Millennials Want Flexible Work.. Is your Company Ready? #SMACtalk

On this episode Brian and Daniel discuss flexible work and really question what is holding business and leaders back from implementing this.  They also cover the role trust plays in companies implementing a flexible working environment and the impact millennial are making by factoring in if a business cares about their quality of life when it comes to where and who they want to work for.

Show Notes;

Millennial Leadership

• Working 9 to 5 —  Who said 9 to 5 is the most productive and optimized times to work?  Is there reason or is it the status quo only because it’s the way it’s always been.
• Startups and innovative companies today are looking at the role or departments function to decide if flexible work hours is a good fit.  Brian shares his experience with software developers, heavy travelers and non customer facing employees.
• Could we ever move away from 9-5 work week?  Why or Why Not? What technology would need to exist for flexible work hours to be the common theme rather than the benefit certain innovative startups offer.
• Millennial Mindset is discussed as Brian & Daniel discuss it’s more about the connected generation that wants to make a difference and there are plenty of people that they work with in their 40’s and 50’s that have more of a millennial mindset than most 25 year olds.
• What impact does trust play in companies allowing employees to work from home or work with flexible work hours?  Because someone works in the office does that mean the brand or manager has more oversight on how productive an employee is?
• What will happen when a majority of fortune 500 companies have millennial CEO’s?

Can today’s leaders TRUST the connected generation:

• Do Social Media interruptions when working from home make you less productive than those who have to work with noisy employees, water cooler discussion office environment.
• Are Millennials willing to work more hours a week if the company allowed them to work from anywhere?
  • If you trust the employee they’ll give you more value…
• You no longer need to be an entrepreneur or work at a startup to work from home but what is required for a business to give this option to employees.
• Does an employee’s commute play into a managers decisions of letting someone work from home?

Do Businesses Care about Employees Quality of Life?

Wait did flexible work from home conversation just offend our listener base?

• If our listeners took this podcast to their bosses and got them to embrace work from home would people not have wasted time to listen to our podcast

When did technology become good enough that working from home was productive and realistic?

• Technology has allowed this since early 2000….
• The trust in technology and technology at home being the norm has made this more optional for everyone!
• 1 in 5 Millennials do 100% of their social, web and work from only mobile devices.

Shouldn’t leaders be asking themselves…

• How do we keep our great talents?
• What ways can we empower them and trust them so they are most productive?

• How do we add  of Remote Work?  Is there an app that allows leaders to monitor and understand how productive remote workers are?
• Do we want people to work a specific 40 hours of the week or do we want them to work the most productive way possible?
• Leaders and businesses would be surprised how many currently employees would be willing to supply data so it could be monitored and with that data the manager and leader could find new ways to make you and the business more productive.

Discuss the responsibility Millennails have in a business becoming a social business and what that role looks like in making Trust & Work From Home work!

• We talk Yahoo’s decisions to eliminate the option to work from after monitoring employees VPN’s.
• If you trust and empower your employees to have option of how, when and where people work…
• It’s about creating a culture for the BEST work environment which includes work from anywhere or everywhere!
• Something Brian reminds all who work from home:
• Don’t be Out of Sight & Out of Mind!
• Conference Call in Real Life Video Daniel Mentions: http://youtu.be/DYu_bGbZiiQ

In the end the question becomes…

If companies trust technology and trust employees then they must find ways to make flexible work an option for all employees as the focus shifts from, this is the way we’ve always done it, to what can we as a business do to increase our employees quality of life and make them more productive which in turn will provide more value to the business and allow the business to attract and retain those with a millennial mindset!