Balanced workforce key for management

MANAGEMENT needs to ensure its workforce has a balanced approach to life.

In turn, this will lead to better productivity, says The Unbeatable Advantage author Glen Pattison.

The book, on the shelves since October, promises to improve business performance by taking a holistic approach to life.

Unlike the myriad of books proclaiming ways to get rich quickly, The Unbeatable Advantage outlines a coaching system that promises success in personal, business and sporting life.

Mr Pattison said success did not lie with how much money a person had. The real measure of success and happiness lay with having a balanced life.

“It’s too easy to get caught up in thinking that money is the most important issue in life. Many people fail to realise that money is only a means to an end, and not the end itself,” he writes.

“Don’t make the mistake of missing out on the great things in your life now by falling into the ‘if only I had more money my life would be great’ trap.

“Achieving financial prosperity at the expense of the other areas of your life is an expensive lesson.”

“Often employees struggle to balance work and home life, taking out their disgruntled feelings on other employees, clients and customers,” he said.

Businesses demanded employees work longer hours to increase productivity and profit but this approach was short-sighted, costing the business, the employees and society, Mr Pattison said.

“About 50 per cent of all employees recently reported an increase in the level of stress in their job and, on average, took 5.4 days stress leave each year,” he said.

“Between March 1998 and March 1999, Australians spent $186 million on anti-depressants.”

Mr Pattison believes the cost of marriage breakdown should also be taken into consideration, with 43 per cent of all marriages likely to end in divorce.

He said management should develop a culture where balance between work and other areas of life is foremost.