Workplaces of the world, Embrace ‘The Side Project’
If creating the conditions for collaborative working, creative freedom and an initiative-driven culture were easy, I wonder if we’d need the small army of business-people using lofty rhetoric to advocate their virtues?
Quite predictably, — and understandably, — for organisations, employees and line managers with deadlines for delivery, targets to meet and finite resources to do it with, job satisfaction and even ‘best practise’ can be an after-thought to the actual purpose of a workplace: to get the job done.
So managers,
How can the goals of a better workplace be made more … manageable?
Lets start by breaking down pearls of wisdom like this:
“In an economy where the only certainty is uncertainty, the one sure source of lasting competitive advantage is knowledge”
This quote from the Japanese organisation theorist, Ikujiro Nonaka, brings to light the fact that the success or failure of any organisation is directly related to how they find, absorb and use new knowledge to move it’s business to the next level.
In an information age, you’d assume it would be easy for modern professionals to leverage networks, source easily accessible expertise relevant to business objectives or any other crowd-sourced, open-sourced, freemium, subscription-based knowledge exchange utopias.
When chatting with colleagues and friends, it seems CV-writing often brings out the most innovative and sometimes most guilty of these humblebrags. [author’s note: as we’re ‘on the record’, obviously any friend of ours is well worth employing]. For organisations, tough-talking ‘values statements’ do much the same. But the question still remains: how can we turn ‘biz guru’ rhetoric into real business drivers?
In other words, how can we make the 9 to 5 (or core and non-core hours if you’re lucky enough to be in a new-fangled flexible workspace) a world of creative freedom and a meeting place for like-minded people? What does it mean to deliver work where ultimately, the individual has ownership and takes responsibility?
One particularly effective solution, we’ve found, is this:
‘The Side Project’
If we all put just a little consistent energy into projects outside the office, external influences can: inspire us all, create new knowledge, introduce new energy and help better understand the skills required to confront new challenges in an uncertain business environment.
Side projects could involve working on emerging technologies, in emerging markets, with different types of people and on totally different problems from what professionals are used to. These new experiences and outlooks bleed into their organisation: supporting innovation, increasing it’s adaptability and preparing or delivering products fit for the challenges of the future, not just the present.
You can spot these modern professionals by their increasing confidence in leadership positions, their broadening knowledge and networks and a ‘decision-maker’ attitude: assessing tasks like problem-solvers and better anticipating the steps need to deliver.
From individual beginnings, it’s time organisations took note of the benefits: with a well-rounded workforce you’ll better understand your business’s problems and build more sustainable successes. This speaks to the holy grail of ‘employee satisfaction’.
When an employee works on a challenge they understand and care about: wellbeing and dare I say, happiness, skyrockets. Interestingly, research by economists at the University of Warwick found that happiness led to a 12% spike in productivity.
The happiness advantage — and the side projects that build it — can making ‘Continuing Professional Development’ a meaningful activity, making workplaces a joy to enter and of course, making a good business proposition.
But the best bit is, colleagues you work beside are likely already working on side projects of their own — whether they’ve told you about them or not. So trust and support them.
This is where BeyondMe comes in.
We were founded on the hunger amongst modern workers to do something meaningful with their skills and spare time.
In the last 5 years, over 1500 people have committed their time to side projects of their own. Members of the community are not just in it to better themselves, but also to gain experience, knowledge and a practical, working understanding of making decisions that can improve the lives of others. We give to good causes and select projects that help others as much as they help us.
In BeyondMe’s first Impact Report, published in 2017, we know one thing about side projects for definite: once professionals make a regular commitment to their side project, its more likely they’ll want to increase their involvement. But its not a distraction, it’ll also increase their knowledge and the impact they can make. Because team-by-team, cohort-by-cohort our movement’s members are finding more time and skills to give and more money to donate.
From a business’ perspective, the effect is:
a network of people thinking creatively,
capable of creating resources where none existed before,
aimed at problems old and new.
In others words: an organisation of self-starters.
If you or your workplace are interested in supporting side projects of your own, check out www.BeyondMe.org and get in touch with us today for more details.
