Asynchronous Work Explained for 2022

June 14, 2022 - 10 min read

Kelechi Udoagwu

In recent years, many companies have adopted remote or hybrid work to deal with the new reality post-COVID-19. Remote and hybrid work allow flexible work arrangements where employees can maximize their time to take care of work and home responsibilities without letting either suffer. However, they have their limitations.

For example, some remote working companies monitor employees and track their work time, requiring them to be online and available at set hours of the day. This defeats the many benefits of working remotely and increases employees’ feelings of stress, anxiety, and frustration.

Asynchronous remote work solves this problem by allowing employees to set their schedules and deliver results based on the organization’s goals and timelines without demanding that they are online for a fixed period every day. In this article, we examine asynchronous work and its advantages. We'll discuss everything you need to know about the dynamic work arrangement and how to foster a solid asynchronous work culture in your organization.

What is asynchronous work?

Asynchronous work is work you can do at a convenient time within a predefined period. It is not dependent on real-time communication and collaboration. It instead hinges on clear goals and standards and team commitment.

Working asynchronously helps you work efficiently, especially when working remotely. You optimally organize and prioritize your tasks to meet your teams' and organization's needs. In asynchronous companies, employees are not expected to respond to messages, emails, or summons immediately. Instead, they can respond at a convenient and reasonable time. Asynchronous employees plan and organize their days to accommodate personal responsibilities and preferences while still prioritizing work responsibilities.

Let's say you typically begin work at 7 am, knock off your big tasks by noon, and take a two-hour break to run errands before returning to finish up the smaller work tasks for the day. Asynchronous employees can choose to work this way as long as they get their work done well and on time. This is unlike synchronous work, where employees are expected to be available and in touch with their colleagues throughout the workday.

What is the difference between asynchronous and synchronous work?

The most crucial difference between asynchronous and synchronous work is the amount of time employees are expected to be online, responsive, and available at work.

Asynchronous work separates work from communication. Employees know their company and team goals and what they have to do in their roles, e.g., tasks to prioritize, deadlines to meet, and who to hand tasks over to.

In contrast, synchronous work depends on real-time communication. Team members may stop working and wait for answers when a colleague is unavailable to provide their input and are directed by hierarchical managers on tasks to prioritize, when to complete them, and other changing work details.

Other significant differences between asynchronous and synchronous work include:

1. Goals and results against time and activity

Asynchronous work managers focus on setting clear goals and expectations. Once a goal is communicated, it's up to the team members to deliver results by the deadline, whether they choose to work in a 24-hour stretch or 30-minute sessions throughout the day. In comparison, synchronous work managers often focus on controlling and measuring employees' time at work and productivity/daily activity.

2. Defined workflows against back-and-forth collaboration

Asynchronous work teams rely on defined workflows and processes to make progress. On the other hand, synchronous work relies on team meetings, one-on-one conversations, and back-and-forth communication to keep work moving forward.

3. Autonomous schedules against fixed work hours

Asynchronous work allows employees to set their own work hours and does not require them to be online and responsive at the same time every day. In contrast, synchronous work demands that employees show up to work at a specific time and stay until that time is over, regardless of what's to be done. Clocking in and out are crucial tenets of synchronous work.

4. Documentation against repetitive communication

Asynchronous work advocates for documentation and transparency over repetitive communication and silos. It promotes a more structured flow of communication, utilizing a single source of truth to reduce ambiguity and confusion regarding any work affairs. This puts team members on the same page and helps move work forward without hitches or hurdles. On the other hand, synchronous work depends on in-person or one-on-one meetings, emails, and instant messaging — communication channels that can limit accessible, documented, and free flow of information across the organization.

5. Employee trust against control

Asynchronous work allows more freedom and trusts employees' ability to deliver high-quality deliverables. In contrast, synchronous workplaces are more hierarchical and rigid. It is customary for employees to wait to ask for permission before getting anything done in a synchronous workplace.

6. Remote work against in-office

Asynchronous work is more commonly pursued by remote working companies than in-office environments. Synchronous work is typically for in-office environments but is also adapted in many remote or hybrid companies.

Why does asynchronous work benefit remote teams?

Asynchronous work is best for remote teams for many reasons. Some of these are:

1. It provides more flexibility

Asynchronous work provides more flexibility for employees by allowing them room to structure their daily schedules and select the most optimal productive hours to work. Asynchronous teams are not required to respond to messages in real time. They can choose to reply when convenient, as long as it's within a reasonable period. This period may be set by the organization (say, 24 hours) but employees have control over how the workday is spent and can organize their schedules to take care of personal responsibilities as well.

2. It increases efficiency and productivity

Asynchronous work increases team efficiency and productivity by encouraging members to work at their peak productive hours, without collaboration bottlenecks or workplace interruptions, often leading to teams finishing their projects quicker and with less hassle. Asynchronous work also unlocks employees' ownership of tasks. Team members take responsibility for their assignments and take the initiative to ensure successful delivery.

3. It allows different personalities to thrive

Asynchronous remote work allows many different types of personalities to thrive compared to synchronous work. Individuals who are introverted and prefer to lose themselves in a flow state while working have better opportunities to do so in an asynchronous work environment. Confident, extroverted, and hyperactive team members may miss their in-office water-cooler conversations but they can easily schedule coffee shop meetups or virtual meetings with team members and colleagues to get the social stimulation they need.

4. It promotes inclusivity

Another benefit of asynchronous work is inclusivity. Asynchronous companies can recruit employees and collaborators without geographical boundaries or other limitations. It doesn't matter if some team members are going to sleep while others are getting to work or if one has more care-taking responsibilities than the next. Work happens around the clock and around the world in asynchronous teams by including and recruiting employees who could never have been a part of the team without asynchronous work.

5. It supports mental health

Asynchronous work supports mental health by reducing the stress of keeping up with expectations to be online, available, and responsive during set hours every day. When an organization adopts asynchronous work, team members can schedule their work to foster greater productivity without sacrificing their well-being. Employees can set time boundaries to create a better work/life balance without the constant worry of judgment from employees who work longer hours.

6. It allows for international collaboration

Asynchronous work widens the pool for recruitment and collaboration as employers do not have to limit themselves to a specific location or time zone. This paves the way to recruit the best possible talent and create a diverse workplace.

Asynchronous Work Explained for 2022 2 — Photo by Firmbee.com on Unsplash

How to instill a culture of asynchronous work in your team

Instilling a culture of asynchronous work in your team requires being clear about goals and expectations. Follow the tips below to build a strong culture of asynchronous work in your organization.

1. Encourage transparency

From the start of a project to its completion, ensure that discussions are documented and organized properly with timestamps, involved team members, and every other crucial detail. This information should be collected in a single source of truth to be accessible to involved team members when needed. Doing this enables asynchronous work. Team members do not have to wait until a manager relays information. They know where to look for what they need to keep their tasks moving forward.

Create unified communication and organizational structures that encourage transparency across the teams in your organization. Ensure that everyone understands why doing things the right way is important. Once a question has been asked more than once, document the answers clearly and thoroughly, so anyone who has the question again can easily find the answers.

A collaborative workspace like Wrike helps ensure transparency between teams and collaborators. You can tag and communicate with team members using @mentions and follow specific projects to stay informed on progress. Wrike makes asynchronous work feasible by providing a secure collaborative platform that encourages transparency for both in-office and remote teams.

2. Promote asynchronous communication

Asynchronous communication provides a strong foundation for asynchronous work. By empowering employees to use asynchronous communication tools, they get better at working asynchronously and respecting each other's time. They also get better at communicating what they need to carry out their duties and begin project tasks.

Use asynchronous communication channels to share and update project-related conversations and encourage employees to follow your communication rules to streamline things for everyone. Encourage them to take important information out of email and instant messaging apps and load them into your collaborative workspace. This way, you reduce occurrences of communication silos or missing and repeating information. In every company, employees come and go. By implementing transparent, documented, and asynchronous communication, your organization retains crucial knowledge throughout these cycles.

3. Set clear deadlines

Clear deadlines are crucial for successful asynchronous collaboration. When team members know when a project is due, they can plan and schedule their workload to be more efficient. Confirm team members' availability before assigning tasks with an upcoming deadline. Also, encourage them to confirm when they have accepted new work assignments. This way, you reduce instances of schedule conflicts and missed deadlines, as you know that once team members have confirmed acceptance of a task, they become responsible for delivering it.

Work with your team to set the deadlines and assign them in your project management tool so everyone involved can see the entire project progress and how their work contributes to it. When people know that other parts of a project and team are waiting for their completed tasks, they are more driven to complete them so as not to keep others waiting. Project management software like Wrike sends automated reminders and project updates to keep all team members in the know whether working asynchronously or not.

4. Create clear guidelines for working

Establish clear guidelines for all teams, employees, and external collaborators working for your organization. Details like how to hand over a task to a teammate or manager, what communication channels to use to ensure you get a response, how long you can wait to expect a reply before sending a follow-up, when to escalate an issue, and how to handle risks are critical and should be easily accessible to team members or collaborators.

Having a defined process for handling operational work and project-related tasks helps to set asynchronous teams on a path to success. Set up a functional and easy-to-use asynchronous collaboration tool like Wrike to streamline these guidelines and processes and invite team members to track and manage internal operations and ongoing work.

Managers leading their teams towards an asynchronous work arrangement should model the new collaboration and communication guidelines to encourage team members to follow them. It is only by getting all employees to follow the guidelines that an organization can become fully asynchronous.

5. Avoid unnecessary meetings

Cutting off unnecessary meetings is one of the most important ways to establish asynchronous work at an organization. You should only call for meetings when it's crucial and invite specific team members to make the best use of everyone's time.

Evaluate the need and purpose of upcoming or recurring meetings. You may find that some of them can be replaced with a presentation or report and sent to the involved team members. These employees can leave their feedback, comments, and edits right in the document or in your team’s collaborative workspace or project management tool.

6. Introduce the right tools

Choosing the right technology stack is crucial to enabling asynchronous work. From your communication to project management and collaboration needs, ensure you choose tools that are made for asynchronous work. For example, using an all-purpose instant messaging app like WhatsApp may deter your efforts to work asynchronously. Instead, it is better to use a project-related communication tool so team members can share updates about what they're working on and easily retrieve information when they need it without distractions.

It's advisable to find the best collaborative workspace software for asynchronous teams, where communication, project management, automation, and other vital features are rolled into one. Wrike provides intuitive and customizable software that serves these purposes. Remind employees to use the selected asynchronous collaboration tools and to share any issues they may have using them, so the team can solve them quickly and foster an efficient environment of asynchronous work.

How to manage your own asynchronous work time

Task management is crucial to managing your asynchronous work time. It's important to create a daily schedule to ensure you develop a habit of getting work done each day.

Use time blocking to organize and schedule your time on your weekly calendar. This way, you know exactly what to do and can estimate how much time you have left for any unscheduled or impromptu responsibilities. Time blocking also makes it easy for you to schedule extended, uninterrupted sessions where you tackle deep work like writing, strategizing, problem-solving, or planning a new project.

Consider your upcoming deadlines when you create each week's schedule. If there are many meetings, you may decide to batch them into specific days so that others are dedicated to deep work only. Break the biggest tasks into smaller bits and schedule time to review and refine your work before handing it to a manager or your team members.

Communicate your plans with your team members and manager if you’re going to be away for an extended time so that necessary steps are taken, and a team member can be assigned to cover for you. If your team uses project management software like Wrike, you can share your updates even when away, so your team members know the progress of your projects without having to ask questions.

Why use Wrike as your asynchronous collaboration tool?

Asynchronous work attracts many benefits. Key among them are increased flexibility, efficiency, and better well-being and mental health. This style of working gives employees autonomy over their personal schedules while still keeping up with the organization's goals and timelines.

Wrike provides the best project management and collaborative software to enable teams to work asynchronously without falling apart or dropping the ball on ongoing projects. With Wrike, it is easy for teams to communicate, collaborate, track projects, and share relevant updates with teammates when working asynchronously.

Are you ready to establish or enhance asynchronous work in your organization? Get started with a free two-week trial of Wrike to build your asynchronous processes and get your teams to work with more efficiency, even when working remotely.

Kelechi Udoagwu

Kelechi is a freelance writer and founder of Week of Saturdays, a platform for digital freelancers and remote workers living in Africa.

#Remote Work #Remote Teams #hybrid & flexible working

Marketing 10 min read

Top Tips for Creating a Twitter Marketing Strategy

Twitter can be complex. Similarly, the techniques and methodologies that brands use to implement their Twitter marketing strategy add yet another layer of difficulty. While some marketing project managers prefer to follow Twitter best practices and cross their fingers, others know that putting a strategy down on (virtual) paper ensures growth and success on the platform long-term. For those who prefer to know what they’re doing on Twitter and why their efforts (and budget) matter, having a strong Twitter marketing strategy is a no-brainer. In this guide, we’ve answered your most frequently asked questions about Twitter marketing, provided a curated list of essential tips, and listed the exact tools you need to achieve your next benchmarks. What is a Twitter marketing strategy? A Twitter marketing strategy is an action plan that aligns with your company’s concrete goals for this particular platform. A good Twitter marketing strategy involves creating and publishing content that will attract new followers and improve your brand recognition. Why is Twitter good for marketing? Twitter is not as creative as other platforms like Facebook and Instagram. However, it does have an advertising audience of 353 million and is the first in line for customer service as far as social media apps go. Not only is Twitter a must-have social media tool, but it’s also effective for engaging individuals, sharing time-sensitive content, and staying up to date with what’s going on in the world as it relates to your business. How to create a Twitter marketing strategy Despite its fast-paced nature, Twitter still requires a bit of strategic planning and discipline to get the most out of it. Not to mention the fact that it’s important to be prepared for all the unexpected conversations that happen on Twitter. Having a strategy in place will help you respond to any situation that may arise while also building a strong marketing and sales funnel for your brand. Here’s everything you need to know to successfully implement a Twitter marketing strategy. 1. Evaluate your current strategy You should check your existing social media accounts both on and off Twitter to make sure they're in good standing. This will help identify any issues that need addressing now before you launch the next phase. 2. Define clear goals Having clear goals is the first step to achieving success on any social media platform. You should create goals that are specific, measurable, and time-bound. These should align with your company's greater objectives and be realistic about the resources you have to dedicate to the project. You’ll also need to get specific about which metrics you’ll use to measure progress and how often you’ll check in with goals. Remember that there are a ton of different metrics available but not all of them will be applicable to your particular goals. 3. Check out the competition By carefully analyzing the accounts of your competitors, you can learn about their weaknesses and develop a stronger strategy. Look for common themes, tweet frequency, and their most popular tweets to better understand what your audiences are looking for. You can also use this information to improve on what they’re already putting out there in your own content. Pro tip: You can also get digital marketing inspiration from original strategy examples found elsewhere that you can make your own on Twitter. 4. Create a Twitter guide Your company’s customized Twitter guide should include a code of conduct and a clear set of style guidelines anyone can replicate. First, follow a clear responsibilities policy to ensure that everyone is on board with how you’ll deal with the variety of scenarios you may find yourself in on Twitter, which can be a well-known hangout for pot stirrers and ‘trolls’. Even something as simple as accidentally having multiple team members answer the same questions can create a lot of confusion and lead to unproductive discussions. Following actionable guidelines will prevent these common roadblocks from happening in the first place. Next, remember that a good social media style guide is also helpful to keep your team's communications on track. This will prevent branding mistakes and minimize miscommunication. Keep in mind that your brand personality should be consistent across all platforms. It should also communicate your company's values and goals. 5. Create your Twitter profile Having a professional Twitter profile can help strengthen your brand and inform your audience. You also want to make sure that your handle is consistent across all platforms. Here are the steps you’ll need to take in order to get started: Create a handle. Your username is the first thing that people will see when they look at your profile. It should include your company's name and other recognizable details. Add a profile photo. Make sure your imagery keeps to the correct dimensions and is high-resolution. Add a header image. Your profile should also feature a clean and prominent header image. It can help provide insight into your company culture or reflect on current campaigns. Write your bio. A well-written and snappy bio is also important to stand out from the crowd. You can also use a tagline or a creative image to highlight your brand personality. Include a link. Send click-throughs to your homepage or a dedicated landing page for Twitter audiences. Choose a location. One of the most important elements of your profile is your location. This is very important for small businesses as they want their customers to be able to find them offline. Add a birthday. Use the date your company was founded or an important launch date. 6. Start a Twitter content calendar A social media content calendar is a great way to align your content across all your channels and identify potential conflicts. It can also help you plan ahead and capitalize on any opportunities that arise. Another benefit of planning out your calendar is that it will help you determine if you're sharing a balanced mix of content. Although you can schedule some tweets to go out ahead of time, the social aspect of social media will still require you to respond to DMs, mentions, and retweets promptly. 7. Schedule some tweets ahead of time Get ahead of the competition by scheduling your tweets to go out on optimal days and times. Doing so will allow you to maximize the engagement and visibility of every post. Unfortunately, you can't always schedule 100% of your tweets or else the platform may flag you as spam. However, it's possible to save time by pre-scheduling content that's already planned in advance. 8. Create a monitoring plan Once your marketing strategy is in place, it's time to regularly evaluate your progress and set goals against those that you set. Use the same project management platform to evaluate your Twitter data and run reports to keep everything in one accessible place. 9. Use social listening Twitter isn't just about speaking. It's also about listening. Through social listening, you can learn about the opinions of other people about your products and services. It can help you develop a more authentic and loyal customer base. 10. Consider paid ads Paid ads aren’t right for everyone, but they can help your new Twitter marketing strategy gain more traction faster. Twitter Ads are a great way to target specific audiences. They allow you to measure the effectiveness of your campaign and find the right messages for your brand. Even if someone doesn't follow your brand or hashtags, a promoted tweet can still show up in their timeline. You can also interact with them in the same way as organic content. 11. Include link tracking Just like you link track on your sales pages, email newsletters, and other social media, Twitter offers another way to obtain data on customer buying journeys. Track the link in your bio as well as any company website links you tweet out. The metrics provided by link tracking tools allow you to monitor how people navigate to your website and measure the effectiveness of your campaign management. They're also useful for analyzing your bottom line as you improve your conversions and traffic over time. 12. Use all of Twitter’s features This one may take some time, but it’s worth noting that the best way to maximize your Twitter marketing strategy is to use every last tool the platform has to offer. For example, did you know Twitter allows users to host live chats? Use a live chat to discuss a topic, ask customers for their opinions, or collaborate with a brand partner on something you're working on. Twitter marketing tips There are countless tips on the internet about how to do Twitter well. The truth is most of your success depends on trial and error plus consistency over time. Here are some of our curated Twitter marketing tips that we’ve either used or seen work firsthand. They serve as a good jumping-off point for any foundational strategy. Start with one, then mix the rest in over time. Think big-picture. One of the most important factors to consider is how Twitter fits into your overall social media strategy. Assign daily supervision. Busy accounts may require a team member’s attention to monitor them every day or even every hour. Have a backup team member for every single account in case one is out-of-office. Plan one month out. A 30-day content plan will help you grow your Twitter following fast. It will also help you track your social media campaigns and analyze what resonates with your audience. Use lists. Through lists, you can get in touch with the conversations that matter to you most. These feeds are curated by the accounts that are most likely to have influential discussions. Develop your voice. Although you can use images and videos to attract followers, a well-written and compelling voice is very important to have on Twitter. Tweet authentically. Don't send tweets that sound like they're coming from a robot or a script. Instead, communicate clearly and politely. Stand out. Follow a unique and original message whenever you post on social media. Doing so will make your Twitter content more engaging. Use polls. Twitter polls allow users to pose questions with multiple choice answers. Gather valuable feedback and opinions about your customer preferences and favorite products. Add photos and videos. Visual assets can help you convey a message more effectively. They can also be used to reinforce an important point or highlight a chart or infographic. Use hashtags. Hashtags are a great way to boost your visibility and discoverability on Twitter. This feature is essential for new accounts. Add branded content. For example, creating a branded hashtag is a great way to organize and promote content about your business. It can also be used to search for user-generated content related to your products. Track trends. Follow trending topics to get notified about new posts and hop on relevant themes. Think before posting. Although most Twitter users rely on the mobile app, search engine preview snippets of profiles may show recently deleted tweets. So think through each message before you hit publish — otherwise, it may come up on Google days, weeks, or months from now! Engage, engage, engage. It's important to create a two-way channel of communication on Twitter to engage your audience. Creating content that encourages your followers to interact with each other is also important. Get verified. A verified profile helps prevent people from being confused with fake and duplicate accounts. Twitter marketing tools to get you started There are three main marketing tools you’ll need to get started, regardless of your goals or strategy. Data measuring and reporting Asset storage Project management platform Without the help of data measuring and reporting, brands aren’t able to perform well on Twitter. The feedback from key metrics such as retweets helps marketers better understand their audience, grow their following, and reach as many new timelines as possible. Asset storage is another essential Twitter marketing tool. Between branded links, third-party links, photos, videos, GIFs, and more, having one central location where all of your Twitter content assets are stored is both convenient and strategic. Last but not least, the most important Twitter marketing tool you can use is a project management platform. Twitter requires you to create content, respond to public and private messages, track data, and keep up with the latest features. A great project management tool will allow you to do all of that in one accessible place so you can stay on top of all the moving parts while focusing on your chosen strategy. Why use Wrike to build your Twitter marketing campaign Like other social media platforms, finding success on Twitter requires a strategy and an intentional approach. That is why using a marketing project management tool is so important. Wrike's marketing project management software lets you track and communicate with your team across all your campaigns in one place. Not only does it help break down silos and make communication easier, but it also gives you a 360° view of your Twitter and related social media campaigns, allowing you to see all of them in one place. Wrike's software also helps you track communication with your team across all your campaigns in one place, so you’re always on the same page, even with Twitter’s fast-paced conversations. If last-minute tweets or replies need approval, team members can easily see your feedback and loop approvers into ongoing conversations via @mentions, which can help cut down on review cycles. For productivity, Wrike's marketing project management software helps you streamline your processes and achieve your goals. Doing so will increase the visibility and efficiency of any strategy you implement. With all of Twitter’s moving parts, having full transparency into your workflows is essential since bottlenecks are that much harder to resolve. If you run a social media strategy on any other app, you already know that project management for digital marketing is different from other project management disciplines. That is why Wrike developed flexible workflows that make it possible to eliminate the guesswork and get more done in less time. Twitter has many complex moving parts with real-time feedback, so solid data reporting is mission-critical to getting it right. Wrike's marketing project management software features dynamic reports that allow you to visualize and gather business intelligence quickly. Ready to take action on your new Twitter marketing strategy? Get started today by organizing your social media plan into assigned tasks and timelines using Wrike’s two-week free trial.

Remote Working 7 min read

Is the 9-5 Job Dead? The Rise of Flexible Working in the Post-Pandemic Office

In February 2021, just two months before all US adults were to be offered a COVID-19 vaccine, Brent Heyder, the president of Salesforce, declared, “the 9-5 is dead." Even if it soon becomes safe for office-based employees to return to work in their droves, some companies are not entirely sure that the traditional 9 to 5 job is worth returning to. Instead, companies like Salesforce are giving employees the choice between: Flexible working (1-3 days in-office for collaboration, meetings, and presentations) Fully remote (for roles that do not require the office or those who live too far from one) Office-based (for roles that cannot be done from home) The company argues that ditching regular work week hours will improve employee connection, work-life balance, and equality, ultimately leading to increased innovation and better business outcomes. So, is the 9 to 5 job really dead? There is no doubt that flexible working looks likely to become a standard offering for many employers. With improvements to technology, we have seen trends such as the rise of digital nomadism flourish. Around 70% of employees expect flexible work schedules post-pandemic, and 50% say they would leave a job if it were not offered. However, the idea that “the 9-5 is dead” may be an oversimplification. According to a report by Inc., regular work week hours have always been a "modern-day illusion," and clocked time has never been a good indicator of progress or productivity. It argues that, by giving employees task ownership instead, they can complete these more efficiently with respect for both their own time and their teammates’. Inc argues that the 9-5 job is not dead because it did not really exist in the first place — most workers struggled to get their work done within the allocated time, even before the COVID-19 pandemic. By allowing flexible working and shifting our focus to outcomes and the benefits of remote working, workers can avoid burnout by using their time more wisely and setting appropriate, achievable timelines for their goals. Why working 9 to 5 hours may not suit younger employees Enabling flexible working will not only future-proof your organization to accommodate employees’ expectations, but it will also be an important move for retaining younger employees. For example, nearly one in two (45%) of millennials will choose flexibility over pay. And when the vast majority of businesses report that it costs $15,000 - $25,000 to replace a millennial employee, it could be an expensive mistake not to hear this preference. The New York Times echoes this, saying, “it’s not about jumping up titles, but moving into better work environments.” Companies such as Apple and Walmart have also begun to discuss the need to shift the focus from prioritizing shareholders to taking care of employees. An increase in flexible work schedules may also help gender equality. As more fathers and non-parents request it, there is less space for "the flexibility stigma" mothers experience to remain. A survey by Werk also found that older generations are just as likely to want flexible working — they’re just less likely to ask for it. How to move away from regular work week hours So, if flexible working is inevitable, then what is the best way to implement it? A report by Inc. advises to keep these three golden rules: Debunk the 40-hour myth. What was first introduced by Henry Ford in the early 1900s to attract autoworkers who were used to 12-hour shifts has become obsolete. In fact, having fewer hours to complete a task tends to sharpen focus. Adapt to peak-performance styles. Some people thrive by replacing their fifth working day with four 10-hour shifts, while some find that impossible. Offer your employees the opportunity to decide when and how they work best. Offer solutions to the challenges of working from home, including home office setup ideas and appropriate technology. Synchronize schedules. Ensure that teams who do need regular meetings have at least some overlap during their flexible working hours. This may not need to be every day but assess how often your team will need it. Different flexible working options Inc. outlines some of the options available for organizations hoping to move on from the concept of the 9 to 5 job below: Flexitime: Employees can choose from a range of available hours Compressed work week: The work week is compressed into fewer than five days (usually by creating four 10-hour days) Flexiplace: Employees can work virtually from home or any non-office location Job sharing: Two people voluntarily share the duties and responsibilities of one full-time position, with the salary divided according to this share Work sharing: Usually used to avoid layoffs, this introduces reduced hours and salaries for a portion of their workforce in order to maintain all employees Expanded leave: Employees can request extended periods of time away from work without losing their rights as employees – this can be paid or unpaid Phased retirement: Under this arrangement, the employer and employee agree to a schedule of gradual reduction of work commitments over a period of months or years Partial retirement: Employees can continue working on a part-time basis, with no established end date Work and family programs: Employers provide some degree of assistance to employees who have childcare or elder-care responsibilities Benefits of flexible work schedules According to job advertisement site Flexjobs, some of the benefits of leaving a 9 to 5 job behind for employees include: Improved retention: Even pre-pandemic, 80% of workers would choose a job that offered a flexible schedule over those that did not, with 80% saying they would be more loyal to their employer if afforded flexible working. Increased talent: By offering what is known to be one of the most attractive perks, offering flexible work schedules can help your organization recruit top-tier talent. Improved diversity: Not only has inclusion and equality become a non-negotiable for younger workers, building a more diverse workforce creates higher-performing teams, so it’s also smart business. Increased productivity: Even before the pandemic, remote workers worked more hours on average than in-office employees. But more importantly, shifting to a results-oriented culture enables teams to focus on getting the results they want. Improved employee engagement: One of the best ways to drive engagement is to show workers they are respected enough to be trusted with flexible working Decreased costs and environmental impact: Unsurprisingly, fewer overheads and less commuting (or at least less rush-hour traffic) have a hugely beneficial impact on cutting costs and helping climate change. How Wrike helps teams succeed with flexible working Now that the world’s workforce is starting to ditch the 9 to 5 job, we need the right software to keep up. Wrike enables teams who opt for flexible work schedules to gain 360° visibility on progress and productivity with shared dashboards, one-click Gantt charts, and advanced, automated reporting. Get started for free.

Marketing 7 min read

What Is a Marketing Environment?

What is a marketing environment, and why is it important for marketing managers? Read on to learn more about monitoring your organization’s marketing environment.

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Asynchronous Work Explained for 2022

What is asynchronous work?