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At Best Buy's corporate campus in Minneapolis, employees ignore regular office hours, don't show up for meetings and are frequently absent without leave. Management couldn't be happier.
Best Buy is reinventing how people work. Through a homegrown concept called the "Results Only Work Environment," or ROWE, the retail giant has embarked on a journey that ultimately will result in a total corporate culture shift.
In a ROWE, employees are free to work when and where they want, as long as the job gets done. Meeting attendance is optional. All that matters are results. Managers are responsible for establishing processes and setting goals; employees are responsible for meeting them.
To date, some 2,600 Best Buy corporate employees, or about 60%, have transitioned to ROWE. The rest will be on board by year's end. The company reports that productivity for ROWE teams has increased an average of 33%. In addition, there has been:
* A significant drop in voluntary turnover.
* Improved manager performance.
* Greater employee engagement.
* Increased customer satisfaction.
ROWE is the brainchild of two former Best Buy employees - Cali Ressler, who worked in HR on work-life issues, and Jody Thompson, who managed large-scale change within the company.
"ROWE is a paradigm shift," explains Thompson. "In this new environment, every person views work in a different way and operates against this new belief."
Can't we all just be adults?
Best Buy's journey to a results-only work environment began five years ago when it implemented a flexible work environment as a pilot program for 300 employees. "After the pilot," says Ressler, "Jody and I realized that one of the problems with flexible work was that we were still operating around a traditional work mentality. It was time to change the game. To do this, we needed to change the basic foundation on which work is based. That is how the ROWE concept was born."
Flexible work schedules are "a con game," she insists.
"Companies implement these flexible work arrangements hoping it will finally shut people up about their work-life balance issues.' [However,] once you opt to work a schedule outside of the norm,' you are immediately stigmatized."
People quickly find out that "flexible schedule" is an oxymoron, Ressler continues.
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