Why France’s Work Life Balance Law Lacks Balance

I’m writing this blog post after 8 pm on Wednesday night. I chose to do this because I took care of some personal things earlier in the day. As I’m writing this, I just received a text question about a project Kelly is working on. I responded with my quick answer. The best thing about working in a ROWE is that we decide on our own work life balance. As a stay-at-home mom, Kelly works during her daughter’s naps and after she goes to bed (hence the 8 pm text message). If she couldn’t do this, she would not be able to stay at home with her daughter. If I couldn’t take some breaks during the day and work in the evening, I’d spend a lot of unproductive hours at the office between 9 and 5 pm. That’s just not when I get my best work done.

Last week, I was working with a team of people whose hours of work are 8:30-5:30, with an hour for lunch. Many of them work through their lunch because they don’t have anything to do for that hour. Then they feel taken advantage of because they still have to stay until 5:30. In one friend’s workplace, people “owe” hours to the company if they leave an hour early for an appointment or come to work late. Those hours are logged and employees must stay late on another day to “pay them back.” I have to admit, it has been many, many years since I worked in such a structured environment. Since I’ve had salaried positions – except for one company that I was with for about a year – I’ve never been told what time to come in, to take lunch or to leave work. Since I am an adult, that worked for me. I’ve worked my office hours around time zones when serving internal clients in BC. I’ve worked my hours around traffic when commuting. And I’ve worked longer hours during peak periods when projects had tight timelines, and shorter hours during downtimes. This just makes sense.

The law

So now let’s talk about France’s law. In case you missed it, France has passed a law called the “right to disconnect” law. It requires employers of 50 or more to establish set hours when email should not be sent or answered. So if my company decided on no email after 6, I’d probably be typing and saving drafts of my emails after the set hours, since I often jump into hyper productive mode between 5 and 8 pm. I’m sure I’d be expected to respond promptly to any emails in the hours prior to 6 pm. This actually may make my work life balance worse because my after hours work would be invisible and lonely. I would have to keep it on the DL, since I would be judged negatively for it. Kelly would be paying a sitter and missing out on her daughter’s life, or not being able to work at all.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I love the idea of the right to disconnect. It is so important in today’s world. The Centre for Creative Leadership’s study found that workers who had a smartphone connected to work were now working an average of 72 hours per week. This “always connected” world certainly leads to greater stress and less time to spend on life, family and leisure. There’s no doubt that change is needed. I just don’t think one rule for everyone is the right way to go.

Better ways to improve work life balance

Here’s what I’d recommend instead of forcing entire companies to follow one rule for hours of disconnection.

1. Lead with empathy. Leaders need to understand that everyone has different needs. People are in different situations as far as their family status, life passions, hobbies and outside-work commitments. Get to know your employees and to see work from their perspective. Consider this before setting expectations about email response times.
2. Set communication rules. For example, when do you really need to reply all? Chances are, it’s rare! What does it mean when you CC people? Is action expected? If something is truly urgent, email shouldn’t be the default. That’s why Kelly and I text when a quick response is needed. We know email might not be answered immediately, so if something is more pressing, a text does the trick. If there’s something really serious and urgent, we call.
3. Go ROWE™. Seriously, this solves the problem. In a ROWE™, everyone is 100% accountable and 100% autonomous. It doesn’t matter where or when you work, as long as the work gets done. People are treated as adults. Nobody is judged for the way they use time at work. It doesn’t mean you never go to the office – it means you make decisions about when you need to be on site to ensure collaboration or productivity, and when you don’t have to be. Going ROWE™ isn’t easy. It takes everyone in the company understanding what it means, setting clear goals, objectives and expectations. It means managers becoming Results-Coaches rather than time-watchers. ROWE™ is a revolutionary way of working that requires training and clarity. But when you see the work life balance that can be achieved with it, it’s so worth it!

What do you think? Is legislating set hours the way to go? I’d love to hear from you! Comment below or join us on Facebook.

And if you want to go ROWE™, contact us! We’re Canada’s only ROWE™ certified consultancy!