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iQuestions Faculty, Pat Gelsinger 
 
 
Question: 
 
How do you find balance in your life and manage the challenges of 
career and family? 
 
Answer:  
 
Finding balance is an ongoing challenge—and believe me, it’s not 
something I’ve mastered. It’s something I work at every day, because 
projects come up, things come up in the family front. You’re always 
struggling. “Am I still in balance?” 
 
One of the things that my wife Linda and I started to do years ago was 
just keep track, because we’d find that we’d be arguing about whether 
I was or wasn’t home very much this last month. I’d say, “Well, I’ve 
been home more this month than the month before,” and she’d say, 
“No, you weren’t.” We’d get into a debate about the data. 
 
This might sound a little bit hokey, and maybe a little bit like a geeky 
engineer, but it’s helped us, and maybe it will help you, too. We 
started to literally keep track. We started a chart, and we have a point 
system that helps us know whether I am doing better or not. 
 
We keep track of days where I’m home before 5:00, and days where 
I’m home before 6:15. The before 5:00 days would count as two 
points, and the before 6:15 is one point. If I’m home later than that or 
not home, that’s a zero-point day. If I’m gone on weekends, that’s a 
minus-one (bad news). 
 
That’s what we keep track of for the numerator, and the denominator 
is the number of work days. And so, every month we tally up how I’m 
 
 
doing. My secretary sends it to Linda as well as to myself on a monthly 
basis, and we track over time, “Am I doing better, and am I meeting 
my goals?”  
 
Against that chart, our goal was 70%. The last couple of months, I 
haven’t done so well, but it’s this reminder that helps us know how 
well I am really doing over an extended period of time, and helping us 
to say, “OK, the last couple of months were pretty bad. Now what are 
we going to do the next couple of months to be a little bit more 
balanced?” And, “Maybe I shouldn’t take that particular trip.” Or, 
“Maybe I just need to take a few nights and get off early and come 
and spend some time with Linda or the kids.” 
 
The most important thing is, be disciplined about it. Find the tools—
and maybe this one will help you, to allow to keep track, keep in 
balance, and make sure that, yes, in fact, you know when you are and 
aren’t being home enough.   
 
 
 
Gelsinger -2- 
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