I have a friend who works for one of largest financial company's in the country. A few days ago, she told me about an experience she had at work; of which, the sheer nonsensicalness of it all was to be the catalyst for this piece.
Apparently, my friend, who's an executive earning six-figures at this company, was reprimanded by her boss for coming in to work closer to 10 a.m. when everyone else is there at 9 a.m. He told her it "looks bad" if she shows up at different times than everyone else.
What he failed to acknowledge was that, though most days she indeed shows up closer to 10 than 9, her workday routinely ends around 7 p.m. or 8 p.m. at night, while most of her co-workers are gone by 5:30. Sometimes she even works from home until the wee hours of the morning, so she sleeps in later. Meanwhile, her boss knows this but chooses only to focus on how things 'look,' rather than what works best for her and the company.
It's almost 2016, people. By this time next week, drones will be carrying us to work and cars will be driving themselves. Yet, everywhere you look, most of us are still racing like rats and herded sheep to get to the office by 9 a.m. And for what? To punch a clock?
Thanks to advances in technology, it's a no-brainer to text your buddy a photo from the top of Mt. Everest, or join a conference call from your living room couch, i.e., the communication part is solved, so why do so many companies still insist their workers be walking cliches of days gone by and have to be there by 9?
Why must we still sit in tiny cubicles all day long, tired, miserable, and resentful of the fact we can't leave early enough to make our son's/daughter's school play without the fear of retribution from our boss for "not being a team player"?
Can someone please explain the point of this? Is it simply that most big companies hate change and are scared to death to try something new? Or, are they too entrenched in bureaucracy to the point where they think any new idea, no matter how small, requires a minimum of 4-5 board meetings and a dozen attorneys working round-the-clock for the next two years, to implement?
Whatever the reason, for everyone's sake, isn't it about time we did away with the notion that the best way to run a company is to force all your employees to conform to a 9-to-5 work week? Heck, even in the classic 9 to 5, a film over 35 years old, the girls knew the way to get better results was to allow people to work different schedules.
It's ridiculous to think we trust someone enough to pay them a six-figure salary but not enough to let them do their job, autonomously.
When I posed this question on my Facebook page, I was inundated with an equal amount of support and ridicule. One friend who runs a security company claimed I didn't know what I was talking about because "I never ran a business."
Maybe so, but we're constantly seeing examples of smaller companies that allow their employees more flexibility with their schedules. And it's well documented that happier employees make for more profits, so what's the issue?
If you're an executive, you can't tell me you'd prefer to have an employee show up bleary-eyed at 8:45 a.m., after a 90 minute commute, needing about an hour and about ten cups of coffee just to wake up, as opposed to someone who arrives wide awake, kids off to school,happy, and ready to kick butt at 10 a.m., or even 11 a.m.?
This doesn't mean that he/she isn't able/available to work earlier if need be - see Everest reference above - they simply work on a schedule more suited to their abilities/needs, which, ultimately, leads to more - not less - productivity in 99 out of 100 cases.
Not to mention, many of us spend more than a little time at work doing personal stuff, i.e., surfing the Net, emailing friends, and conducting personal business when we're supposed to be focused on the company's business, so working from home a few days a month probably won't change actual hours worked. It would also help trim the immense cost of keeping everyone in a brick and mortar office building.
Dress code is another thing. I have friends at companies, both big and small, who have to wear suits to the office every day, even though they never come in contact with any clients. Most of these companies don't even offer them Casual Friday's to break the monotony.
I'm not saying we should unilaterally change the way we do things because most of us are like me and simply like to sleep late. The reality is, millennials are overtaking Gen X'ers as the main generation in labor force. They are all about shorter attention spans, checking their phone 150 times/day, and, if they don't like their job, or how their boss treats them, they will quit. The days of hanging in there for 40 years, like dad did, all for a gold Timex, are gone.
However, things are changing for the better at many corporations. Companies both big and small are adopting new protocol all the time to try and emulate Google, Apple, Facebook, Virgin, Amazon, etc. These free-thinking giants of the business world have an entirely different view that puts them light years ahead of the dinosaurs with regard to how they treat their workers. It's part of their credo to treat their employees with respect - some providing chefs on site for lunch, fitness centers, as well as laundry services, extra days vacation bonuses, etc. They know a happy worker will pretty much do anything for the company.
Meanwhile, while her friends are shooting hoops at lunchtime an ad agency downtown, my poor friend, the finance executive, goes in to work every day and is forced to endure the ridicule put forth to her by her obtuse boss for showing up after 9 a.m. #pathetic
As frustrating as it is, a situation like this can actually tell you a lot about how a business is run. A person in a position of senior management of a large corporation who overreacts to minor problems and whose inflexibility/lack of objectivity prevents the adapting of new, possibly better, and easier ideas, says just as much about the way the higher-ups run the show as it does about the short-sighted boss. Leading one to assume, no matter how profitable the company is, if they got their heads out of their asses, for just five minutes, imagine how much better they could be doing?
Of course, not every company can afford to be Google, but there can definitely be a change within these stuffy, old, outdated HR memos. No reason why someone working for a Chase or a Price Waterhouse shouldn't be able to work from home every other Friday if it's at all possible. No reason to tell me a company shouldn't let an employee out in time to catch their kid's baseball game - or to make a 4 p.m. yoga class. Because, if they're doing their job, who cares? Who cares if they're there at 9 or at noon? Who cares if they're not there for two days in a row if their at the top of their game and handling their responsibilities?
What's the harm if someone works from home a couple of days a month, as long as they remember to put on a shirt for that Skype conference call? Besides, studies show people are way more productive when they're not wearing pants.
Ultimately, it probably doesn't matter that half the business world is adapting and changing with the times. A good portion of companies in this country are so deeply rooted in their old-school principles they will most likely never change. Because they are run by old-school rich guys. And, as long as the money keeps rolling in to these stuffy, stubborn billionaires, and their private planes are fueled and waiting on the runway, odds are nothing will change for their poor proletariat.
But, in the immortal words of Bill Lumberg...
"If we can just take these old ideas and beliefs and move them down to Storage B, that would be greeaatt."
Take care of your employees, and they’ll take care of your business. It’s as simple as that: http://virg.in/tcob
Posted by Richard Branson on Wednesday, October 7, 2015