Clever businesses know that the best way to retain employees is to not run them ragged.
Wanted: Web developer for cutting-edge dot-com. Competitive pay, benefits, equity. Must know Java and C++ and be willing to work no more than 40 hours a week.
Is that a typo? Silicon Valley is supposed to be the land of milk, honey, and 100-hour workweeks, right? Not anymore. As dot-com burnout becomes a serious reality, recruiters looking to sign on weary Internet hotshots are turning to a new perk: a realistic balance of work and life.
Kim Fisher, CEO of audio application developer AudioBasket, competes for employees in staff-starved San Francisco and touts her company's more manageable working style as a competitive advantage. "Even though we have a wonderful, comfortable office," Fisher says, "if people don't get out of the place, they don't keep the ability to be creative."
But enforced sanity isn't just for the staff, it's also easy on the bottom line. "It's more cost-effective for us to retain employees than to replace them when they burn out," Fisher says. "We're not raising money to get bought out. We're building a sustainable business . . . and you have to have a certain environment to make people want to stay for the long run."
How does a dot-com get the job done and still send people home in time for supper? It starts with recruiting the right people. "We hire people who know their jobs, which makes it easier for people to get their work done in a reasonable time frame," Fisher says. "The kinds of people we recruit know how to get their jobs done and have a life as well."
By all accounts, AudioBasket's easygoing ways have been a hit with the staff: The only time the company has lost any of its 40-plus employees was when it moved offices, leading to the departure of a couple of commuters.
Rat Race Won
"Flexible" and "balanced" are buzz words that have paid off for burned out Net refugees.
Tricia Stone, founder of Stone Communications, an eight-person communications consulting firm (slogan: "high-stakes presentations"), takes the balancing act to heart, giving staff members a lot of leeway when it comes to sculpting their own work environment. "It's one of the reasons people come here," Stone says. "They've all been management consultants and are burned out. They want to have a more flexible lifestyle."
Ironically, Stone's client base is composed largely of investment banks and venture capital firms, companies not well known for an easygoing work atmosphere. How does the company balance a client-imposed grind with a carefully maintained corporate culture? Stone says it simply involves "doing what you have to for the client, but not doing unnecessary work . . . or just showing up to look good. We don't take on more than we can do."
The culture has even seeped into Stone's recruiting efforts. A recent job posting extols the virtues of "a sustainable, balanced work life . . . in a quiet, bright office environment."
Likewise, employment ads for Ticketmaster Online-CitySearch.com (TMCS) woo candidates with the following: "In this entrepreneurial environment, the company has carefully balanced the issues of home and career to create a fun workplace."
Walt Boyle, a TMCS vice president and its "minister of the interior," says the company has built on this attitude since its inception. To Boyle, a balanced work life means creating an environment that's easy on the staff when they're at work, while providing plenty of opportunity for people to get away from the office. While Boyle admits that TMCS does have staffers "who work ridiculous hours . . . there are plenty of folks who, uncoached, would say, 'I love coming to work here. I love this place.'" Our follow-up calls proved him right.
"You'll see kids in the office, dogs in the office, families coming through," Boyle says. For TMCS employees, the environment is so laid-back that work and home are barely distinguishable. "There are no time clocks. If somebody put in a bazillion hours last week and they need time off this week, it's no big deal. It's up to the individual."
But Boyle points out that unlike most other dot-coms, TMCS has the luxury to take a breather. Considering CitySearch's launch five years ago, the company is practically geriatric compared with most upstarts. As such, the company has proven itself in the market, leaving the frantic dash to build something from scratch safely in the past.
While balancing work and life is clearly a priority for companies like TMCS, few staffers are able to precisely quantify it. Boyle's remarks are typical of the group when he says, "It's almost awkward thinking about this. It's just the way we are."
But perhaps the most surprising thing about the pockets of sanity in the dot-com rat race is not that they're out there, but that so few people are willing to discuss them. More than one of our would-be sources declined to be interviewed for this story, unwilling to let on to the world just how cushy a Net job can be.
In the Valley, it seems, it's not how much you really work that counts, it's how much the other guy thinks you do.
