Flex Time Can Make Your Entire Staff More Productive (Even Hourly Workers)

Do you still think your small business couldn’t possibly function if you offered your employees flexible work hours? Do you believe your staffers need to be at their desks 9 to 5, or they couldn’t do their jobs effectively? Then you’ll want to know about a growing trend: Companies are increasingly offering even low-level or hourly workers flexibility that used to be available only to white-collar employees.

The Wall Street Journal recently reported on this trend and took a look at how factory workers, retail clerks, food service employees and customer service call centers are starting to offer flexible hours to suit their employees’ schedules.

Typically, hourly workers haven’t had a lot of flexibility in their work arrangements. They often find out their week’s schedule just a few days in advance, forcing them to scramble to handle child-care arrangements, doctors’ appointments or other events. One study cited in the article says nearly half of hourly workers have “little or no” control of their schedules.

Why are companies making the change? It’s not entirely altruistic, of course. Offering flexibility helps reduce absenteeism and turnover among employees who can’t fit an inflexible job schedule into their other responsibilities. I think we’d all agree that having to replace a worker and train a new employee is something we’d all like to avoid, costing us time, effort and money.

There’s another clear reason I see for offering hourly workers flexible arrangements: It can help alleviate resentment that builds if some of your employees are allowed flexibility or even remote work options while others are not. Inevitably, in any business there are some jobs that can be done at home (typically white-collar) while others (retail clerk, assembly line) can’t. If you can’t offer these employees the option to work at home, letting them set flexible hours to suit their needs is a nice way to make up for it.

If flexible work truly doesn’t work for your hourly employees, other options that employers are using include offering short increments of paid time off. One company in the article offered as little as 15 minute segments), enabling employees to deal with doctors’ appointments or children’s school plays without having to take the full day off.

You can also offer more lead time on scheduling so employees can plan better knowing what hours they’ll be working in the coming month.

Companies cited in the article say they’ve found more employee engagement, greater loyalty and almost zero turnover among employees who have the option of flexible scheduling. And as someone who offered my staff flexibility for years (even before it was in vogue), I can vouch for the same.

You may not like the idea of flexibility, but the reality is that with two-income families and a 24/7 economy, your approach to how employees work needs to keep pace with the times. If it doesn’t, you’re losing loyalty, losing employees and, ultimately, losing money. And nobody wants to do that.

About the Author

Rieva Lesonsky is CEO of GrowBiz Media, a media company that helps entrepreneurs start and grow their businesses. Visit her blog, SmallBizDaily. Visit her website SmallBizTrendCast to get the scoop on business trends and sign up for Rieva’s free TrendCast reports.

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Interview With Jerry Mills: Take a Break to Be Productive

You might not expect the author of two business books, speaker, contributor, and founder of B2B CFO® to be into yoga and tai chi, but that’s exactly what helps Jerry Mills stay balanced between work and life. He practices regularly and also strives to read nonfiction books:

“I often have my most creative business ideas after I have lost myself for a few hours in a good murder mystery. It seems that the human mind needs a break in order to be most productive.”

And productive he is. His firm, B2B CFO®, provides part-time CFO services to small and midsized businesses. Currently, the company boasts 200 B2B Partners who serve more than 750 clients with combined annual sales totaling $5 billion dollars. In the next five years, Mills expects to have 400 partners and $45 million in sales. It’s no wonder he made the list of Small Business Influencer Champions this year.

Mills attributes his firm’s success to recruiting top professionals, being on the cutting edge of technology and hiring a stellar public relations firm.

Jumping in With Both Feet

Mills was reluctant to start his business back in 1987, but some valuable advice got him moving:

“A man named Roger gave me some good advice. He said, ‘Jerry, the hardest thing you need to do is to make the decision. Once you make the decision, everything else will fall into place about what you need to do to grow your business.’ He was 100 percent correct.”

And while technology is a huge part of B2B CFO’s® platform now, if Mills has any regrets, it’s that he didn’t dive into technology sooner. He says he wasn’t proactive enough upfront about technology, and wishes he had spent more time and money investing in it early on.

Back to Balance

We hear a lot about work/life balance, but few business owners truly practice it. Mills insists that it be part of every leader’s life:

“If every small business owner had an extra hour in their day, they should rotate that time doing two things: (1) exercising and (2) reading good non-business books.”

If reading good books and practicing Pilates will give us the success you’ve got, Jerry, we’re on board.

Jerry Mills was recognized as a Small Business Influencer Champion for 2011. Read more of our Small Business Influencer Champion interviews.

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