June 3, 2005/Iyar 25 5765, Volume 57, No. 40
Balancing work and home lifeFamilies must strive for togetherness
TAMI BICKLEY
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 Shabbat is a time when families can take a break from the workweek to enjoy each other. Pictured, Dr. Rob Ziltzer and his daughter Andie participate in a Dad's Day Shabbat service at the Har Zion Early Childhood Center of Scottsdale. Photo by Anne Mara |
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Welcome to the metaphor for America's working families.
A drawn-out dance of balancing career and life, the Eisinbergs' busy work schedules force them to scramble for time with each other and their two children. They find the balance, says Lee Eisinberg, by way of careful planning. After the couple exercises, Lee heads off to work as associate vice president financial consultant at RBC Dain Rauscher in Phoenix. Ellen drives home again to pick up one of the couple's daughters for school. Then Ellen goes to work as CFO of Arizona Arthritis and Rheumatology in Scottsdale. Following her workday, Ellen prepares dinner for the family so they can eat together before Andrea, 16, leaves for a social gathering or extracurricular activity, and Lee and Ellen tend to career-related work they've brought home.
A weekday for the Eisinbergs seems indicative of the lives of working families, especially those with children. And in the Jewish community, where family values weigh heavily, working couples and parents often struggle with the dilemma of succeeding at high-performance careers in the corporate world while managing to maintain close, positive relations with their families, say behavioral experts and a number of Jewish professionals.
Last month, approximately 80 people gathered at the Jewish Community Center in Manhattan, N.Y., to discuss the challenges Jewish communal workers face in balancing work and home life.
The discussion, called "24/7: Is it time to change the way we work?" marked the first conference of Advancing Women Professionals and the Jewish Community, a group that aims to promote gender equity in the Jewish community.
However, "it's not a women's issue," says Boston politician and conference attendee Marty Linsky. "It's an issue about high performance."
It's also not necessarily a challenge faced only by Jewish communal workers. Marcy Kaplan, a part-time CPA with two children, notes that finding adequate time for work and children is an ongoing issue for her family, especially during tax season. She adheres to a self-imposed schedule, which helps relieve stress associated with driving her daughters, Danielle, 11, and Haley, 8, to school everyday, driving to work, then rushing off after her workday to take them to Hebrew school, sporting activities and dance classes.
"There are the days when you're at work and you wish you could be with your kids. You're trying to get out of (work) but you're in the middle of a meeting," says the North Phoenix mom, whose husband, Steven, is in the jewelry business and works long hours.
Often times, "women have an extra burden" of additionally managing their children's lives plus household chores, says Linda Feldman, a family life educator for the Bureau of Jewish Education in Scottsdale. Even so, Feldman sees each partner in a marriage as an integral component in the soundness of the entire family structure. So if the dad works and has little time to spare for the family, it can be as stressful as if the mother works and has little time to spare, she says.
"One of the important components of fostering good marital relations and a good home life is to create a good balance between home and work and taking time to nurture relationships and the family. (Doing so) is an important aspect of Judaism," says Feldman, who teaches Jewish Baby University and Jewish Marriage University at BJE.
One way Jews may compartmentalize their work lives and their home lives is by observing Shabbat in their own ways, suggests Rabbi Stephen Kahn of Temple Beth Israel in Scottsdale.
"Shabbat is the great equalizer," comments Kahn. "Done appropriately and done with some level of regularity, (Shabbat) can make all the difference."
Some Jewish-based workplaces in the Valley, such as the Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix in Scottsdale, close early on Fridays and remain closed Saturdays to enable staff to spend time with their families during the Jewish Sabbath. Adam Schwartz, the federation's executive vice president, remembers when his oldest son, Jacob, now 8, returned home from school one day and announced that he wanted his family to focus more on Shabbat. For Schwartz, who describes his life-work balancing act as "an ongoing struggle," the request couldn't have been more uplifting.
"We make Shabbat a family day," he says. "We go to synagogue ... it's about a break and it's a time for us to be together as a family."
Though some professionals consider weekends away from the office the perfect down time, others feel that in order to gain a competitive edge in today's cutthroat corporate arena, they must stay on top of their work day after day, no matter the holiday or personal circumstance.
"For many people, work can really take over," says Meryle Mahrer Kaplan, a panelist at the Manhattan conference and vice president of advisory services for Catalyst, a consulting firm that helps companies build more inclusive work environments and tries to advance professional opportunities for women.
Staying competitive in the global economy often means keeping in touch with clients in different time zones, which can lead to long workdays, she adds.
But there's a "window of opportunity" today to change working modes, since many people are concerned about work-life balance and will chose jobs based on those values, Mahrer Kaplan says.
Therefore, flexibility in the workplace - the option to telecommute or work less than full time, for example - is a key element in advancing opportunities for men and women, and providing the life-work balance many people are seeking.
Schwartz considers himself "lucky" not only because his wife, Stacey, is a full-time mother for their children, but also because he and his family spend the majority of their lives at the JCC campus, which allows him to see his wife and children periodically everyday. Jacob and Alisa, 5, attend The King David School, while Noah, 2, is a JCC preschooler. Meanwhile, Stacey exercises at the campus. Most days, the Schwartz family dines together at the JCC cafe, and Adam Schwartz says he sometimes "drops in" on his children while they're in school.
Though he admits that being in the same building helps, Schwartz also points to the empathetic nature of his colleagues as another reason he can be present for his wife or children on a whim.
"(But making time for family) has to start with the person," he explains. "This is not a struggle unique to Jewish professionals. We have been blessed and cursed with technology and the constant need to stay in touch. ... Each person needs to be more conscious of when to turn off (computers or cellular phones) and make time for their families. The community should be responsive and supportive of that, but the community can't be the lead on that."
Workers seeking to take a stance from a religious standpoint - excluding the observance of Shabbat - as a reason for employers to be sympathetic to family related issues are without grounds for demanding a change. There is nothing stated in the Bible that touches specifically on the separation or prioritization of family and work, Kahn says.
"The Torah is so complex in what ... it says about family," he says. "Judaism and the cultural value of family is not necessarily part of the Bible. The Bible is (about) the family of the Jewish people and how we function and live our lives together."
When ceaseless cell phone calls and hours-long meetings put a strain on professional individuals, it's time to create a family schedule to obtain a balance, advises Kaplan.
"The key to all of this is organization," she says. "You have to do what you can to make (the balance) work."
Now that Eisinberg's daughters are teenagers, he finds it slightly easier for himself and his family to stay on track with schedules and managing work and life. To reach the point where family relations are so solid that work cannot erode them, his remedy is this: Communicate, "set aside time for yourself" and "spend (uninterrupted) time with your partner and with your children."
Rachel Pomerance of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency contributed to this article.