This week is National Work Life Week and a chance to think about what really matters to us.

We spend more time at work than anywhere else, and if you are unhappy, the days and weeks drag and it is easy to become resentful of this thing that takes up so much of your time. It also affects your mental health.

We all have to work to live, but it is easy to become trapped in a vicious circle where you are unhappy at work and it makes the rest of your life miserable because it is constantly on your mind and you dread the start of the next working day or week.

Changing your mindset can make a big difference, but where there are real problems, you have to do something about it. The first step is to speak to your manager about what is making you unhappy and what the company can do to address it.

You have to be realistic about what you are asking for, but it is important that you are honest with them. If another employee is making you unhappy or are difficult to work with, it is in everyone’s best interests that it is worked out.

The worst thing that can happen is that it festers and reaches the point that the unhappy employee sees no alternative but to leave, affecting their wellbeing and financial security, and the company has lost a valuable employee. 

Feeling pressure at work to hit deadlines, targets, etc, is nothing new and is not something that is going to go away. 

Many people say that if they were paid more, they would feel happier coping with the demands of the job. A lot might deserve more for what they do, but there also comes a point where no matter what the salary, it doesn’t make up for the stress, sleepless nights, working evenings and weekends and missed family events that many people endure.

When I set up my own PR agency, I made a decision to work set hours on set days, making evenings and weekends my own with the family.

Having spent more than 20 years declining invitations or having to send apologies at the last minute because something had come up at work, it has been fantastic (pre-Covid) to be able to go out for a meal, go to a concert, or arrange to meet family and friends at the weekend, without worrying that work will get in the way.

It went with the territory, but when I worked in newspapers, nothing was off limits and there would be calls and emails at any hour, on any day. It wasn’t and never will be a nine-to-five industry.

The Manchester Arena Bombing and Boxing Day floods of 2015 are incidents that no matter where you are or what you are doing, you drop everything and get on with it. That was a given.

But what became intrusive was unnecessary calls about mundane things. Staff need to be managed and supported and I have no problem with that. But it reached the point where you felt some people couldn’t think for themselves.

I have always hated disturbing people outside of work, and have only done so in an emergency. 

The most serious out-of-hours call I had to make was the night the paper almost didn’t print following a huge IT failure just before our 10.30pm deadline. The whole network just went dead. I rang the MD, who was at an awards ceremony, to say the paper wouldn’t come out for the first time in its history. Following several more frantic calls, the head of IT came charging over the hills like a knight in shining armour, mumbling something about speed cameras, and eventually managed to coax the system back into life.

It was hugely stressful for all concerned but we finally got the paper away. It was a real emergency that needed all hands to the pumps.

Had I phoned the head of IT at that time to ask why an email I sent kept bouncing back, I can imagine what the response would be – and it would have been well deserved. That is the sort of thing that makes staff feel they don’t get paid enough and makes them unhappy in work.

Knowing you can look forward to something at the end of the day or week can change your whole outlook on work and life.

I love what I do which is a huge help, but that is because when I left newspapers, I decided to only do what I enjoyed, rather than what I had to.

I hope you’ve had a great week.

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