As of the writing of this blog post, it feels like what we thought of as normal, every day life just four months ago is a thing of the distant past.
Remember going into the office? Handshakes? Socializing with friends and family at a restaurant?
There’s countless examples just like the above. Along those lines has been persistent talk about a “new normal”. What’s lacking, is what everyone’s vision for this new world actually is. What are we going to reshape? What are we going to keep? Abandon? Create anew?
In many ways, this is an opportunity unlike any other we’ve had during our lifetime. We can effectively rewrite the way in which we live; a rewiring of how we communicate, work, the distribution of our time, energy, and love.
With that in mind, we decided to put pen to paper in organizing some thoughts of how we can take advantage of this opportunity. To be clear, these are some ideas and by no means an exhaustive list.
Racial Equality.
Enough is enough. For us, it’s plain and simple. We have a golden opportunity to have future generations look upon us with smiles, knowing that we reconstructed institutions in a way that provided for the safety and well being off all, irrespective of race. Thing is, the broader public needs to demand of its public servants real action. Not words or narratives lacking in follow-through. It’s finally time to hold lawmakers and people with power accountable for the world in which they mold, but the vast majority of us live in.
We’re seeing before our eyes masses of people who are acting in concert to initiate change. Protesting in a peaceful way raises the collective consciousness. Voting people into power, however is where legislative and structural change can actually come about. This can’t be a here today, gone tomorrow movement. We’ll be left right where we’ve seemingly been stuck for years.
Demand more of our politicians. Demand real plans, not just talk.
Then vote.
Remote Always.
Commercial real estate is among the highest costs associated with running a business. The pandemic and its subsequent quarantine has forced people to work from home.
End user feedback is pretty overwhelming:
- Three-quarters of people expect to work from home more often after the lockdown
- Two-fifths want to work from home permanently
- Just under two-thirds report that they are just as, if not more productive at home than they were at the office
Lower your fixed costs dramatically? Provide employees with what they want? Get just as, if not more productive workers?
The math seems easy on this one.
To clear some things up: We understand that there are MANY businesses where remote working isn’t an option. We understand that there are many businesses where it’s not ideal. But if you find yourself sitting outside of these two buckets, why wouldn’t you?
Switching to a digital workplace enables a lot for the company, as well. Geographic limitations are no more. The talent pool which you can recruit from grows exponentially. Costs of that human capital varies, but if your used to hiring purely within the confines of a major metropolitan area, you’re likely going to be able to bring folks in with similar – if not the same – skillsets at lower costs.
A soft – but equally prevalent – benefit of recruiting from different parts of the country is that you also pull in different perspectives. Many business owners want well-rounded organizations where opinions and experiences are diverse and constructive. But having a workforce that doesn’t resemble that is antithetical.
Create Your Own Semblance of Freedom
The idea of the American Dream and capitalism is generally a beautiful thing. It’s something that we as a company and the individuals behind it firmly believe in. Take a risk, create something of value, bring it to market, on and on…
Working both hard and smart can pay dividends in ways that is unattainable in most places on Earth. But for the average worker, it’s not all sunshine and rainbows…
An unintentional consequence of this mentality, however, is that it’s created an environment where many people invest an inordinate amount of time, energy, and emotion into who they are as professionals, often time to the detriment of their sense of self and the relationships within their personal lives.
A lot of the above, however is difficult to measure. But let’s simplify it a bit…
The average commute to work in the United States is a little more than 25 minutes, one-way. That’s a little less than an hour a day, a little more than 4.3 hours per week, and nearly 9 days per year. Over a 40-year career, the average American will have spent a full calendar year commuting to and from their place of work.
Let that settle in for a minute.
Our “new normal” has remote working as one of its core tenets. If we had our way, we could effectively eliminate the need to commute for many. One could argue about the environmental benefits and the like, but we prefer to take a much more human approach to why we think it’s important.
The freedom associated with being able to redistribute that time is invaluable. If information is the currency of our generation, time is the most scarce of our resources. If companies willingly make the shift to a truly remote first culture and provide the technology to support it, the average American will get back nearly an hour a day, 4.3 hours per week, 9 hours per year, so forth and so on… to do whatever it is they want.
Learn new skills.
Invest in family or loved ones.
Cook.
Work on your physical or mental wellbeing.
Pick where you live, adopting a lifestyle of choice instead of one out of need to be close to your office.
The opportunities are endless.
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