Increasingly, managers and employers understand the importance of supporting good work/life balance among their staff. The evidence about the benefits for business is mounting and employers are increasingly implementing practices that help staff maintain a healthy balance between their work and the rest of their lives. And for good reason – one estimate places the cost of a lack of work/life balance at $12 billion each year.

Of course, employers and managers must be primarily concerned about the health of their business – after all, if the business does not succeed, there may not be a workplace for employees!  But the fact is that improving work life balance will improve the success of the business in several critical ways.

Absenteeism

Workers tend to be away from work more frequently when they’re stressed.  According to the Conference Board of Canada, workers who reported a high degree of stress balancing their work and family life missed 7.2 days of work each year, while those who reported very little stress only missed an average of 3.6 days.

Absenteeism results in lower productivity if work is not completed, or overworked colleagues and potentially, overtime costs to cover for the absent staff member.

Disability Costs

Workers who are stressed may be more susceptible to mental health problems.  Statistics Canada found that employees who considered most of their days to be quite a bit or extremely stressful were over 3 times more likely to suffer a major depressive episode, compared with those who reported low levels of general stress.

The cost to employers when staff experience serious mental illness is significant. Disability costs can be up to 12% of a business’s overall payroll cost, and mental health claims are the fastest growing category of all disability costs.

Competitiveness in Hiring and Retention of Workers

When employers think about recruiting and retaining workers, they often think first of the competitiveness of the salary and benefits package.  These are critical factors, obviously, but more and more, employees are looking for non-financial benefits when choosing a workplace.

According to a US study conducted by Metlife, more than half of today's employees rate work-life balance as a key job selection criterion.  This is particularly true of workers between the ages of 21 and 30, who rank work/life balance ahead of financial growth and advancement.