Atypical But Successful Ways Businesses Function
Holacracy – Making Your Own Decisions
In layman, holacracy encourages decision-making in self-organizing teams, rather than the sometimes arduous task of seeking approvals on decisions from a higher order. Strangely enough, the term “holacracy” was coined only in 2007, but Phelps have been responsible for the enactment of holacracy since the company’s founding in 1981.
Now imagine this; a pool of employees forming independent teams and organized around clients’ specific needs. What that does is 1. shorten, or eliminate, the lag time in responses to clients, and 2. making the best decisions for the benefits of the businesses they are serving.
Joe Phelps, founder of Phelps, insists that his company is now reaping the benefits of holacracy by having each member in each team constantly pushing the other to do their best, and you can’t say there’s too much wrong with that!
Four-Day Workweeks – Your Weekend Just Got Longer
Counting down to that public holiday that swimmingly falls on a Friday or a Monday adds that extra zest to a shortened week, but there are companies and there are workers already out there who get that long weekend every week, with a full-time salary!
Nate Reusser, founder of Reusser Design, discovered that the four-day workweek policy he’s put in place for two years now, has got his staff working faster and with better focus; very much like how people work just before a vacation. The doubt has already formed in your mind – work is sure to pile up if a staff goes on sick leave, but Reusser has found it to be a beneficial trade-off.
A more in-depth study of the four-day workweek was conducted and written by CNN. This trend continues to gain traction, and not just in the private sectors – The U.S. Government Accountability Office offers it too!
No-Overtime Wednesdays – Lights Out at 5:30p.m.
Canon Singapore have their own approach pushing for a healthy work-life balance – by strongly discouraging overtime hours on Wednesdays. When days at the Canon Singapore offices typically linger from 8:30a.m. to 5:30p.m., overtime can be a necessary evil especially when deadlines loom.
On Wednesdays, however, things go a bit different. An announcement booms around the offices informing that there would be no need for overtime hours from any of the staff, and the lights go off at the stroke of 5:30p.m.
These modus operandi aim to promote a blooming work-life balance and have set a precedence for other companies to want to do the same for their staff. Where it may get tedious and tiresome at work, there’s no better respite than family and friends.