Subtracting complication
...is one of the most overlooked techniques for improving our life and work
Did you know that you’re spending 288% more time in meetings now than you did at the beginning of 2020? 🤯
You’re also getting 55% more pings on your 8+ networked devices, sifting through roughly 300 text and email messages a day, and wasting 32 days per year toggling between poorly designed technology applications at work. 😵💫
I’ve been in countless discussions on the topic of #workforceexperience, and
most of them center on the #burnout, overwhelm and anxiety that people are experiencing every day at work.
For the past two years, the data has been telling us that people across industries and job types feel that their #wellbeing is getting worse, instead of better, because of where they work.
“What can we do?” tends to be the first question leaders ask.
A better first question might be, “What can we stop?” 🛑
The reality is, so much of what is not working at work does not need a complex solution. It requires us to acknowledge that organizations have lost control of the way work gets done… and the humans who work for them are paying the price with their quality of life.
While there isn’t a silver bullet solution, there are plenty of simple, low-risk things leaders can stop to give time and energy back to their people.
Here are some real-life examples clients and colleagues have shared with me:
Eliminate mass, inform-only meetings. Instead, pre-record video messages teams can consume on their own time. 🗣
Stop sending recurring reports and communications to see if anyone cares (seriously) to root out what’s not adding value but continuing to be done out of habit. 📈
Institute a TL/DR (“too long, didn’t read”) rule on email, where the sender has to include the takeaway in the first line to help others decide if it’s worth reading. 🎯
Experiment with “meeting-free” and “email-free” times during the week, like Friday afternoons and Monday mornings, to give people space to focus. 🎧
Establish OKRs (objectives and key results) for everything, and use them to gauge effectiveness instead of rewarding “busyness” or visibility. 📐
Ask, “What’s working, that we should do more of?” and “What’s not working, that we should stop?” each week, and support your team in answering honestly to stay focused on what’s measurably moving the needle on your objectives vs. wasting time and resources. 🧐
If this resonated with you, consider sharing it with your team to inspire ideas for how you might subtract complication from your work to make things better for everyone.
[Sources for stats: Business Insider March 2021 (Meetings Spiraled Out Of Control); Gartner (The Digital Workplace Reimagined); Text Request data; Statista Digital 2019 Report; Deloitte Human Capital Trends 2021 Special Report]