Turn It Off | Chapter Titles and Content

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Chapter 1 - How Did We Become So Attached To Our Offices?

This introductory chapter explains the background factors - changes in technology, employers, and employees - that account for our interest in and problems with mobile work. It begins with a brief description of the recent surge in mobile office technology (laptops, cell phones, pagers, voice mail, and home offices) and the unintended and unexpected consequences of this growth.

The chapter emphasizes how most most people seem to slip unaware into the problems of near-nonstop work. Nobody wakes up one day and decides, "I think I'll give up my free time on weekends, answer my pages during dinner with my spouse, and carry my laptop on vacation." Those intrusions of work into personal time result from a process of slow erosion, not sudden upheaval.

Corporate pressures to improve productivity and "do more with less" in a post-downsizing era certainly contribute to this, and there is a kind of co-dependency between the pressure to do more and the availability of mobile technology that lets people do more.

In this chapter you'll also learn that the grass probably isn't greener in another job. This dilemma of nonstop work isn't just something that has happened to people in one organization; it is much more universal. Therefore, the best solution is to find a more productive way to cope with it. The chapter also explains why I wrote the book and what I hope it will accomplish.

Chapter 2 - How To Find Out If You've Gone Over The Line

This chapter includes several checklists and short quizzes to help you find out to what extent work (in the form of mobile technology) has begun to intrude on and take over other aspects of your life.

If your scores are less than ideal, you won't be intimidated or be made to feel guilty - but instead will be motivated to start looking for solutions. The benefit to you is to learn about specific patterns of "boundary abuse" and the way they affect your personal and work lives.

Chapter 3 - How You Can Get Back In Control - If You Want To

This is the "turning point" chapter - the background case has been made, the problem has been personalized through Chapter 2, and now this chapter gets you fired up and looking for a solution.

It sets up the model in Chapter 4 as a practical and achievable alternative, and makes the case for taking action rather than sitting back and suffering in silence. The potential benefits for your career, customers, manager, family, and personal satisfaction and health will be the basis of this argument.

Chapter 4 - The "Three Zones" Model For Balancing Your Time And Work

This is the core of the book. The model suggests that you should consider dividing your weeks into three categories of time periods with varying degrees of responsiveness to work. For example, certain days and hours are 100% "on-duty" time, others are 60% "mid-duty" time, and others are 0% "off-duty" time - the difference being the expected frequency of checking or responding to voice mail and e-mail, the expected time to respond to a pager, and the degree of permission you give yourself to turn off the technology entirely.

This model will be discussed in the context of the typical work week, and also in the context of holidays and vacations. The 100/60/0 percentages will be positioned as examples but not prescriptions, i.e., you can assign whatever numbers you want, and you can allocate those numbers to whatever time periods you choose - as long as you make this a conscious and deliberate process.

This model gives you a practical way to tackle the creeping overwork and start making decisions about bringing it back under control. It emphasizes attention to both personal and work demands - and assumes that both can be met. Done well, this will create the ultimate "win-win" solution and sense of balance.

Chapter 5 - Putting The "Three Zones" Model To Work

This chapter takes the model that was developed and explained in Chapter 4 and turns it into a working tool for you. By completing a series of short surveys and filling in several charts, you'll be able to see how you can be divide your 168 hours each week into a mix of "on-duty", "mid-duty" and "off-duty" times.

Chapter 6 - How To Approach, Inform, And Get Support From Your Boss, Clients, Or Co-Workers

Once you have mapped out the desired time and attention model, the next step is to use it as the basis for a discussion with the boss, clients, co-workers, or others who have explicit or implicit expectations for how often you should be checking e-mail, voice mail, etc. This chapter gives you the skills and encouragement to have these discussions (e.g., examples of assertive rather than aggressive statements, examples of legitimate selling points for the boss) and some confidence for doing so.

Chapter 7 - What To Do If You're The Boss

Since some bosses might already recognize (or come to recognize) the negative consequences of this anytime/anywhere work, this chapter speaks to them and suggests specific ways to help insure that their employees don't work endless hours. Examples will be provided about ways to discourage what employees may think is the desirable behavior of checking voice mail while on vacation, checking e-mail at midnight, etc.

Chapter 8 - What's Ahead - And What It Means For Your "Turn It Off" Prospects

The book builds to a strong conclusion with this chapter that offers a glimpse at where today's mobile office technology and corporate trends are headed, and what this means for how easy or difficult it will be to achieve or maintain this kind of work-life balance in the future. The case will be made for learning how to manage this technology today - because it will only become more pervasive, and more demanding, as time goes on.

Chapter 9 - What To Do If You Just Can't "Turn It Off"

Finally, the book closes with a "life-preserver" approach (written in a humorous tone) for the reader who, for whatever reason, just can't manage to carve out some time away from the mobile office technology. This could be because of personal temperament, an unyielding boss or client, or other factors that won't go away. The chapter won't berate or belittle the person who can't seem to break loose, but instead will gently show how to find unique and offbeat ways to cope with these technological anchors.

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