Who is to blame for sh*tty wellbeing?
I like to get into the nitty gritty scritti politti (that reference is for any 80s pop music fans out there) of wellbeing with the law firms I work with.
Partly because I can’t bear platitudes about wellbeing.
“Something must be done” everyone cries!
But no one talks about what we can actually do on the ground.
“BIG LAW NEEDS TO CHANGE!”. The hours! The money!
Okaaaaay…
But personally my watchword to wellbeing (and everything else in life) is practicality.
What small steps can we take right now?
Rather than screaming into the void and achieving nothing.
And so it was when I was training a firm recently where we got into an in-depth chat about email hygiene (sounds gross, right).
Specifically, who bears the responsibility for emails ✉ sent ‘out of hours’?
Because we all know that while, ideally we would all send emails between 9am and 5:30pm, in reality we don’t.
We all have different working patterns these days. And some of us are working with colleagues and counterparts in different time zones ⏰ .
So, if I receive emails during (my) evenings and weekends, is the sender to blame for my wellbeing being affected?
Or am I, the sendee or recipient to blame if I choose to check/open those emails?
Even as someone who specialises in wellbeing myself, I sometimes send emails during evenings and weekends (shock, horror). Because that fits with my (slightly odd, given I have three children and my own business) working patterns.
*Sometimes* the email is time sensitive. There is an urgent issue within a firm I work with and I want them to know that I’m here for them.
But, being honest, sometimes, I’m sending that email because it makes me feel better to have it off my plate. It improves my wellbeing in the moment to get rid of it. To lob the proverbial tennis ball over the net to someone else.
I think that’s true for many of us. It improves our wellbeing/anxiety in the short term to get that email sent.
And sometimes hitting ‘delayed send’ doesn’t quite hit the spot (and for us lawyer types who can have a tendency towards slightly OCD type behaviour, we worry that, if we select ‘delayed send’, it won’t actually work – the email won’t get sent and we won’t have realised).
What about the sendee/recipient?
The truth is that, for them, it often alleviates their anxiety in the short term to check the email. It satisfies their curiosity. But obviously, in the long term, it can create & perpetuate unhealthy working practices. It creates unrealistic expectations from others as well.
So, is it on the sendee to manage themselves? To resist the temptation to check, even when they know an email is likely to be sitting there, waiting for them?
Would the situation be alleviated by senders indicating in the subject line ‘Urgent’ or ‘Not Urgent’? Particularly if they’re sending emails out of hours?
Who do you think is to blame for sh*tty wellbeing? The sender? Or the sendee?