Is your office full of workaholics?

Most small business owners work at least 50 hours a week, according to a New York Enterprise Report poll, and yet the perils of overwork are well-documented. A recent Harvard and Stanford Business Schools study (pdf) found that health problems associated with work-related anxiety – including high blood pressure, heart disease and mental illness – account for more deaths each year in the US than Alzheimer’s or diabetes. So evidently it pays to prevent your team from turning into a troupe of workaholics. But how?

Anti-workaholism policies remain a fairly radical concept for small businesses. Little wonder, since you don’t build an empire by limiting output – yet many small businesses increasingly recognise that doing just that can enhance productivity.

Titus Sharpe, CEO of lead generation company Approved Index, believes countering the workplace culture of presenteeism benefits a business as much as its employees.

“There are no awards for being the last to leave our office in the evening,” Sharpe explains. “A positive company culture that encourages staff to have enough time for their own lives outside of the office is paramount for any successful business.” He adds: “Staff look forward to coming to work, work more efficiently, and stay longer with the company, so it’s win-win.”

The term workaholic – a portmanteau of “work” and “alcoholic” meaning to work compulsively to the detriment of other interests or commitments – was coined by American psychologist Wayne E Oates in 1968. The advent of modern technology, with its capacity to enslave us to the office 24/7, has arguably made workaholism more prevalent and socially acceptable.

Ranjet Chohan is CEO of Pollpic, an app which allows users to create image-based polls for sharing on social media. In a sector where overwork is the norm, he says the firm consciously sought to carve a different path.

“Many of our team come from technology backgrounds where the ethos is to work until you drop, but we’re keen to encourage productivity through mental clarity – whether that’s achieved by pounding the treadmill at the gym or switching one’s phone off at night, which I do, religiously,” says Chohan.

“We encourage taking work – especially team meetings, brainstorms, report writing – out of the office whenever possible. Last week we took the team to work at the V&A museum for the afternoon. That counteracts overworking by boosting productivity – staying at one’s desk means you have the same visual stimulation whereas changing your surroundings stimulates more creative thinking.”

CEO of skills marketplace fivesquid, Terry Koutsios, says the high pressure environment of a startup can quickly consume employees’ personal lives. “Work-life balance is key for company growth,” he explains. “Staff should arrive at work refreshed with creative ideas, not drained from the ongoing work stream.”

To that end, Koutsios caps overtime – staff can only work overtime on two days each week. “Any more affects performance during normal working hours,” he says.

Jessica Steele, founder of Steele Social Media, says no business is immune from the lure of workaholism. “It takes a knowing leader to break the false parallel between working longer and working smarter, but select companies are catching on to new ways of working that focus on outcomes rather than hours,” she says.

Catherine Kane, founder of the eponymous strategic human resource outsourcing firm, says there are a number of ways to ensure productivity isn’t hampered by overwork. “You could support initiatives like the annual #GoHomeOnTimeDay or perhaps, as is common in financial circles, impose a holiday of three consecutive weeks for each employee,” she suggests. “This also helps ensure employers are adhering to the working time directive (a minimum of 28 days pro rata annual leave per annum).”

“BT is a good example of an organisation which recognises the pressure of work and takes steps to offset that in ways that benefit both the business and its staff,” adds Kane. “Managers are allocated time away to volunteer with a chosen charity or community group, which boosts personal satisfaction, improves skills and, according to BT, makes for better-rounded people.”

But stringent anti-workaholism policies aren’t the only antidote, cautions Steele. “Often, the highest quality work results when an individual is trusted to take advantage of their independence in a productive way,” she says. “For many small business owners, your working life usually intertwines with your passion so your work is actually fun; therefore I don’t limit working hours but I also don’t track them – for myself or anyone else. My rule is to produce what you’re good at, when you’re good at it. If the client is happy and my team are happy then I’m ecstatic. What else matters?”

Similarly, crowdsourced software testing company Testbirds implemented a policy to optimise working hours following a consultation with staff. “Employees choose their working pattern within core hours of 10am to 5pm, and may work from home provided it doesn’t interfere with meetings which require their physical presence,” explains co-founder Markus Steinhauser. Staff must be reachable online or by phone during their core working hours, and can’t work from home more than two days in a row.

There may be no silver bullet to rid the workplace of workaholism, but a cultural shift towards new ways of working might help make it a thing of the past. Anna Sarjantson, a former recruitment consultant who co-founded business consultancy Availexe believes flexible working offers a compelling alternative to the culture of overwork and presenteeism which fuel workaholic tendencies.

“Increasingly people don’t want to work 40 or 50 plus hours a week, and studies suggest the next generation of jobseekers expect flexible working as a given, so we’re seeing a complete move away from the old, established patterns of working that gave rise to workaholic practices.” she says. “The businesses that truly benefit from that shift will be those that measure results in terms of deliverables rather than hours worked, and which embrace flexibility as something which enhances productivity, boosts morale and improves retention.”

On that note, I’m calling it a day and clocking off early.

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