Companies must move away from surveillance and visible busyness, and toward defined outcomes and trust.
In 2004, Best Buy was facing a problem at its corporate headquarters, in Minneapolis-St. Paul: job-hopping. The issue of how to retain valuable employees has always vexed the business world, but the concern was amplified at Best Buy because it wasn’t the only major retailer based in the Twin Cities.
Ressler and Thompson soon realized that even this looser scheme gave managers too much control over their employees’ time. “Let’s say you set your flexible schedule—Monday through Thursday at the office, with Fridays at home,” Thompson said. “Then your tooth falls out on Wednesday. Now you have to go to your boss and get permission to go to the dentist, and he’s, like, ‘I thought Friday was your day off? Now you have to work here then.’ ” This was not real autonomy.
These efforts eventually had the intended effect. Managers largely stopped questioning when their employees were in the office or whether they were sufficiently accessible while at home. The focus shifted to whether or not clearly defined work was actually accomplished by the negotiated deadline. Even meetings became optional: if you wanted someone to attend your PowerPoint presentation, you had to convince them that it was worth their time.
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