do the job, and performance slips.
Our work-life balance programs stop the drainers and adjust how we do things at work and at home, eliminating overwhelm and increasing flexibility for smarter work and life.
1. Flexibility programs
2. Self-management and time management programs
Work-life balance programs take two basic approaches — policies that provide employees more flexibility on schedules and location, and self-management programs that reduce stress and increase work effectiveness and satisfaction on the job and off.
Flexibility Programs
Trying to juggle work and life responsibilities creates a time squeeze for employees, one that flex policies can help alleviate. Flex programs give employees the ability to navigate both realms better with adjustments to schedules and offices.
Research shows employees feel they can manage workload and home responsibilities better when they have the ability to adjust their schedules to pick up a child early from school, or work from home a couple days a week. The perception of more control reduces stress.
Studies show that remote employees actually work more hours from home (Fried, Boston College), but the time crunch isn’t as intense because they can accommodate their lives better. This increases job and life satisfaction, which is one of the reasons why 57% of companies offer some form of flexible schedule options for their employees (Society for Human Resource Management). Satisfied employees are more engaged.
The main work-life balance flex initiatives are:
Flex Time. This is a popular option for parents. Some employees may want to start work later so they can take their kids to school, or earlier, so they can pick them up after school, see a class performance, or employees may just want to avoid peak commute hours.
Remote Work. In a digital world more organizations are turning to telework from home at varying frequencies. It’s ideal for companies whose teams are spread around the country or globe, for people with long commutes, and to signal trust to employees.
Compressed Workweek. Some organizations offer their employees an option to get their allotted work done in a shorter time span. A standard program allows employees who work 35-40 hours per week to do 10-hour days for four days a week, instead of eight-hour days over five days. The extra day off goes a long way to bumping up life balance.
Reduced Workweek. This flex option allows employees to work a reduced schedule of hours but still get benefits, and is particularly helpful for new parents.
Work Sharing. Two heads are better than one in this program. Employees who would like to work less but the job requires 40 hours or more per week can divvy up the job with another person, each of them working 20 hours while the position is being fully staffed. Parents with young children are prime for this approach.
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We build sustainable work-life balance by giving employees the tools for smarter and more proactive self-management. They get strategies to manage demands, reactions, minds, and bottlenecks, and prevent shrinking attention spans.
The science tells us that attention is the chief productivity tool, chief life tool, and chief happiness tool. The more of it we have, the less stress, the more we are engaged in what we’re doing, like what we’re doing, and get it done faster.
Yet devices, distractions, and unmanaged demands are shredding attention today and, as a result, driving work-life imbalance and conflict. Without good time management, information management, interruption management, and stress management, strain and distraction drive stress and overwhelm. It leads to tasks having to be done over again, reduced productivity, more effort to get the same amount of work done, and hours of catching up on work at home or on the weekend.
Our work-life balance program gives employees proactive self-management skills that let them make critical adjustments to how they do their tasks and how they organize life outside the job to reduce stress and maximize attention and engagement. Here are some of the ways the program boosts work-life balance and job satisfaction:
1. Do a Work-Life Balance Survey.
The right work-life balance survey can surface issues driving work-life conflict and identify the areas that need to be improved. Our How to Do a Work-Life Balance Survey Ebook serves as a road map to the hot buttons and pressure points that are undermining work-life balance. It serves as a starting point for a second survey to be done after the work-life program to get metrics on the success of the program.
2. Manage demands, pressure, and pace.
Stress blows up attention and undermines intellect, leading to mistakes, conflict with others, and crisis mentality, not to mention absenteeism, medical bills, and loss of top talent. Turn off the false danger signal of stress and the stress stops in four minutes.
3. Set boundaries on an unbounded world.
Research at Harvard and elsewhere shows that boundaries are a success tool. Reining in information overload and mechanical momentum help restore order to the workload and improve life outside the job.
4. Increase time management skills.
Everything is urgent when we don’t stop to think about what is urgent and what isn’t. Separating the urgent from the non-urgent and prioritizing tasks is key to unfrazzled pulse rates and effective workflow.
5. Improve time estimation and deadline management.
Employees can avoid missed deadlines and the stress that comes with them when they know how long each of their tasks takes and make sure their bandwidth can manage it.
6. Control email and information overload.
Every email results in six emails, three going and three coming back, since no one knows when the conversation is over. Employees can get control over email overload with information overload strategies vetted by the science.
7. Cut down on interruptions.
Lack of impulse control and crisis mentality drive excess interruptions. Interruptions blow up working memory, triple the risk of errors, and make everything you do seem harder than it is. When employees cut interruptions, productivity and job satisfaction increase.
8. Manage the self-infliction of multitasking.
Multitasking is a myth. Employees can’t do two thinking tasks at the same time. When they get control over this habit, they build attention and reduce mistakes and strain for brain neurons not built for doing two cognitive tasks at once.
9. Increase self-regulation and impulse control.
The more you check email, the more you have to check it. Interruptions and stress erode impulse control and discipline to stay on task. Employees can get willpower back when they build up their self-regulation and attention resources.
10. Refuel and recharge brains and bodies.
Humans are energy machines. After burning up energetic resources over the course of the day, we have to recharge like our smartphones. Employees get strategies on how to refuel during the day, after work, and in their leisure time.
11. Get the home front and family organized.
Employees can carve out more time for kids, partners, and schnauzers, when they have plans to manage chores, childcare, and quality time with each other.
12. Get more sleep.
One of the best ways to improve attention is to get more sleep. Through the latest science we learn the best and worst strategies for getting sufficient shuteye to bring full attention to the tasks at hand.
13. Put life on the calendar.
We have time for life, say researchers. It’s just not organized. We help employees identify the open slots and pursuits to indulge in. They also learn the difference between work and life skills to put the most gratifying life on the calendar.
14. Measure work-life balance improvements.
After the program employees can do a sustainment follow-up program and a survey to quantify the benefits of the program.
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It's very easy to get caught up in a work style that makes us act before we think, reacting to devices and others all day. It's a pattern that leads to doing more than we can do well, mistakes, stress, burnout, and reduced productivity.
There's a more productive way to work: managing demands, instead of having them manage us. This inspirational and interactive training shows your team how to do that, by using the latest research and best practices to make key adjustments to how they do their tasks and respond to stress, time frenzy, and reflex behaviors.
Our work-life balance training course equips your team with an array of self-management tools to manage interruptions and email overload, improve time management and prioritization, increase focus, reframe stress, refuel energy, and upgrade quality of life.
They also get strategies to navigate the work-life divide and activate a fulfilling life outside the office, shown to increase attention and success on the job.
Give your team the best tools science has to offer, and big dividends in performance, engagement, and improved work-life survey scores follow.
Life satisfaction goes a long way toward job satisfaction. They are a team. Life is the engine of productivity, vitality, focus, and the attitude that we bring to the job.
Our work-life balance programs help your team recharge vitality during the day, when they get home, and on the weekends. Recovery strategies outside the office reduce stress and help us return to work the next morning minus strain and fatigue — and with a more positive attitude, studies show (see Joe Robinson's article, "The Science of Work Recovery").
Your team learns how to activate the fullest life outside work, unlocking experiences that fuel satisfaction with a skill-set that is opposite of what's needed at the office. They find out how to initiate quality life experiences, and get family, friends, significant others, and themselves on the calendar.
We can’t do anything about 60% of our potential happiness, which is due to genetic or circumstantial factors, but we can control the other 40%, and your team learns how. This inspirational program gives your group tools to dramatically increase their life satisfaction, which shows up in a more positive spirit on the job.