Sources of stress have to be divided between those derived from home life or from the office. Wherever the stress originates, there is a common factor. It is the relationship between other people, whether at home or in the office, that causes it. Research carried out in the early 1970s added another dimension to this fact. By studying heart rate and rhythm with a twenty-four-hour monitor, by taking serial blood tests to estimate levels of the stress hormones, and by studying the incidence of angina and even heart attacks, these studies showed that the most stressful periods in any day were at the interface between home and office, and office and home.
Why the changeover hurts the most
The reason is simple. In each place you play a different role. At work you are a manager or a colleague. At home you are a parent or a partner. Switching between the two takes effort, and most people give it no time at all. They walk straight from one role into the other. The mind is still solving a work problem while a child is asking for help with homework. Nobody gets your full attention, and the tension builds on both sides of the door.
Managing the Transition of Home and Work Stress
Bill Atkins was a banker who worked in the plushest of plush offices in the West End of London. Whereas all his equals were driven to work every day by a liveried chauffeur in a Daimler, he pedaled to work on a bicycle. The journey took about half an hour. Frequently he was soaking wet; at other times of the year he was running with sweat. When asked why he did this, he said that he could only tell his doctor the true reason. To everybody else he pretended it was because he wanted the exercise and to keep fit.
The real reason was something quite different when at home, his wife – a good if not tactful woman – disturbed his thoughts as he attempted to marshall them for a hard day at work. The bicycling distracted him; he had a simple repetitive job that took his mind off his wife’s thousand and one anxieties. Once at work, he had laid on a bathroom in the office and he soaked in the bath while he recovered. Having had his bath he could face the world and the finances of his district. He then went to his office, had a cup of coffee before he saw his first client and read the City pages.
The return journey home was the same in reverse. He dressed up in his cycling clothes, walked in through the door, shouted a greeting to wife and family and disappeared to the bathroom. Recovered he could face stories of the fishmonger who had forgotten the order, the plumber who had failed to find the leak and made a mess and the telephone call from the insurance company who wanted to know when he was going to complete the valuation forms for the following year. He was even able not only to play with his young children, but to enjoy doing so. The bath over, after a glance through the evening paper and a drink, he belonged to his family.
The usual advice
The usual advice, and it is the advice I have given to hundreds of potentially stressed people dividing themselves between two different worlds (home and office, colleagues and family) is that from the moment people wake in the morning their mind, if not their soul, belongs to their boss. Once awake, they are thinking about the day ahead of them, who they are going to see and what they are going to say to them. They are alerting themselves to the possible hazards of the day and preparing themselves for any necessary crisis management.
Their thoughts shouldn’t be distracted by being asked to remember to buy some lettuces on the way home, to find out how Aunt Marjorie is coping with her new house or not to forget to ask the secretary to book a flight because ‘It will only take a few minutes’. So it will. But the need to do it will be a distraction as it weighs down the mind throughout the day. (‘Goodness, I mustn’t forget those bloody lettuces.’)
Once in the office, the potentially stressed worker shouldn’t immediately see anyone who might be demanding or pressurizing. Ideally, for the first quarter of an hour, the busy man or woman should read the favourite part of the newspaper, have a cup of coffee and leave the telephone to the secretary. They are re-orientating themselves and completing the process they began when they woke up. They are now an instrument of the organization for which they work – a cog in the wheel – and home with all its worries is behind them until they eave in the evening. The fewer calls from home, the better. Those that are made should be about emergencies, not chats about fourth-form French.
One small change to the morning
Keep a single notebook by the door. Anything from home that needs doing later goes in it before you leave. The lettuces, the insurance form, the call to the plumber. Once it is written down the mind lets go of it. Most of the weight in that example is not the task itself. It is the effort of remembering it all day.
On the way home
On the way home the worker should start to think about his or her evening with the family. Work is now left behind, and enough discipline must be developed so as not to take work troubles home. The journey helps. Bill Atkins prolonged his commute by cycling. Commuter trains may seem to be the transport organized by the devil, but when they are comfortable and run to time they perform an invaluable function. They give time for the man or woman to re-orientate from office to home.
When the commuter trains are running badly – when there is no seat, when they are canceled without notice – then they add to the stress and may be the last straw. It is for this reason that any failure of commuting transport has an effect on morale way beyond its importance to someone who isn’t either in a hurry to get to work, or has already been frazzled by the work-day. It is too easy to blame the person who calls in for a drink at the White Lion on the way back to the family, but this may be only the way in which someone living in crowded surroundings can have some time to him- or herself while preparing for the evening’s role as husband, wife, father or mother.
What happens when there is no commute
Working from home removed the journey, and with it the gap that did all this quiet work. The desk is now ten steps from the dinner table. Many people find they never fully leave either role. The answer is to build an artificial gap. Walk around the block at the end of the day. Change out of work clothes. Shut the laptop and put it out of sight rather than leaving it open on the table. Some people take the long route back from dropping the children at school and treat it as their commute. The point is not the walking. It is marking the line between one part of the day and the next.
Simple ways to close the working day
- Write tomorrow’s first three tasks before you shut down. The unfinished list is what follows you home.
- Keep the last ten minutes free of new problems. No fresh emails, no new calls.
- Use a fixed signal, such as switching off the desk lamp or closing a door.
- Take a different route home now and then. It breaks the automatic loop of work thoughts.
- Do not check work mail in the first hour at home. That hour belongs to the family.
- Warn the household if a day has been rough. Ten quiet minutes on arrival prevents an argument later.
The phone is the new problem
Bill Atkins could cycle away from his office. Today the office follows people into the kitchen and the bedroom. A single message at nine in the evening can restart the whole working day in the mind. Agree the rules with your team where you can. Where you cannot, at least move alerts off the phone in the evening and check at a set time instead. Being reachable and being on duty are not the same thing.
Warning signs to take seriously
- Snapping at family for small things soon after arriving home
- Trouble sleeping, or waking at three in the morning thinking about work
- Frequent headaches, chest tightness or stomach trouble
- Drinking more in the evening to wind down
- Losing interest in things you used to enjoy
If these carry on for weeks, treat them as a signal rather than a phase. A doctor is a sensible first stop, and many workplaces now offer confidential counselling.
Frequently asked questions
How long does the switch actually take?
There is no fixed figure, but most people find that fifteen to thirty minutes of doing something unrelated is enough to settle.
Is a long commute good then?
A short calm journey helps. A long or unreliable one usually does more harm than good, as the article describes.
What can be done in a small home with no quiet space?
A short walk works. So does a shower, or ten minutes with music and headphones. The privacy matters more than the room.
Should work problems never be discussed at home?
They can be, at the right moment. The trouble comes when work talk fills the whole evening. Set a time for it and then close the subject.
