A new industrial revolution between employees and employers is shaking up the way we work together for good! With innovative efforts to build a healthy balance between work and life, businesses and employees are thriving. So how do industry leaders build balance with their teams? Here, Top Applicant takes a deep dive into core concepts that make up the best careers for work life balance.
Keys to Beneficial Balance
Before we go into the list of careers that foster a healthy balance, let’s understand the principles that make successful work life relationships a possibility. As our management experts compared hundreds of career paths, they found that better employee relationships start with unifying ideas. The best careers for work life balance share these characteristics.
Flexibility
No, we’re not talking about team yoga classes. Instead, let’s consider the flexibility your business gives your employees. Offering remote working capabilities, scheduling for personal needs, and the ability to set unique hours as needed all help employees feel like they have ownership of their lives—both on and off the clock.
Constant surveillance and being told what to do every hour of every day are for people behind bars, not those building their careers. While guidance shouldn’t be overlooked, the careers on our list empower employees with standards that allow them to balance their multi-faceted responsibilities. Remote work, flexible scheduling, and input on current demands all help support employees as they look to take on more responsibility at work or at home!
Autonomy
Empowering employees to take ownership of their work helps workers feel like they’re in control of their work and life. True ownership comes from trusting employees to be effective, regardless of what they’re working on. Employees are more apt to enjoy their work and life when they have a say in how they get things done.
The other side of this coin is accountability. While allowing workers to have autonomy over their roles, managers need to instill clear expectations. From taking on more responsibility to scaling back work to focus on their life, employees should understand the consequences of every decision, even though they remain in control of their choices. Many of our ideal career paths make the worker the master of their own destiny rather than a slave to the grind.
Meaning Meets Work
The final piece of the puzzle that makes the best careers for work life balance is all about purpose. Passionate employees feel more fulfilled in their work. By identifying connections between professional and personal passions, employers can help employees develop a deeper connection to their work.
When both managers and employees understand the impact that their roles have on the world, everyone works together better. To build an effective team, everyone needs to feel like their work matters in their life and the lives of others. No matter where you find yourself on the corporate ladder, each rung can feel rewarding when passion meets profession!
Career Paths With Balance
While many careers evolve to promote better work life balance, a few sectors are making extraordinary strides to more holistic work environments. By implementing the key aspects discussed above, these career paths lead the modern industrial revolution. In this breakdown, we explore how 2 industries have made balance a priority.
Tech
Some of the world’s biggest tech companies don’t just innovate the work they do—they reshape the way they do it! A wide array of flexible positions, rewarding work, and innovative support structures make the tech field a great career path for work life balance.
Many of these roles are adopting remote work possibilities to provide flexibility for where and how people get things done. This helps employees live in areas they enjoy while spending more time with family and maintaining autonomy over their daily schedules. Flexible work arrangements also help employees adjust working hours to maintain personal commitments while staying productive.
Additionally, tech careers provide financial security—thanks to competitive salaries and benefits packages. To stay competitive, companies offer perks like paid time off, parental leave, on-site amenities, and other incentives to retain hard-working employees. Companies in this sector are shifting to a model that prioritizes quality of work over quantity of hours, which helps employees take ownership over the efficiency of their work.
The fast-paced nature of this industry requires continuous learning and upskilling to stay competitive. To provide a pathway for employees to build their value, many companies offer courses and constructive feedback structures to keep employees engaged and challenged. However, this competitive environment can lead to some difficulties in maintaining work life balance.
Level Up or Level Out
To maintain peak performance, many employees in this sector fall victim to the “always on” culture. Even with flexible work arrangements, empowering growth pathways, and numerous incentives, employees can fall victim to burnout as they strive to rise in their careers. Despite the exceptional support some companies provide in this sector, constant pressure can make this one of the most challenging career paths.
Business
In the world of business, many finance, marketing, and management roles are moving to more equitable models to build the future of work as we know it. What makes this one of the best careers for work life balance is the collective drive to benefit both employees and the industries they serve. Here’s how and why more companies have changed the way they do business!
While remote work started to come into fashion before 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic rapidly accelerated the adoption of remote work in many industries. The flexibility of this capability continues to allow employees to work from anywhere, to cut down commute times, and to increase employee autonomy over daily schedules. This has also allowed businesses to offer more flexibility for in-office requirements and demands throughout the work week.
In addition to this beneficial flexibility, many businesses also offer support systems previously unheard of in the workplace. Resources like employee assistance programs, mindfulness training, and mental health support can fortify the internal structures of progressive organizations. Instead of treating every day like a grind, more employers are empowering their employees to take equal ownership of their work and life. By putting the human element back in human resources, the world is doing business better. But not every company is embracing this change.
Adapting to Survive
Return to office mandates and shifts away from inclusivity have tested the mettle of millions of employees. To align with changes in culture, demands from shareholders, and decisions from the very top, many corporations recently rolled back initiatives that improved work life balance. The results speak for themselves.
The “Great Resignation” has empowered employees to prioritize their well-being and seek out employers that offer a better work-life balance. While an initial wave of resignations happened between 2021 and 2022, the ripple effects still move things in the business world.
Workers now know they don’t have to settle for less than they deserve, which puts the pressure on employers to prioritize a healthy balance. That change drives the modern industrial revolution happening before our eyes.
A Balanced (R)evolution
So what can we learn from businesses that adapt to this new mindset? Our experts have found that profitability and productivity don’t come from building shareholder value or from having a fancier office.
Instead, the true value of any organization comes from real people with real ambitions for their life outside of work. The best careers for work life balance recognize the most crucial component of the workplace: the human element.
By focusing on improving the balance between how people work and the life they live off the clock, employers notice a few impactful improvements across the board. While managing a team can be complex, making sure that team feels empowered to stay productive boils down to a rather simple formula. Happier people + better culture = improved productivity. Companies with a healthier work life balance achieve major benefits, including:
- Increased Employee Retention and Engagement
Happy and fulfilled employees are less likely to seek employment elsewhere. High turnover rates cause costs to stack quickly, as you pay extra for recruitment, training, and lost productivity. When employees feel valued and supported, they stay more engaged and contribute more creatively and productively.
- Stronger, More Productive Teams
Managing stress and prioritizing employee well-being improves focus, creative problem solving, and increases productivity. Companies known for their commitment to work-life balance attract top talent, which serves to elevate the company’s brand and make them more competitive in any market conditions. Happy and healthy employees also take fewer sick days, which improves attendance and reduces potential disruptions.
- A Culture of Innovation
Employees that feel less stressed and have time for personal pursuits can bring fresh perspectives and innovative ideas to the workplace. When working in a culture that prioritizes work-life balance, teams foster a positive and supportive environment, which boosts morale and overall satisfaction. This perfect recipe can create innovation to organically evolve a company for years to come!
A Balanced Approach to Building Business
Companies that don’t evolve to meet changing times eventually become obsolete. That’s why forward-thinking leaders shouldn’t just look into AI or automation to improve their bottom line. The top leaders factor in the most valuable assets in any organization—the people that make it all happen.
To put the human element back into your human resources, use Top Applicant—the platform designed for the future of hiring. Customized profiles, streamlined applications, and focused talent pools help you build teams faster, better, and stronger than ever before. To see how the human way to hire can help build your business, log in, build your profile, and find your next Top Applicant!
