In the world of employment, late hours is often related to extra productivity. You can find many managers who actually encourage their team to work for later hours on a regular basis. It is seen as a culture that propagates that work and professional duty comes first in line. This is most definitely true! The interest of the company with which you are working will definitely have certain importance to you as a professional. However, does it really mean that the employees who stay back after office hours regularly are the most productive assets of the company?
Interestingly you will see that this is not the case. On the contrary, the employees who happen to leave the company on time are the talents who are really contributing to the progress of the organization as a whole.
As a startup CEO, it is imperatively crucial that you make a proper assessment and estimation of the people who are working for you. It is really important that you know the formula that will be able to extract the best performance from the employees on a regular basis. This is one of the simplest ways the employees can grow and the company can prosper. However, making the employees stay back for long late hours after their office timing on a regular basis is a derogative and oppressive culture. If anything at all, it will work to tire and burn out your employees. Quite rightly such an attitude on the part of a startup CEO can make you lose some of the best talents that you had garnered.
Stressed Businesswoman
Get the result you desire but don’t use time as a parameter
There is a misconception that late and extra hours from employees means optimum us of resources and better performance of the organization. As a CEO you must be able to ascertain the exact level of performance and the nature of results that you wish to attain from your employees. The fact that they have stayed after the timings they are supposed to stay is an indication of their inefficiency. Efficient people and employees are capable of managing their time and give time-bound results and productivity. You must be interested in the element of productivity alone and not the hours an employee spends in the company.
Not all roles are alike
Often the head of the companies, vice presidents, and managers often feel that if they can stay for late hours so should the other employees of the company. Now, this is one of the faultiest relativity that one can use. The role and the responsibilities of people in management like a CEO happen to be completely different from that of a general employee of a company. A CEO has to manage the clients of the company, the operations of the company and also the requirements and the problems of the employees. In fact, many startup CEOs have confessed that the best time for them to work is before the employees have arrived and after the office is closed for the day. This is definitely not the case with the general employees. The role of general employees is much different from entrepreneurs. Their roles are much segmented, simplified and quite in line with a single kind of responsibility.
Perceptions and reality differ
Perceptions and the way you look at a certain thing or a practice can be very different from reality or the real impacts of the practices. As the owner of the company, you might feel very good about the fact that your employees are working late on a regular basis. However, it does not mean you are getting their best or topmost productivity. On the contrary, it can be just the bang opposite. Staying for such long hours can make your workforce feel really depressed and tired. Their work and life balance will get lost. Finally, all you will have is a bunch of burnout employees. Such a practice can also make you lose some of your most productive team members. Hence a practice that is looking like a feature to build up a competitive and a hardworking ambience of work where you can find optimal productivity can actually be a dead hole which is but thwarting quality manpower.
Know when to stop
As a CEO, it is important you strike a balance between running your team to optimal performance and also letting them relax once in a while. Everything comes with a limit line. Your employees also have a limit of stretching and working hard. This is the extent and the limit that must be understood by you as the CEO of the company. You need to respect the fact that your employees are humans and have their own limits which they cannot exceed. If you make them stretch on a daily basis, it will only increase their stress and work pressure level. Instead of getting their best and topmost performance you will actually see a decline in their productivity.
As an alternative method, you can give them occasional rest and relaxation spans when the work pressure will not be all that high. This will cool off your employees both emotionally and also physically. This way when you will require extra work from their end they will be physically and mentally in a state of offering you their optimal performance standards.
