No email on the weekend:

Here’s a novel idea from a Washington DC consulting firm – an instruction to staff to stay off the e-mail overnight and on weekends.

The Washington Post reported on the weekend that staff of Advisory Board, a Washington based health and education consulting firm, were told if they really can’t stay away from their smartphone, tablet or laptop, then they can read an e-mail but not respond to it. But their preferred position is for their employees to stay away from e-mail altogether.

The company’s push for no after-hours e-mail is part of a growing effort by some employers to rebuild the boundaries between work and home that have become increasingly blurred with the arrival of new technology together with the economic need to get more and more out of fewer and fewer employees.

US data shows that many organisations have become more productive since the global financial crisis thanks, in large part, to work-issued mobile technology. Academics believe that more often than not, employees are working unpaid evenings and weekends beyond their normal hours and do not record that time with their employers.

“There is no question e-mail is an important tool, but it’s just gone overboard and encroached in our lives in a way where employees were feeling like it was harder and harder to achieve a good balance,” said Robert Musslewhite, CEO of Advisory Board.

Although this lack of work life balance due to technology might sound familiar, one man took it beyond mere workplace grumbling. Two years ago, a Chicago police officer sued the city for back overtime spent tapping away at his BlackBerry.