To say I took a few notes at this year's Festival of Work, is a severe understatement. There were a wealth of ideas and case studies which made me sit up, feel inspired and consider how I could apply them in our business. I’ve attempted to illuminate the gems. Buckle in.
Holistic flexibility
‘To attract the best talent, you need to pivot on ways of working. People expect flexibility in every area of their lives, and the legislation is coming.’ Kevin Lyons (Senior HR Manager, Pearson)
I attended three related talks: exploring the 4-day week, a discussion on whether hybrid is really working and flexibility for non-office-based workers.
Findings from the largest and longest study, which sees 60 businesses experimenting with a 4-day week, are overwhelmingly positive. 95% intend to stick with the format post-trial, citing reduced carbon footprint, meeting or exceeding performance targets and increased engagement.
I liked how straight-talking Simon Ursell (Managing Director, Tyler Grange) was on the subject. TG spent two years coming up with a plan before dropping a day and learnt a lot in the process. He framed the real challenge as becoming 20% more efficient – ‘It’s more intense and you can’t afford to cruise.’ He also had great advice for anyone looking to sell the idea to their leadership teams, including refraining from calling it a 4 day week at all. ‘Talk about becoming a better place to work and more productive. It’s a poor business decision to continue doing something just because you’ve always done it. Is there a better way?’
Absenteeism is down 70% at TG and their meetings had undergone a hard reset in order to cut down on unnecessary time. They’ve had to become ultra-focused on what’s important and cut the chaff, rather than putting the pressure on individuals to simply figure out how to make it work. They’ve found it easier to hold onto existing staff and to recruit great people.
Frances Guy (CEO, Scotland’s International Development Alliance) also sang the benefits of being able to offer people a three-day weekend. She spoke about some of the challenges of navigating this as a small team. Although on the face of it, it was simpler to try and keep the business open five days, she explained that this created the temptation for staff to work on their day off. Only when they all downed tools together, was the pressure to keep tabs on emails and respond removed. But the ability to do this started with experimentation, consultation and in-depth conversations with customers and partners, reworking expectations.
We were encouraged to take the time to find the sweet spot in our own organisations, and not to lift up and paste a format just because it’s successful somewhere else.
In a similar vein, Kevin Lyons (Senior HR Manager, Pearsons), really encouraged us to take a holistic look at ‘flexibility’, and not to fall into the trap of limiting the concept to days and hours. I heard about paying people weekly, job shares, shift patterns, annualised hours – and this idea of ‘unbound working’. Kevin advocated the power of being able to advertise as a flexible working provider – it’s becoming the cornerstone of competitive edge. He urged us to respond to the war on talent.
We heard from several businesses that give control of the level of flexibility to their managers and team leads – letting each team decide what’s preferred and practicable for them. And if we’re worried about being fair and offering different things to different people? It’s all about sound decision-making which is transparent. Structures founded on distrust, micromanagement and whims, will quickly fall down.
We need to ask people how they want to work – could it allow them to perform just as well or even better?
Technology is the workplace now, not the office
This is an interesting idea: is the workplace really where work gets done, as culture is the way things are done (not the policies or perks)? I’m tempted to agree; at the very least, what we need from the office has changed – from why we’re inclined to go there to the adaptable types of spaces we need.
Key questions to ask in your business were – what’s the compelling reason to come in? What work are people coming in to do?
Some companies are choosing to simply insist people return to the office, mandating specific days and changing nothing about the environment. Panellists were sceptical that this kind of thinking is good for the people or the bottom line. We need to encourage and enable discussion and collaboration – to help people come together effectively. We also need to keep in mind that some people use the office to escape distraction and knuckle down – are we also providing quiet spaces for focus? Quite the challenge for small teams and small spaces – so we need to get creative and intentional.
Over-communicate and clarify expectations
Three great talks looking at the relationship between people professionals and the c-suite and stepping up your game as a People Officer, shared central themes. One of these was around expectation setting. Pete Cooper (Director of People Partners, Personio) asked the audience, ‘How do we drive effective performance if they (managers, leaders) and we, don’t know what that is?’
There was a call for getting on the same page, and outlining in no uncertain terms, what good looks like. The Personio team shared their leadership framework, ‘great leaders do x’ – guidelines at every level of responsibility in the business. The Hi-Bob team encouraged us to throw out surprises, to get really specific about how managers are expected to work with their teams and articulate the touchpoints: ‘These are all the occasions throughout the year when X is going to be spoken about…’
They also spoke to our own expectations about what we can achieve and how fast we can move, especially when it comes to changing minds and gaining that all-important buy-in. I noted down the following questions to reflect on:
- Do I give things time before I say they haven’t worked?
- Am I proactively dealing with the problems of tomorrow, not just today?
- What have I done which hasn’t worked and what did I learn?
- How can I demonstrate the value of my activity on the business?
Drowning in data
Advice which really resonated with me, especially with the, at times, overwhelming call to become data-driven and evidence-based, was to pick three insights or metrics to report and share with the c-suite. Pete Cooper urged us to take a step back and start small. Which metrics have the most significant impact on the business strategy? What’s manageable right now? You can build from there.
It's part of the wider conversation around how people professionals build credibility at the top – talking in meaningful language, connecting with commercials, demonstrating the correlation between business success and the people agenda. Pete insisted, ‘Embed the people strategy in the business strategy. People and commercial goals should be one. Misalignment between HR and the c-suite benefits no one.’
Missing the trick with onboarding
‘It’s common sense that’s not commonplace.’ Howard Watson (Divisional Sales Director, Civica)
Howard's talk, sharing onboarding top tips, was incredibly direct and practical. His opener was along the lines of, if you’re struggling to recruit, it’s taking ages, or you’re haemorrhaging people in their first few months, it’s past time to look at why.
We learnt that (on average) it takes someone 29 weeks to full productivity. But a lot of business focus on the first week alone, the induction, the policy and compliance side of things, then think everyone is good to go. With a 28% failed hire rate, we really need to pull our socks up and look further and deeper – things like cultural integration, building key relationships, and curating moments to learn and grow (especially with remote hires). Setting people loose without support so early on, is costing us time and money.
He was also keen to emphasise that expecting managers to know how to do this by themselves is another mistake – L&D and HR need to provide the scaffolding for great onboarding to happen.
‘Don’t employ the best of the bunch, hire the right person.’ If the job ad’s been out there for a while, it can be tempting to go with the strongest option, rather than the right one – Howard stressed that this would only cause issues down the line (especially if the onboarding is lacking alongside). He explained that this was just pushing the problem further down the line, resulting in wasted time for everyone, and significant costs – if all you’re doing is repeatedly replacing people rather than addressing the cause(s).
Another point I’d not considered enough was thinking about all the times in your business where there’s a significant change, like returning from maternity, sickness, or switching roles. To help and enable people to get back into the flow of work or manage a step change, we need a plan. It doesn’t need to be extensive, but it does need to be personal and surpass good intentions – what do they need to know and when? What can we provide? What conversations should happen and who should be involved? A hands-off approach is short-termism and failed opportunity to engineer success.
‘If you want to go fast, go alone, if you want to go far, go together.’ Kanya King (CBE Founder & CEO, MOBO Group).
Summing up
It strikes me that the conference was a dichotomy – adding more flexibility in some aspects, and introducing more structure in others. Dialling up and dialling down, but doing so because of the context of your organisation and people. The challenge I’ve taken away is to throw out preconceptions and comparisons and start with where we are and what will support us, specifically us, to thrive. Or as Ross Seychell (Chief People Officer, Persinio) put it, ‘Design for outcomes.’
Gemma Glover
Head of People
