On this week's episode of Inside Outside Innovation, we sit down with Grant Botma. Grant is the Author of the new book, Work-life Harmony. Grant and I talk about the common problems with work-life balance. And some tactical tips for how to create harmony through the inevitable changes and opportunities that people face each year. Let's get started.

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Interview Transcript with Grant Botma, Author of Work-Life Harmony

Brian Ardinger: Welcome to another episode of Inside Outside Innovation. I'm your host, Brian Ardinger. And as always, we have another amazing guest. Today, we have Grant Botma. He is an entrepreneur and author of the new book called Work Life Harmony. Welcome to the show Grant.

Grant Botma: Hey, thanks for having me on Brian. This is cool.

Brian Ardinger: Grant with all the changes in technology and markets and environmental disruption that's going on in the world. We're trying to talk about what individuals can do to navigate and manage accelerated change. And I thought your book would fit in perfectly. This concept of work-life harmony.

Grant Botma: Yeah, I think balance is great. It's something that all of us need to have in various areas of our life. The problem is somehow our society has made balance the goal. And that's the wrong target. Even the best balancer in the world who holds the Guinness Book of World Records. He fell out of balance. There are times where we fall out of balance. And the biggest travesty I think with that is when we do fall out of balance, because it isn't inevitable.

We feel like a failure. We feel shame. We feel alone. And sometimes it prevents us from continuing to pursue the real goal, which is work-life harmony. Where we don't have a work life and a home life warring against each other all the time. But they're in harmony moving in one direction.

Brian Ardinger: Well, I think a lot of folks are having to reevaluate that in their lives. You know, with COVID and all the changes when it comes to hybrid work. People are now both for good and bad trying to restart. Or we think about how they approach this particular topic. Why don't we talk a little bit about the book? And how you've outlined a number of different tactical concepts that people can go through to create this work-life harmony.

Grant Botma: The biggest concept within the book, is to try to invite your family and your work into this purpose that you are on. What I espouse is that no matter who you are, no matter what you're doing with your work, a business does not exist unless you're serving somebody somewhere with a product or service, right?

So, you are making an impact on somebody's life at somewhere down the line, through your business. And although profit is a great goal and a great thing to have with business, it's not the primary goal. You can still have profit, but not meet your purpose of genuinely serving people. And what we want to do is determine, okay, what does that impact we're making on folks?

Let's put that in something that's simple that everybody in my life that's important can understand. Including but not limited to my coworkers and my team at home. And then you want to create intentional systems and processes. And also have some very tactical things that you can do throughout your week, month and year. To make sure everybody's invited in this mission together. And you're all going in the same direction, and everybody has good expectations managed. That's kind of the big thing.

Brian Ardinger: I had a chance to skim through the book a little bit. And you do break it down for folks how to think about this, because I think it's very easy to struggle with. I know I have to manage my household. I know I have to manage all the work-related things that are happening. But how do I go about doing that? And one of the particular topics is you have what you call is like creating your ideal year calendar.

Grant Botma: Yeah, this has been a huge thing for me and my wife. But then also it's something I make sure all of my employees do as well. That's where you look at the year to come. And instead of putting things specific on this day, at this time. I'm going to go to go here.

It's understanding what are my priorities for this year, both in work and at home. And making sure that you say, okay, during this time of year, I'm going to focus in on this priority and make sure I do that.

But then in this time of year, I'm going to focus in on this other priority and make sure I do that. So, an example is I take my kids out on a birthday trip every year around their birthday. And again, this ideal year calendar I'm not putting the exact date of when I'm going to go on the trip with them, but I know it's around their birthday.

I'm going to say with my son Parker, his birthday, September 15th. Sometime in or around September 15th, I'm going to go on a trip with him. And it's not going to be something that lasts a week. It's just something where I spend one or two nights with him and maybe we go out of town. Maybe we stay here locally. Where I just focused on him.

And I ask him some intentional questions about how I'm doing as a father. I might have some intentional questions about him based on where things are going in his life. But really, it's just, I'm pausing and I'm focusing on him. And I have that priority for each of my three children, but then also my wife during our anniversary.

But I also have some priorities that work to where I get together with my other business partners and founders. And we do a trip. And we ask some intentional questions, and we focus in on what we want our business year to look like. I'd say the biggest thing with the Ideal Year Brian is understanding that I have busy seasons. Communicating to my family ahead of time. These are my busy seasons. So that I can get the support needed before, during, and after those busy seasons as well. Those are just a few of the things that are in that. Ideally your calendar,

Brian Ardinger: And so, the idea of zooming out and getting the big picture at the beginning of the year, so to speak. And blocking time from that. Is it blocking time? Or is it more along the lines of here's the ebbs and flows and things that are going to be part of the year that we know coming up. And then a plan from that?

Grant Botma: Yeah, it's expectation management. Brian, think of it this way. So, harmony, we're going to talk about music for a second. If I asked my wife and kids to sing a note, they'll do it because they love me, and they'll sing. And they'll keep singing and they'll keep singing. But eventually they'll stop. And when they stop singing, I'll look at them like, why did you guys stop?

And they'll say, well, I got tired. And you didn't tell me how long to sing for. But if I tell them ahead of time, hey guys, I need you to sing a note. I need you to just sing it at this tune. I need you just sing it for this long. Chances are there'll be able to sing it longer because their ex...

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