Work-life balance is dead and rapidly being replaced by the concept of work-life integration, if the number of articles and commentaries about the topic are to be believed. The "old" idea of work-life balance seems to imply that the two concepts are actually separate parts of someone's existence. Whereas work-life integration is about seeing work as a part of improving one's overall quality of life. There is now a distinct blurring between the notion or work and leisure. And if people see their work as an important, rewarding and enjoyable part of their lives who says they cannot spend 60 hours a week doing it? Moreover in our increasingly online, connected, global economy where even the notion of 'going to the office' is now out of fashion, there is increasingly a co-existence between work and non-work. Many of us now have virtual work, work-on-the-go, multiple jobs, flexible working arrangements and traditional notions of work-life balance cannot capture this new reality. Perhaps then it is time to stop talking about a balance - weighing up one thing against another - and truly embracing the new notion of integration that stresses a more complex yet more holistic approach to the various elements that make up our lives. Balance is about trade-offs, integration is about completeness. Let's get away from talking about the old out-of-date work models so easily criticized by people who analyse work-life balance through number crunching surveys and move onto something more positive. Afterall, the notion of nine-to-five remains merely a Dolly Parton song and not something people actually do.

I was recently contacted by someone interested to know if CSR Asia would be repeating its survey on work life balance that we published almost exactly one year ago. You can see the report here. My response that I did not really see the point since on the one hand many people in the region are being forced or encouraged to take more time off (in one case at least in Hong Kong, two days a week) and on the other hand, many people are now voluntarily working very long hours in order to make sure they can keep their jobs. So that means any survey such as those that we have conducted in the past is not going to accurately reflect how people feel about their work-life balance.

There are however, some interesting lessons to be learned from the current situation. One is that many companies who have offered unpaid leave have actually been rather surprised at how high the take up has been. In one case a compay offered leave of up to three months (with a guaranteed job at the end of it) and found that the offer was so popular that it had to ask some staff to stagger their start date. There are so few opportunities for most people to take time off (even if it is unpaid) and be able to return to a job. So lesson one seems to be that people often rather like the idea of a career break or period of extended leave where they can do something meaningful. I spoke to one person who had planned a three month backpacking tour around South East Asia, never thinking that such an opportunity might arise a year ago.

At the same time there are people now working enormous amounts of unpaid overtime. But they are not being forced to do so and see it as a way of cementing their role within their organisations. Companies (or at least rational ones) are not going to let hugely productive people go, even if that productivity is a function of long hours worked. So working long hours has now become acceptable behaviour whereas a year ago we tended to view it as somewhat exploitative. So, I think the second lesson learned is that we have sometimes seen the work-life balance issue as a rather simplistic debate that hides the fact that some people see good reasons for working long hours and are not unhappy so to do.

I might give up the work-life balance surveys that I have been involved with in the past because they fail to grasp the many complexities in the debate. There are no 'simple solutions' to a very complex issue and the behaviour of people at the moment seems to indicate to me that many of us have got it a bit wrong in the past. 

A business that helps people relieve stress by either breaking or squeezing toys, plates or porcelain bowls is now booming in Beijing. Increasing numbers of white-collar workers of a similar age are now venting in a similar fashion. The business of this kind of toyshops is so good that shop owners don’t even need to advertise. More here.

Prompted by a ruling over a death from overwork, Toyota Motor Corp. will pay full overtime to factory workers engaged in after-hour kaizen (or continuous improvement) activities designed to improve efficiency and product quality, sources said. Japan's top automaker now pays compensation only for up to two extra hours a month because it considers employees are engaged voluntarily in kaizen activities. But the company decided Wednesday to regard kaizen as part of the workers' job requirements and start paying allowances on June 1 to cover all work done after hours, the sources said. Labor unions at the company have agreed to the revision.