How to maintain work-life balance during busy season
Maintaining work-life balance is one of the more important goals that young professionals have in the modern corporate environment. While this can be difficult under normal circumstances, it is much harder for public accountants working during busy season. After working through 5 busy seasons myself, I cannot understate the importance of finding the balance between working and self-care during the busiest time of the year when your firm is taking up more than its fair share of your time. Today, I’m going to share my 3 step process for achieving work-life balance during a public accounting busy season that you can use to survive the coming months.
Before I get into the steps, there are a few things that are important to understand when it comes to public accounting busy seasons:
Every firm, office, and team will have a different culture surrounding work and deadlines, and it is critical that you understand how your team works at a fundamental level. Some teams may have regular daily check-ins at certain times that cannot be missed, while others may only care about hitting certain hour targets. Some of you reading this now could be at an understaffed Big 4 office and have to work many more hours than someone at a different firm. Wherever you find yourself currently, it’s important to understand what you can and cannot change about your team. That way, you can focus on changes that make sense instead of just blindly asking for a 50% cut in hours.
Work needs to get done in a certain timeframe. Busy season is driven by a combination of deadlines and a large volume of clients, and every manager is looking to either complete a job before its deadline, or before the next job starts piling on more work (sometimes both). In any circumstance, it's better to get work done sooner rather than later. If your work is not getting done, don’t expect to be able to clock out early on certain days.
Your work impacts others. Managers and partners will need time to review the work, and other team members may require certain sections to be done before other sections to make an engagement go smoothly. Understanding how your particular job impacts the team will be key to gaining the flexibility needed to achieve better work-life balance.
With those things in mind, here is my 3 step process to achieving better work-life balance during busy season:
Step #1 - Set Priorities
With all the things that need to get done during busy season, it’s easy for your firm to fill your daily schedule with tasks related to client work. Because these tasks take up so much of your time, it’s easy to lose track of other things in your life that you may commit time to during the off-season. This is why it is so important to set priorities during busy season. While you won’t have as much time due to the increased hour commitments, you should still be able to commit your time to things outside of work. By picking a few things and making them a priority, you will be more able to set aside that time and not let it be consumed by work. Common priorities that people focus on during busy season are:
Health and Wellness - Such as going to exercise a certain number of times per week
Family and Friends - Setting aside time for dinner every day, or a regular weekend outing
Hobbies and Personal Time - Keeping up to date with personal interests
Step #2 - Set a Schedule
Once you understand your priorities, the next step is to find time in the day where you can address your priorities outside of work. In the process of doing this, you may discover that it's more convenient to work at certain times of the day in order to schedule your priorities. For example, if you have a commitment at 6:00PM, it may make sense to start work earlier in the morning to make sure you get enough done before it's time to move on to that commitment. By blocking off the time necessary for these other priorities, you are creating a framework that you can follow to address both your work and personal obligations without either one completely taking over. The best way to do this is to block the time on your calendar so no one can schedule a meeting over the time you have dedicated to not working.
Step #3 - Set Boundaries
With your priorities and potential schedule in mind, the next step is to work with your team members to make it happen. Most teams will encourage you to have a life outside of work during busy season as it helps to prevent burnout, so long as you are getting your work done. Take the time to let your team know about your commitments and priorities to create a healthy boundary between work time and personal time.
There you have it! I’ve personally seen many members of my time use a strategy like this to preserve their wellness and sanity during the busiest time of the year, and I’m sure it can work for you too. When you are talking to your team about your schedule, remember to be reasonable and frame the conversation with the long-term goal of avoiding burnout. Good luck!