Latest / The Electrical Show / Thomas Nagy and Paul Meenan address work life balance

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Thomas Nagy and Paul Meenan address work life balance · The Electrical Show

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The Electrical Show with Thomas Naji. Welcome to the Electrical Show, Boss Professional
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here on Fixed Radio on Thomas Nagy and once again with me in the hot
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seat is Paul Mina. Now on today's show, we're going to talk about
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the work life balance as it were. Obviously, you know you're laughing because
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it doesn't exist, but I mean we're going to try and make it exist.
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And our our producer here, Mark, he does a fantastic job of
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keeping our train hugging its proverbial track, as it were, and he gives
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us this little crib sheet every week that we sort of we put hot notes
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on and stuff. I don't think we're going to need this crib sheet this
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personally, Paul, I don't think we're going to need it. This is
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this is one of those shows that we can just do off the off,
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off the cuff. We don't need crib sheets for it. But yeah,
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we're going to be talking about work life balance and how we can aim to
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improve our work life balance without losing money. I know this is there's a
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lot of people that say this is sort of an impossible task, and to
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an extent it is. It's an incredibly hard balance to find. But we
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are going to talk about how we can avoid overworking ourselves, which causes sort
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of a negative effect, a loss in revenue, and how we can be
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a better person to work with and be around socially, because when you flat
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out, you've become basically a grumpy git. So it's we've got to try
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to avoid these things as well. So we've got a lot of talk about,
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Paul, haven't we We do? This is the This is the one
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that gets very deep and emotional. We pour our hearts out. You can
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go off piste hugely on most carefully, Yeah, I'll try not to cry.
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Fix Radio time to crack on. I'm Thomas Nagie with Paul Mean and
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on today's electrical show, we are talking about work life balance. If you've
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just tuned in, don't worry. We're just getting started now. Paul,
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explain that. Explain for those that aren't the regular listener. Just give us
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a bit of context around your job, at what the work is and just
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how much of your time it actually does take up in real life. It
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takes up most of my life. Yeah. Yeah, So my role I'm
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an asset manager or head of m EP or whatever term you want to use
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it. Kind of changes every few months, but basically I'm in charge of
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all the electrical mechanical systems on a lovely little railway down south East. My
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role is to effectively define the maintenance regimes, define any works that need to
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be done, ordering a rewire, going out, getting the contractors, and
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then also supporting the contractors in successfully doing it to a good level of quality.
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Because if I don't support the contractors to successfully do it, I might
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as well not be in the job, which it would appear in my world
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of being a client is a very rare thing because people were ordering the work.
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All I want is cheap, cheap, cheap, cheap. They don't
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want quality. Whereas my view as the asset manager for my railway is I
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am a steward on behalf of the taxpayer. I will pay a little bit
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more if I get the longevity of the trunk, in the containment, the
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conjure at the boards, because that's value. There is no value in putting
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a job about for half a million pound a wardant to someone who'll do it
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for two hundred grand, and all the fuse boards and all the containment is
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rotten after five to ten years. I'd rather pay four hundred grand and get
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saying there's designed the last thirty plus years. It's a good way of looking
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at So that's that's my stewardship mindset on. The one thing I do find
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a massive struggle is finding contractors who care and are not been burnt heavily by
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bad clients. I try, and you can tell me otherwise to be firm,
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fair and reasonable. If not, I again should not be in my
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job. But I am well aware that in the world of clienting in railways
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that that is an incredibly rare thing. It is stressful, Oh yes,
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because I spend a lot of my time internally debating with my colleagues. That's
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a nice term to use. Debating. And what I find is I have
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to educate them as to why we shouldn't be going for the cheapest and you
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know why the better value is employing the good contractor that lives locally. You
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know that you support the local. I'm a massive fan of buying British,
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supporting local companies, making sure apprentices are trained. I'm a huge fan of
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that, and that goes against most of the what we would call in the
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modern world procurement guide us because the percument guardans will say, go cheap,
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that's the best value. No it isn't. We are as a nation,
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I believe, losing our engineering judgment skills on mass and it's being replaced by
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accountants. I mean, there's a good how do you mean explain that?
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But by accountants. I hear stories. I'm again hopefully I won't get sacked
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for saying this, but I hear stories around the rail industry of the cheapest
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contractors won it and then they you end up going in and have a look
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at it and they have to rip it all out because they've done it to
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a substandard level or not respect not to standard, and it costs everybody,
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including us as a taxpayer, more money. You look at Metronet, you
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look at Crossrail, you look at Bliming, what was the other one,
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Jubilee Line extension, all megaprojects or Thames Link, all massively over budget?
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Why something failed Somewhere? Was it the accountants and the project managers steering the
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ship or where the engineers actually steering the ship, who know what they know
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and know what they don't know. And I'm finding that one of the biggest
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challenges in construction in general is accountants and project managers who aren't technically qualified to
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any trade. In many a circumstance are making decisions without taking the advice of
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the guys on the shop floor. And you know, if I'm out on
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a station somewhere, on a site somewhere, when one of the sparks or
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one of the guys gives me feedback, if I don't listen to him,
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I shouldn't even be in my job. If you're not willing to listen to
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the shop floor guys, what are you doing there? My job is to
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make sure the guys on the shop floor, because I came from the shop
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floor, are actually enjoying the work. If you enjoy the work and it's
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good work, you'll want to do a good job. If you hate your
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job and you're not being paid well for it, you're not going to do
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a good job. Wors leads me on perfectly to my next question. And
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be honest, how much time do you spend when you get home after you
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finished work actually still thinking about work? If I'm being honest, I've described
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my average day. When I get home around half five, quarter six,
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I'll be on the phone for probably about another forty five minutes to an hour.
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I will then sit down and get shouted at. I'll have my dinner
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by my beloved and and yeah, I'll sit down for about an hour or
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two. Then she'll start moaning, and then I'll go upstairs and I'll do
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about four or five hours on emails and all that stuff, because I wasn't
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born in front of a computer, and I prefer to be out on site
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with the chaps and chapess is doing the work. But yeah, it's it's
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very difficult trying to trouble is. I care too much, I know,
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but I see my passion as my biggest strength and a weakness. But I'm
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happy with it being a weakness, all right, Cool, Well, look,
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when when did you realize? I guess there was a mismatch in your
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work life balance. I kind of always knew, but I'm a dad's son,
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and my dad all ever knew him of as as a workers still work.
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For the time I really realized was when Paul Skerm there's Welsh chap who
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we had on He died three months ago and I had to carry his coffin
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and that hit me like a ton of bricks broke me on in every way.
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His death broke me in ways, so I didn't even know I could
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be broken. And that was it for me. That was like, right,
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just stop, cut back and I am trying my best, and I
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am I am, in all fairness, I'm doing far less than I ever
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used to, which is good, good effort. The Electrical Show on fixed
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radio. You're listening to the Electrical Show. I'm Thomas Nachie, and we
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are talking about the work life balance and I with Paul Mean and discussing this
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now. So, Paul, you told us about the challenges you've had,
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you know, trying to find some sort of remote resemblance of a work life
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balance, as it were. What have you done to try and improve it?
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If possible? What have you tried to achieve that I kind of realized
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I had to realize I was. I was living to work, not working
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till the lights points out. Literally during this, during this, I've got
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the fire engineer from CTC literally texting me as we speak. They're talking about
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work life Even here in studio. Your phone is still going and clients are
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still trying to get ahold of you. So sorry, I'll have a word
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of him. It doesn't end. Yeah, no, bless his soul.
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Yeah, it's it's a it's a difficult one to be going to shive you.
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I've I think the first thing I had to do was when when my
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friend died, I just basically went on holiday somewhere and got in a car
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and drove and just had conversations with myself, tried to clear the cobwebs out
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of my head and realized what I was doing. But I'm I'm a bit
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of a self harmer as well, if I'm being honest, because I mean,
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what two and a half years ago, I got COVID was on event
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later that nearly killed me. So I thought, when I come out,
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I'm going to change my life, and I didn't, and I was within
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six months back to just doing silly hours again. And from that I got
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diabetes and I got this thing called AF which is arterial fiberation, which is
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what that s Club singer died from, and a wrestler died from the other
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day. And You're like, okay, am I going to learn from that?
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And it was only when Paul passed and I went to America and cleared
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my head, I just thought, no, I got to do something came
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back joined the gym, and that has helped massively doing less work and more
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physical work. If that sounds mental, yet it helps. It clears the
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fog and the haze, and it gives you some times. I know it
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sounds mental, but I'll go on a cross train for like an hour or
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two and I will literally just clear the fog in my own mine and I'll
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come out exhausted, drenched in sweat, but feel amazing for it. Yeah,
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so physical. There's a lot to say for physical work. I'd love
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to join a boxing gym again because I still when I was younger, and
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that's also a good stress beater. But that's on the agenda for Jim is
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a good one because we've in fact, who how long? How long ago
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did you join the seven weeks? Have you not noticed from my remark?
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Sorry I didn't. I didn't want to point in front of the pack,
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but I have going on is a phenomenal thing. One day, men everywhere
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we will aspire to have a one pack clearly look alike, I mean says
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it's a fuel tank for a love machine. Right before drift too far off
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piste. Dear, what advice do you have for anybody looking to improve there
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if they're in a similar situation. I think Jim is a great one because
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that really does. We both do it, and it really does clear the
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fog. But anything else encourage your partner to shout at you more when you
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got upstairs to do work, I think probably helps. Where actually don't need
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to encourage them really sometimes, that is if she hasn't already left you.
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Obviously, Yes, luckily my one hasn't yet. I'd be honest of you.
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This sounds really weird. You need to have a conversation in yourself.
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Yeah, you need to have a conversation yourself. I swore after COVID my
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life would change, and it took one of my best friends in the world
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dying and having to carry his coffin for me to go you're an idiot.
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That's enough enough enough Now. I have spent the last ten years of my
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life and it's not just work stuff, my voluntary stuff, because I've been
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I was going around the country tons of that stuff, done every single voluntary
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role I could humanly find, and I only realized I was doing too much
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when they gave me a medal for it. I know it sounds mental,
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but I literally went hang on a minute, and then I realized how many
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hours of mine and I was literally living my life to help everybody but myself
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yourself. And I need to balance that, so I always said, and
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I literally posted on LinkedIn the other day about balancing yourself. Help people always
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absolutely corporations institutes. I'm not so much now, to be perfectly frank,
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I'd rather just help people if they need help, but only when you've had
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enough time for yourself. Yeah, And I am trying to live those values
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now so far. Touch would It's it's been okay. Last weekend gone.
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I normally sit around working, doing power points or preparing for podcasts. This
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weekend I went to Wembley to watch the wrestling. I went to the gym,
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I did stuff to have fun and enjoy myself, and it was it
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was scarily fun. Not used to doing that. Yeah, it's easy to
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forget how how fast you let this stuff go because you work just gets in
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the way. It just you just blind. Yeah, it'll blind you in
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the trouble. You think yourself, well, I'll just do a bit more
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because I'll get on top of it. You will never get on top of
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it. And I tell you. Now, there are people out there who
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are committed entrepreneurs who are committed to that goal of what they want, and
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fair play to anyone. We should never sit there and say you shouldn't work
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the hours you want to work. I'm not your mother. You do what
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hours you need to do to feed your family and look after yourself. But
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if you're not there to look after your family, kind of pointless. The
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Electrical Show with Thomas Nargee on fixed radio the Builders Station. You're listening to
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the Electrical Show. I'm not Thomas Nagy talking about work life balance with me
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Paul Meenan. So, Thomas Mason change being in this this role now like
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it. No, you've kind of we've You've spoke to me about the challenges
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we have. But in regards to work life balance, what have you done
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to try and improve upon your work life balance? Because I've seen your journey
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over the last few years, so I've been pretty harrowing. You've had some
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close calls, squeaky bum moments. Yeah, I don't know. I mean
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it's a difficult one because for me, I you know, I really don't
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understand how you're supposed to get around the problems. I just don't see it.
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You've got a partner who you know, they want all the good things
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in life. You know, you want a nice you know, you want
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a nice house, you want a nice car, you want nice food,
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you want la cruze, cutlery, crockery. All right, that's fine,
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and that's all very well and good, but that yeah, money doesn't grow.
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I don't have a tree which grows money Like, it's got to come
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from somewhere, and the only way it's going to happen is if you go
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out there and work hard for it. And you've got to. You have
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to work hard, but you have to consistently work hard. You have to
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You have to find something, which is why we go on about specialisms,
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because you have to find something you can do that you're good at and just
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keep doing it. Don't jump from pillar to post. But you know,
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you do have to commit yourself a huge amount to reach. Like we're talking
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about art a smart I mean, you know the guy, Okay, I
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mean he works around the clock. But to be fair to the fella,
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he's made a fantastic business and he's earning good money. But yeah, okay,
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I mean that that's that's the price you pay. I know you're trying
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to improve yours, but how have you found in trying to improve yours it's
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benefited you in any way, shape or form, or are you still too
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early on that journey? How do you mean? Well, like, what
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have I found to make it easier? Yes, same as you, Jim,
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one hundred percent. I started that about five months ago. I started
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swimming and that was good. I enjoyed it, and then I ended up
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getting I bumped into an old client who was actually her son was a PT.
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So I do gym three times a week with this PT and it's absolutely
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superb because you just leave the gym, Like you said, it just clears
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all the try to something from your mind. And for me, it's like
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it's getting winds, stacking winds. It's the easiest way to explain it.
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Like, if you can get up in the morning before if you can get
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up in the morning when your alarm goes off and not hit snooze, you've
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stacked a win. If you can go and drink a big glass of water,
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that's another win. And the more of these it sounds silly, but
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the more of those little winds that you can stack. First thing in the
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morning will encourage you to do better things later on in the day and you'll
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stack bigger wins if you can go to the gym. You know, it's
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discipline. It's every morning. That's there, every morning, and it's discipline.
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And at seven o'clock, I've done an hour on a cross train or
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saying, and I feel fantastic. I go into work and I'm bouncing off
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the walls. By four o'clock in the afternoon, I'm absolutely shattered. But
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yeah, no, that's it's it's a cycle, it's a you know,
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and if you can keep stacking those winds that I mean, that's the biggest
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thing that I can definitely says helped. Just go and do something, Go
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and join a gym. It's the literally the best piece of advice. Fantastic.
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Okay, that was actually gonna be My next question is what advice you
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would have to anyone else looking. Yeah, I mean, that's the only
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one which I have found, honestly that actually for me. Works. But
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I mean I quite like. I mean, I like the idea of going
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and just doing something because it's your own time. You're literally that's your own
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little thing that you do, that's just your own time you put your air
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pods in and you just zown out to the rest of the world and you
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just do your own thing for for nineteen minutes two hours. I agree.
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I think the gym helps. I also think having some momentary pauses and conversation.
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We all talk to ourselves in our brain. We're not see you do
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genuinely will have a word with yourself sometimes when you're knackered or saw I think
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having some realistic conversations and what you want to achieve. Let's be honest about
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everybody wants the most amount of money for the least amount of work. That's
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a utopia for everyone. He ain't out there. Sometimes. I know a
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guy who runs a very successful electrical contractor, and his entire business profile is
16:30
mopping up other contractors works. He just gets brought in three calls away for
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a job, get rid of the main electrical contractor, and he makes a
16:37
fortune, putting it all right and doing it to a good finish. That's
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his entire business model. It's insane and it's hard work, long hours,
16:45
but that's what got him the success he has in life. Let's wrap this
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up before the end of the show. You're listening to Fix Radio, the
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Builders Station, the electrical show on Fixed Radio. Love is it for today's
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show where we have talked about our work life balance as it were, going
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on a minute, Hang on a minute, Tom obvious, you're not done.
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Okay, we're not finished yet. I've got a couple more questions actually,
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because you have stimulated the mind. Quick one for you, then quick
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couple Actually, and what takes up most of your free time or what aspects
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of the trade and work dominate your life. I mean, there isn't a
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lot of free time. That's the thing that there is very little free time.
17:22
By the time I get back to you get back to the unit at
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like sort of four thirty five, there's always something in there that's got to
17:30
be done. By the time you get home, it's I'm normally home at
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like sort of six thirty seven, is somewhere around there on a good day.
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But by the time you get home, it's just you're still thinking about
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work. You're thinking, Okay, what am I doing tomorrow? Okay,
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I've got to go via their pick those materials up, drop those to the
17:44
boys there, get them. But you know, you just you just and
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I know that hugely irritated Nelly. That massively annoyed it because you're at home,
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but you're not actually at home, if that makes any sense, because
17:53
you're still at work thinking. But I don't know how you fix that.
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I don't know. It's it's a really it's a hard one, especially in
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the on the journey that you're on as well. Hopefully you won't be on
18:03
that journey for for too much longer. Now that leads to my next question.
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Can you see a light at the end where you might actually find some
18:08
balance to this? I mean, yeah, you're doing okay on the highways.
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Yeah, there is light at the end of the tunnel. I think
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it's like we've said, between between the links, at what cost? There
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is a light at the end of tunnel, But it's at what cost to
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you? If that makes any sense. And that's that's an impossible question to
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answer, at what cost? And I couldn't answer that. I don't know.
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All I know is that I don't have an inheritance. I don't have
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any you know, I've gotten. Anything I'm gonna be left with is debt
18:40
when my parents die. So the only that's I've got to go out and
18:41
build my own future. I have well you have to go out and make
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your own future. There is no you know, if you're lucky enough,
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and I'm not. You know, it's not a I'm not suing to be
18:52
rude or disrespectful. I mean, if you're lucky enough to have parents where
18:53
when they do pass away, you've got an inheritance, that's fantastic because you've
18:57
got that life security. You know, you can you can basically balls up
19:00
your life and you still at the end of it. I have a house
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and you know, money at the end of it. Well, unfortunately,
19:06
not that I'm bit already. I'm not. But I have to go out
19:07
and make my own reality. It's a reality of life. I have to
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go and make it myself. So I mean, if this is the journey
19:12
I have to do to get there, then so be it. That.
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My dad was always the same the minute you hit sixteen, no more pocket
19:18
money, go out and get a job salary and taught you the value if
19:22
you want something exactly going on because no one else is going to help you.
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And it's a good mentality to have. Yeah, it's not taught enough
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nowadays. I don't think. No, No, I agree, all right,
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Well, look some of the hallmarks. We've got a little crip sheet
19:36
here from my producer mark some of the hallmarks if you are overworked, somebody
19:40
is quite good. Actually, you need to simplify how people can contact you
19:44
both on and off the clock. So I mean, I actually I've got
19:47
a personal phone and a work phone here. That's the best way I can.
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I've managed to dissect those two things. I need to do that I
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don't. I just have one phone and I need to get a work phone.
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People do think you're a drug dealer or a pimp. That is that
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the thing when you pull two phones out on a dinner table or something.
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But I mean, you know, so be it. I thought you were
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sorry. You can't find time to do life admin. That's very true.
20:08
Putting ties on your personal car anything like that, So you just haven't got
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the time to do it. That's fair enough. You never take off enough
20:15
time to end up missing work to let you go on holiday, and then
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you're like, I mean to be fair, I can only take a week
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off at a time, and after that I'm done, I want to go
20:26
back to work. I'm quite the opposite. I find when I go holiday,
20:29
I spend the first three days because we'll normally go to somewhere in Turkey
20:33
on a beach. I'll just sleep, but to catch up with all the
20:36
sleep that I haven't had. So it's just like, yeah, let's go
20:37
on holiday, pay a load of money to la on a beach and just
20:40
sleep. Next one's a good one. You feel anxious taking too much time
20:44
off work. I openly admit I suffer from that terribly. Like anything over
20:48
ten days, I'm like, I'm just itching to get back on the plane.
20:52
Not anymore. When I went to America, I did, I think
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it was nine or ten days, and they were the best nine or ten
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days I've ever had in my life. Yeah, oh yeah, I don't
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not no type of personal relationships. Yeah you got, you got. You
21:03
need a partner who is seriously understanding years. But it's interesting because you're a
21:07
client touch I'm a contractor and you're a client, but you still both share
21:11
the same issues. Yeah. Well, she gets young with me because occasionally
21:15
I like to do love jobs. In fact, not last weekend, that
21:18
jobs, not this weekend gone, but the one before lady on my road,
21:22
I did an exterior socket for her and stuff, and she was moaning
21:26
me in a minute I walked in at half six. You do everything for
21:30
everyone else and you do nothing for yourself. And I was just like,
21:32
yeah, okay, she didn't pay me for it. She's a pensioner,
21:33
but we should be doing these sorts of love jobs for people. She could
21:37
have been loaded for all you know. No, she wasn't. She didn't
21:40
pull that. The O pension a couple. We haven't got money. No.
21:42
I was taught to respect and look up to my elders, regardless of
21:47
whether they're manipulative scumbags or not. But you do get that occasion radio.
21:56
And the last one is you can't remember what you did a month ago,
21:59
or you can't easily out how you're working week unfold. That is true.
22:02
I've had days like that where you just start at Monday and I'm like,
22:03
there's literally no point trying to plan out Thursday and Friday because whatever I put
22:07
in the diary now is never gonna It's never going to be that. I
22:11
literally now look in the diary in the morning, go where am I supposed
22:12
to be? Because it's just so overwhelming at time, especially when you work,
22:17
just trying to applow for your work. One other thing that I find
22:18
to add to that list is when all of your colleagues are able to do
22:22
all these nice, fluffy things and tell you about and you sit there and
22:26
go, how did you find the time? Yeah? It doesnoy Yeah,
22:30
which is wrong of us, because we shouldn't get annoyed. We should be
22:33
happy for them and go give me something what you've got. Unfortunately, and
22:36
I'm going to say this out loud, I probably shouldn't. They generally don't
22:38
give a damn, whereas people who do work long hours care deeply and have
22:45
a lot of responsibilities. And I do find that in the workplace there are
22:48
people who turn up literally to get paid and we'll do as little as humanly
22:52
possible, and that does chafe people who care and work the hours are driven
23:00
right the other