'Improving work-life balance may help you to be more effective leader'

WASHINGTON: According to a recent study, turning off your notifications and ignoring your email at the end of the workday might help you become a better leader.

Managers who disconnected from their jobs at home felt more refreshed the next day, identified as effective leaders and helped their employees stay on target better than bosses who spent their off hours worrying about work.

Less-experienced leaders were especially prone to becoming ineffective if they spent their time focusing on their jobs at home.

The upshot is that the key to effective leadership in the office might be a better work-life balance.

Led by scientists from the University of Florida, the University of Arizona and Florida State University, the new study was published in the Journal of Applied Psychology.

"The simple message of this study is that if you want to be an effective leader at work, leave work at work," said Klodiana Lanaj, a professor in UF's Warrington College of Business who led the research.

"This is particularly important for inexperienced leaders, as they seem to benefit the most from recovery experiences when at home. Leaders have challenging jobs as they juggle their own role responsibilities with the needs of their followers, and they need to recover from the demands of the leadership role."

The study surveyed managers and their employees at U.S. businesses in 2019 and 2022.

The researchers assessed leaders' ability to disconnect from work when at home the night before and their level of energy and how strongly they identified as a leader in the morning at work.

Employees rated their bosses on their ability to lead their teams.

"What we found is that on nights when leaders were able to completely turn off and not think about work, they were more energized the next day, and they felt better connected to their leadership role at work. On those same days, their followers reported that these leaders were more effective in motivating them and in guiding their work," Lanaj said.