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Pimp Your Work - Improving Your Work Day Efficiency

Do You Recognize the 5 Early Warning Signs of Workaholism?

by Celine on October 25th, 2007

What are you doing right now? Oh, right, you’re working.  How about an hour later?  Still working, right?  How about at around 11pm tonight?  Oh of course - you’re working.  Do yourself a favor and prevent yourself from being a complete workaholic by keeping an eye out for these symptoms:

You find yourself working even if you’re not in the office.  Instead of watching some TV or sleeping when you get home, you still spend your remaining working hours catching up on some work.  Whether it’s typing reports or answering work related emails, it’s still considered work.  This is especially common among people who work from home.  As a solution, designate a specific working space and time and stick to it.  Make a rule to work on office hours only - you’re not paid extra for the work you do at home.

 Your phone never stops beeping.  Unless you’re a doctor, being on call 24/7 for your boss or clients is ridiculous.  You’re putting them in charge of your time even if you’re away from them.  The solution? Turn off your phone or put it on silent mode once office hours are over.  Also, don’t give business contacts your personal number.

You micromanage.   Do you do every little thing including stapling reports and putting things in envelopes?  Stop it.  Nobody cares if you’ve got the most perfect stapling style - there are just some things you have to delegate.  If it falls outside your job description, and as long as someone else has the skills and time to do it - give them these menial tasks.

All you talk about is work.  I admit I have this symptom.  On my personal blog, I talk about work.  When people ask me how I am, I reply in terms of work.  I’m stopping this now.  You have to stop it too.  You’re more than just your work, so talk about other things - your personal life, your hobbies, your adventures.  What? You don’t have any of that because work took over your life?  Well, reclaim your life.  Take some time off to do the things you used to do before work took over your life like a giant blob from space.  whether it’s a couple of hours or an entire day, you need other experiences you can think and talk about.

It’s 10pm, do you know where your friends are?  They’re probably either asleep, partying, or resting in the comfort of their own homes.  If you haven’t been spending time with your friends, relatives, and your family, you need to make time for them.  An hour a day reading to the kids doesn’t sound so bad.  How about a couple of hours of quality time with your spouse?  Have a regular get together with your friends as well.  Doing this will remind you why you’re working hard in the first place.

Hmm… I just realized that I am a workaholic. Help me!

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POSTED IN: Worklife Balance, Workplace Wellness

4 opinions for Do You Recognize the 5 Early Warning Signs of Workaholism?

  • Li Yang
    Oct 25, 2020 at 8:19 pm

    Before subscribing to this blog (a month ago), I found myself kind of workaholic. Luckily, the posts help me out of it now. I smile more these days.

  • Celine
    Oct 25, 2020 at 8:56 pm

    Great to hear about that :) Just let me know if there are certain topics you want to read about more.

    I’ll be taking baby steps to rid myself of workaholism. I’m not going to work at all each Sunday. That’s my new rule :)

  • I’ve Been Busy!
    Oct 31, 2020 at 1:18 pm

    […] Without that, everything else is a house of cards. And sometimes, when your business is going well, and you haven’t yet built a good-sized staff to take care of all that stuff for you. It’s really tough to be both an idea man and also a workaholic! […]

  • Pimping bookmarks: Workaholism
    Aug 6, 2020 at 12:55 am

    […] Do you recognize the 5 signs of workaholism from yours truly at Pimp Your Work […]

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