In today’s fast growing company it is easier than ever to stay in contact with the other members of your organization during any time of day and any day of the week. Weekends, vacations and evenings may be ‘off hours’ but the definition of that term is changing. At least it is for those who are trying to move up in a company and see fast growth and employment success. The idea of working hard while at work and having the rest of your time be ‘work free’ is gone — too much happens during off hours and employees who are looking to succeed can’t afford to be omitted from those conversations.
Does that mean that there should be no vacations and no weekends and no evenings off? Of course not! What I’m suggesting is a less intensive but more integrated role for those looking to be on the ball all the time. During ‘off hours’, by engaging in Twitter commentary, reading through company related news articles, shooting off a few idea emails as they come to you, and answering emails that you can contribute to, you may lose a couple hours of your weekend or an hour or two during the week during the evening, but you gain a less stressful morning and a less stressful Monday return to work — all the while staying in the game and contributing in meaningful ways; ways you may not be able to contribute during the day to day chaos of the office.
I’m sure we have all experienced the stress and burnout experienced by repeatedly letting your inbox of emails build up to 100+ and having to go through them all at once to catch up. It turns out to be much less stressful when you are able to answer them as they come in, never letting them build up past 10. This can’t be done all the time, but it illustrates a more integrated approach to email answering that results in more scattered work time (not much more total time!) which alleviates a large amount of stress and also shows the people you are responding to that you care about their emails and about responding to them quickly. The same is true of other types of correspondence, involvement and decision making!
From the persective of the employer, the employees who maintain contact during ‘off hours’ and appear to be available for questions, ideas and decision making will be seen as the most committed and most eager for advancement, responsibility and contribution. On the flip side, those employees you hear from only during the week and during office hours will not only lose out on giving input during decisions made through email commerce (a very tangible loss), but will also lose out in the intangible — the appearance and benefit of eagerness, excitement and commitment.
You may think you can point to employees with particular jobs who work at particular companies that would not benefit from this ‘off hours’ advice, but I think I could point to other employees at those same companies who have shot past them because of a more integrated and continuous approach to handling their job.
I hope your employees don’t read your blog…
=) I hope they do. I’m not trying to say that it is my expectation for employees to take my advice, only to point out that there is a very obvious contrast between employees who do and ones who don’t — a contrast that could likely make the difference between advancement and stagnation in a job.
I always try to hire people who have a passion for their jobs and who are excited to advance and learn everyday. For these people, it comes naturally anyway.
I agree that in a world with Blackberries and high-speed internet at home there is every opportunity for participating in work during non-work hours (I answered an email on my Blackberry this past Saturday morning and consequently spent the whole weekend working). So, I’m not disagreeing with the substance of *what* you’ve written. Rather, if I was an employee of yours, I’d take offense to *how* it’s written.
At a startup, you don’t have the luxury of being able to survive a union-like work ethic with strict lines separating work hours from non work hours. It’s a ‘make things happen’ environment and if you can’t do that then the company has to find someone who can in order to be successful.
I hope that is obvious to everyone who chooses to work at a startup and thus the idea of being harder working shouldn’t be offensive to any of those people. If it is, it may not be a bad thing to do some offending because they should know already.
I don’t disagree with any of that. And I’d go one step further and say that even in a non-startup, someone who wants to get ahead shouldn’t try to draw a line between their work and non-work hours.
I just think you sounded kind of condescending is all.
So are you going to give me a job or what? I’m going to be in Texas next week.
Knowing Dan, I didn’t take it as condescending. It also makes it easier to perform well when the expectations are clear.
I also know Dan and I’m 100% sure he didn’t mean to be condescending. It just came off that way.
I’m pretty sure I’ve read articles that talk about how it’s psychologically unhealthy to work during vacations and weekends and such, and to not take time completely off. However, I also think that this usually refers to stressed people who probably hate going to work anyway.
I believe that if you’re truly passionate about your work, the line will be blurred between work and play. Only people that hate their jobs or don’t like what they are doing will draw a line between work hours and off hours. Work is supposed to be fun, not a drag.
p.s. work sucks for me and i can’t wait to quit…haha.