Downshifting: Less work, more life
Relaxed: Alexandra Metzger
Sometimes she just sat there thinking of Mexico. Where in the morning in the office first looked, who was already there by the colleagues. Where you hugged yourself in greeting. Where people took a more relaxed approach to the job, because life was not just a profession. For six months Alexandra Metzger worked there in the branch of a German car manufacturer. About ten years after completing this internship, the 37-year-old graduated from the parent company in Germany to become department head in purchasing. Two company cars, 65-hour week and an annual salary of around 100,000 euros. Until the autumn of 2006. Until she succumbed to her super job.
The termination marked the beginning of her new life. "However, it took me a year to reach that goal," says Alexandra Metzger. With her 22 employees, she was responsible for the new markets in Russia and Asia for the automotive group. But at some point she realized that something else was more important than rushing from appointment to appointment and putting the professional aspect in the foreground. "Out of sense of duty and pressure to succeed, I had lost the respect for myself," she says today. "Now I do not run this way through life anymore." She started her own business in the autumn of 2007 and now organizes intercultural trainings for managers. But the experiences of the past are not forgotten: "My whole attitude has changed from the ground up, in the meantime I have become much calmer."
Get out of the unloved job
Alexandra Metzger stands for a social trend that sees more in less. The so-called down shifters take the murderous ride out of their lives, turn it down a few gears in the truest sense of the word. Many make this decision without being forced to do so by their bodies. They have enough of the rude tone in the department, they have no more desire to work in the evenings and on weekends on the laptop, at traditional meetings with family or friends on the other hand rarely and then "just a quick" stop by.
Often the change begins with an indefinite feeling. The thought of the office causes you to get upset as you once did before the math exam. Management Coach Doris Hartmann says: "The first question I have to ask myself in such a situation is: Do I really love this job? Because an unloved job - that's my fundamental thesis - you should leave immediately. "Most, she says, stayed too long and tormented.
The first reflex after such a realization is often: Immediately looking for a new job, for another challenge. That was also the case with Christine Scherer *. At 33, she had a top position in a luxury goods company in Munich, 50 to 60-hour weeks were everyday life, evening appointments anyway. Professional and private she was surrounded by noble, expensive, nights in luxury hotels were as normal as champagne meetings with important customers. "At some point I was full, I was bored," she says. "I had satisfied my petty girl dreams, and I did not want to be so fucking adult and sovereign.
Christine Scherer, as always focussed on security, first looked for a new task. But she simply had no idea what she could possibly enjoy. Until one day it was clear: You do not have to have a new job to go. She announced - something that rarely happens in her industry, at her level. "I managed to jump over my status shadow," says Christine Scherer today. The 37-year-old even considered being an assistant at the bottom, with no responsibility for staff, with the certainty of being able to just go home at five in the evening. Although she has no child. Unthinkable as a former leader. That's another reason she does not want to show up with her own name.
Want your own luck
Christine Scherer first went on a trip around the world for nine months. She was not afraid of what would come, she knew: "I just have to earn my food." Now she is emigrating to Australia, she already has a 35-hour job in Sydney. "My boss said at the job interview, he'll get to work at ten and will not go home until six o'clock. Well! First! That would be unthinkable in Germany." She moves into a shared flat, three minutes from the beach. "The will to own happiness," she says, "has become even stronger."
"I have to know what I want to treat myself," confirms Doris Hartmann, "time or money." As well: more freedom or more security. Women, says Hartmann, have a very concrete relationship to money. For them it is a means of payment."For men, it symbolizes status - as a fee for a high position."
Decelerate everyday life
The status symbol of downshifters? For example, a table. Big, powerful, made of light solid wood, he stands in the kitchen of an apartment in Hamburg's green district Eimsbüttel. "We wanted the kitchen to be the center of the apartment," says Mareike Baldauf *. The table is more than a piece of furniture. He is a statement. He says: Here is cooked, eaten and above all - lived.
What would the 35-year-old nine years ago hardly came to mind. At that time, her food point was in the office. It was the boom time of the start-ups, she developed projects with an internet company in the American Silicon Valley. One with whom she brooded over new plans during the day, at night, on the weekend, was Lorenz *. "The word Feierabend did not appear in our vocabulary." They went back to Hamburg, restless as in the US. And then the crash: At Lorenz, just 31, it was a herniated disc, for the rest of the world the dot-com bubble burst.
* Names changed by the editor
For nine months Lorenz lay flat, almost motionless. "It was the best thing that could happen to us," both say today. Forced to decelerate their everyday rhythm and found that their time together was more important than work. For that they accepted to earn less.
Discover the freedom
More time: Lenka Zupkova
Many of the declared downshifters are developing an almost post-materialist attitude. Only working to consume, that goes against the grain of all. However, the new lifestyle always assumes that you can afford - or want - less income. "In our society, it's so often about earning a lot and then spending it right away," says Lenka Zupkova. The 38-year-old is a violinist and as a freelance artist relies on commissions and concert appearances. Nevertheless, she has been rejecting well-paid jobs for the last five years to allow more time for her own projects, such as her "Megaphon" ensemble.
Less job: Luzia Mittermaier
She used to be in a show band, playing balls regularly. "It took us only hours to get on the bus, soundcheck at three in the afternoon, and we were done by three at night." Their relationship broke down because of all the work, Lenka Zupkova vowed to change her attitude. The practical implementation is not easy yet. After all, she now frees up one day a week and makes lucrative, but time-consuming gigs whiz. "I appreciate freedom more and more," she says.
Even the doctor Luzia Mittermaier, 41, always wanted to preserve the freedom to work less, and has therefore deliberately renounced the purchase of a car or apartment. Already at 34, she reduced her working time to 75 percent; a drastic step for an anesthetist in the hospital. For shift work, 60 to 80 hours can easily come together, and those who want to become something in a clinic must follow suit. Actually. The head doctor of Luzia Mittermaier is known for agreeing with other working time models, and above all, "He gave me the same responsible responsibilities as his full-time colleagues," says the anesthetist, who is currently taking parental leave. Earlier, when she had no children, she worked six hours a day, mostly in the morning shift, and was usually home around half past two.
Keep an eye on the big picture
More time for their relationship, for friends, for hiking, "that has always been an inner need," explains Mittermaier. But her employer also benefits: part-time work, showing surveys, encourages motivation and productivity of employees.
This does not seem to have arrived in most HR departments. "Who wants to get out or even just want to reduce the working hours, is considered a disruptive factor in the company"Friederike Maier, economist at the Berlin University of Applied Sciences, says that if you want to spend less time at work, you have to sacrifice your career, that's the reality.
Consultant Doris Hartmann considers Downshifting to be "a healthy reaction" to the overrun standards of some industries. The business administration thinking, which often belongs to the job especially in the free economy, transfers itself with many on the entire life. But instead of calculating in quarterly balances, one should Take a look at the big picture and ask yourself time and time again: What's in it?
The Baldaufs sometimes wonder if they would still be together if they had not reversed their rhythm of life. Mareike started with a radio traineeship again at the bottom, Lorenz founded a record label with his brother. Their afternoons are spent together. Perfect CVs, certain career levels do not care about them. "We do not want to have to," says Mareike Baldauf.
What does Downshifting mean?
The principle of downshifting, created by management guru Charles B. Handy in the mid-1990s, is part of a social movement that would like to have everything a little easier. Downshifters opt for a lifestyle contrary to the norm and consciously accept to make less - for more free time. If downshifting is described as a variant of a lived work-life balance, it primarily means strategies for reconciling work and family life.
book tips
Angie Sebrich: Nothing wanted, much found: From the media woman to the host mother. My almost normal life (Herder, 12,95 Euro).
Axel Braig, Ulrich Renz: The art of working less (S. Fischer, 7.95 euros). www.arbeitswahn.de
Hajo New: Less work, more life. Strategies for consistent downshifting (Campus, 19.90 Euro)? via ZVAB.de
Marco von Münchhausen: Time out. Inspirational stories for busy workers (Campus, 19.90).
Charles Handy: The progress trap. Giving new meaning to the future (Goldmann).
John D. Drake: Downshifting: How to Work Less and Enjoy Life More (McGraw-Hill, 21 euros).
Judy Jones, Polly Ghazi: Downshifting: a Guide to Happier, Simpler Living (Hodder & Stoughton, 18.50 Euro).
Internet addresses
Initiative Modern Working Hours of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia: www.arbeitszeiten.nrw.de
Downshifting as burnout prevention, incl. Testimonials: www.manager-ohne-grenzen.de
National Downshifting Week in the UK: www.downshiftingweek.com
Coaching expert Doris Hartmann: www.doris-hartmann.de
Downshifting test of a British insurance group: //www.pru.co.uk/home/calculator/downshift
