Our working patterns in the NHS following the COVID-19 response have fundamentally changed. In light of Government advice to work from home where possible, and the increased use of digital meeting platforms, the move towards more of a ‘homeworking’ pattern across the NHS is one that many colleagues have adopted. Giurge and Woolley (2020) suggested that the recent global shift to remote work due to the COVID-19 crisis risks the breakdown of formal boundaries that separate work from non-work, with employees potentially feeling conflicted about what time is and isn't meant for working.
The NHS England and NHS Improvement and Health Education England (HEE) (2020)People Plan for 2020/2021 includes metrics in relation to flexible working. This heralds a significant systematic change to what I would previously have described as an extremely varied approach in the NHS. In the future, we should see a number of changes and will be measured against the following 11 metrics:
I have just returned to work following annual leave and, while I had a great week off, I, like many of my colleagues, spent some of my time off catching up with work emails. I have to admit that this is something that I have always done, viewing my role as a ‘lifestyle choice’ and have envied colleagues who are able to go completely ‘off the grid’ and be unavailable for work matters for the duration of their break. I have always been quite happy to continue to work throughout my leave, feeling that I was setting my own schedule. I often felt that I have been very productive during my leave—having time to think about work. I was therefore drawn to an article that I spotted entitled ‘Don't work on vacation. Seriously.'
Giurge and Woolley's article (2020) highlighted that, although many of us feel comfortable and happy to work on our time off, many do not. They found that spending weekends or holidays working undermines one of the most important factors that determines whether people persist in their work. They note that people feel intrinsically motivated when they engage in activities that they find interesting, enjoyable and meaningful. The data quoted showed that working during leisure time creates internal conflict between pursuing personal and professional goals, leading people to enjoy their work less.
Giurge and Woolley (2020) did this research during weekends and holidays themselves and found that they discovered a solution to this problem: if people are able to reframe time off as ‘work time’ if they need to undertake work activities, this can help maintain intrinsic motivation for their work. This was backed up by one study quoted, in which one group of people were told ‘people use weekends to catch up or get ahead with their work’, while another group were told ‘people usually use weekends to relax and take a break from work’. The data suggested that even though both groups were working during time off, the first group felt more interested and engaged in their work goals because they were thinking about the time as time to work (rather than time to relax).
My reflection from considering this article, is that it is less about whether we enjoy the work that we are doing. Rather, with more opportunities now to plan a more flexible approach to diaries, if there is an occasion on which someone decides to work during their time off, they should try to reframe this time mentally as work time. This in turn should help maintain motivation.
The takeaway is clear for us in the NHS. As Giurge and Woolley (2020) concluded, managers should not encourage colleagues to work during time off. However, as the pandemic forces many employees to work more remotely and burdens them with additional demands on their time, these strategies will be crucial to ensure that we role model and support our teams to stay as productive and engaged as possible.