Whatever your remote working situation, setting clear boundaries and communicating them is critical.

On this week’s podcast, I sat down with Mehan Jayasuriya, Senior Program Officer at the Mozilla Foundation, to explore boundaries, scheduling, and parental survival. Together, Mehan and I dig into what bad boundaries look like, what good ones can unlock, and how to wrangle your calendar to create boundaries and stick to them.

Read on for three takeaways from the episode, plus the link to listen in full at the end.

What we cover: Boundaries & work-life balance with Mehan Jayasuriya

1. Being less available doesn’t (always) mean getting less done

If you feel pressure to be ‘always on’ or work in a team where having lots of meetings is equated with being productive, setting boundaries can be hard. For Mehan though, good boundaries have resulted in higher-quality work. By declining meetings that took up time in his calendar without big pay off, and saying no to extra projects that don’t advance his core work, he’s made time for more focused, more productive work. Cutting superficial work time makes space for his life but also for the deeper work that really moves work forward. It’s a win-win.

2️. Clear expectations make good boundaries possible

Mehan points to clear expectations from his manager as the key to success in making and keeping boundaries: he knows what success looks like for his role and what he needs to do to meet goals. He also knows that it’s his job to communicate his boundaries with his colleagues by blocking his calendar when he’s unavailable (at times like daycare drop-off) and figuring out async ways of working with colleagues. As ever in remote life, communication is essential when it comes to boundaries at work. And being clear can open up conversations about necessary compromises so you can fix problems before they create resentment.

3️. Right size tasks for time and energy

Life has seasons. There will be times that you thrive in round-the-clock thinking and doing. When that isn’t possible or rewarding, you’ve got to find efficient ways of getting stuff done. For Mehan, this means creating task blocks on his calendar and then right-sizing tasks to fit those time blocks so he’s not overcommitting to himself or his colleagues. He takes this planning one step further by matching his energy to what he’s working on. Have a 90-minute block to get stuff done but no one in your house slept last night? Today might be a great day for that admin work you’ve been putting off.
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Want to start setting better boundaries?

Take a look at your calendar for the week and figure out where your attention is going to be divided. Where you will be trying to show up in different ways at the same time, or where there will be competing demands on your time?

Can you make a decision that helps you create a boundary?

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Listen to the full episode here.