Page 34 - BusinessWest June 23, 2021

The employees at Paragus IT have been returning to the office — but will be allowed to keep working at home some days.
Work-life Balance
Blurred Lines
Maintaining Balance Is Tricky in a Post-pandemic World
During the pandemic, work arrangements were, in some ways, clearer than they are now — in short, remote work was the norm. Now, however, businesses and their employees are grappling with balancing company needs and culture with workers’ desire to maintain flexibility regarding when and where they get their jobs done. At the center of all
of this is the amorphous, yet critically important, concept of work-life balance — and how,
in some ways, remote work has made it even more challenging to achieve.
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understood that everyone was doing their absolute best to get done what needed to get done and make sure the clients were taken care of,” the CEO of Paragus IT told BusinessWest. “It was going to be messy, but we had to get through it.”
Emerging from COVID-19, then, has been a time for employers to assess what happened and what they learned about the many different ways people can get their work done — and still have
time for themselves.
By Joseph Bednar
“What did we lose having everyone remote, and what did we gain?” Bean said. “We realized it was some of both columns A and B — there were certainly some ben- efits and some risks.
“Really, we found it’s very employee- specific,” he went on. “Some employees really need the structure of the office — they get up, commute, work in the office, commute, relax at home. That’s what helps them separate work from life. Others were really flourishing with a blend, doing work from home; they were good at setting up boundaries and not having their work bleed into their life.”
Workplace
Continued on page 36
etting work done during the pandemic was ... messy, Delcie Bean said. But it got done.
“In the heat of the pandem- ic, we had to have maximum flexibility and
34 JUNE 23, 2021
WORK-LIFE BALANCE
BusinessWest