By Delta Emerson
While evidence is mounting that ties employee happiness to productivity, there's not always agreement for the best way to keep employees happy and engaged.
Free food and competitive pay certainly might contribute to team productivity, but one of the most important things for a company to consider is how it's approaching employee work-life culture. If work-life balance is the goal, I'd argue that doesn't go nearly far enough. CEOs need to aim for work-life success in order to fully realize the many benefits a company can achieve from a happy and engaged workforce.
I serve as President of Global Shared Services for Ryan LLC, a global tax consulting firm that has successfully transformed our work culture to provide greater employee freedom and flexibility. Prior to our radical culture change, the Firm was demonstrating a consistent history of revenue growth while earning a reputation in the market for client satisfaction. At the same time, we expected employees to put in long hours at the office, and as a result, Ryan was also gaining a reputation in the industry as a tax sweatshop.
Our Firm continued to deliver results, and we had assembled a team to study the concept of work-flex, but we had not yet squarely faced the underlying issues caused by our false perceptions that hours worked in the office translated to business success. That is, until 2008, when a tipping point occurred. A bright young star in the company presented her resignation letter. She candidly shared that she loved our firm, and loved her job, but that a mandatory policy of a 50-hour work week in the office was incompatible with her plan to have children, as well as a career.
Our CEO, Brint Ryan, convinced her to stay and committed to reassess the Firm's work culture as a result. Ryan's resolution to the issue would be innovative, radical, and measurable by the results achieved. To combat employee dissatisfaction and turnover, we flipped long-held beliefs about face-time and productivity and developed a new flexible work environment that provided unlimited employee freedom and flexibility in exchange for personal accountability for results. We named the program myRyan and redesigned our work policies, procedures, and performance criteria to help employees achieve the highest level of success and productivity in all areas of life, including professional and personal endeavors.
The new myRyan work environment eliminated previous performance goals of hours worked and time in the office, replacing them with financial targets and performance measurements to improve client service and results. Employees work when and where they are most productive, and thrive in a guilt-free workplace where the focus is on results and superior client service, rather than clocking in time at the office.
It's working.
Since myRyan was introduced in 2008, revenue and profits have almost doubled, client satisfaction scores are at an all-time high, the firm has received multiple "best place to work" awards, and we dramatically decreased turnover, allowing us to retain more highly skilled employees than ever before.
Companies that implement a flexible work schedule are moving in the right direction, but the difference between a program that thrives and a program that falls short is when leadership strives for work-life success, not just balance. Balance doesn't go far enough. Balance, by definition, requires equal distribution of weight in order to not fall flat.
Balance connotes a constant shifting in priorities; a juggling act to ensure you stay upright. We want our associates to thrive both personally as well as professionally. Not simply because it's the right thing to do, but because when people can focus on the most important things in life (the big rocks), like volunteering at their child's school, or caring for a sick family member, we've seen that success in their personal lives translates into success in their professional lives as well.
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