The glorious work-life balance.
The United States of America is, let’s be
frank, decidedly not a workers’ paradise. The employed in
this land of the free, home of the brave are expected to slave long
hours without rest and then are at beck and call of bosses after
hours if something goes sideways. It’s the wages of capitalism, I
suppose, and you can imagine the envy US surfers have in eyes when
peering across the Pacific at communist Australian brothers and
sisters.
The Lucky Country, hours ago, passed a landmark “right to
disconnect” rule wherein surfers can tell their bosses to kick
rocks if contacted after hours.
According to the BBC, the law does not prohibit
the aforementioned big cheeses from contacting their charges but
does give the latter the right to not answer and/or obey if the
request is “not reasonable,” a phrase which will be defined on a
case-by-case basis by Australia’s Fair Work Commission.
Failure to comply, and/or failure to do reasonable work, leads
to a hefty fine.
Australia’s Council of Trade Unions proudly declared the new
standard “will empower workers to refuse unreasonable out-of-hours
work contact and enabling greater work-life balance.”
John Hopkins, from Swinburne University of Technology, added,
“Any organisation that has staff who have better rest and who have
better work-life-balance are going to have staff who are less
likely to have sick days, less likely to leave the
organisation.”
But do you think John Hopkins wishes he attended John Hopkins
University instead?
Likely.
Back to the issue at hand, though, “work-life balance.” How
often have you heard/read this phrase lately? Any concept that gets
this much heat very soon transforms into utter nonsense. I feel
we’re already there with “work-life balance.”
David Brennan, an Australian in the financial industry, bucked
the trend and openly said, “I think it’s an excellent idea. I hope
it catches on. I doubt it’ll catch on in our industry, to tell the
truth though. We’re well paid, we’re expected to deliver, and we
feel we have to deliver 24 hours a day.”
