Balancing Work and Family Responsibilities

In our busy career and home lives, there can be a lot to juggle. However, finding a good balance between work and family responsibilities is possible. Here are a few things that may help.

Ask for help, or delegate tasks

There may be ways you can get some tasks off your plate to give you more time to use elsewhere. One example of doing this at home arranging a school drop-off carpool with friends or neighbors to make a little more time in the mornings. In addition, children can help with household tasks in age-appropriate ways, such as feeding the family pet and putting away clean clothes.

Write out your weekly plan

Whether it’s a focused task list or just the major activities, creating a family schedule weekly can help keep everyone organized. Having all of the family responsibilities in an easily-visible place can help you better see where you might need to remove some commitments or ask for help. Take some time at the beginning of the week to write out your weekly plan, and keep it somewhere where you can easily reference it.

Set your family priorities

A weekly plan can also help you determine any places where you may be giving more time and energy than you need to. For example, if your family spends three hours every Saturday visiting your parents, consider shortening that weekly visit so that your family has more energy for other commitments.

Prepare things in advance as often as possible

Look for ways to use your free time to make your busier times more manageable. You may be able to ease the morning rush by choosing your child’s clothing and sorting school-day snacks the night before. You can also make busy weeknight dinners easier by batch-cooking meals on the weekends and freezing them in portions. Some good options for this are chili, casseroles, shepherd’s pie, and lasagna (simply freeze before baking).

Discuss options with your employer

If you’re finding it difficult to balance work and family responsibilities, there may be adjustments you can make at work. Consider talking with your employer about options such as a work-from-home schedule, or incorporating flex hours that you can use for running errands or going to appointments. You may even simply be able to redistribute some work tasks where applicable.

Time is a valuable commodity for most families, and these are just a few ways you can improve your work-life balance.