It’s safe to say that the Great RTO Push is here to stay, and what workers want most from the process includes maintaining a work-life balance. So, most would not be thrilled to follow the San Francisco tech crowd’s so-called “996” schedule that’s the talk of LinkedIn these days.
That specific industry trend – 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days per week – is very real, according to financial-operation platform Ramp.com’s data crunching involving food delivery times. Beyond that headline-grabbing example of atypical schedules, the opposite trend is also rising: Out-of-the-box work arrangements that improve productivity and cut down on labor costs associated with high turnover.
This creative experimentation is happening where you’d least expect it.
Even at a hospital? Yes, and elsewhere, too:
An “impossible” nursing model: Becker’s Hospital Review detailed how an Ohio-based healthcare system recently switched nurses from hourly to a salaried pay model. A key result of this experiment was a $40,000 annual labor cost savings, but how did the nurses feel about this shift?
Spoiler alert: They loved it, and they are as surprised as anybody else.
This happened when one administrator, a former nightshift nurse, dreamed up several options, including “a seven-days-on, seven-days-off model,” which allowed for ample recharging. Soon, the turnover rate plummeted for nurses in this healthcare system, and burnout decreased, too.
After six months, the previously “wary” nurses were convinced that this scheduling method worked well. The hospital’s previous need to pay overtime and hire traveling nurses also ceased to exist. Retention rates skyrocketed, labor costs stayed predictable, and money was saved.
A food manufacturing flex: More experimentation happened at Land O’Lakes. The Wall Street Journal called attention to a Minnesota plant that was previously running mandatory 12-hour shifts to operate 24 hours per day, which worked for decades to minimize the chaos associated with frequent shift changes. Yet due to high turnover, the plant tried out a “flex work” program that has since expanded to 60 factories out of 140 sites.
At these facilities, the company is allowing employees to pick their own shift duration and starting hours, and retention is soaring. Additionally, the new structure helped the company fill positions that frequently stayed open.
Many of the dairy giant’s workers are now thrilled to adjust their schedules to start after school drop-off times, and so on. Land O’Lakes is also finding that they have filled vacant positions without pulling “the lever” of increasing labor costs through temp agencies or overtime pay.
Conclusion: Happier workers = greater retention = saved money. This isn’t always the precise equation, but the above examples illustrate how it’s possible, even outside of office settings.
Granted, not every workplace can feasibly pull such gambles off, nor would these work-schedule adjustments be a good idea for all companies, which must prioritize demand to stay sustainable and in business.
Still, the above healthcare example shows that leaning into flexibility goes a long way in workers’ minds. And if this openness also ends up saving money for employers? That’s a win-win.
