Welcome to the Business Abundance Podcast, providing
the tools and knowledge to help small business
owners succeed. For additional resources, visit
www .businessabundance .online. Welcome back
to the Business Abundance Podcast. Today we have
Jake and Rowan and we're going to be chatting
about the nine till five workday and why it's
maybe not as relevant as it used to be. Jake,
do you want to just give yourself a bit of an
introduction and tell everyone what you do here
at Business Abundance? Yeah, hi everyone, thank
you Sahara, Ron. So my name's Jake, I'm the Senior
Marketing manager here at Business Abundance.
So here that's a bit of a two -fold role, making
sure that our clients are taken care of, that
we're accelerating all their marketing and helping
them achieve their targets, but as well as also
promoting Business Abundance and what we do and
clearly articulating our value proposition and
what exactly we offer. So I've been with Business
Abundance a few months now, but I've been in
marketing as a whole for around the 10 to 15
year mark, somewhere in between there. been in
a number of roles. And I think as it relates
more importantly to this discussion, I've been
working pretty much with international teams,
Flexi working for about the past six years. So
yeah, it should be an interesting discussion.
So today we're talking about the nine till five
workday and why it might not necessarily. be
as relevant as it has been in the past. Now we've
had the COVID, which has obviously pushed everyone
into remote work, working from home, those sort
of things. But now that COVID is sort of over
and people are heading back into the office,
the nine till five, Monday to Friday in the office
isn't as popular as it once was. Can we, I guess,
talk about maybe why people are so stuck in the
nine to five, Monday to Friday, traditional,
let's just call it the traditional working setting.
Yeah, it's, I mean, business have their different
reasons. I think technology companies traditionally
are the ones who sort of spearheaded this movement
around remote work, flexi work, you know, working.
having a team operating around the clock and
that's come from the expansion of international
teams as well. So I was in remote work before,
say the COVID came out before, there was just
this big rush and surgence of companies coming
through and having to do remote for survival
more than anything. In terms of being stuck in
the nine to five, I think it's just about the
most important thing, first and foremost, is
being on when your customers are on, being able
to service their needs. I think the world's changed
in general. You know, thinking back 20 years
where it was very much nine to five, that's when
you conducted a lot of your business at more
of a local, national level, whereas now... since
online shopping has completely emerged and you
can reach your customers from anywhere in the
world. Obviously, it depends what industry that
you're in. But that's created a need to create
a business that can support that demand 24 hours
a day. And so there's only so much that you can
do within your own country. I guess you could
hire a support team as an example to be operating
24 -7. As part of this online world, it's helped
shape the way we think in terms of we don't need
to hire nationally as well. We can hire internationally.
And so that's created a more global world, which
we know that we're now part of. There's the old
saying, if you're not going global, you're getting
left behind in many sense. So it applies more
to some businesses than others. I mean, if you're
a local business, working nine to five can still
be relevant. But even then, you've got to really
understand the need of your customer. If your
customer's busy nine to five, how are you going
to meet their needs? More when they get home
from work, when they're sitting at home on a
device after dinner, and just being able to service
that need. I think it's important to be able
to try and reply quickly, promptly. at a time
that suits them. And customers have become far
more demanding than what they ever have been
in the past as well. So that's created this need
to be more present and in a competitive environment
with business. It really is the ones who've got
the best service structures in place to be able
to meet those needs, those demands who are doing
better than others. So to go back to your question,
the world's just changed. It continues to change.
The biggest shift has been the expectations of
customers. I think sometimes you see places,
unless if it's like a post shop or something
like that, when you go down and you see that
you can't contact the business after five, you're
a bit shocked really. We're so used to just being
able to get the answers we need instantly. So
yeah, it's been the progression of technology
and the online shopping. I think that's really
changed everything. The post office, they shut
at three or four o 'clock in the afternoon. And
then who can actually go there if they're working
their nine to five job? Jake was talking a bit
about the customer side, but then you've got
sort of the workforce side too. You've got, in
the past, the weekend was off. Sundays in a lot
of places, no business would open on a Sunday,
full stop. Sunday was off for everyone. If you
go back 25, 30 years, when I was a little baby,
but for my knowledge, sport and community activity
was much higher because people had the time off
in the evenings and they had the time off on
the weekends, and not much else to do, as far
as they weren't connected to a phone all the
time, so they got a little bit bored. they had
the ability to do that. Whereas now, the nine
to five for a lot of people doesn't exist. There's
shift work, there's overnight work, there's working
the weekends to keep in touch with the consumers,
like Jake said. And then people have all these
hours all over the place. And then it's going,
okay, we've got a family and we've got hobbies
that we want to do. How do we still do those
whilst having a job and making an income? and
that's probably where the world's definitely
changing really quickly is that you know people
want to go watch their kids um you know athletics
carnival or whatever that is and if they're working
nine to five they can't really get away because
they're paid to sit there at a desk or they're
paid to be on the tools so it's definitely an
area that's changing and and it's of quite interest
quite a big interest for us so you're in new
zealand jake and the rest of us are currently
in Australia. Can you tell us what that's like
for you? Much better situation. No, I'm kidding.
It's not so grim here in the future. But as I
say, I've been doing it for a number of years
now, and it takes a bit of adjustment in the
early stages to get up to speed with the right
tools and understand that it's not. You don't
walk into an office every day, say hello to people
from the get -go. You're constantly communicating
face -to -face with people. It's a bit of a shift
and an adjustment to get used to that. But it
is funny, and there has been studies done around
what is more productive, working remote, working
in an office. And some of the results, well,
results vary. I'd say across the board, it doesn't
change so much in terms of the production of
the business. But it's all about being set up
in the right way and being process driven and
having the right leadership and the team to motivate
staff and to make sure that you are connecting
with your colleagues regularly, you know how
to connect with customers remotely. But, oh geez,
I'd say... a huge shift in terms of technology
is around just the collaboration tools for workplaces
to cater for situations like this. You think
of Slack for just staying in touch with your
colleagues and team across the board. You think
of your Trello's, Jira, monday .com, which is
organizing your tasks and working through campaign
boards together. And video calling, like we're
doing now. Just being able to do that has just
become the norm for so many places. And it helps
new businesses as well. If you want to hire across
the country, you're not restricted to your local
area. If you want to save on overhead, such as
rent, having to have an office, which is a huge
expense, you're able to just work from your living
room, your bedroom, co -office workspaces. So
for myself personally, I've gotten used to it.
I'd still love to come to the office. Not that
we necessarily have an office, but I'd still
love to be able to meet people face to face,
but we do things. We do things as part of business
abundance. We have our weekly gahoots. We just
have general catch -ups because you don't want
to lose that human aspect behind it. But yeah,
I can see how it seems a bit foreign to many
people if you're not used to it and a bit of
an adjustment and having to get all that in place.
But it's just getting used to it, having everything.
getting the right tools for communication, for
project management, for conferencing calls, whatever
it might be. And the rest, it just falls into
place and becomes the norm eventually. Yeah.
You raised a good point about productivity. There
might be some owners that say, well, if I leave
my employees at home or allow them to work from
home, they're going to be really distracted by
everything at home. They're going to have their
games close by, the beds next door, like kitchens
close, like how can I trust that a work alternative
to the office is actually that productive? Rowan,
do you have any answers for that? I was actually
just laughing to myself because in the background
I just muted my microphone because the one -year
-old's come down the hall and started smashing
on the door going, which definitely would have
been heard for a moment through the microphone
and then he's lost interest and he's heading
back down. There's a lock on the door. It's all
fine. But yeah, making sure people are doing
things. Jake Minch has been process driven. We
have a lot of people that work remotely for us
and an awful lot more people that work remotely.
It's something you do have to learn and learn
how to do, which is unique to each individual
as far as what sort of contact you need and what
makes you feel good and what makes you feel bad
and whether you want to be in the loop or you
don't. But it's about going, what's the result
we want? What's the outcome that we want for
our customers? or for our business and making
sure that that's happening. So if you're thinking
about are they working at this minute right now,
that's probably not gonna be the right question.
The right question would be have they done everything
they needed to do today? to make sure everything's
ticking away, we're all happy. So yeah, it's
just having the systems and procedures in place
to make sure that you know that that's happening,
or the support network and the management and
training to help people do that. And then from
there on, it's really on the person. Some people
can do it, some people can't. I think one of
the biggest factors that will make someone Unsuccessful,
just can be mental health. If you don't have
people around you outside of work, or you don't
have hobbies, social life, et cetera, and then
you go to workplace in your bedroom and you can't
see outside and you just churn work away all
day and then you're done. you got no one to talk
to and you didn't really talk to anyone all day.
It gets pretty lonely pretty quick. And as humans,
we're not really designed for that. So it's like
Jake said, it's a matter of making sure that
you get in touch with people and there's this
processes in place that is still a team environment.
So just as much as it's the employee's responsibility
to get some work done, it's also the management
responsibility to facilitate the support. Is
that what you're saying? Yeah, it's sort of like
anything, it's a bit of teamwork. Jake, did you
have something to add? Yeah, I was just going
to say very often there's the right way of doing
things and there's the wrong way. Well, maybe
it's not that black and white, but there's ways
that suit both parties a lot better than others.
If I'm going to talk about some funny experiences
I've had in remote work, you know, I've worked
for a team that was strictly cameras off and
I'm meaning you I worked for a company for It
was only about four months, but I never saw anyone's
face not even not even the manager and that company
that did that Like to film your laptop basically
take photos every 10 seconds of what you're doing
across all monitors, which could feed back and
that they'll be able to just keep track of what
you're doing. So I'd say that's a good example
of the way not to do it as a way of it's more
like Big Brother watching you. I think we talked
about that in our team meeting today about having
Big Brother watching you. No one wants to have
that feeling, but there's more of it. There is
a trust element to it, and it is about staying
transparent. Transparency, I think, is very important.
Making sure that you can see tasks across the
team, that you can see communication, how it's
going back and forth across the team. So there
are ways to do it, but I think if you're lacking
trust within your team, maybe you shouldn't be
going remote. Yeah, there are cases where you
know remote is good and you don't necessarily
need to trust but it's it's it's It's a cog in
the machine approach. Not really a team -building
kind of thing Like if there's XYZ job, you just
need done. It's grunt work. It's hard to find
people to do It's hard to keep doing that role
and you can do it offshore a million times cheaper
and no one locally wants to do it Then yeah,
you know, that's where a screen recording and
that sort of stuff does make a little bit of
sense It's one make sure things have been followed
but to make sure that you're paying for what
you get But yeah, definitely. It's a it's a weird
vibe. I couldn't imagine just going to a business
Did you ever show your face like do they know
who you were? Oh, yeah, so you do the First time
you meet someone you dress up all nicely and
then you put the camera on and you go Look at
me. Yeah, look at me, but look at you. Like where
are you? It doesn't but that's normal for them
and you know, then all the team gets into that
habit of just cameras off, don't want to see
anyone. And, you know, that's doing that and
just having a clock that as soon as you click
on, it's taking photos of your screen of how
you're working every 10 minutes. It puts you
on edge a bit. And I think the most important
thing that you lose from that is the time to
really connect with your team about non -work
matters, because that's very important to know
what people are interested in, how their day
going, just general questions like that, which
we'd do if we were in an office together. But
if you do it the wrong way and you don't create
an environment where you can have those conversations,
I think the team morale can go down quite quickly,
which will decrease productivity. And overall,
it won't be good for the business. Yeah, it's
an interesting point that you just touched on
then, which is the team building. So people talk
about building a business. So the business that
you were working in, they obviously saw people
as pretty replaceable. There's a process to follow.
We just need people to follow the process, push
the buttons, which probably is not a... It's
a fine business model, but if you're building
a business and you're trying to change something,
you're not really including anyone else in that
or building a team. Something that I think is
really good is that if you've got employees,
here's a story actually that's probably quite
relevant. This is probably seven or eight years
ago. There was a really good person working for
a client of mine. She was good at her job, did
everything well. And she approached her employer
and said, I'd like to go to Europe for three
months. I've only got two weeks of leave. Can
I please have two and a half months unpaid leave?
And they said, no, it's an inconvenience for
us. You know, no. So they were largely set up
at the time, actually, to be able to do that
position remotely would have been probably just
a tweet to her phone and whatnot. Maybe she wouldn't
have done it or she might have done some hours
that could have worked. They said no. So she
said, I don't care. I'm going to go to Europe,"
which was always going to be the answer. And
then they lost that person from the business
along with three years worth of training experience
and customer relations and all that sort of stuff.
And then came back after Europe and got a different
job. So it worked out fine for both of them.
She got another good job and they got another
good employee. But when you're going, as a business,
we want to... invest in our business, we want
to invest in people, we want to have a team that
get along and help the business go forward and
help the clients then having the ability to not
necessarily always work remotely but be able
to, I'd like to go overseas, is that okay? Yes,
I've got some holidays or can I still do some
work? Use your technology that's available now
to actually keep working, keeps them on board,
keeps the business going forward and makes everyone
happier. Yeah, that's a really good point. I
mean because being able to offer that to your
employees is such a big asset to the business.
You know having that as part of your perks that
you can offer your employees to go traveling
for three months and work on the road is something
really good because one of the hardest things
in this day and age is to retain really good
talented staff and I think that's what's starting
to separate a few of the businesses that offer
these flexible arrangements compared to ones
that don't is that they're able to cater to the
lifestyle of the employees which helps you retain
really great talent and it is funny that you
say that because I'm someone who's done quite
a bit of travel and I remember through my travels
going oh if only I could have a job that I could
take and travel and do all this and have my work
taken on the road the only problem is is that
when I found it was pretty much the day where
I was just becoming a dad and now I'm all settled
down. I've got three kids, family, house, all
these kind of things. So I can no longer really
do it. But I think that's a really good thing
for, say, people who come out of university.
They may work for three years. They're learning,
always developing, keen for a career. And if
you can really blend that in with the travel
and just those things that people do at that
age, I think it's a huge win for both the business
and for the employee. You're spot on there, but
I would argue your point about you can't do it
anymore with the children because someone else
in our business has a crew of eight driving around
Australia for the last four months, working as
well with the remote satellite internet. Happy
days. I think that's a bit full on, but anything's
possible really when you think about it. That's
cool. There's remote work, but there's also other
adaptions that you can have to the nine till
five. So that might be split shifts or which
we mentioned before the four day week and results
only work. What, how could a small business take
these on or what should they consider before
they get started? Well, there's a few questions
there, but Yeah, just being flexible, I think.
If you've got the right person, you're getting
the right results. It's a matter of how does
that person fit in the business and what are
their requirements. So, oh, they can't do Mondays,
or they want to spend more time with their families.
They've got a new hobby. Can I do my work in
these hours rather than these ones? It's about
being flexible. And the other side of that is
that you can ... You can agree certain things,
but you just want to make sure you stay in line
with workplace law as well, especially in Australia.
There's rules and regulations, so it's making
sure that there's a good agreement between the
two parties that everyone's happy with and it's
mutually agreed, not sort of coerced onto someone.
So that means it's employee wants it, it's been
agreed, not. the business would like you to work
from six o 'clock at night till 10 o 'clock at
night so are available for our customers when
they get home from work and hit social media.
You don't want to do it whatsoever. We're going
to make you do that and then you've got to rock
up four o 'clock in the morning as well. So you've
got a bit of a fine line but I think there's
lots of different options. So there's results
only work which is hey we'll pay you to do a
certain task when that task is complete which
with employment law that's a little bit tricky
unless you're playing paying well above award
because you've got to guarantee certain pays
to people. So if they're not hitting their targets
and they're not doing enough work, they're not
getting paid enough and then you're basically
underpaying them, which is a different problem.
But split shifts, yeah, it's definitely just
fitting in the hours and what's the need of the
businesses. I think there's two, nothing really
new there. But I guess the remote work or the
four day week or those sort of things don't necessarily
mean that your employees have to be out of the
office the entire week. I mean, one example is
let's just say I was in an office with you guys
Wednesday afternoons. I'm out on the golf course,
but I can still work from the golf course. I'm
still answering emails and taking phone calls
and those sort of things. So it's like, yes,
it doubles it as networking, but I'm still working
that afternoon. I might not be in the office
at that point in time present, but things are
still happening, so there's those alternatives
as well. Yeah, it would be interesting. People
will listen to that and go, well, she's playing
golf. She's not working. She's available to work
when someone requests her, but she's not taking
a swing while she's processing some numbers or
anything like that. So probably clarify that
a little bit. But using my case, for example,
my phone rings randomly all the time. So... Most
of my clients that were bring out of hours or
anything like that You know to get guidelines
and and it's finding that relationship with your
your your customer But when I had to work nine
to five for someone I would sit at my desk sometimes
going, gee, I don't really have too much to do
right now. It's been a quiet day. Like I'm just
sitting here twiddling my thumbs. This is a complete
waste of my time. I could be doing this. I could
be doing this. I could be playing golf. I didn't
play golf then I'm still no good at it. But you
know what I'm saying? Whereas with the sort of
the remote, the flexible type work is that, hey,
well, I can be available at these times while
I'm doing these other things. Then the flip side
to that is that sometimes you might not have
wanted to be available before, but you would
do a little bit of work because it sort of balances
itself out and overall for the week you find
that you can do a whole lot more. An example
would be if you drive to a meeting with a client,
you've got some travel there and then you drive
back, you drive past the supermarket and you're
like, I'm on the clock now. I'll go back to the
office where later you've got to go back to the
supermarket then back home whereas the flexible
style is that you would hit the supermarket on
the way home then go to work and you can deal
with the work after which just saves you a good
half an hour out of your day. Yeah, good way
saying and I still remember my first day working
with the wonderful current business abundance
Being two hours ahead here. I thought 830 in
the morning I'll just quietly stroll on in online
login and sort of take my time get familiar with
things because it'd be 630 a .m. Where you guys
are based and yet? people were online at that
time of the morning chatting getting started
with their day and not because that they had
to or feel that they had to but because it suited
them it suited them to be on at 6 37 am take
a break around eight thirty, drop the kids off
at school, go do a few other things, come back.
And that's really the beauty of it is that, you
know, people are ready to go at other times.
People are night owls. People like to stay up
a bit later. And it just caters for all that.
It caters to the individual more than just being
structuring everyone's routine into the nine
to five workplace philosophy. Yeah. And you definitely
can't make it work in all industries. Some do
have certain. Sorry, Zee. No, you're fine. You're
fine. I was just going to say that this is attractive
for employees, but how does a business owner
benefit? So it's attractive for employees, but
it's more attractive, I would say, for business
owners. So you've got to be able to manage the
people. You've got to be able to make sure your
work's going. But for a lot of businesses, if
you don't have systems and processes or ways
to know if things are going well or wrong, you've
got... some business issues to fix, but if you
can see that, then it's just a management issue
of if people aren't performing, then having something
happen with them. If people are performing, it's
good. Why is it good for the business? Happy
employees. There's reasons for people to stay.
There's the whole... I'm really good at what
I do, but I'd like to be my own boss and have
holidays when I want and drop the kids off at
school. And I just can't do that here, so I'll
go work for myself. Well, that aspect's definitely
gone because they do get all those benefits without
the stress of running their own business. But
like a direct one, we can attest to recruiting
accountants in Australia is really hard. Most
accounting firms will say they can't get any
applicants or any good ones. And we have a huge
amount of applicants when we put an ad up and
they're mainly good quality. And the difference
is that we're saying, hey, you're remote. We
operate business hours. But once you're up and
running, you can basically pick when you work.
As long as you're doing your job, we don't care.
and that's their choice. It's not ours. We're
not saying go work nights or we're not encouraging
it even. We're just saying, your work is this,
get it done. And if it suits them to adjust it
and most employees say it's, oh, I just wanted
to go to school and watch my kids. But in my
old office, I was allowed to do that. But when
I walked back in, all the eyes were on me and
it didn't feel like I was allowed. So it's the
whole fact that if you've got that culture, then
you get these really good people that are great
at what they do, that just want to do a good
job. They want to be rewarded for doing a good
job, not for sitting at a desk doing nothing
all day or whatever, getting paid the same as
the numpty next to them. So if you have a really
good setup, you keep it flexible, you should
be able to attract really good people and that's
great for your business. The second part is,
like in our case, Jake's in New Zealand and most
of us are based in Australia. He was the person
we thought was right for the job. There's no
reason why he couldn't be part of the team. It's
the same as anyone else. So we can get him on
board, which the business benefits from just
for that. So yeah, it sounds great for the employees,
but that's probably more looking at from a...
point you would have heard the quiet quitting
or people working from home and they've got the
thing just pushing the keyboard every one minute
whatever to make sure it shows they're online
but you know that's just a business that doesn't
know what people are doing and doesn't look at
what the clients are getting in and manage that.
The upside's much better. So how would a business
owner change from their standard nine till five
to something like remote work or change the way
that employees can work within the business.
Yeah so in terms of being changing and jumping
in and well so I say jumping in or treading carefully
and moving slowly towards it. I mean the first
thing is if you're let's say you're working in
an office environment already and you want to
extend that to even be semi -flexible let's say
fully flexible it's probably just taking working
in stages making sure that you test it in your
own environment where you are at the moment,
just get the right tools in place, I'd say is
number one. What I can recommend is have a solid
communication tool to communicate with team members.
We use Microsoft Teams here. I know that Slack's
another alternative, Google Hangouts, whatever
your preferred platform is, just start to communicate
with the whole team using that. And this doesn't
replace email. It just creates more transparency
across the team, having certain channels, communicating
with multiple people. It's just an easier way
to keep track of the history. And then a project
management tool is equally as important. I mean,
I can only speak for, say, the marketing side
of things, but being able to have an environment
where you can go online and work with your team
through big projects and break them down into
individual tasks. communicate solely on that
task and bring that from in progress through
to if it's stuck in the work to put it in stock
right through to completed so you're always working
on individual tasks moving forward and like we
are right now, just know what you're going to
be using to hold calls and team meetings so people
can see your face. See your face, as I say, is
very important. It was always distressing not
seeing people's faces. Not all the time, but
just once in a while. People can hear your voice.
But I'd say if you're wanting to start to move
into that environment, just start. Start by getting
the right tools. Have a Allow your staff members
to work from home maybe two days a week to start
with if you're a bit cautious, but use those
tools and you'll see how it starts to work into
your everyday work life. And I'd say as a business
owner, as Rowan's already pointed out, it doesn't
just give your employees the flexibility, it
gives you as a business owner the flexibility
to go away with your family and not lose track
of what's going on or feeling. Not in control
of your business as you can stay across your
business overseas and micro chunks, which I'd
recommend So that would be my advice for starting
small Some great tips there Jay The one thing
I would would add is that if you're going to
offer it to people offer it to everyone Because
there's nothing going to devastate a team environment
more than now some people getting preferential
treatment to work from home and not others definitely
make sure that whatever you choose to just put
across the board that works for everyone. Most
of the things that Jake mentioned there basically
are things that most businesses should have anyway.
So the example could be in a lot of businesses
you have six people processing payroll as an
example and they spend probably the first three
hours of every day chatting to each other about
what's gone wrong, what's gone right, and who
did what last night, and what do we eat for breakfast,
and causing general chaos in the office every
time they're bored because there's two days of
Fortnite, they're not processing payroll. So
when you've actually got some processes in place
and some accountability and some transparency,
if you had that as a business, you probably wouldn't
have needed the six people on payroll. You might
only need four. So it sort of forces you by having
these tools to have a much better picture of
what's going on in your business. That's good.
We have resources and also the support services.
So if a business owner was saying, well, I don't
have the IT to even facilitate that, then we've
got IT services that are able to set up remote.
work and provide remote IT services or support.
There's resources in our knowledge center that
you can access to just see how you can develop
your team remotely or how you can better communicate.
There's a ton of different resources in particular
because remote work is becoming so popular. There's
resources all over the internet. But if you are
looking for those resources, head over to our
website at www .businessabundance .online. Just
want to say thanks for joining us, Jake, and
thank you again, Rowan. We will wrap it up here
and see you next time.