One of my favorite movie scenes of all-time is from Remember the Titans, when Julius Campbell and Gary Bertier have a heated exchange on working out the differences on their football team. The backdrop is a 1960s America undergoing desegregation, and the tensions between the black and white players has reached a boiling point by the end of a grueling preseason practice.
Julius: "I'm supposed to wear myself out for the team? What team?! No. No, what I'm gonna do is, I'm gonna look out for myself, and I'm gonna get mine."
Gary: "See, man? That's the worst attitude I've ever heard."
I can't tell you how many times I immediately think of this scene when I reflect on how to be a better leader – a better person. I've said that final quote in conversations more times than I can remember, and it has only become further entrenched in my beliefs over time. Sometimes the conversation is centered on racial inequality, a prominent topic that deserves ongoing attention. Other times, the conversation is about the nuances of managing a team of individuals. Most recently, for me, it applies to setting the example of remote work in an organization.
This week the WSJ released an article titled: "A Year Into Remote Work, No One Knows When to Stop Working Anymore". While behind a paywall, here's the most relevant passage:
A year into the Covid-19 era, many can relate. Employees say work-life boundaries blurred, then vanished, as waking life came to mean “always on” at work. Experts warn that working around the clock—while slipping in meals, helping with homework and grabbing a few moments with a partner—isn’t sustainable, and employers from banking giant Citigroup Inc. to the software company Pegasystems Inc. , are trying ways to get staff to dial back.
I've seen at least half a dozen articles from prominent outlets over the last few months with a similar message, and it frustrates me to no end. The construct is assumed to be an invisible hand that forces you to blur work-life boundaries, to sideline time with you family as you hammer out one more email at 9pm. Because if your boss doesn't see you quickly reply to a Slack message, you're not dedicated, right?
This really isn't a difficult problem to solve, nor does it require a stack of peer-reviewed research to implement. As a manager – whether your realize it or not – you set the tone of culture and work within your team. If you work late, your team works late. If you send instant messages at 9pm, your team will do the same. Your behavior is a litmus test for what's acceptable vs what isn't for every person that reports to you. If you're a senior leader in the organization, that behavior cascases accordingly.
If you want employees to feel like there's a solid work-life boundary in place, the solution is simple: after a typical 8-9 hour shift, you can choose to shut your laptop, set your instant message status to away, and not send emails late into the night. When something arises that requires after-hours work, you isolate it to only those that need to be involved, and then you ensure those instances are a rare exception, not the rule. After a few weeks of this behavior, your employees will start to notice and adjust their patterns accordingly. Most of the time you don't have to say anything, but sometimes it's worth mentioning in a casual message to the team. Soon enough, that blurry line will become quite clear, and your employees will be grateful for the change.
The moral of the story: don't pay an over-priced consultant to come up with a 5-step plan to reduce around-the-clock work for your company. Simply be the change you want to see, and others will follow suit.
