Memorial Day Weekend
Productivity versus morale. The great question of every friday before a holiday weekend. Do you stay open to get work done or do you let out early to increase morale.
For hard-ass jobs, it’s not really a question. Choose productivity. However, for this approach, you need consistency. In this age of intraoffice e-mail, it is Outlook Express that is watched, not the clock. Now, if you never let people out early for a holiday weekend, no one will have any reason to watch for the little envelope icon because they will know that the e-mail reprieve is not coming. It’s like Jeffrey Dahmer waiting for a call from the governor.
The downside to the productivity approach is that the work product will suffer. People will just wait for the whistle to blow and haul ass out the front door after punching out. Not only that, for the entire day, the staff will whine and bitch about having to work a full day before a holiday weekend. Maybe you agree with the whining, maybe you don’t. The staff will whine.
If the office has a traditional management/support division of labor, you’ll get double whining. The secretaries and clerks will whine about working and the managers will whine about the whining (and having to work). Not only that, but people will whine about how their friends had off/get off early on the friday. Morale will take a big hit and the productivity payoff will be minimal.
Choose morale. Let people off early and let them know early that they’ll get off. By letting people out early, you’ll look like a nice boss and engender employee loyalty. By letting people know early, you’ll salvage productivity because the staffers won’t be waiting for the e-mail notification.
This is especially true before Memorial Day, Labor Day and Columbus Day weekends. When people go out at the lunch break and are greeted by beautiful weather, they’ll dread going back inside for another five hours of busywork. If work lets out at a pre-designated 3:00 p.m., lunch can justifiably be cancelled. Maybe even order a pizza party for the office. It’s cheap and will send the message that the boss is a cool dude.
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