Setting Boundaries
Real-life stories and lessons to help you decide when and how to separate or integrate work and home.
The day after I returned from a week-long work summit, I hosted our annual Diwali party at home. Thirty people. Homemade samosas. Sparklers for the kids.
A few years ago, this would have been impossible. How do you shift from intense work conversations to being fully present as a host, a mom, a friend? Today I have some answers for this dilemma!
Managing work and life is not about balance. It’s about knowing when to build walls between the different parts of your life, and when to let them spill over into each other.
Compartmentalizing: Why and When
Let me show you two snapshots from my life to explain the concept of Compartmentalizing.
Scenario 1: Valentine’s day during calibrations
Making handmade cards is my hobby and doing it with my daughter is a most joyful experience. I intensely remember one February a few years ago at Google doing this activity in the middle of a difficult performance review season. Layoff rumors swirling. My team looking to me for stability while I’m navigating calibrations and trying to ensure everyone gets fair ratings.
Scenario 2: Sick kiddo and exec reviews
My daughter has been throwing up all night. I’ve slept maybe three hours. She’s finally asleep, curled up in her favorite comfort blanket, and I have an executive review in a couple hours. The kind I’ve been preparing for weeks. The kind that matters for my team’s roadmap and my own visibility.
In both scenarios I had a choice to make — which side to fully be present in? Work or Home? And after that choice, I had to actually switch off the other side in order to stop myself from being pulled into many directions.
Compartmentalizing isn’t about pretending half your life doesn’t exist. It’s about being fully where you choose to be. When I’m making Valentine cards with my daughter, she gets my attention. When I’m in that calibration meeting, my team gets my focus.
The skill isn’t doing everything at once. It’s switching between modes intentionally, completely.
Three Tools for Switching Gears
Here are three strategies I use to switch between work mode and home mode.
1. Transition Cues
Your brain responds to cues. Smell coffee brewing? You start waking up. Hear your favorite song? You’re instantly back to where you first heard it. You can use this for better compartmentalizing.
I’ve noticed it’s easier for me to switch from home to work than the reverse. Professional context pulls me in naturally. The harder shift is coming home after a demanding day and being present for my family—not just physically there, but mentally there.
Two cues that work for me:
The Turkish coffee mug. I have this beautiful mug we bought during a family vacation in Turkey. Every time I use it, I see us exploring Istanbul together—navigating the Grand Bazaar; trying to grab Turkish icecream from the seller doing his tricks; enjoying a delicious dinner. That mug tells my brain: family mode. Work can wait.
The commute ritual. When I was going into the office, I’d use the drive home as transition time. Podcast or music on, brain unwinding. By the time I pulled into the driveway, I’d already shifted from engineering manager to mom.
2. Off Switches
If your work email is one tap away, you’re never really off.
Two strategies that create actual separation:
Android’s work profile. Underrated feature. Toggle your work profile off, and all work apps disappear. No notifications. No “just checking one thing.” When you’re with family, work is invisible.
Two phones. I carry separate devices for work and personal. Yes, it’s cumbersome. But I can physically leave the work phone in another room when I want to. Out of sight, out of mind.
The goal isn’t to be unreachable during emergencies. It’s to stop the constant, draining context-switching.
3. Delegation
Remember that sick child scenario? It has happened so many times that I now have a playbook to manage it. Here’s how I have handled it in different situations.
With a senior direct: I delegated the entire executive review to her. She was ready for this visibility and responsibility. She crushed it. I got to focus on my daughter. Nobody dropped balls. Win-win.
With a junior direct: I delegated the prep work—data gathering, initial analysis. They got us 80% there. I filled in the last 20% and led the review. They learned. I preserved my energy. We delivered.
At home: Sometimes our nanny handled sick day care while I focused on critical deliverables. Other times, my husband and I tag-teamed—he took morning, I took afternoon, or vice versa.
Delegation looks different in different circumstances. But leveraging it can give you a big boost to compartmentalize without dropping balls. Asking is a big part of using delegation; it helps you make sure the other side is willing and ready to receive when you delegate!
A Snow Day in Seattle
Seattle doesn’t get much snow. When it does, schools shut down immediately.
One winter, surprise snow day. My daughter was home, thrilled, wanting to build a snowman. I had important meetings scheduled. The kind you can’t postpone.
How compartmentalization worked:
Morning: I set her up with coloring sheets and gave permission to watch a movie, explained mom had important work for a few hours. Then office door closed. Meetings got my complete focus.
Afternoon: Work done. Warm lunch together. Bundled up and went outside. Snowman, snowball fight, hot chocolate.
Neither work nor family got 100% of that day. Both got focused, quality attention when it mattered. That’s the power of compartmentalizing well.
When to Let It All Spill Over
Here’s the paradox: sometimes you should let work and life flow together.
I call this strategic integration.
Halloween at work. I share our family costume every year in work chats. It always sparks a conversation and more photo sharing. My teams connect with me and with each other over a shared family occasion and we get to know each other a little better.
Bringing my daughter to work. I love these days! She sees what I do all day, meets my colleagues, and understands why mom’s work matters. This helps her connect with my professional life in ways compartmentalizing never could.
The difference is intentionality.
Compartmentalizing protects your focus and energy.
Integration enriches both sides of your life by letting them add value to each other.
It’s Not About Balance
Here’s what I wish someone had told me earlier: the goal isn’t perfect work-life balance. That’s a myth that will make you miserable.
The goal is intentionality.
Some days you’ll nail it. Smooth transitions, effective delegation, full presence everywhere. Other days you’ll drop balls. You’ll be mentally at work during dinner. You’ll think about your sick kid during an important meeting.
That’s not failure. That’s being human.
Try the tools I shared above to help you get back on track when possible. You can’t do it all. But you can do what matters most, when it matters most.
That’s what boundaries make possible.
What strategies have you built for managing work and life? I’d love to hear what’s working (or not working) for you. Reply and let me know, or share with someone who needs to hear this.
Chaitali, thanks again for sharing. I will keep this in mind as my kid grows up. I feel the same, work-life balance will never be a completed thing, but having boundaries really matters.
I am ok with intense work. But after working hours, if there is no P1 or surprise, that time should be for family until the kid sleeps then I can come back to whatever I need to do.
Intentionality is exactly the word I could not think of.