Episode 15: How to Balance Work and Family Life Podcast

This is the last show of season 12 and the issue of finding a balance between work and life will be discussed with Sarah Parmenter as the guest of this podcast. Paul has tried to invite Sarah on his shows for ages, but she didn’t reply to his emails for some reason.

The guys began their discussion wearing slippers, because they wanted to give their listeners some down to earth advice about how to achieve work life balance. Sarah told the guys about how she has been spending her time recently and it turned out to be really nice. She learned some new things that we have no time to learn as a rule, did some talks and freelance work.

Then the group touched on the question of underestimation, which arises rather frequently as you notice that you are not paid enough for your skills. Sara voices the idea that web designers must not only work, but spare some time for regular learning in order to be up to date. The problem is that having a salary is addictive and it’s not easy to break away from it. They arrive at the conclusion that web designers need to take breaks, either for learning or relaxation.

Consider the computer just as a tool for doing something. This is a trick. Use your computer or laptop for work only. You may use other gadgets like a tablet, for example to check your Twitter account or watch a film.

Then the guys discuss where it is better to locate one’s office.

Sarah confessed that she began recording videos on business as she couldn’t find anything awesome on YouTube to subscribe to. She wanted to watch videos related to women in business, but found plenty about fashion, makeup and stuff like that instead.

Then they move on to discuss the question of keeping hours under control when you are struggling for rates. Sarah gives some good advice on the topic like: track your time because you often underestimate yourself; switch from hourly to daily rate. You’ve got to increase your rate (if you have a lot of enquiries) to keep your hours under control. She explains how she increased her daily rate.

The guys suggest that you not over estimate how many hours you are going bill. You are not going to be able to charge out anywhere near as much as you think are.

For instance, Sarah charges six. She has it in her contract that her average working day is six hours of working. Because she knows there are going to be two hours of every day where it’s email or going back and forth with a new project. No one has ever challenged her on it. In the Terms and Conditions sheet she always says that her daily rate is based on six working hours. And that works fine for her.

Anyway, second question. ‘Everybody says you should work smarter and not longer – how?’ This turns out to be an easy question for the podcasters and they cover it completely.

And the last one is: ‘I don’t feel like I can go away on holiday because clients won’t be able to reach me. Help!’ Sarah thinks that no client normally ever needs anything in the two weeks you are away that can’t wait.

Sure, this has been just a brief summary of what has been said, so you’d better listen to the 'how to balance work and family life podcast' yourself and learn all those tricks and life hacks from professionals.

We hope you have enjoyed this season. We are all done. If you listened to all episodes, you can think of yourself as a Knight of Boagworld. Just kidding. Have a nice day and find the perfect balance between your work and life.