Episode 84: 8 Essential Tips on How to Set Boundaries at Work

Jul 29

Boundary setting helps you prioritize your needs over other people's wants. You are not required to set yourself on fire to keep others warm. Those who get angry when you set a boundary are the ones you need to set boundaries for. That's J. S. Wolf. Our boundaries define our personal space. And we need to be sovereign there in order to be able to step into our full power and potential.

Jessica Moore. And our final one to close this out. Just as we expect others to value our boundaries, it's equally important to respect the boundaries of others. And that's Lori Buchanan, PhD.

Hello, and welcome to prospecting on purpose. Today, we're talking about setting boundaries at work. So we're going to cover what a boundary is, why it leads to a healthier work life harmony. And we'll go through eight tips to identify and maintain boundaries in a work environment. And before we get into this, I just want to say that setting boundaries is really challenging, especially at work.

It's something that. I've been intentionally working on it for many years, and it's definitely elevated my life and my relationship to work. And if I look back at past experiences, and I, if I had had the tools I have now back then, I think I would have handled a lot of things differently over the course of my career.

But. That's just part of the life and growth experience. So as we get into this episode, I just want to kind of set the stage to let our audience know that it's always going to be a work in progress. And I hope that this episode continues to just help you invest in yourself and how that's going to impact if you're able to really kind of identify those guardrails on how people work with you.

So the formal definition of a boundary is a limit or a guideline that defines acceptable behavior, responsibilities, and interactions in various aspects of our lives. So personal and professional settings. We're essentially just laying out the rules on how other people work with us and how we expect to be treated.

But in a work environment, it can feel very challenging to be comfortable establishing and enforcing our own boundaries, especially with our leaders or our teams, or if we're in a customer facing role, setting boundaries with our. There are many reasons why people struggle with this, myself included, we struggle with setting boundaries because we fear rejection, we fear conflict with others.

Many of us have a desire to please. And so we want to establish an expectation that we are easy to work with. We're a team player. There's also a fear of missing out on the FOMO element. So maybe if we say no to an event, we're going to miss out on an opportunity to network with senior leadership. Or sometimes we're worried that if we set boundaries, we may come across as being difficult to work with, or we might feel guilty or obligated.

We don't want people to think that we're selfish, or maybe we're just unsure of our own needs. And we've never set boundaries before. So we don't know how to do it. Professionally, and or we don't know how to handle pushback. So that's what we're going to get into today is kind of overcoming some of these things and understanding that it's okay to establish this.

And what are some of the best ways to do? So, setting boundaries gives us an opportunity to practice self awareness. Confidence, clarity about our own needs, but also learning new communication skills. And if you can frame this as just, you're learning a different way to communicate, but it's a way, or excuse me, it's a communication skill that's going to really help set the stage for effective and fulfilling work that I think that mindset of CHIPT is going to help us all and just understanding that this is an okay thing to do.

And I think that the world as a whole is getting a lot more accepting and better at it. Because we are all realizing the workload, the overwhelm, the attention that's coming at us, what's happening in the world and the news, it can get overwhelming. So the only way to actually push through is to set boundaries.

So I do feel like there's a shift in understanding that this is important and. Personally, from an overwhelming standpoint, I've experienced heavy workloads in the past. And if someone were to tell me, you know, just those boundaries, I probably would have laughed in their face. And sometimes it just doesn't feel possible.

But I really do think that. This is something that if I had certain tools when I was feeling an experience of overwhelm and stress, I could have navigated a lot more organically and in a healthier way. So, setting boundaries at work is crucial for a healthy and productive work environment. And so we're going to get into it.

Some of the reasons why, and then we'll get into our 8 tips. So, first of all, it prevents burnout and it boosts productivity. So, if we have clear limits for focused work, better time management, efficient task handling, and how to communicate heavy workloads, that's going to actually strengthen relationships.

If we have clarity for ourselves and others, then we foster an environment of respect and clear communication, which reduces misunderstandings, uh, boundaries, encourages personal growth too, because they help us prioritize our self care and develop assertiveness, which are actually key components for career growth.

And then it helps us to become better leaders because if we can recognize and respect the boundaries in ourselves, then we're, we're able to really understand it and others. And then that creates an environment where boundaries are not only understood, but encouraged and all of this is going to lead to enhanced job satisfaction and a workplace that's happier and more satisfied and more engaged employees.

So in a nutshell, it's really about creating sustainable work environments where everyone can thrive. And it's not just good for an individual, but it benefits the entire organization and also the way that we interact with our customers. Here are eight tips to identify and set boundaries. Tip number one, understand what your musts are.

What must happen in your life in order to have a fulfilling life? And this is usually around outside of work stuff, right? So it may look different for everyone, but if you must exercise during the day, finding ways to block your calendar, to get your workout in, set up meeting times to do walking meetings with your colleagues.

Maybe it's a walk and talk meeting. If making your kids soccer games or plays or being home in time for dinner every night is a must, it may require you shuffling your workload and your schedule to adjust and honor that boundary you set for yourself and your family. And it's really easy to let these must slip because, you know.

Dropping your workout on your calendar might be the lowest hanging fruit. But if you can clearly understand your need and take some time to realize what is a priority and a value for you, then you can manage your time around your non-negotiables. Tip number two, determine your work hours. And this is going to be a fluid thing for most of us, but determining what hours you're willing to work and stick to them as much as possible is going to be at least one line in the sand of your working relationship.

And obviously there's going to be times where you're going to have to bend this boundary. There may be work trips that require you to travel on the weekends. There may be evening events that you have to attend. But if you can create some structure and honor your own working hours, then you're not overextending yourself when you have to say yes to special events.

If you get to a point where you're always saying yes, then they must drop off and it's become expected of you. You teach others how you want to be communicated with. If you're able to set standard work hours, when you're available for meetings and calls, it at least gives you that base, it gives others that baseline expectation.

And you know, if you work for a global company, maybe there's times where you're going to have to go outside that boundary. I was based in the Pacific time zone. I had many meetings at 5. And it just was easier to take meetings earlier and earlier because that was more convenient for my East coast colleagues.

But if I did it every day, which I got to a point, I was, I set an expectation that I was okay with that. And I honestly, in that situation, I was because it was the pandemic. I was waking up early anyway. I, you know, I would start exercising at 3 PM instead of waiting until five or 6 PM. But what gets sacrificed, if you set that expectation that you're okay with that, that can lead to resentment.

Shame, anger, feelings that don't serve us when we're trying to build fulfilling lives for ourselves. Tip number three is set response expectations. This is great for customer facing roles as well, but informing others of your typical response times for emails or messages or projects, that's going to at least set the expectation in the other person.

And 1 of the things that boundaries can do if you can establish this type of communication is balance a realistic workload with a realistic turnaround time. Here's an example. Let's say you're in a new outside sales role. And since you're new, you know, your inbox isn't flooded yet. Your calendar is not flooded yet.

So you're just responding to everyone. You're turning things around. You're turning deliverables around the same day. You're answering your phone. The first ring, what happens when you start to get really busy and you're in meetings all day and your project workload is overwhelming. And now to maintain those standards you put in place for yourself and your clients, you're working 12 hour days just to keep up with the workload because you've taught your clients that you're always going to answer on the first ring.

Now to be really clear here. Overservicing our clients is an amazing way to be an effective business partner. So I'm not saying don't have high standards for yourself and rapid response times are always important, but think of a future state of how you want your days in your workload to look. If you can set clear communications with your clients on when they can expect a response from you, that's going to make everything more seamless.

So if you tell your clients, you know, Hey, I'm in meetings most of the day, but I always carve out time to return calls. So please leave a message or shoot me a text. I'll get back to you as soon as I have a gap in my calendar or Hey, I'm so excited to work with you on this project. I have to connect with a couple of other teammates.

I can get back to you by Monday of next week. Is that okay with you? And then they have expectations. Okay. Sarah told me she wasn't going to get back to me until Monday. So they're not wondering what are you doing? Where's my response? So again, setting proper response times and clearly communicating and having clarity on how you can handle that workload.

That's going to establish that mutual respect. Tip number four, know your limits, understand your capacity and prioritize tasks accordingly. Many of us think that the only way to get work done is to do things on our own, or we say yes, because it's a task we feel like we should take on, or our role should be the one doing that, or we must be at that meeting to have a seat at that table.

I know I am very guilty of that. But if you overextend yourself because you haven't taken the time to set clear understanding of yourself and what you're capable of, you may be pushing yourself to a limit or beyond a limit of what's actually possible. And that's when things start to fall through the cracks, you start to drop balls.

So delegate when possible. I know it's not always possible, but sharing responsibilities with colleagues when it's appropriate, you know, it's okay to ask for help. Yeah. And then if you're being tasked to take on more responsibilities, then you have bandwidth to handle, you need to talk to your boss or your HR team about prioritization.

And sometimes, you know, we don't have the human capital or human resources to take things on. That means we have to have clear communication on what needs to fall or what needs to move to the back burner. So if you're being asked to do things and you already have, you know, five projects on your plate and a six one drops on it, you may need to say, Hey, boss, if I take on this project, then one of these other five tasks are going to have to be put on pause.

Can you please help me prioritize which of these six tasks is most important at that time? Work with your leader to help you understand how to prioritize that workload. And that might give a little bit of visibility that it's not possible. Tip number five, use technology to help you communicate expectations.

I'm talking about not disturbing and out of office messages, you know, using auto replies for emails to indicate when you're not available is a really easy tool. And if you're in a customer facing role, it's not always possible. But lately, more and more lately, you know, this concept of the workforce is getting more understanding and empathetic on boundary setting.

Okay. I've started to get auto responses from people that say, Hey, thanks for your email. I check my emails twice a day at 12 PM and 3 PM Eastern time. And I will respond in those windows or sometimes when I'm doing a multi day workshop, or if I'm at an event, I'll put an out of office that says, Hey, I'm at an all day training, my response time will be delayed because then I'm able to focus more on the training at hand instead of thinking, Oh my gosh, my emails are piling up.

So obviously understand your organization rules and kind of your industry expectations, but there's some pretty clever ways I've started to see auto responses work within email settings. So try to figure out tools that are going to help you communicate those boundaries. Tip number six, maintain physical and mental boundaries.

This one's easy. It can be in the form of a dedicated workspace. If you're working remotely, do your best to create a dedicated area to keep separate from work and personal life, you know, don't work from your bed. If you can help it, there's a lot of research on that, uh, that is for sleeping and relaxing.

And then take breaks, you know, schedule regular breaks to recharge and prevent burnout. Tip number seven, reflect and adjust accordingly. So periodically assess what you've set up for yourself and adjust them to accommodate any changes in your life. Life is always going to be changing. We know that we move, we change jobs, we cohabitate with somebody else.

We have a baby, we gain weight life. Changes. And so if you need to readjust or hit your personal goals and priorities, take some time to understand what you need and then do your best to arrange your time and habits accordingly. Boundaries are always going to change things that maybe you accepted in the past.

You can't anymore because you don't have the bandwidth to, you know, deal with so and so who calls you every day to vent, Hey, I don't have time. You know, let's set up once a month and you can unload, or maybe that person isn't for you. You need to start to look at where you are trying to go? And what are the things that are preventing you from getting there and adjust accordingly?

And then tip number eight, this is the last tip I'm going to leave you with, but I think it's important one, if you look at this as leading by example, if you're able to establish your boundaries, it sets you up to be a stronger and more empathetic leader, whether you are a direct manager of people or not, I had a direct supervisor once who would never put their out of office on and they'd be on vacation for a week on the other side of the world and they wouldn't tell anyone and they'd be responding to emails at 2 a.

m. when they had computer time. And watching this, it didn't make me respect that person more. It made me feel that I wasn't allowed to put my out of office on or that I wasn't a top performer if I took five days off work and wanted to check out. It also gave the subtext that this manager didn't trust the team to hold down the fort for one week.

It said unrealistic and unhealthy expectations. And so if we find ways to honor our own boundaries. It gives others the permission and the example that it is okay to have work life harmony. So take a look at how your guardrails of working with you positively or negatively affect those around you and adjust accordingly.

Setting and maintaining healthy boundaries requires practice and consistency, but if you start to do it, you start to work that muscle, you're going to foster a healthy work environment for everyone. Everyone. And then I hope that these tips make you more comfortable with this topic. If you want to spend more time on this one resource that really helps me learn how to do this effectively and with care and kindness is a podcast titled just break up.

It originally started five years ago as really as a relationship advice podcast, but it's expanded to all types of relationships, whether it's with yourself, with your colleagues, with your. Boss with your family and your workload there. So no matter what the actual topic is, I usually walk away with some type of takeaway, um, that helps me in areas of my life.

So I'm going to link that up in the show notes, but to wrap up our episode, I'm going to end with a couple of quotes about boundaries, boundary setting. It helps you prioritize your needs over other people's wants. You are not required to set yourself on fire to keep others warm. Those who get angry when you set a boundary are the ones you need to set boundaries for.

That's J. S. Wolf. Our boundaries define our personal space, and we need to be sovereign there in order to be able to step into our full power and potential. Jessica Moore. And our final one to close this out. Just as we expect others to value our boundaries, it's equally important to respect the boundaries of others.

And that's Lori Buchanan PhD. Thank you so much for tuning into the prospecting on purpose podcast. I appreciate your time. If this episode resonated, feel free to share it with a colleague or a friend. Best of luck in your boundary setting. It will elevate you to your next level and beyond. If you haven't spent much time with this, I know you can do it.

Thanks again for listening and I'll see you next week.

Thank you so much for listening to the prospecting on purpose podcast. If you'd loved what you heard today, subscribe to the podcast and please rate and leave a review for more info on me. Or if you'd like to work together, feel free to go to my website, sarahmurray.com on social media. I'm usually hanging out at Sarah Murray sales.

Thanks again for joining me and I'll see you next time.