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In a recent talk, Tony Hsieh, the CEO and founder of Zappos was asked about how the company manages work-life balance.
Hsieh replied,
“For most companies (work-life balance) implies that work must suck so much you need a life on the outside. At Zappos we’re more focused on creating a lifestyle. We don’t think of it as one or the other. Most Zappos employees leave work and hang out with other Zappos employees.”
He’s right. While it’s usually done with good intentions, focusing on work-life balance is killing your corporate culture. Like Hsieh says, the mere term implies that work must be so terrible that you need to stop thinking about it the second you walk out the door.
This was a great philosophy – in 1890. In the days of 8 hour shifts on an assembly line, everyone had work-life balance. When the machines shut down, there were no widgets to be made; you couldn’t work if you wanted to. And there was no point in dreaming about how to get the job done better or faster or how to beat the competition when the machine dictated everything you did.
Its 2009 and things are different now. We live in a knowledge based world. The companies who dream, innovate and change the world are the ones that win. No one is making world changing innovations in 8 hour shifts, 5 days a week. Ideas come in your sleep and breakthroughs come at happy hours.
Start-ups are doomed the second people start talking about work-life balance and begin thinking of each other as nothing more than “coworkers.” They need to be best friends, they need to work around the clock, or at least be thinking about work around the clock, and they need to kick and scream and fight together, just to survive. So start-ups create a culture where work is a lifestyle. Zappos is well past the start-up phase, but they’ve managed to do this too.
Stop worrying about work-life balance or how to give people as much time off as possible, and start thinking about how to create an environment where people never want to take time off. Not because they’re scared or intimidated, but because they can’t think of anything in the world they would rather be doing than working with their peers and friends to achieve a common goal.
The employees you really want aren’t looking for a job, they’re looking for a lifestyle. Create one for them.
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Comments
11.13.09
Excellent piece. I'll be sending this to some companies I know are grappling with how to better engage their workers. While I agree 100% with the spirit and content, many employees I've seen would be very suspicious of overtures from companies whose goal would be to get you to like work so much you want to do it all the time. Some people thrive on doing different things, hence the focus on the word balance.
11.13.09
Hi Caroline, thanks for the comment.
I agree you can't go out there and tell people, "we want you to work all the time." That will never fly. But you can show them through your actions and through the kind of culture you build, that work can actually be fun and its OK to think about work outside of the office, to work late hours sometimes, and to befriend your coworkers.
Some people will never embrace this, and that's alright. But the top performers want to love their job, so companies need to give them a reason to!
-Ryan
11.13.09
I actually read the talk given by Tony, and was stunned by a statement he made:
"We tell people when we hire them that they should be spending 10 to 20 percent of the time outside work with other employees."
Oh...my...god!
I'm all for making friends at work if you feel like it. But doesn't this feel a little 'cultish'? Why should your employer tell you who you should be spending your time with outside the company?
By all means, Zappos should hire people that they feel will fit the company culture. They may even hope that, by hiring certain personalities, most employees will become close and spend more time together outside the office (therefore spurring more money-making ideas).
But then they should just let the chips fall where they may. If an employee wants to socialize with other employees, that’s great! If not so much, well, that's the employees personal choice.
I'm reminded of Henry Ford, who used to send managers around to the homes of his factory workers, to make sure that their home life was acceptable so that they were not distracted while working in his factories.
I just think Zappos crosses the line on this.
11.13.09
I got so caught up in Tony's statement that I didn't comment on the rest of the post.
There is a reason that startups have this sort of "I love this job" culture. And it has to do with the size of the company. Once it gets bigger, things change, and I'm not sure it's possible to maintain that culture.
At small startups, statistically speaking, it is more likely that the people working there just have a passionate personality. And they usually have some personal stake in the company, having invested their own ideas and money. Additionally, they are more likely to wear many hats. Chances are, that at least one of those hats is something the employee really likes doing, while the others are just things that need to get done, so he loves his job most of the time.
But once the company gets bigger, you need to hire additional people. People who might just need a job. People who don't have a personal stake in the company. People who, just maybe, are good at that accounting hat the CEO was wearing for a while, but for whom accounting isn't their passion.
It's a delicate balance, and I admire any company that can find that balance (Google comes to mind).
Good luck to Zappos (except for that whole telling employees who they need to spend time with after work).
11.13.09
I think it's perfectly wonderful if you can be friends with coworkers.
I, personally, have never really been great friends with any of my coworkers. I think it has to do more with a generational gap. While they deal with 25th wedding anniversaries, I'm still nowhere near that. I did, and do hang out with them, and find them engaging and smart, but they are also not my generation.
I think the crux might lie in learning to shut off, and making a lifestyle of saying that you're not taking your work home every weekend and that girls/boys nights out have to be somewhere in your agenda.
Whether you make good friends with your coworkers or not, it's important to have a workplace that fosters choice to be able to take off for a while.
11.13.09
I do not want my career to define my life. The things I am most interested in achieving have nothing to do with my career. That being said, good article, it got me thinking.
11.13.09
Thanks for the comments!
@Scott - I think you're right, as companies grow they can't possibly hold on to the same culture as when they are tiny. But there are things they can do to act like one. I personally love the fact that Tony Hsieh encourages people to spend 10 to 20% of their time outside of work with Co-workers. Really what hes doing is trying to create friendships between co-workers to create that start up environment that is hard to get in a big company.
@Mehnaz - thats always a tough one. When you work with people in different life stages than you, its not always easy to become friends. But I totally agree with you, everyone needs a work place that lets you shut off for a while. I just dont believe it needs to be a special privilege, everyone should be able to shut off and start up when its right for them!
@Josh - glad I got you thinking! Not everyone wants this, and its important to know what you want before you can figure out what you should be doing.
-Ryan
11.14.09
@Ryan : I'm uncomfortable with any employer "trying to create friendships". A the primary reason for a work team is to accomplish a company goal. All an employer can require of employees, is to work together well. Anything beyond that, and the employer is overstepping their authority. This doesn't mean that the employer can't create an atmosphere that encourages work friendships. But shouldn't require (or even encourage) employees to take advantage of it. It seems to me that Zappos is going just a bit too far in this respect.
12.26.09
astaga.com lifestyle on the net . Cool artickle and nice to read. Sharp topic..wow so great..really so great.Make me get knowledge after reading this post..verry usseful.
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