6 Work-life Balance Habits for Recruiters

As recruiters and headhunters, we often have to go beyond our 9-5 work hours to yield the best results. We are put under such constant pressure of time and quality from many stakeholders, that sometimes we find work-life balance much of a luxury we can’t afford. 

However, with a clear goal in mind and little bits of effort every day, it’s only a matter of time before we regain control of our life. Work-life balance has never been an easy fight for anyone, we cannot achieve it overnight, but we can with time. 

Here are 6 simple but powerful habits recruiters can pick up for better work-life balance:

1. Disconnect after 9 PM

With many of our potential candidates occupied during daytime with either university or their current job, it’s likely that they’re most active in the evening. This is why so many of us recruiters tend to stay readily available in our entire evenings while proceeding with our tasks at home, hoping to make prompt responses to our candidates. 

If you still think this helps to boost our recruiting productivity without much effort, think again. 

The truth is you’re doing this at the expense of your long-term productivity. 

• One, does one night earlier make that big a difference?
• Two, being under constant working mode means placing ourselves at great risks of burnout, which will take us lots of effort to recover.  
• Three, instead of multitasking at the expense of our concentration, we can just simply disconnect and spend time on leveling up our professional knowledge through online courses, articles or books. 

Therefore, it’s recommended that you make yourself unavailable after a set time, latest 9 PM preferably, in case you have to finish some tasks leftover from your workday.

After that, disconnect. Stay away from your mailbox, your social media, or your LinkedIn. Urgent problems could be dealt with through the phone. Enjoy a night of your own.

If you want a work-life balance, you have to draw the line first.

SEE ALSO: An Entrepreneur's Secret to Work-life Balance, Mindfulness and Productivity

2. Journal to free your minds from negative thoughts

We have all been there: sometimes the candidate search is tougher than normal. Sometimes a week passes by and after a few days digging up all the networks and possible references, we just can’t seem to find any person who has any intention of considering the position. 

This could seriously drain the energy out of us, making us feel overwhelmed about our responsibilities, yet underwhelmed about our ability. If these thoughts and feelings go on for too long, it surely harms both our productivity and our mental well-being.

In this case, it’s better to just sit down, sort out our thoughts, get over that feeling of demotivation and make space for a refreshing start over. 

That’s where a journal comes in handy. As we write down our thoughts, we somehow actually release them from our mind.  This helps us cut off mentally from a workday, especially tough ones, to be able to have some inner peace for a while in our personal life. 

Moreover, through journaling, we can observe our thoughts from a more objective perspective, which makes it easier for us to let go of things we can’t control and focus on those that we can.

You can learn more about how to journal for mental clarity here. 

SEE ALSO: How to Start Journaling

3. Daily restorative activities

As someone working in Human Resources, it’s highly likely that you spend most of your time for others. At work, there are hiring managers, clients, candidates, employees,... that demand your care. At home, you have your family to take care of. This probably leaves no time for you to take care of the most important person - YOU. 

You need to make time for YOU, spend it for you, not anyone else. Just you. Because if you don’t, you cannot restore your energy for the long run called life.

Here are some daily restorative activities you can pick up for a more sustainable, fulfilling life:

• A hobby you used to love, or something you’ve always wanted to try
• Something for personal improvement like taking up a new class online or develop a reading habit
• Exercising, whenever it’s running, going to the gym or some home workouts - make it a must-do, not a should-do
• Some spiritual activities to boost your mental health like meditation or yoga

Find at least one and try to do it. If you still find it hard to start, check out this simple habit trick to get you on track.

SEE ALSO: How Hobbies Can Drastically Improve Your Productivity

4. Become an early bird 

If you’re at the point of life where you feel like you don’t have any bit of time left in a day, then make more time by starting your day early.

Waking up at 5 in the morning gives you a few hours for yourself before anyone gets up, preventing all kinds of distractions for whatever you intend to do.

In addition, having these first few quiet hours for yourself allows you to have a sense of ownership for your entire day. This is important in work-life balance because it keeps you from sliding along the day with whatever the world places on you, lacking the necessary awareness to be in control of your life as a whole. While being aware and in control of your time is a must if you want work-life balance.

So how about waking up at 5, reading some books, going for some run or a walk, grabbing a planner to sketch out your day. 

SEE ALSO: 5 Habits of Morning People

5. Make time for personal relationships

Every recruiter has to deal with many work relationships: clients, candidates, hiring managers, other recruiters, other departments’ managers, people with potential references, the list goes on.

If we only focus our entire energy on these relationships, there would soon be a point when we feel overwhelmed, perhaps empty at the same time. 

That’s why we should make sure that we set aside quality time with personal relationships.

It’s common knowledge that relationships with family and friends play a big role in work-life balance. However, for recruiters, it’s particularly important to nurture these meaningful connections. It helps us maintain a good sense of personal life and prevents us from distrusting the beautiful nature of human connections when we face toxic professional relationships. 

6. Periodically review your life

Let’s admit it, recruiting jobs are repetitive, which could hold us back from bettering ourselves or distract us from the long-term goals we set for our life.

Therefore, sometimes it’s good to look at how far we’ve come, see where we are in life, and make some assessment over whether you’re heading to the right place and with the right pace. 

This reviewing practice enhances our self-awareness, helps us to live with better mindfulness and balance between what’s short-term and what’s long-term. And more importantly, we get a chance to view our life as a whole, not just “work” or just “life”. 

After reviewing, it’s time to take action to improve by starting new habits or a new mindset that further optimizes our life. In addition, a plus point for those bearing a repetitive routine when it comes to building new habits is that you already have the most important asset for self-improvement - persistence. 

So be confident, you already have what it takes to change for the better, but you need to be aware that you can change first. 

SEE ALSO: How Often Should You Review Your Goals

Summary

We all get the same amount of hours in the day, but it is how we organize them that separate the success stories from the failures when it comes to work-life balance. With the power of habits to transform small effort daily into big results, anyone can achieve the life we want through persistence. 

Start building life-changing habits with Habitify - a multiplatform habit tracker that helps you stay on track, measure your progress and achieve your goals.