Today's CPA | Summer 2017
Work-Life?
Technology has “freed” us to work anytime and anywhere.
Todd Shapiro
ICPAS President & CEO
Inside Insights From the CEO
We’ve all heard the term work-life “balance.” Now there’s
also work-life “integration” and work-life “flexibility”. But what do
all of these terms mean? And, more importantly, how are we supposed
to manage a workplace when each term means different
things to different people?
As Charlie Brown would say,
“Oh, good grief!”
The workplace has changed dramatically over the past 20 years,
driven heavily by smaller and faster technologies that have made
us more mobile, more nimble, and more available. We seamlessly
check our emails, make transactions, and remote into our office
networks from the devices we hold in the palms of our hands.
Technology now tethers us to work 24/7/365—we can work
anytime and anywhere.
But, what has that done to the culture of the “workplace” and our
ability to actually have work-life balance? And when I say work-life
balance, I mean a defined time when one is truly disconnected
both mentally and physically from one’s job (not counting when
you’re asleep). Our constant connectivity doesn’t just affect oneself,
it can and does affect the coworkers around us.
Now, I openly admit to checking and responding to email almost
every night and weekend because that’s when I have free time, but
I also proactively tell my employees that there’s no expectation of
an immediate response. However, I’m learning that’s not always
the case in today’s firms and companies.
In some firms, it’s not unusual for a staff person to get an email
from a partner on the Friday of a holiday weekend asking them to
complete a task by 5 p.m. on Saturday. Is that considered
work-life integration?
A partner or senior executive may talk of going to a child’s
sporting event but then takes conference calls at the event. Is that
work-life flexibility?
On the flipside, staffers may have the option to work anytime,
which might mean 7 p.m. to 2 a.m. The only way for the manager
on the receiving end of their middle-of-the-night emails to disconnect
is to literally turn off his or her smartphone.
My point is, technology and our morphing work anytime and anywhere
policies have blurred, and maybe even eliminated, our
workplace boundaries—those being the physical office and
“9-to-5” workday, and if you had work to do beyond it, you stayed
late or went back into the office on the weekend. There was only
so much you could do or would do at home, and checking work
email wasn’t part of it.
Technology has “freed” us to work anytime and anywhere. And
yet, staff retention is always identified as a key business challenge.
So, what are we to do? What do young professionals want? As we
shot my recent CEO video, we talked with graduating accounting
students from DePaul University about their expectations for
work-life “something”. Not surprisingly, their answers were all
across the board. Some anticipate some level of work-life integration;
others want jobs where they can truly get away from it all on
nights and weekends.
It’s easy to get caught up in trends as we try to attract and retain
talent. In the end, I think we business leaders need to pause and
ask ourselves what kind of work environment and workplace
culture we truly want to create for our teams. We have the opportunity
to uniquely define our paths. Will your definition of
work-life “whatever-you-want-to-call-it” help advance the value
of the CPA profession?