Investing time and energy in a hobby, project, or side gig — what a healthy idea! We know that pursuing interests outside of work can help stave off burnout, prompt us to pursue career goals, and guard against the belief that our value lies solely in our full-time jobs. In practice though, these projects often leave us feeling guilty instead of fulfilled, especially when they gather dust.
In this episode, Emily faces up to her neglected personal projects and makes progress, with the help of Brianna Caza, a professor who studies people who pursue work outside of their full-time jobs. She provides useful advice on finding enough time, energy, and support to spend your life the way you want to.
Guest:
Brianna Caza is a management professor at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.
Resources:
- “How to Make Room in Your Work Life for the Rest of Your Self,” by Brianna Barker Caza et al.
- “The Strategic Side Gig,” by Ken Banta and Orlan Boston
- “Make Your Side Hustle Work,” by Jennifer Nahrgang et al.
- “How to Figure Out What Your Side Hustle Should Be,” by Dorie Clark
AMY BERNSTEIN: OK, Emily, what made you realize that you weren’t keeping up with your passion projects the way you really wanted to?
EMILY CAULFIELD: Yeah, so, I think during this extra time at home, with the pandemic, I’ve become so much more aware of all of the passion projects that I’ve been avoiding or putting on the back burner, because it seems like a time where I’m sort of reestablishing how I’m spending my free time. A lot of it is spent alone and at home. And so, these passion projects would sort of be the perfect things for me to do right now. And I realized recently, just scrolling through the notes on my phone, that I have lists and lists of hobbies I want to explore, and ideas that I have, and creative projects that I’ve started and haven’t quite finished yet. In addition to all the notes, I also have been just looking around my bedroom and just seeing in different corners unfinished projects that I’ve begun. So, I know that these projects are the ones that I want to complete, that I want to work on because they’re things that have made me really excited to get started on in the past, and these are activities that make me feel fulfilled. But I just realized I’ve had this extra time where I think I have had a little bit more space to do it in my schedule, but just haven’t done it quite yet.
AMY GALLO: I haven’t thought about that that going to the office every day, if you have an anchored job like both of you do that you can easily ignore your side gigs because they’re not staring you in the face. That hadn’t really occurred to me.
EMILY CAULFIELD: Exactly. There’s so much more time now at home, so now I can see them every day, every hour of the day.
AMY BERNSTEIN: They’re taunting you Emily.
EMILY CAULFIELD: Yes, and there’s no commute to distract me in the morning, and there’s not commute back home to distract me from getting, like when I’m coming home and there aren’t social engagements after work. So, now it’s like, it’s now. Now is the time to do these things.
AMY GALLO: You’re listening to Women at Work from Harvard Business Review. I’m Amy Gallo.
AMY BERNSTEIN: I’m Amy Bernstein.
EMILY CAULFIELD: And I’m Emily Caulfield. In this episode, I’m confronting the hobbies, projects, and side hustles of mine that I’ve put on the backburner but want to pay proper attention to. Brianna Caza, a professor who studies people who pursue work outside of their fulltime jobs, agreed to help me out. So far, her advice is working. I’ll tell you later in the show about the progress I’ve made since our video call. The tips she gave me are useful for those of us struggling to find the time, energy, and support we need to invest in our different interests.
EMILY CAULFIED: Thank you so much for joining me today Brianna. I’m so happy to have you here.
BRIANNA CAZA: Thank you so much for having me.
EMILY CAULFIELD: I wanted to be totally honest. So, I didn’t cover up the mess that’s behind me, so you can see some of the passion projects that I have going. Behind me you can see I have my sewing machine. I have a rack of clothes. Those are not clothes that I wear. Those are clothes that I’m hoping to sell. And in addition to that, I work as a designer, so I’m interested in picking up more freelance design work. I need to work on my portfolio and build my personal brand. I want to write a children’s book that I’ve had in my head for a little bit. I’ve also just recently tried to begin designing my future ideal home, and I’m very, very serious about this. And then I have another cookbook project that I started a long time ago, and I’ve worked on a little bit, but haven’t quite finished yet. So, I have a long list of these passion projects, side hustles that I want to pursue, and it’s just been so difficult to actually work on them regularly, get them done, prioritize. So, I don’t know where to start with that, but maybe you know.
BRIANNA CAZA: Well, first off, I love, I love your list. You sound like a modern-day renaissance person with such a wonderful, fulfilling portfolio of things that you’re working on.
EMILY AULFIELD: So, I wonder if you could help me figure out how to work with the list that I have and work with my particular interests and how I can start to figure this out.
BRIANNA CAZA: For sure. I think one of the things that might be helpful in terms of trying to have you focus on not just one thing, but at least a set of things that you can productively move forward, is by thinking about, “What do I want this month to look like?” And not feeling like I’m committing to these five things for eternity. So, if you’re looking at the list, I would start by thinking about what are the things that I feel most urgently now that I want to express, and then also, how do they related to one another? So, are they complimentary in terms of how I can fit them into my week and so on? You have to think very logistically about, “If I’m pursuing my Etsy gig right now, what does that mean in terms of my sewing?” Are those things compatible timewise? And how much it is that you want to invest per week? Are they both things, you can do for 10 hours or does one really require at least a ramp up period of say 40 hours a week? And if that’s the case, then you have to think about how do I position my other side gigs around that? Are there certain gigs that I have in my anchor job where I can be coasting for a little while, while I put more energy into the one that I need to take off? And then, knowing that in a couple of weeks, if I put the energy in right now, you’ll be able to back off that one and pull some of the others side gigs to the forefront.
But I do think that it’s really important to start thinking about a timeline for these things. And really trying to look at your list of projects and figuring out what is me for the next month? What is me for the next six months? So, looking at each project and figuring out what is the desired timeline that you have for that, and I think it’s really important too, to look at not only the compatibility in terms of the time they need this week, but also in terms of the long-term product that you’re trying to produce. It sounds like your future home. I don’t know if that is a 10-years-out project or five-years-out project, or you really want the design done in the next month. And so, depending on what that timeline is for you, and that becomes really important to commit to because for example, if you’re trying to sell vintage clothes on Etsy, perhaps if you don’t have that website up within the next month, that’s a side gig that is just not worth having because the market’s going to become completely saturated, or whatever it is. And so, then you’ll know, this is something I really need to prioritize this month, and I need to commit more hours to this, this month, or this week because I need to get it amped up. And once I have my website up and running, then it’s more of a maintenance side gig. I can check in on it, post new clothes every week, or so on. And it’s something that I can fit in, in these little pockets. And so, it’s really important to not get in the mindset of, “Do I have to pick just one? And do I have to commit to this forever?” But really figuring out how it is that you can pattern each of these things so that you can actually accomplish those. Because one of the really important findings that we’re learning from some of the research on side gigs is that a lot of times we think of it as a very fixed pie, our side gigs, especially in relationship to our anchor job or primary job. But there’s emerging research that shows that there actually can be effective or passion spillover. So, for example, when you’re working on one thing and actually gets you really excited to work on something else, because you have that moment of feeling like you’re in flow, like you’re really passionate about something and that reminds you why you have the list that you have. That you obviously are drawn to many different things. That you really want to forward all of these projects and so it allows you to kind of tap into that really positive energy you get when you’re feeling engaged and like you have ownership for these projects.
EMILY CAULFIELD: OK, that sounds good. I like the idea of prioritizing more by month and thinking about how they relate to each other because I hadn’t really done that too much before. And there may have been times where I’ve tried to do this, where I’ve tried to focus on one thing for a particular amount of time. But for whatever reason, at the end of a workday, I find it difficult to do. It’s like I just want to relax, and I think maybe I’ve created these side gigs that maybe feel like work in a way. They feel very daunting. And so, it’s number one, just feeling like I don’t necessarily have the time, but also feeling like the projects sometimes feel too big to take on. So, I feel like I’m a very externally motivated person with work. I get my work done. If somebody asks me for help with something, I’ll help with that, and those things come very easily to me. But when it’s my project, my outside-of-work project, I think the reason why I don’t get it done is because the only person holding myself accountable for it is me. How can I keep myself accountable?
BRIANNA CAZA: That’s a great question. And I think what you’re pulling out are actually two related things. So first, it seems like you’re having trouble managing your energy. And your priority at this point is giving your energy to those things that other people are depending on you for. And so, you’re giving all your energy to those projects. And what it sounds like is obviously, if you created this list, at some point in time you’re really passionate and internally motivated to do these things. But that gets lost as you start giving your energy to all of the other projects. And then it just feels like pressure, and you have this psychological baggage of knowing that you had wanted to do this, but you haven’t created the time to do this. And knowing that you still want to do this, but you don’t have the time, or you don’t have the energy, and then it just creates this really negative cycle where it becomes a source of guilt as opposed to the source of excitement and passion that you used to have.
EMILY CAULFIELD: That’s so true.
BRIANNA CAZA: I think one of the things that is really important and that I’ve seen in people who are successful long term with having side gigs and passion projects and pursuing them, is that they have created a network of supporters and a community that’s going to help them be accountable to themselves. And not trade in the things that they’re going to do for other people at the expense of not forwarding the things that makes them happy and that they want to do. So, I think the first thing that you need to do after you have your list of priorities, is to really think about how is it that I could fit this out over the course of a week? How can I make space for all of these things so that I can see that I am making progress? So, a lot of this is just pulled from basic projects management skills. But the key is, if it’s a side gig, is to making it a real project. So, not having it in the back of your mind as being the side gig. You have to actually commit to it at the beginning of the week, set goals, and then share those goals. Share them with your partner, with your friends, with your coworkers, with your boss, and they will help you to make sure that the space that you are reserving for that project is seen as legitimate. So, you actually have to schedule it in, and make sure that you are committed to it. And then at the end of the week you can evaluate and say, “Did I feel like those five hours were worthwhile that I invested in my sewing project?” And if not, then maybe that’s time to move that off your plate. And if you move it off your plate, you’re also moving it off your psychological state. So, then it’s not a source of energy drain where you’re possibly thinking about what you’re not doing in terms of moving that side gig forward. But as you’re looking at each project, is there a time of day where you feel the most energy, or you feel the most productive? So, for example, writing. Some people really like to write first thing in the morning as opposed to at the end of a workday. Or maybe it’s something that you could do during your lunch hour. So, where is it that you could fit that in where you feel like that hour is going to be maximally spent?
EMILY CAULFIELD: I definitely have my most energy during the workday, but I had never thought about doing other things like even during a lunch hour. But now that you put it that way, that would maybe be a good idea. But I also have a lot of energy at the very end of the day, like 11 p.m., is like I’m ready to do something.
BRIANNA CAZA: That’s great and perhaps on your writing days, just to get you amped up for doing this at 11 p.m. is, you don’t have to necessarily find specific times to write during the day, but are there times that you can keep track of your thoughts? So, it just takes five minutes to zero in on what it is that you really want to do in that writing session at night, and maybe create an outline, or just make sure that you are reviewing your last few pages. Because one of the problems when you are doing multiple things is that there are switching costs. And you’re talking about switching multiple side hustles throughout your week. So, if you’re doing one thing on Tuesday, Thursday and another thing on Wednesday, Friday, and you want to try to as much as possible reduce those switching costs if you have limited time so that you can really just focus on those. So, are there things you can do during the day to start thinking about the project, just even passively so that you’re not spending that hour reviewing what you did before and then getting to the end of the session and feeling like oh, but I’m not actually productively moved anything forward?
EMILY CAULFIELD: Yeah. So, when you say there are switching costs, do you mean like it would be better if I just stuck to one passion project like Monday, Tuesday, and I didn’t break it up over the course of the week in that kind of way?
BRIANNA CAZA: Yeah, so, I think what you have to do is you have to find your own rhythm. So, there are switching costs in terms of if I’m working right now, even on my day job, my anchor job, and then right afterwards say you have a lot of energy at 5 p.m., are you then ready to get straight into a creative project? Are you feeling like that’s something that hasn’t been fed during the day and you’re ready to have an outlet for that creative project? In that case you’re not necessarily having that switching cost. You’ll have attentional residue, if you will, if you’re being preoccupied with one thing as you’re trying to switch into the next. And how is it that you can minimize those? From what you described, the really key thing in terms of reducing any kind of switching cost for you and planning your projects throughout the week, is figuring out what is it that you need to have accomplished to feel like you’ve been productive on that project and you feel comfortable shutting that away, and the guilt isn’t going to be eating away at you while you’re doing the rest of your projects. So, if it means kind of creating a time block where on Monday and Tuesday, you focus specifically on your children’s book, and then on Wednesday, Thursday, after work, you’re focusing specifically on your Etsy project. And then during the weekend is a perfect time for you to focus on your home design project. Then that might be a way of blocking it up a little bit more, especially if what you’re thinking you need to have accomplished can’t be necessarily accomplished in just one session. Because then you will be thinking about that in-between times.
EMILY AULFIELD: Yeah. And I think that almost sounds more doable with my way of working. I think if I get into a project, I’d be more interested in continuing to work on it if I really get into a rhythm, rather than like drop it, work on something else, pick something else up the next day. So, I do like the idea of kind of sticking to it and also what you were saying about the end of the workday, I had never really thought about jumping right into to something else at the end of the workday because I’m just like, “yay, work is over and I can, now I can relax a little bit,” or like whatever. But that probably is a good time to continue working on myself. And I’m sitting in front of the computer already. If I have to do something on the computer, it’s not a huge deviation from what I’ve been doing.
BRIANNA CAZA: Yeah, and perhaps that’s a period of time either then or during lunch, or if you get to work half an hour early, where you can do some of the skill development work that you were talking about. So, playing around with software, starting to learn things.
EMILY CAULFIELD: So, Brianna, if I do successfully take on these side projects, these side hustles, and I am spending time that way, how would you expect my personal relationships, my professional relationships to be effected by it, or would they not be?
BRIANNA CAZA: I think you’re right to worry about your relationships when you are going to be investing your time into these projects, because investing in these projects, especially these projects that at this point in time might not necessarily be bringing in any extra income, means that you are not going to be investing in your personal relationships. And your professional relationships might worry that your energy is going into these side gigs at the expense of your primary job, or the projects you’re working on with your coworkers. So, tell me a little bit about your support network now. So, how much do your friends and family know about your passion projects? How supportive are they? Do they seem skeptical? What are their reactions currently?
EMILY CAULFIELD: Oh, this is a good question. OK. So, my close friends and family members, they are aware that I have a lot of interests. They’re aware that there are little projects that I want to work on, and I’ll tell them about it. I won’t talk about these things a ton because I do know that I tend to start something and then put it on the backburner for years at a time. And I do spend a lot of time with friends and family. And I could imagine shifting gears and spending more time on myself, on these hobbies, on these passion projects would take away from that time. So, I could see it as potentially being a strain on some relationships in my personal life.
BRIANNA CAZA: So, I think that there’s two things going on. So first, I do think it could be a strain as well. But what is not clear to me, from what you described is in keeping these things separate, are you keeping them separate because you’re worried, you could be embarrassed that you have not fulfilled other side gigs in the past? It sounds like that could be one part is that there is some kind of guilt or shame, or the facts that you’re worried about them thinking you’re…
EMILY CAULFIELD: … Another one of Emily’s ideas.
BRIANNA CAZA: Yeah, yeah. So, you’re worried about creating a dilettante type reputation with your friends and family. But if that’s the case, by keeping these things separate, you’re actually blocking your friends and family from helping you to commit the time to these things. So, you’re actually creating this more secret backroom side gig, and you’re not giving it the space to be a real project. And then of course, you’re not going to make time for it or prioritize it and so on. And so, I think that you might want to consider having conversations, not with everyone, but with a couple of friends and family members where you say, these things are really important to me and I really want to get these things out. I want to tell you about them because I’m committing to them, and by creating that conversation, you’re going to have them help you create that space. So, you do want them to check in with you. If you actually want to commit to moving these things forward, you need to create a situation where you explain to people why you want to do it, because that explanation becomes really important. It’s not just something that you’re thinking about for the moment and you’re going to drop. And if they love you, which I’m sure they do, and they care about you, they’re going to want to help you to achieve those goals. Of course, you can join different communities of people who are focused on the particular side projects that you’re interested in. Those are great sources of tips and tricks and ways to learn software really fast, or here’s an online e-class that might help you. So, I think that you could think more broadly about what type of support you need for each project, and maybe it’s sharing it with friends and family members because you want them to hold you accountable. But perhaps there’s some side projects that your friends and family members just won’t get at this point in time. And that’s OK. And I think it’s important to realize that you don’t have to share all of what you’re doing with everyone. Because if they don’t get it at this point in time, they’ll probably get it when you have design plans in hand and have put the deposit down. And maybe that’s when you want them to be supportive. And so, I think you have to think about the psychological experience of why you’re not sharing that. Is it because you know they won’t get it? And if that’s the case, are there other communities that will get it and that you can tap into?
EMILY CAULFIELD: How transparent should I be with my colleagues and with my boss about side hustles, side gigs that I have going on?
BRIANNA CAZA: We do know from some research that I’ve been conducting with one of my colleagues that there is a discounting effect when you have side gigs or multiple jobs, even if you’re in a really professional occupation. The assumption that others make about you is that you’re not fully committed to your primary job or your anchor job, if you have the time and energy to invest in a side gig. So, some of the people that we researched, especially early on, they did decide not to disclose the side gig to their boss. And instead, what they chose to do is that they wanted to wait until they could demonstrate to their boss, “Look, I’ve been doing this for the last two months and my productivity has been great. So, it’s clearly not going to take away.” And then you can start negotiating space, even more space for that. However, at some point you need to reveal your side gigs, especially if you are planning on asking for accommodations from your boss. So, if there are scheduling overlaps that you need, if you are going to ask for time off so that you can go to a conference around your side gig, you might need to have those conversations. And if that’s the case, I think the best thing to do is to come prepared with the evidence of how it is that you are going to manage your time effectively. And then the second thing you need to do is to demonstrate that the reason you have this side gig isn’t because you’re planning on stopping your fulltime job. You’re not looking for a career transition. This is something that you’re doing because it’s feeding a different part of you that is not in conflict with the work. So, you need to explain your motivation for doing so. What we found in our research is that once you have an explanation, or whatever the explanation is, we at one point in time thought it had to be a really particular type of explanation. But once you have an explanation the discounting effect of being a multiple job holder is actually reduced. So, people aren’t as worried about you. They understand that you’re doing this because you have multiple motivations, or that you have a creative side of you. So, I think you just have to have a story that they can buy into and understand, and then they’re going to be supportive.
EMILY CAULFIELD: Cool. I like that. So, I don’t have side gigs like this. I’m just like, oh, I have all these interests. But I know that there are other people who do have side gigs because they want to make career moves, or they’re looking to advance their career in some way. Maybe they’re pursuing education in the hours outside of work, or maybe they are trying to build a business outside of their workhours. Is that something that we should share with our bosses, or share with our colleagues, or do you think that that’s something you think might be better left unsaid?
BRIANNA CAZA: Yeah, it’s a tricky question. I think a lot of people, when they’re starting a side gig, they feel motivated to do it for one reason. So, we know that people can be motivated financially. That they want to make ends meet. They want to gain a new skill. They might perhaps see themselves transitioning into a different career down the line. They might feel that something inside of them isn’t being fed by their current careers. So, for example, we see a lot of people with side gig, primary gig combinations that are, one’s physical and one’s intellectual. So that they’re able to express those parts of themselves, or a logical versus creative. If you’re finding that what you want to do is actually have that long-term transition goal, I think you do need to be careful about what it is that you share. Because sharing that eventually I want to stop being a lawyer and be a fulltime writer, is going to definitely signal to your boss that you’re not fully committed for the long run. So, I think depending on your motivation, you might want to be careful about what you share. I think that you can definitely find that you’ll have multiple motivations and you’ll also find that your motivations will change. Our careers are quite fluid, so perhaps you’re going into this thinking, “I want to be a writer forever,” and then what you find is that you have a week off from your gig, or your real job and you spend 40 hours a week writing, and you realize, “Nope, I can’t do this for 40 hours a week. I want something else. One of the things I was drawn to about this is the facts that I could come home and spend five hours writing and feel like I’m in a flow state, but once I get past that five-hour mark, I’m not productive anymore. I want to switch and do something else.”
So, I think when you have those motivations for a career transition, that’s something that perhaps you don’t want to share necessarily with your boss and colleagues but could be something that you wouldn’t want to share with friends and family members, other communities. You definitely want to think about where you are in terms of the timeline for each side gig when you’re deciding what to share. What we found in studying a variety of multiple job holders is that early on, their strategies really need to focus on synchronizing these side gigs, and they had a lot of segmentation strategies, they kept a lot of boundaries between their different job roles, and this was really important for them to begin to feel like they’re doing all of those different job roles really well. They needed that segmentation. They needed hard boundaries. Whether they were time boundaries, whether they were different communities of people that they were working with, whether it meant that they had to have very physical boundaries like going away from one place to go to the other to take on those roles, and it wasn’t until they really felt like they were performing and had products that could demonstrate that they could really start to synchronize those roles in an important way, or what we call harmonize them. So, they started to think about, well, what does it mean to be a writer and a lawyer? What does it mean to be somebody who is a designer, but also an Etsy vintage clothes seller, and a children’s book author? So, what is kind of the overall meaning of that? It’s really hard to develop that overall meaning, that story, that kind of career narrative that pulls everything together, until you actually feel like, “Yes, I am actually a house designer. I have this product. I can demonstrate that I’ve done this. I do have this Etsy shop, so that is a role that I own at this point in time.” So, I think one other thing that we haven’t touched on that I should have asked you about at the beginning is, what do you see as being your overall career goal or aim? Like who are you vocationally? How would you describe it?
EMILY CAULFIELD: Well, I like when you said that Renaissance woman thing. I don’t necessarily have a very specific career aim, but I know that I want to constantly be learning and constantly be doing. And I like the idea of just, of making things. So, I don’t know what that means, but I think I just want to be fulfilled in the everyday and currently I don’t feel that way because I’m not pursuing the things that I told you I really want to pursue. I don’t have a very specific like –
BRIANNA CAZA: Well, I’m not asking you for something specific. I think what you said is great. So, the idea that to you, who you are vocationally is a maker. Like if you have this overarching story of who you want to be in terms of your career, then it allows you to start to evaluate all of the side gigs you have by that metric. So, is it something that’s allowing you to create or learn? Is it something that helps you to feed into this more overarching goal? And it doesn’t need to be the specific, I want to make X amount of money in a certain amount of time. But just the overall goal of how you see yourself. And having that overarching story will also be really important as you start to have these conversations with your boss, your coworkers, your partner, your family members about why it is you’re pursuing this side gig, or any one particular side gig and how it is feeding into your overall goal of who you want to be.
EMILY CAULFIELD: I really like that. I don’t think I thought about it that way before where I’ve kind of had an overarching goal, or overarching motto or values that I’ve been putting these up against. And I think that would be a really good thing to think more about. I feel like I am ready to take some of this on.
BRIANNA CAZA: That’s great.
EMILY CAULFIELD: Yeah, I feel like I need to make some progress by the time this episode comes out.
BRIANNA CAZA: Yeah, I hope you’re going to give updates throughout the season on how it is what you’re pursuing.
EMILY CAULFIELD: Yeah, I will. I plan on it.
AMY BERNSTEIN: So, I learned an awful lot about you in this interview Emily. And I’m wondering where you stand on all of these side projects. The children’s book, the Etsy shop, all of it. Update us.
EMILY CAULFIELD: Yeah. So, I was really hoping that I was going to have completed something huge by this time that we had this conversation. And I haven’t yet, but I have worked on my passion projects every day. I think because I had you guys as my external motivation, I had to report back here. So, that was very helpful. Like with sewing, I’ve been sewing almost every night. I’ve been sewing simple things like I’ve been sewing masks. I’m making a bodice block. I started doing that yesterday which is just a pattern for shirts and the upper parts of dresses and stuff, and jackets. With the children’s book, I started working on that at the end of my workdays. So, at the end of the workday, when I’m done with all of my other stuff, I spend a little bit of time working on the children’s book. Again, I thought that was going to be so much easier to just like bang out, but it is still taking me a lot of time to get through. But I’m happy because I have sort of had that just on a list and now it’s actually coming together in a real way. I feel like I can sort of see the steps and the progress that I have to make along the way for the project to actually conclude and to actually produce something. With the Etsy shop I haven’t done anything.
AMY GALLO: But that sounds, I mean having worked on something every day, that seems like a victory worth celebrating.
EMILY CAULFIELD: Yeah, I spent more time than I had, like it’s been like a week and a half. And over the last week and a half, I spent some time, every day doing, I would say two passion projects, or something related to two passion projects, actual creating of something. So, that’s felt good. I was really happy to have you guys here waiting for me.
AMY GALLO: We were. We were waiting. I remember when I first heard that phrase, side gig. I think we published an HBR article several years back, and I, at the time, had a young kid, and I felt pretty busy at work and I remember thinking, oh my God, that concept just makes me tired. Like you Emily, 10:00 at night used to be my primetime to get things done. And now 10:00 is not a good time at all for me.
AMY BERNSTEIN: Oh my God, I’ve been in bed for two hours.
AMY GALLO: Exactly. Exactly and so it’s, I do think it’s also the question of how do you manage your energy toward these projects. And I think Brianna has a broad definition of what these things are, so it doesn’t have to be something that takes up hours and hours of time. I’m sure we have lots of listeners who are like between taking care of my family, working, probably working more than 40 hours a week, or even just like doing things that are enjoyable. I don’t have time for this, and I think that’s fair.
AMY BERNSTEIN: I have to admit, I have been thinking about the women who are just hanging on, who cannot loft another ball into the air. What do you guys think of that? I mean that’s reality.
AMY GALLO: It is reality, and I actually have a good, good friend who was at that point. Young kids, a really demanding job in a fast-paced media company, and yet she was sick of that job. And she said, “I need to start doing something else, but I don’t even have the energy.” And eventually she negotiated with her anchor job, as Brianna calls it, to get one day off a month to focus on taking classes and she transition her career entirely. And now she’s doing something different. So, I agree. There’s so many folks who are just barely keeping it together with what they’ve got. And yet I also think to Brianna’s point, there is the spillover effect if there’s something you’re excited to do, it can either influence your main job in a positive way, or it can help you reach a goal that you’re really trying to reach.
AMY BERNSTEIN: OK, I want to explore that. Emily, do you experience that spillover effect now that you’ve been spending what sounds like a substantial amount of your time on your side projects. Are you feeling it?
EMILY CAULFIELD: Well, I don’t think that I’m in a great rhythm with them yet. When I have a really good day of passion project working, I do feel that energy spill over into my anchor job. But I don’t know that I’m in that rhythm yet. And I want to get into that state of flow that she talked about in like when you are working, and it’s just like, it’s just going. You’re not trying very hard and it just feels good.
AMY BERNSTEIN: I wish you could schedule that state of flow.
EMILY CAULFIELD: Flow start now.
AMY BERNSTEIN: That’s our show. I’m Amy Bernstein.
AMY GALLO: I’m Amy Gallo.
EMILY CAULFIELD: And I’m Emily Caulfield. Our editorial and production team is Amanda Kersey, Maureen Hoch, Adam Buchholz, Rob Eckhardt, and Tina Tobey Mack.
AMY GALLO: And if you enjoyed listening to the real time coaching that Brianna gave Emily in this episode, there’s a new podcast from HBR coming out soon that you might like. It’s called Coaching Real Leaders, hosted by our friend, Muriel Wilkens who has been on our show many times before. She’s a longtime executive coach who helps people work through career challenges, and that’s what she’ll be doing on her new podcast, bringing listeners into real life coaching sessions. If you’re interested in being on the show and having Muriel provide you practical advice and solutions to the challenges you’re facing right now, head to coachingrealleaders.com to share your story. That’s coachingrealleaders.com.
AMY BERNSTEIN: Thanks for listening and take care.