I attempted a 4-day workweek at my firm and it failed — for a few of my staff

For a number of staff, that reply was a convincing sure. However, because the experiment
matured, I began to see that what felt versatile to 1 worker was restrictive to a different.
The actuality is that folks’s jobs and private circumstances are totally different. Some
staff cherished the four-day construction, and a few nonetheless work that method in the present day. For others,
having all people work the identical 4 days wasn’t significantly versatile in any respect.

As we listened to our folks and checked out how totally different groups and roles operated, it
turned obvious that the four-day workweek wasn’t working equally nicely for everybody.
We had modified the schedule, however we hadn’t essentially created true flexibility. If I let you know
precisely when it’s a must to be versatile, that’s probably not flexibility. We’d changed one
schedule with one other.

When flexibility will get much less versatile

The lesson wasn’t that the four-day workweek had failed. It was that we had been asking
the improper query. Instead of specializing in what number of days folks ought to work, we would have liked
to concentrate on what every position truly wanted to ship.

That’s once we modified the query. Instead of asking, “What is the versatile working
mannequin for Safeguard Global?” we began asking, “How a lot alternative can we give every
individual over how they work whereas nonetheless delivering what the enterprise and our clients
want?” That shift led us to what I name “optionality.”

Optionality is the brand new flexibility

Optionality is about giving folks extra alternative in how they construction their work relatively than
changing one company-wide schedule with one other.

If somebody can meet the expectations of their position in 4 days, that’s nice. If a five-day
workweek is best, that possibility stays in place. The similar philosophy applies to the place
folks work. We’re overwhelmingly distant, however we preserve places of work and coworking
choices for individuals who need or want them. The level isn’t to remove construction. It’s to offer
staff as a lot alternative because the work permits. The second you prescribe precisely what
flexibility has to seem like for everyone, you begin taking the pliability out of it.

However, optionality solely works when you’ve got accountability. And that accountability wants
to come back from the highest.

Giving alternative with out shedding accountability

Flexibility solely succeeds when folks know precisely what they’re accountable for. If a
supervisor has to depend on hours labored or bodily presence to find out whether or not somebody
is performing, the group might not have outlined the correct measures of efficiency
clearly sufficient.

In our case, we knew management needed to set the framework, so we went position by position and
outlined what folks want to perform to satisfy our targets. Instead of asking managers to
concentrate on hours labored, we requested them to concentrate on whether or not folks had been delivering the
outcomes their roles required.

For a customer-facing position, that may imply bettering a key buyer relationship,
lowering recurring points or tickets, or bettering buyer sentiment. The particular metric
will differ by position, however the precept is identical: Measure the end result that issues relatively
than utilizing time or bodily presence as a proxy for efficiency.

That required a shift in my very own pondering as a pacesetter, too. Giving folks better freedom
doesn’t imply changing into much less demanding. In some methods, it requires leaders to be extra
disciplined as a result of it’s a must to articulate what success truly appears to be like like. That’s a a lot
more healthy administration dialog than attempting to dictate when somebody must be in
entrance of their pc.

It comes all the way down to being extremely clear concerning the outcomes you anticipate after which trusting
folks to find out for themselves one of the simplest ways to ship these outcomes for the
enterprise and your clients.

Stop designing flexibility from the highest down

Four-day weeks, hybrid schedules, and return-to-office insurance policies can all fall into the identical
lure: Leaders determine what the perfect working mannequin appears to be like like, then anticipate staff to suit
themselves into it.

Companies are nonetheless determining what the office of the long run appears to be like like. I don’t suppose
leaders are going to determine it out by attempting to foretell the following office pattern. Our
expertise taught me one thing extra helpful: be prepared to check an thought, take note of
what truly occurs and alter course when the truth doesn’t match the speculation.

As a CEO, I don’t take into account altering an strategy a failure. The failure can be sticking
with one thing just because it was determined that was the reply. The office will
preserve altering. Our job as leaders is to continue learning with it. That’s optionality.

The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary items are solely the views of their authors and don’t essentially replicate the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.