This past September, CBC radio’s
satiric series This is That aired
a segment on a new – and fictional
– “aquatic workplace” in
Hamilton, Ont. A faux spokesperson said
that for the sake of creativity and engagement,
the made-up firm converted 70 per
cent of its office space into a pool.
Plenty of listeners thought the aquatic
workplace was real, which isn’t so surprising
given the exceptional lengths some
organizations are willing to go to keep
their workers happy. Tech firm Evernote,
for example, has its employees’ homes
cleaned twice each month. And web development
company Basecamp pays for its
employees’ vacations – not paid time off,
but paid airfare and accommodations.
Competition to attract and retain talent
is fierce, and creating a unique and collaborative
culture is a top priority for most
organizations. New and innovative HR
practices can help, but how can an HR
professional sift through the options and
sort the impractical from the imperative?
Much like a made-to-measure suit (given
to each new employee in sales), it’s all
about individual fit.
VACATIONS, UNLIMITED
Take unlimited vacations, for example.
The idea – offering employees as much
time off as they’d like – has gained a fair
bit of traction in some circles, but it’s not
for everyone.
“I’ve had two clients switch to this in the
last few months, both in Silicon Valley,”
said Liane Davey, co-founder and principal
of 3COze, an HR and consulting firm
based in Toronto.
A handful of megafirms, including
Netflix, LinkedIn and Virgin, have jumped
on board as well. And GE has also been
rolling the plan out gradually, with reported
success so far.
The idea makes sense when an employee’s
work is reasonably autonomous.
“If you’re in a knowledge output job and
you can do the work, get it done and then
go off on vacation, I think it makes sense,”
said Davey.
Despite the high-profile names in
the mix, unlimited vacation is a long
way from commonplace. A 2016 survey
by the Society for Human Resources
Professionals reports only four per cent
cover feature
Lightspring/Shutterstock.com
of organizations in the U.S. are offering
it.
Still, it’s a movement that reflects the
shifting nature of how people are getting
work done.
“The idea of unlimited paid time off interrelates
with some of the other things
going on in the workplace,” said Norm
Sabapathy, executive director, People at
Cadillac Fairview. “If you have a workforce
that’s contingent, distributed and
variable, for example, what’s the real value of
a vacation policy? When your organization
is spread across jurisdictions, how do you
compare U.S. and European vacation standards
and rationalize the disparity for
employees as they work with others around
the globe? There’s a big disparity.”
Unlimited vacation time can help solve
that challenge.
The practice could also help address the
costly problem of accrued holiday time. A
2015 study by Oxford Economics reports
unused vacation time in the U.S. resulted
in $224 billion in liabilities for accumulated
employee vacation time.
“There are practical limitations to the
idea, though,” said Sabapathy. “Naturally,
on an assembly line, you can’t just leave
whenever you want. But that’s also true
with the ‘virtual’ assembly line of knowledge
workers; people are relying on you to
get stuff done.”
As Davey points out, removing the
structure of encouraging people to take
their vacations might mean that, without
the prompting, they’ll wind up taking less.
There’s also the daunting idea of supervising
unlimited vacation time.
“How do you manage equity around
this?” said Davey. “If someone takes five
weeks of vacation and someone else takes
two, what is a manager to do with that?
Is it supposed to factor into performance
management? How do we help people
manage something that used to have a lot
of structure and now has very little?”
While some organizations, like GE, report
the transition is going well, it’s clearly
not a one-size-fits-all solution.
PERFORMANCE REVIEWS
Over the past several yeas, few HR-related
initiatives have been in the spotlight more
than performance reviews, and with good
reason.
“The traditional performance review
is widely considered to be broken,” said
Sabapathy. “There are positives, but also
many negative things that come out of
them, including biased results, negative
engagement, unhealthy competition and
wasted time.”
Some organizations have ditched the annual
review entirely. Others have modified
their practice, moving to more frequent
check-ins and a coaching approach.
“I think many managers are cheering at
the thought because they don’t like getting
“YOU’LL NEED TO SET
UP SOME SORT OF
SIGNAL THAT ALLOWS
AN EMPLOYEE TELL
OTHERS THAT THEIR
‘DOOR’ IS CLOSED.”
– LIANE DAVEY, 3COZE
HRPATODAY.CA ❚ NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2016 ❚ 19